T30
Contents
Description
The Heavy Tank T30 is a premium gift rank IV American heavy tank with a battle rating of 6.7 (AB/RB/SB). It was introduced in Update 1.85 "Supersonic" in the 2018 "Festive Quest" that took place between 21 December 2018 to 14 January 2019. It was obtainable via completing 10 Christmas Toys for tankers. It could also be purchased on the Gaijin market after the event was over.
The T30 was a World War II American tank project developed to counter new German tanks, such as Tiger I, Tiger II, and tank destroyers, such as the Jagdtiger, or Soviet heavy tanks, such as IS-1 or IS-2. The T30 was designed at the same time as the T29 Heavy Tank. However, it had a 155mm gun mounted on the same hull and turret as the T29 and T34 heavy tanks.
General info
Survivability and armour
Armour type:
- Rolled homogeneous armour (hull roof, sides & rear - engine bay, hull bottom)
- Cast homogeneous armour (hull front, sides & roof - fighting compartment, turret, gun mantlet, cupola)
| Armour | Front (Slope angle) | Sides | Rear | Roof |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hull | 102 mm (55°) Front glacis 70.25 mm (61°) Lower glacis - centre 70.25 mm (40°) Lower glacis - sides 102.5 mm (5°) MG housing 88 mm (sphere) MG port |
76.2 mm Front half 51 mm Rear half |
51 mm (5°) Top 51 mm (60°) Bottom |
38.1 mm (57°-81°) Front 38.1 mm Rear |
| Turret | 203 mm Gun mantlet 158.7 mm Gun mantlet frame |
158.7 mm | 102 mm Vertical part 50 mm (71°) Turret ring area |
38.1 mm (79°) |
| Cupola | 152.45 mm (45°) | 38.1 mm (79°) | ||
Notes:
- Suspension wheels are 20 mm thick while tracks are 30 mm thick.
- Mudguards are 4 mm thick.
- Frontally, the MG housing (around the MG port) as well as the lower glacis are weak spots on the T30.
- The bottom of the hull is only 25.4 mm thick, making it vulnerable to powerful HE shells shot under the belly.
Mobility
| Game Mode | Max Speed (km/h) | Weight (tons) | Engine power (horsepower) | Power-to-weight ratio (hp/ton) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Forward | Reverse | Stock | Upgraded | Stock | Upgraded | ||
| Arcade | 38 | 15 | 65.8 | 1046 | 1,545 | 15.9 | 23.48 |
| Realistic | 36 | 14 | 716 | 810 | 10.88 | 12.31 | |
The T30's mobility is good for the role it fulfills. Its acceleration and maximum speed are good for a heavy tank. While the reverse speed is average, it isn't a handicap. And the T30 can brake quickly in spite of its weight. Neutral steering allows you to turn your hull towards flanking enemies relatively quickly on the spot. The offroad mobility is good: the T30 can reach 15 km/h when climbing uphill from idling and 21 km/h when fording. Due to its weight, the tank's mobility is unhindered by obstacles.
Modifications and economy
2 × 150 / 210 / 240 % 2 × 196 / 196 / 196 % | Mobility | Protection | Firepower | ||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Armaments
Main armament
| 155 mm T7 | Turret rotation speed (°/s) | Reloading rate (seconds) | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mode | Capacity | Vertical | Horizontal | Stabilizer | Stock | Upgraded | Full | Expert | Aced | Stock | Full | Expert | Aced |
| Arcade | 34 | -10°/+15° | ±180° | N/A | 14.5 | 20.1 | 24.5 | 27.1 | 28.8 | 38.9 | 34.4 | 31.7 | 29.9 |
| Realistic | 10.7 | 12.6 | 15.3 | 16.9 | 18.0 | ||||||||
Ammunition
The available choice of ammunition focuses on heavily armoured targets:
- M112B1: APBC; an armour-piercing ballistic capped shell with high explosive mass and good penetration power that will one-shot any tank it penetrates.
- T29E1: APCBC; an armour-piercing capped shell with a ballistic cap offering an increased penetration compared to the M112B1.
- M107: HE; a powerful high-explosive shell useful to destroy all enemy vehicles and even open and lightly armoured vehicles indirectly with the blast.
