Cross country speeds

[Pibwl]

Originally Posted by DRG

I'm not sure how everybody , including us, seems to have missed the BT series speeds being low for so long....

Maybe it's because they are almost perfectly correct (apart from BT-7M)
According to Russian books by Baryatynski/Kolomiets (Bronyekollektsya series), both BT-2/BT-5 developed 52 km/h on tracks (ie 17) and 72 km/h on wheels, BT-7: 53 (ie 17.6) and 73 km/h and BT-7M: 62 (ie 20.6) and 86 km/h respectively.
Obviously, these tanks could go on wheels on roads only.

Mihail Svirin gives the same figures for BT-2/BT-5, and off road speed 32 / 33. For BT-7 he gives 51.6 km/h (ie 17), for BT-7M also 62.

High figures, exceeding 100 km/h, probably come only from one of Christie's prototypes.


BTW: speaking of BT, there was no such thing as BT-2a (unit 115) and BT-5a (unit 95) - only BT-7A with short 76mm gun (there were only two experimental BT-2 tested with 76mm guns in different turrets).
Formations 005 and 124 must be modified accordingly... It seems however, that there should be no BT-7A in each company, because eg. 23rd Brigade, during attack on Poland, had 206 BT-7 and 3 BT-7A... And in 1940 there were only 104 BT-7A in a whole army (for over 5000 BT-7).

Unit 003 BT-7a should have capital letter, carried only 50 rounds of ammo, and was armed with #034 76mm L16 KT-28, not L-10 L/26