Traveling through the sword to engage in military industry

#194 - New Advances in Tanks

Faced with the Border Region's request, General Shi did not refuse outright. However, such technical assistance couldn't bypass the Kuomintang. Even though General Shi was thoroughly tired of the officials in Chongqing, they were, in name, still the leaders of the national resistance.

Such large-scale technical assistance was something even the Kuomintang didn't receive.

Fortunately, Ren Zhong gave him a new option, hoping General Shi could provide a complete set of factory blueprints and core mechanical equipment designs, along with blueprints for a main battle truck and the M2 tank. The Border Region could then try to build such a factory themselves.

Currently, the Border Region, through the production of Hercules and Red Star I tractors, had basically stepped into the threshold of rudimentary automobile manufacturing, but further research into automobiles still required a significant amount of research and development time.

Even in the main world, it would be difficult for Ren Zhong to obtain complete data for these complete designs.

He could only break through it bit by bit.

If there were no time constraints, Ren Zhong could develop core components like gasoline engines and clutches for automobiles in three to five years. But if he waited that long, the Japanese devils would already be defeated.

Since the 'Rogue Eagle' (America) had extended an olive branch, Ren Zhong would take this opportunity to extract some useful information from them little by little.

Next, what he wanted was an electronics production line.

Although the Dawn Research Institute already had its own rudimentary electronics industry, it was not on the same level as the 'Rogue Eagle' at all.

If he could get some things, Ren Zhong could save the Dawn Research Institute at least ten years of detours.

Vacuum tubes and transistors were outdated electronic products, but without these accumulations, it would be extremely difficult to leap into the integrated circuit era.

After the meeting, the Border Region and the Eighth Route Army did not break their word. They really launched a round of attacks, capturing five county towns in Jin Province in a row, making the Japanese devils in Jin Province panic every day.

What they mainly produced were 107 rockets, Type 56 semi-automatic rifles, Type 56 machine guns, 82mm mortars, and new grenade launchers. The required 45 steel and Q255 steel could be produced in large quantities locally.

And these weapons were also the most urgently needed by the Eighth Route Army now.

The Japanese devils in Jin Province seemed to be deterred by the continuous attacks of the Eighth Route Army headquarters. During this period, they basically quieted down. Even the Jizhong counter-offensive back to the base area, and the North China Command did not have much action. They only increased a brigade on the surrounding railway lines to strengthen the defense of the railway lines.

And on the grassland, the Japanese devils finally began to act. Ren Zhong received intelligence that two Japanese divisions had already gone from Zhangbei to Qingshui via the PingSui Railway!

Intelligence showed that the Japanese devils also had a tank regiment following them this time.

Without a doubt, this was aimed at Jiuyuan.

However, the Japanese devils' reaction was a bit slow this time. After General Shi's activities back home, the pressure on the Border Region from Chongqing was reduced a lot. Several main divisions were required to be transferred from Chang'an to the First War Zone to strengthen the threat to the Japanese devils in North China.

With this opportunity, the Border Region once again mobilized a newly reorganized main regiment to go north, and at the same time brought the equipment of 5 main regiments, preparing to arm the three divisions expanded from the Suiyuan-Mongolia Self-Defense Army reorganized from the Third Provisional Division.

Among them, the Second and Third Divisions absorbed more than 4,000 grassland riders on the basis of the two main regiments that went north in the early stage. This time, what was sent to them were weapons mainly based on Type 56 semi-automatic rifles and 107 rockets.

The basic configuration of these two divisions was a infantry regiment plus two cavalry regiments. Each cavalry regiment had sabers plus Type 56 semi-automatic rifles, and was equipped with 4 107 rockets. Their mobility on the grassland had exceeded the mechanized regiment composed of Ren Zhong's Hercules and Red Star I.

After all, the grassland was lush with water and grass, and many places Hercules could not reach, but horses could easily cross.

The original personnel of the Third Provisional Division were reorganized into the First Division of the Suiyuan-Mongolia Autonomous Army. On the original basis, they absorbed personnel and reorganized into a main force of 3 infantry regiments, 2 cavalry regiments, and an artillery regiment.

In this way, the main force in Jiuyuan expanded to nearly 40,000 people.

Dawn Research Institute.

Ren Zhong looked at several large boxes of materials, feeling a little emotional.

