Finnish 120mm mortar on T-26

As I mentioned in my previous article, Finnish armored forces are interesting. Why? Because all the armored forces, relying on improvisation are. Some of the most creative designs came to be in countries such as Finland or former Yugoslavia, both of which had "to do" with what they had at the moment.

Finland armored forces were never really large and until the German Panzer IV and StuG imports, they relied on outdated Soviet and British designs, sometimes turning them into some pretty interesting conversions, such as the BT-42

When Finnish armored forces are discussed, lots of people ask about BT-42. For those who don't really remember, it was a BT-7 hull with a turret-mounted 4,5in (114mm) obsolete British howitzer. On World of Tanks forums, this vehicle recieves (undeserved) attention, because when talking about it, people start to drool about the prospect of driving around in a fast BT-7, derping the hell out of everyone. Nothing could however be further from the truth: the whole thing was hideously sluggish and it was nearly useless too: the howitzer's HEAT rounds were practically pointless and the HE rounds were useful only against soft targets. The vehicle was a nightmare to drive, the overloaded chassis broke down all the time. This is how it looked:

Either way, some of these vehicles were used against Soviets with very limited success. Not ideal. But there were other conversions.

One most of you probably never heard about was the "120mm Krh/40 varustettu T-26" ("T-26 with 120mm Krh/40 mortar"). It was a 1944 project to arm the T-26 hull with the aforementioned mortar. The idea was to make an autonomous mortar battery with 12 of these vehicles. The first mention of this vehicle is in the communication between Gen. Lagus and Col. Björkman from 23/24.4.1944. As the weapon to be used, the outstanding 120mm Tampella Krh/40 mortar was selected. The prototype was introduced to the soldiers on 25.7.1944 in military school in Niinisalo. For reasons unknown, the prototype was never accepted to service and some speculate that it ended its career converted into an artillery tractor, namely the T-26V (the Finnish, replacing their obsolete T-26's with German Panzers gradually, wanted to convert the obsolete tanks into artillery tractors under the designation of T-26V, however, only 3 were converted in the end).

This is a photo from the presentation:

Does it have any importance for World of Tanks? Well, I doubt it. Apart from it being a possible artillery piece for the upcoming tree - but of course, the mortar couldn't be lowered to 0 elevation and fired, so its implementation would be problematic. The iconic BT-42 hower will probably appear at some point, possibly as a lowtier tank destroyer (it was capable of direct fire too, but it did not fare very well), or artillery piece.



Source:
http://forum.valka.cz/viewtopic.php/title/FIN-120-mm-Krh-40-varustettu-T-26/t/99221
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=47&t=167716