The T34 Tank: A Comprehensive Guide To The Legendary Vehicle.

The T34 is a Soviet made WWII medium tank with an excellent battle record. Due to its good performance and low cost even today after almost 80 years, still T34 tank variants are in serving many countries. T-34 is one of the most popular tanks ever built. More than 84,000 tanks entered the service starting from 1940.

T34 served in 40 different armies. T34 tank is the most produced Soviet tank during the WWII with over 35,000 T34 tanks and another 30,000 T34-84 tanks entering the service during 1941-1945.

Tank Category	Number produced (1941 to 1945)
Light Tanks	14508
T-34 All variants	64549
KV Variants	4581
IS Variants	3854
SU series	22323

T34 tank has a good mobility with a power to weight ratio of 18.9 hp/T. With a V12 500hp engine it can reach 53km/h speed.

T34 Tank features

T34 was the most reliable, effective and efficient tank in  the WWII battle ground. Especially during the early war period its armour was capable to withstand heavy enemy attacks. However, later in the war some tanks surpassed its capabilities.

Main armament

Tank Model	T34 1940	T34 1941	T34 1942	T34 1943	T-34-85	T 43
Gun type	L-11	F-34	F-34	F-34	Zis-S-53	Zis-S-53
Caliper	76.2mm	76.2mm	76.2mm	76.2mm	85mm	85mm
Ammunition	76 Rounds	77 Rounds	77 Rounds	100 Rounds	60 Rounds	58 Rounds

1940 T34 tank – L11 Tank gun

In the first T34 version introduced in the year 1940, L-11 was attached as the main gun. L-11 is a medium weight gun functioning with a Hydro-pneumatic recoil. It can fire 6 to 7 shells per minute. For a medium tank this is a very good fire rate especially when fighting with other tanks.

L-11 gun can accelerate the ammo to 613 m/s velocity. The maximum firing range is 5.6km. The accuracy in long range firing is low. The barrel of the gun is only 3.2m long.

F-34 Canon used in multiple T34 versions

The L-11 gun was only used in the first commercial T34 model which was released in 1940. Afterwards 1941, 1942 and 1943 models were equipped with F-34 canon.

F-34 has a barrel length of 3.2m. The rate of fire is better than L-11 gun. F-34 has a maximum firing rate of 10 rounds per minute. Also, it can accelerate the ammo up to 680 m/s.

However, comparing to the L-11 the maximum firing range is low which is only 2km. The effective range is only 800m.

Zis-S-53 Gun used in the T34-85 variant

In the final T34 variant T34-85 and in T43 tanks the F-34 gun was replaced with more advance 85mm M1939 Zis-S-53 gun. This gun is a modified version of the 52-K anti aircraft gun.

A hydro-pneumatic recoiling system used to minimize the backward pressure generated by firing. This improves the stability and provide better accuracy when firing. Th 85mm caliber can accommodate better ammunition than what is used in F-34 and L-11 guns.

S-53 gun has a better firing rate which is 10-12 rounds per minute. It can accelerate ammo to 792 m/s velocity. Maximum firing range is about 16km and effective range is 10.5 km.

Secondary armament

As the secondary guns T34 is equipped with two 7.62mm DT machine guns. One gun is positioned on the top of the turret and accessible by the top hatch.

The second machine gun is positioned in the front of the tank. The gun fires through a small opening in the armour.

Internal gunners position is positioned next to the driver seat. The gunner have very limited visibility of the battlefield through a small opening.

Degtyaryov machine gun is a light weight infantry machine gun with a good rate of fire and ammo acceleration rate.

Engine and transmission of T34 Tank

The T34 is powered with a 38.8L V-12 diesel engine. The engine model is V-2-34. This engine has 12 cylinders arranged in a V shape. The angle of V shape is 60 degrees.

This engine can output 500hp power. T34 engine is cooled with water. Two radiators are installed in the sides of the engine. A 75L water tank facilitate  the storage of cooling liquid.

T34 External fuel storage

T34 tank has two permanent 90L external tanks attached to the right armour plate. Additionally another two 65L tanks are attachable in the rear compartment area.

Neither of these tanks are connected to the main fuel system. When the tank need external fuel supply, the crew had to manually access and pump fuel from the external storage tanks. This prevent any external fires spreading to the main fuel tank.

As a practice 3 out of 4 tanks were used as fuel storage. The 4th tank is used to store engine oil.

T34 Armour

The T34 was equipped with a heavily sloped armour design. This made the tank to have better protection against armour piercing ammunition than a flat armour. Also, this technique reduce the requirement of a thick armour. The required protection was provided with a less thick armour and this reduced the build cost and also the overall weight of the tank.

The rear hull armour is very thin (45mm) and highly vulnerable to get pierced by anti-tank ammunition. Since the engine is located in the rear in case of enemy tank attack the engine has a high potential of getting critical damages.

Additional armour

In some tanks add-on armour plates were installed to improve the overall protection. Armour plates were specially installed in hull sides and turret area.

Since, the armour is not that thick this add-on armour was a very important addition especially when fighting against heavy tanks.

Success and failure of the T34 Armour

In the beginning of the war the T34 tank armour was proven to be very effective against German anti-tank ammunition. According to war reports a German 37mm anti tank gun  fired 23 rounds against a T34 tank and only the turret was damaged.

From the first deployment the T34 tank gave a headache to the German engineers. Even the 50mm KwK gun was ineffective against the improved armour of T34 tank.

As a respond the Germans implemented better anti-tank guns to fight against the T34 tank. Pak 40 75mm was proven to be very effective against T34. Also, after the tiger 2 deployment the T34 was not able to stand against the mighty 88mm Pak 43 gun.