General Shi, carrying the needs of the Border Region, actively carried out activities in the 'Rogue Eagle' country. He took the Border Region's recent brilliant record, the rapid capture of Jiuyuan, the strong annihilation of the Fourth Mixed Brigade, and the record of almost completely paralyzing the Japanese devils' air force base in North China. General Shi successfully persuaded the country to cooperate with the Border Region and won new technical support for the Border Region.

M3 "Stuart" light tank and Chevrolet G506 light truck.

The former was already outdated. On the European battlefield, it was basically cannon fodder. The 37mm main gun and the 50mm steel plate at the thickest part. Facing the little mustache's No. 3 and No. 4 tanks, it was simply a cannon to kill them.

The killing power of the 37mm main gun against the assault infantry was also extremely limited, not as useful as the machine gun on it.

Its advantage was that it ran fast, with a top speed of 55 kilometers per hour, which was almost the fastest among the current tanks.

Although the 'Rogue Eagle' was willing to pay a little price to let the Border Region eliminate more Japanese devils, so that they could shed less of their own blood on the Pacific battlefield.

But in terms of technical assistance, they were still stingy, and took out an outdated product that was massively aided to the Soviet Union to give to the Border Region.

Of course, this was already good. The Kuomintang in Chongqing did not have this treatment. They were only worthy of directly giving the product to become users.

But often this user could not do well, and often became the captain of the transportation team. Many weapons and equipment from the 'Rogue Eagle' fell into the hands of the Japanese devils, which made General Shi extremely disappointed in them.

Moreover, according to his understanding, it was useless to give it to them. They could not even produce steel. On the contrary, in the Border Region, they magically produced steel far exceeding the rear in a kind of earthen furnace.

Under such a strong contrast, this was the reason why General Shi tended to further cooperate with the Border Region. After all, they were doing everything possible to win the war.

Compared to tanks, the automobile technology given by the 'Rogue Eagle' this time was more sincere. The Chevrolet G506 light truck was the main truck that the 'Rogue Eagle' was now producing and using in large quantities.

The design and production were both in the recent two years of the 1940s. This model was also specially customized for aid to the Soviet Union. In the historical timeline, nearly 160,000 of this truck were produced, of which 150,000 were aided to the Soviet Bear.

This car weighed 3.7 tons, and was designed with an effective load of 1.7 tons (as everyone knows, in our hands, at least 5 tons or more can be stuffed in), 5.7 meters long, 2.1 meters wide, and 2.7 meters high. With such a large space, if people were loaded, according to Tiger's loading method, at least 2 platoons could be stuffed in!

This truck is equipped with a Chevrolet BV1001 83-horsepower gasoline engine, with a top speed of 48 miles per hour (approximately 77 kilometers per hour). Its performance is still very superior.

Compared to the two agricultural vehicles introduced by Ren Zhong, it is more than one era ahead.

Ren Zhong obtained the information on these two products and, after checking them in the main world, was quite satisfied.

The M3's W679-9A air-cooled gasoline engine is not technically difficult and has a wide range of uses. The only drawback is that it is relatively delicate and needs good fuel (80-octane gasoline). However, for Ren Zhong, in addition to its use in tanks, this engine can also be used in heavy-duty vehicles in the future. Together with the BV1001 gasoline engine on the Chevrolet G506, it forms a high-low combination, perfectly solving the problem of having or not having a gasoline engine.

In the future, these two gasoline engines can be used to form a gasoline engine series.

The M3 Stuart is relatively useless in Europe, but it is just right in North China and the Great Plains. It can completely dominate the Japanese Type 95 Ha-Go light tank. Even when encountering the Japanese Type 97 Chi-Ha medium tank, it is not without a chance of fighting back. After all, most of the armor of the Japanese Type 97 tank only has 25mm of protection, which is useless against a 37mm tank gun.

In terms of armor, it can be said that the M3 Stuart and the Japanese Type 97 each have their own strengths, but the Japanese Type 97's 57mm tank gun has the upper hand.

(Samba Country's X1A1 modified M3 Stuart tank)

However, for Ren Zhong, this is not a problem, because he discovered in the main world that Samba Country explored the improvement route of this tank for him. They simply and crudely replaced the turret and changed it to a 90mm cannon! It became a new main battle tank, called X1A, with its power increased several times.