- M110: Smoke; useful to blind enemy vehicles that are too remote for you to disable so that you can progress towards objectives.
| Penetration statistics | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm) | |||||
| 10 m | 100 m | 500 m | 1,000 m | 1,500 m | 2,000 m | ||
| M112B1 | APBC | 179 | 177 | 168 | 158 | 148 | 139 |
| M107 | HE | 54 | 54 | 54 | 54 | 54 | 54 |
| T29E1 | APCBC | 199 | 197 | 187 | 175 | 165 | 155 |
| Shell details | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile Mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (m) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Explosive Mass (TNT equivalent) (g) |
Ricochet | ||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | |||||||
| M112B1 | APBC | 670 | 45 | 1.2 | 20 | 640 | 47° | 60° | 65° |
| M107 | HE | 717 | 43 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 6860 | 79° | 80° | 81° |
| T29E1 | APCBC | 670 | 45 | 1.2 | 19 | 640 | 48° | 63° | 71° |
| Smoke characteristic | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Velocity in m/s |
Projectile Mass in kg |
Screen radius in m |
Screen time in s |
Screen hold time in s: |
Explosive Mass in g (TNT equivalent): |
| M110 | 717 | 45 | 25 | 5 | 30 | 50 |
Ammo racks
| Full ammo |
Ammo type |
1st rack empty |
2nd rack empty |
3rd rack empty |
4th rack empty |
Visual discrepancy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 34 | Projectiles Propellants |
30 (+4) 21 (+13) |
8 (+26) 7 (+27) |
3 (+31) 3 (+31) |
1 (+33) 1 (+33) |
No |
Notes:
- The T30 uses two-piece ammunition, composed of projectiles (yellow) and propellant bags (orange). Both have separate racks.
- Racks 3 and 4 are first stage ammo racks. They total 7 shells for projectiles and 6 shells for propellant bags.
- These racks get filled first when loading up the tank and are also emptied early: the rack depletion order at full capacity is: 4 - 3 - 1 - 2.
Machine guns
| 12.7 mm M2HB | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mount | Capacity (Belt) | Fire rate | Vertical | Horizontal |
| Coaxial | 1200 (200) | 577 | N/A | N/A |
| Pintle | 1000 (200) | 577 | -10°/+50° | ±120° |
These heavy machineguns can be extremely useful for gauging distance measurements (coaxial), engaging lightly armoured vehicles or shooting down enemy aircraft (pintle).
Usage in battles
Despite its labeling as a heavy tank, the T30 is better used as a tank destroyer and being more of a supportive role than a breakthrough role that most heavy tanks were designed to do. With its long reload for the 155mm makes it's gameplay a bit similar to tank like KV-2 than tank like T29 or T34. The T30 can handle itself on its own if in a one on one encounter but will be at a disadvantage if it is facing more than one due to the long reload time. So to fully utilize that heavy gun it might be best to be a supportive role tank for the medium tanks or the MBTs that got a faster reload but not the same destructive power as the T30's 155mm have.
The T30 share similarities with the armour as the T29 and T34, having a thick heavily armored turret got it's advantages. Since it's most heavily armoured part is the front turret it can be a key factor on how to make plans where to best utilize the tank, keep in mind even if having the turret only exposed it's not a 100% guaranteed safety from shells like APDS that will with ease be able to penetrate turret. But shells like HEAT-FS will mostly not do same amount of damage but can take out the gunner or in worst case scenario the gun's breech.
Enemy tanks to be aware of is mostly MBTs like Leopard 1, M60, Vickers MBT, T-54 (1951), STB-1, OF-40, Strv 101. But that is not the only threat there is also ATGM Vehicles and large caliber tanks that can have enough Power to disable the T30's turret when hull down and out flank the slow T30's position.
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Inherits the great armour layout of the T29.
- Since the T30 is armed with a huge 155 mm gun, the APCBC shells are good at over-matching angled armour found on tanks like the Panther.
- Both of the APCBC shells have an amazing amount damage potential. Any shot that enters an enemy's crew compartment will almost certainly lead to a one-shot.
- The M107 shell is one of the most powerful standard HE shells in the game. Great at taking out heavily armoured tanks if the explosion occurs over the turret, or under the hull.
- The smoke shell produces a 50 meters wide cloud of smoke that lasts 30 seconds.
