Finnish OOB35 Corrections and Suggestions PART 2 -- Units

[PvtJoker]

Finnish (OOB 35) corrections and suggestions:

NOTE! A lot of armor stuff is applicable to Soviet OOB as well!

Unit 2 FT-17: This tank was called FT-17 "female" in Finland (Translated to English, since the OOB does not use Finnish words elsewhere, either). Since Jan 1938 main weapon was a Maxim M/09-31, which had a rate of fire of 900 rounds per minute. A TMG for that gun should be added to weapons as well. HE Kill would probably be 8. Last availability should be Oct 1943, since a few tanks survived the Winter War and used for training. No radios, so radio code should be 1.

Unit 3 FT-18: called FT-17 "male" in Finland. No APCR ammo was available, so Weapon 12 (37mm Puteaux) should be modified to have an AP Penetration of 1 and the Sabot rounds transferred to AP. Correct total number of rounds was 233. No radios, radio code 1.

Unit 004 Vickers 6s: the Coaxial MG was the Maxim M/09-31 mentioned above. Ammo load 35 HE, 15 AP. No Sabot!

Unit 005 T-26 M31: Turrets' armor was less than 10mm all-around, so SP armor value for turret should be 1 for all faces. No radios, so radio code should be 1 (actually this tank was pretty common in Finnish use in 1941, so radio code could be also 0, but that's up to you).

Unit 006 T-26 M33: I would give this one radio code 2, since it was the most common of T-26 variants in Finnish service. Only command tanks had radios in any case, so no chance for others to get them.

Unit 007 T-26 (OT-130): probably radio code 1 would be suitable. The numbers of these conversions is unknown, but it could not have been very significant.

Unit 008 T-26 M37: radio code could be changed to 2, because this variant was pretty common since summer 1941, although not quite as common as Unit 006 above.

Unit 009 T-26 (OT-133): probably radio code 1 as per unit 007.

Unit 010 T-26E: radio code 0, no radios except in some command tanks.

Unit 011 BT-5: my sources give it turret side armor of 15mm (2) and front hull armor of 30 mm for lower front hull. The 13mm upper hull front is also well sloped (http://www.jaegerplatoon.net/BT5_2.jpg), so the penetration path at 90 degrees would surely be at least 20mm. Therefore I would give it a total hull front armor value of no less than 3. Max speed on road with tracks about 50 km/h (Speed 17). Last ones were retired from Finnish service in Spring 1942, so end date should be no later than June 1942. Radio code should be 1; despite fairly large numbers captured, the Finnish army never used the BT tanks much.

Unit 012 BT-7: hull side armor 15mm (2). The hull front was well sloped (http://www.jaegerplatoon.net/BT7_2.jpg) with 15-20mm of armor, so I would give it armor value 3. Radio code and availability as Unit 011.

Unit 013 T-50: turret side armor was 37+14mm (the applique was not installed on all Soviet T-50 tanks). Hull sides also 37mm.

Unit 014 T-28: turret front and side and rear armor was only 20mm. You may want to add something from the gun mantlet and rounding, but at least the current TF value of 5 is excessive. Upper hull front 15mm, but well sloped and lower front hull 30mm with some slope. HF value 6 is still clearly too much. Hull sides and rear 20mm. Top armor was less than 25mm on average, so top armor value should be 2. Machine gun turrets 20-22mm. 70 rounds for the main gun. Max. road speed was 45 km/h (15). The optics were half-decent for aiming the gun, so I would give it FC value 2. All tanks had a radio, so radio probability should be 50+.

Unit 015 T-28E: turret front and sides 80mm, turret rear 40mm. Upper hull front 58mm (+slope), lower 30mm, driver 80mm (the current HF value 8 is probably OK otherwise, but the thinly armored machine gun turrets are a problem). Hull rear remained at 18-20mm. Machine gun turrets 30-32mm. Top armor was not upgraded. Top speed 33 hm/h (11). Otherwise as Unit 014.

Units 016, 017, 018: harmonize unit data with the current Soviet OOB. Currently they differ especially in armor. Move Sabot ammunition to regular AP, since practically no APCR was available to the Finns. Radio probabilities should be higher. More than half of the Finnish T-34/76 tanks had a radio, since the ones bought from Germany all had a radio.

Unit 019 T-34 M44: change name to T-34/85, which was the most common designation used for this tank by the Finnish Army. Harmonize other data with current Soviet OOB. Move Sabot ammunition to regular AP.

Unit 020 KV-1c: Harmonize data with Soviet OOB unit 023. Move Sabot ammunition to regular AP. Finnish designation was KV-1A, if you want to confuse people even more (possibly KV-1A (M1942) would be acceptable?)

Unit 020 KV-1e: Harmonize data with Soviet OOB. Finnish designation was KV-1B, if you want to confuse people even more (possibly KV-1B (KV-1E) would be acceptable?)

Unit 022 Panssar IVJ: all had a radio, so radio code should be 92. Turret skirts were still in place in 1944, so turret armor should be harmonized with German unit 745. Icon should also be 1301 in 1944. Later turret skirts were removed. It happened some time in spring 1945, so Jan 1945 is probably as good time as any. A second unit identical to the current Unit 022 should be created for that.

Unit 024 ISU-152: harmonize data with Soviet OOB unit 038.

Unit 024 BA-10: replace with BA-6 (currently missing) from Soviet OOB unit 311. Keep the current availability start (Feb 1940), extend end to Dec 1946.

Unit 025 BA-10+: rename to plain BA-10, available since Apr 1940 until Dec 1946. Harmonize other data with Soviet Unit 041 BA-10, except ammo total 43 rounds (should probably be corrected to the Soviet unit as well). As recon vehicles the BA-10 usually had radios, so radio chance should be much higher than 20. (The radio chance of 10 is quite low for the Soviet unit as well, although late production examples after the German invasion often did not have a radio).

Unit 111 BA-3: no radios.

Unit 112 BA-20M: all had a radio at least in pre-invasion production. (Applied to earlier BA-20 as well in case you want to adjust the Soviet OOB). Max speed 70 km/h (23).

Unit 113 FAI: no radios (radio code 0).

Unit 301 Turret Bunker: change weapon, FC, RF and turret armor as per unit 2.

Unit 302 Turret Bunker: should have same turret armor and FC/RF as Units 2 & 3, no Sabot but regular AP as Unit 3. ROF 8 (where did that 6 come from?).

Units 304-315: change name to Casemate, since a word with common etymology (kasematti) is also used in Finnish (both come from Italian casamatta).

Suggest addition of MG units with 7.92mm Maxim MG-08. Import weapon 122 from German OOB (While pondering why it has a higher HE Kill than other 7-8mm Maxim MGs and MGs with similar cyclic rate of fire and belt feed ). About 1,000 of these weapons were used by the Finnish coastal troops and fortification units.

Changes to artillery and AAMG units were recommended already in the Weapons post (PART 1).

Sources: mostly Jaeger Platoon website: http://www.jaegerplatoon.net/MAIN.html

The Jaeger Platoon site contains some incredible research, including lots of digging into primary sources like war diaries and field manuals, which are not available on-line. I suggest it for anyone interested in WW1/WW2 Finnish and Soviet equipment (some German stuff as well). For Finnish Army WW2 weapons and vehicles it is the best single source that exists anywhere.