Next, Samba Country felt that this was very good and carried out magical modifications on it, adding a series of observation and aiming equipment, anti-aircraft machine guns and other new equipment, increasing its weight by several tons to become the X1A1. This is the ultimate Samba modified M3 version.

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In the main world in the 1960s and 1970s, this modified tank could only survive in South America.

For Ren Zhong, putting it on the time node of the 1940s is already a very good weapon.

In Ren Zhong's hands, the ZIS-2 main gun, which is now being researched for the T-34 heavy tank, has been completed. This is a 76mm tank main gun, which can compete with the powerful German tank torrent in Europe.

Now, putting this main gun directly on it, the M3 Stuart can instantly change from a weak and powerless pudding to a domineering little prince who can easily blow up the Japanese Type 95 and Type 97 tanks!

Such a change is very small, and the chassis, power, and driving do not need to be moved. Just reweld the turret.

This trash light tank, which is quite useless in Europe, is given to Ren Zhong at this stage, and it is simply tailor-made for Ren Zhong.

There are too many advantages.

First of all, this tank is nearly 20 tons lighter than the T-34. For the border area and the Eighth Route Army, which are currently very short of steel, this saves most of the steel.

Secondly, the technical difficulty is also reduced. Compared with the GAA V8 engine, which has not yet been mass-produced, the MS gasoline engine technology is much less difficult. With the research and production experience of single-cylinder diesel engines, it can be directly started.

In essence, it is similar to the Chevrolet G506 truck developed by Ren Zhong.

So the more Ren Zhong looked at it, the more he liked it.

He was still looking at the information in a daze until someone came.

"Mr. Ren, you were looking for me?" Professor Pan Jichun, who is in charge of tank research, came to Ren Zhong's cave, looked at Ren Zhong strangely, and asked with some puzzlement.

After all, he had just reported the latest progress of the tank power GAA V8 yesterday. The first engine has been hand-crafted and is now being tested. Ren Zhong should not be impatient to use this engine, right?

Professor Pan thought.

"Professor Pan, come and take a look at these things." Ren Zhong was awakened, raised his head, glanced at Professor Pan, and smiled, pointing to the tank information beside him.

Professor Pan stepped forward, picked up a thick book of English information, and his eyes lit up when he saw the title.

"This is the production information of the M3 tank from the rogue eagle?" Professor Pan asked in surprise.

"That's right. This is the complete technical information of the M3 Stuart tank and Chevrolet G506 truck that we requested from General Shi and they transferred to us. Our tank team will first research and produce these two products. Compared to the T-34, the information on these two products is more detailed and specific, and the technical difficulty and requirements are much lower. We will research and mass-produce them as soon as possible," Ren Zhong said to Professor Pan.

After all, the M3 is an old light tank, and the engine is also a relatively old gasoline engine. According to the current foundation of the Dawn Research Institute, there is no shortage of materials and processing machine tools.

"However, we don't have a 37mm tank gun now. I hope to improve it directly, replace the original designed 37mm turret, and modify our own 76mm tank main gun turret."

"Okay, I will immediately organize people to study this information and absorb and digest this new tank design as soon as possible." Professor Pan flipped through it and said excitedly, "The M3 is a light tank, and the load and armor are much simpler. We should be able to achieve it much faster than the T-34 in terms of time. Not to mention anything else, the GAA V8 engine is relatively much more complicated than the gasoline engine of the M3 tank. The production process and production efficiency are not comparable."

Professor Pan has been instilled with a lot of tank-related information provided by Ren Zhong, and now he has a strong knowledge reserve. He himself is studying these mechanical power-related aspects, and his understanding of these materials is much stronger than Ren Zhong.

The professors at the Dawn Research Institute are numb to Ren Zhong's mysterious ability to obtain new technologies, so Professor Pan is not surprised at all to take down these new things.

He only knows that he has to be busy again. This is a complete set of information for a tank and a car.

Just looking at so many cardboard boxes in the room, you know it's not simple.

Fortunately, there are quite a few people under him who are familiar with English, otherwise, it would be a troublesome thing for the team to learn and understand so much English information.

Of course, now, many people in the team have experience abroad, and there is no big problem in directly reading English materials.

There is a lot of information, and Professor Pan obviously can't take it all away by himself, but Ren Zhong was prepared and directly called a few members of the guard team to carry these materials to the tank research team.

Next, it's up to Professor Pan and them.

The second and third updates are combined into a 4000-word chapter, the amount is not reduced.