- Because of the slow shell velocity, this is one of the few tanks in the game that's really good at hitting targets behind cover.
- Despite the massive breech, the tank still retains 10 degrees of gun depression.
- Has a set of optics that give magnification levels of 4.0x-8.0x. Excellent for both close target acquisition and long range target identification.
- Has two .50 cal machine guns that can rip apart lightly armoured vehicles, tracks, and gun barrels.
Cons:
- Has one of the worst reloads in the game. Even an ace crew using the 6-rounds first stage ammo rack will take an abysmal 29.9 seconds to reload the gun.
- Despite the great armour, the gun's terrible reload rate renders you helpless if 2 or more enemy tanks attack you at the same time.
- Even at point blank range, the default APCBC shell just doesn't have sufficient penetration to pose a threat to contemporary heavy tanks.
- The top APCBC shell still only has 199 mm of pen at point blank range.
- The advantage of having incredible optics is negated by the bad shell velocity and accuracy of the 155 mm shells. Hitting a moving target is difficult, and hitting anything past 1,000 meters is basically impossible.
- Despite the 6-man crew, the sheer size of the 155 mm shell and case means that any enemy APHE shell that enters the hull or turret will likely end in an ammo explosion.
- Has one less .50 cal machine gun than the T29 and T34.
- Due to the horrendous rate of fire, the T30 is heavily reliant and friendly vehicle support. In other words, carrying games is difficult.
History
In 1944, the Army requested 4 prototypes for heavy tanks, two armed with a 105 mm gun and two armed with a 155 mm gun. The intention was to create vehicles that could face enemy heavy tanks on even terms, or even advantageous terms. The vehicles armed with the 105 mm gun were designated T29, and the two armed with a 155 mm gun were designated T30.
The armament of the T30, a 155 mm T7 L/40 gun, was one of the largest guns ever fitted to an armored fighting vehicle made in the United States. The gun was carried in a tall, long turret with rounded edges. The height of the turret was quite necessary, as the size of the gun and its ammunition required a standing loader. The hull of the T30 was the same as the T29. It was a lengthened version of the T26E3 chassis. The armor of the T30 was quite thick, and the hull was also well angled, as one of the requirements for the design was protection from the German long 88 mm anti-tank gun. The T30 carried a crew of six men. These were the driver, commander, bow machine gunner, gunner, and two loaders. One loader moved the crane that placed the shell, and the other used the rammer that put the shell into the breech. The gun could only be loaded at certain angles. The T30 saw an upgrade, called the T30E1, which added an automatic loading system, which moved the gun to the correct position, loaded the shell, and moved the gun back to the firing position. A hatch was added to the rear of the turret to allow the ejection of shell casings after firing.
World War 2 ended before the heavy tank designs (T28, T29, T30, T32, T34) could enter service, and the development of these vehicles ended, but the development of these heavy tank designs provided experience that proved useful when designing the M103 heavy tank during the Cold War.
Media
- Skins
- Videos
See also
- Other tanks sharing the design
External links
| USA heavy tanks | |
|---|---|
| M4 Jumbo | M4A3E2 · Cobra King · M4A3E2 (76) W |
| M6 | M6A1 · T1E1 · T1E1 (90) · M6A2E1 |
| T26 | T26E1-1 · T26E5 |
| T29/30/34 | T29 · T30 · T34 |
| T32 | T32 · T32E1 |
| M103 | M103 |
| Others | T14 |
| USA premium ground vehicles | |
|---|---|
| Light tanks | LVT(A)(4) · M2A4 (1st Arm.Div.) · M3A1 (USMC) · ▃Stuart VI (5th CAD) · M8 LAC · M8A1 GMC |
| M18 "Black Cat" · Super Hellcat · T18E2 · M551(76) · T114 · M1128 Wolfpack | |
| Medium tanks | ▃Grant I · M4A5 · Calliope · T20 · M26 T99 · M26E1 · M46 "Tiger" · T54E1 · T54E2 · ▃Magach 3 (ERA) · M728 CEV |
| XM1 (GM) · XM1 (Chrysler) · M1 KVT · M1A1 Click-Bait | |
| Heavy tanks | T14 · Cobra King · M6A2E1 · T29 · T30 |
| Tank destroyers | T28 · T55E1 |
