T-64BV Soviet main battle tank MBT 1/35 SKIF 205

T-64BV Soviet main battle tank MBT
1/35 scale plastic model kit
SKIF 205

Package include:
Decals
Gum tracks
Plastic parts
Assembly guide

Manufacturer: SKIF (Ukraine)
Scale: 1/35
Material: Plastic
Unpainted, Unassembled, Kit do not contain paints and glue.
Condition: New in Box

T-64BV â€“ Features "Kontakt-1" reactive armour and "Tucha" 81-mm smoke grenade launchers on the left of the turret.

The T-64 is a Soviet main battle tank, introduced in the early 1960s. It was used solely by the Soviet Army in its front-line divisions and was a more advanced counterpart to the famed T-72. Although the T-72 would see much wider use and generally more development, it was the T-64 that formed the basis of more modern Soviet tank designs like the T-80.

The T-64 was conceived in Kharkov (Kharkiv, Ukraine) as the next-generation main battle tank by Alexander A. Morozov, the designer of the T-54 (which in the meantime would be incrementally improved by Leonid N. Kartsev's Nizhny Tagil bureau, in models T-54A, T-54B, T-55, and T-55A).

A revolutionary feature of the T-64 is the incorporation of an automatic loader for its 115-mm gun, allowing a crewmember's position to be omitted, and helping to keep the size and weight of the tank down. Tank troopers would joke that the designers had finally caught up with their unofficial hymn, "Three Tankers"—the song had been written to commemorate the crewmen fighting in the Battle of Khalkhin Gol, in 3-man BT-5 tanks in 1939.

The T-64 also pioneered other Soviet tank technology: the T-64A model of 1967 introduced the 125-mm smoothbore gun, and the T-64B of 1976 would be able to fire a guided antitank missile through its gun barrel.

The T-64 design was further developed as the gas turbine-powered T-80 main battle tank. The turret of the T-64B would be used in the improved T-80U and T-80UD, and an advanced version of its diesel engine would power T-80UD and T-84 tanks built in Ukraine.

The T-64 would be used only by the Soviet Army and never exported, unlike the T-54/55, T-62 and later T-72. It was superior to these tanks in most qualitative terms, until the introduction of the T-72B model in 1985. The tank equipped elite and regular formations in Eastern Europe and elsewhere, the T-64A model being first deployed with East Germany's Group of Soviet Forces in Germany (GSFG) in 1976, and some time later in Hungary's Southern Group of Forces (SFG). By 1981 the improved T-64B began to be deployed in East Germany and later in Hungary. While it was believed that the T-64 was "only" reserved for elite units, it was also used by much lower "non-ready formations", for example, the Odessa Military District's 14th Army.

With the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, T-64 tanks remained in the arsenals of constituent republics. Currently, slightly fewer than 2,000 of the old Soviet inventory of T-64 tanks are in service with the military of Ukraine and about 4,000 remain in service with the Russian Ground Forces.

T-64
T-64A rebuilt
Type	Main battle tank
Place of origin	Soviet Union
Service history
In service	1966–
Used by	Soviet Union, Belarus, Russia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan
Production history
Designer	Morozov Design Bureau
Designed	1951–62
Manufacturer	Malyshev Factory
Produced	1963–85
Specifications (T-64A[1])
Weight	38 tonnes
Length	9.225 m
Width	3.415 m
Height	2.172 m
Crew	3
Armour	20–450 mm of Glass reinforced plastic sandwiched between layers of steel
Primary armament	D-81T 125 mm smoothbore gun
Secondary armament	7.62 mm PKMT coax machine gun, 12.7 mm NSVT antiaircraft machine gun
Engine	5DTF 5-cyl. diesel 700 hp
Power/weight	18.4 hp/tonne
Suspension	Torsion bar
Operational range	500 km, 700 km with external tanks
Speed	60.5 km/h