Ah the T series (not the indian youtube channel), you either love or hate them and that’s for a good reason since half are soviet propaganda and half or soviet engineering at its finest. So where did it all begun?
Well for that we gotta go back, way back to 1918 where a newly born Soviet union relised they need a designation system for their new tank, the MS-1, and they decided to say “fuck it, just make it tank and then it’s year of creation” - and so the first T series tank was born - the T-18, AKA tank 1918.
Now before we continue i just have to mention this system is only for the soviet & russian MBT’s, TD’s, light tanks and so on have a different designation system.
Now to back to where we were, the system worked well for them that to this day they still use it but the process isn’t simply have an idea", “Ok it’s a T… what’s the year?”.
Before every T series gets his T honor designation and recieves an OBJ (obyect, object) designation which is something I myself don’t understand because to me it seems like they just take object and slap three numbers of their choice after.
Let’s follow the life cycle of a T series, and I have chosen the simple and classic T-62 as an example.
It all started back in 1953 when soviet engineers had an idea for a tank, and started designing and after 6 years in the August of 1959, after perfecting their design the soviet government gave it the green light, the designation OBJ 166 and a green light to make the first prototype.
It then existed as a prototype for 2 years, where the engineers made it better, tested it in a range of scenarios, and in 1961, the soviet government who was overseeing the testing of the OBJ 166 gave it the green light to go into first production, and after that into full soviet MBT production.
Before we continue I just need you to understand how much of an honor it is to be chosen as the USSR’s MBT, dozens of objects are made but only a minor amount get chosen, so the engineers are treated with a great deal of honor.
Now back to our OBJ 166 - but wait, it’s now time to give it a name and official designation, and the chosen one was T-62. Now I know i said it’s chosen by the year it enters production but it’s common that they go a year or few up and down to a name that looks better. Generally the USSR doesn’t really like odd numbers. If you ask me that oddophobic but basically that’s it!
We have our T62, its his time to shine in the soviet army and the engineers are moving to their next project with a pay raise of 5 Rubles and a medal that says “i did something!”.
And that is how most T series tanks early life cycle went.
This is a very simplified way to explain it, and i already created a script for a video so why not add it here too for readers (: