Talk:ISU-152

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Contents 1 Proposed merge with ISU-122 2 ISU abbreviation 3 To all contributors in ISU-152 page 4 Indirect fire capability? 5 Merge ISU-122 into ISU-152 5.1 Support 5.2 Oppose 5.3 Discussion 5.4 Results

[edit] Proposed merge with ISU-122

I would like to merge ISU-122 with ISU-152. The latter is more of an upgrade to the former then an entirely new vehicle. Oberiko 15:44, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

The ISU-152 was introduced first in November 1943 under plant designation "Object 241". ISU-122 was developed in December 1943 as "Object 242". The changes were only connected with replacement of primary gun from 152.4-mm ML-20S to 121.92-mm A-19S. In mass production ISU-152 was launched immediately after testing, in November 1943, but series ISU-122 were produced only in April 1944. The producing of ISU-122 has a very simple cause - there were not enough tubes of ML-20S gun-howitzer for equipping newly built hulls. But Soviet arsenals had a big stocks of A-19 cannons. So after very minor upgrade to A-19S variant they were installed in incomplete hulls of ISU vehicles.

Alright, but my point is still valid. It's basically the same vehicle with a different gun. For most other articles we lump those together (the various types of Shermans etc.) Oberiko 10:27, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

Agreed partially. These vehicles shared the same chassis, hull but differs in historical aspects, armament and combat use (although Soviet instructions for crew did make any difference between them). So the technical data, history and tactics description is better to divide into separate page for each type of the ISU vehicle.

Merging sounds reasonable to me, too. The article at ISU-122 is very measly right now, and a lot of material here applies to it. In the long run, it's probably more efficient to mention the few differences in one article, rather than duplicate the commonalities in both.

The gun carriage and recoil were identical, only the barrel and ammunition storage differed between these vehicles, although the 122 had a minor variant with a different gun produced later. According to Zaloga, "There was no tactical distinction between the ISU-122 or ISU-152. Both types were kept concurrently in production simply because of the availability of 122mm tubes and ammunition, even though the ISU-152 was preferred for most assault roles because of its larger, high-explosive rounds. The better anti-tank performance and longer range of the ISU-122 were seldom taken advantage of because of the type of tactics used by these units." Zaloga & Grandsen, Soviet Tanks and Combat Vehicles of World War Two, 1984, page 179. These vehicles are covered in a single section in his book. —Michael Z. 2005-10-18 16:38 Z

Additionally, we can always add headings which are specific about each vehicle to discuss the differences between them. What exactly does ISU stand for anyway? Oberiko 16:50, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

Since there's some support, I've added the merge tags. —Michael Z. 2005-10-19 18:04 Z

Since LostArtilleryman has done some good work there, ISU-122 now looks more like a stand-alone article, or at least a very substantial section for this one. —Michael Z. 2005-10-22 20:35 Z

Even if the 152 is just an upgrade of the 122 it doesn't mean they should be in the same article, for example there are different articles for the Panzerjager 1 and the Panzer 1 even though the they are the same except for a bigger gun on the jager. You would have to merge dozens or even hundreds of articles if you follow your reasoning to its logical conclusion. I think we should leave the articles seperate, if you have a problem with the ISU-122 article you can add to it. [unsigned by User:Julian Diamond]

This is a matter of judgement, and it's up for discussion here. I'm not ruling that this MUST be done.

I proposed this because 1) the ISU-122 article was a tiny stub (which has changed since then). 2) The material at ISU-152 mostly applied to that vehicle. These are essentially the same vehicle with a different calibre gun barrel (not even the whole gun); they were employed by the same types of units with the same tactics and probably the only reason they had different names is because they needed different ammunition.

And you should be able to find better examples to support your argument than the Panzerjäger I self-propelled anti-tank gun, which is not an "upgrade" of the Panzer I light tank: it is a vehicle built for a different role, used by different units with different tactics. No one is proposing merging ISU-122 with IS-2 because they share the same drive train and suspension. —Michael Z. 2005-11-3 17:32 Z

I would vote for merging them; the vehicles had very similar designs *and* tactical roles. An analogy would be the suggested merging of the SU-85 and SU-100 pages. DMorpheus 19:56, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

I dont like the mergeing idea because soner or later someone will delete information from the merged article saying that there is to much information there, and therefore before anyone says there is to much info lets just keep the 2 articles apart.(Deng 06:54, 5 April 2006 (UTC))

On the contrary, I think a merged article helps prevent duplication of material and content forking, and makes it easier for the reader to find relevant material in one place. If it grows large, then large sections or more specific and detailed material can be split off into one or more specialized articles. —Michael Z. 2006-10-22 21:11 Z

Since the question of merging has been open for a long time, and the articles have changed since it was brought up, I'll re-propose it with a vote at the bottom of this discussion page, so we can resolve this. —Michael Z. 2006-10-22 21:11 Z

[edit] ISU abbreviation

Istrebitelnaja Samokhodnaya Ustanovka. What does "Istrebitelnaja" mean? —Michael Z. 2005-10-18 17:39 Z

I'm not sure. It's something I've seen associated with the vehicle and is the only expansion to ISU that I've seen which doesn't propose the I and S to be Iosef Stalin. Oberiko 20:04, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

"ISU" means simply self-propelled gun based on the IS tank chassis. "SU" (Samohodnaya Ustanovka, Self-propelled gun) was already used in designations of early vehicles, such as SU-152 and SU-122. New abbreviature was introduced for better differentiation between vehicles. Istrebitelnaya means destroyer in this context. However this word is used only for mnemonic purposes such as "Save our souls" for SOS abbreviature. Primary Russian sources never use this word (I'm native Russian and have read some documents and books about ISU vehicles).

Lost Artilleryman

I got that from ISU-122. Google finds other examples. —Michael Z. 2005-10-18 20:44 Z

[edit] To all contributors in ISU-152 page

Great thank you for enhancing the article and supplying it with a photo.

There are some remarks about ISU-152 which were rejected from the article by Oberiko, but I think these are still worthy to include. Of course, my own English is quite ugly, may be someone tries to put following facts in the article in a proper manner.

1. Many people thinks that ISU-152 was a minor upgrade of SU-152. This is incorrect. ISU-152 had completely new hull with better armour protection then SU-152. The front armour thickness of ISU-152 was 90-120 mm vs 60-75 mm of SU-152. Due to better equipment layout this armour improvement did not increase the overall weight of the vehicle. Both ISU-152 and SU-152 weigh near 46 metric tons. The ISU-152 was equipped with new modification of V-2 diesel engine, V-2IS. It had reduced power to 520 hp in comparison with SU-152 V-2K engine (600 hp). This reducement improves general reliability of the V-2IS engine. ISU-152 was also equipped with completely new gearbox. This unit was quite unreliable in SU-152.

2. SU-152 and ISU-152 looks quite similarly. The distinguishive features are the idlers and the rear armour plate. ISU-152 has identical idlers and road wheels, while SU-152 has special idlers, non-compatible with road wheels. ISU-152 has rear armour of two flat plates, but SU-152 has one cylindrical-shaped plate. These features are light to recognize, other is not so viewable. Note: Presense of DShK machine-gun is not a ISU-152 unique feature. After repair some SU-152 were also equipped with it.

3. ISU-152 was the base for ISU-122 design. ISU-122 prototype had designation "Object 242" and was built in December 1943. It was launched into mass production at April 1944 due to lack of ML-20S tubes for arming ISU hulls.

4. There was another ISU-152 vehicle, called ISU-152 model 1945. This was a single prototype on the IS-3 tank base with much more strong armour and with ML-20SM gun-howitzer without muzzle break. Now it is a piece of Kubinka tank muzeum exposition.

With best wishes to all of you, Lost Artilleryman

[edit] Indirect fire capability?

I see the article mentions the ability to use the ISU-122/152 in the indirect fire role. I wasn't sure this was possible with these vehicles? Can someone confirm whether they were equipped with artillery-type sights? DMorpheus 19:56, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

ISU-122/152 had two sights: telescopic for direct fire and panoramic (so called Hertz's panorama, I don't know the right English term) for indirect fire. The left forward hatch was made specially for panoramic sight visor, not for crew members. Some photos in Russian history military magazines show ISU-152 firing with closed position, with stocks of projectiles and charges nearby the vehicle. The vehicle itself has small hatch on the left side for loading ammunition from the ground. LostArtilleryman 15:37, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Merge ISU-122 into ISU-152

[edit] Results

I'm closing the vote now, since it's been longer than the proposed ten days. A two-to-one majority is in favour of merging these articles, but in light of LostArtilleryman's major contribution to ISU-122, I propose we don't merge the article's without including him in the consensus. What do you say, Lost? Would it be acceptable to go with the majority and merge these into a single good-quality article, or are you strongly opposed? —Michael Z. 2006-11-04 00:20 Z

Well, I'm strongly opposing the merge of ISU-152 and ISU-122 articles. My reasons are:

• The card in upper right corner shall be ambiguous if ISU-152 & ISU-122 articles will be merged. The general data of ML-20S, A-19S and D-25S guns are not the same so table rows about caliber, ammunition, sights and so on will be cumbersome and not clear to understand what value corresponds particular vehicle.
• Analogy with articles about M7 HMC and Sexton SPGs: they have very similar drive train from M3 Grant/Lee but differ in armament. There is no proposition to merge this articles
• Please look to ru:ИСУ-152 (now it is a candidate to FA in ruWiki). There are information only about ISU-152 and in future I want with Bukvoed possible assistance translate it to English. As a result combined article about ISUs will be cumbersome and not easy to read.
• Also I want to expand article about ISU-122. Do you hear about ISU-122-1 and ISU-122-2 variants? Unfortunately I have no much spare time an it must be shared between my own site and ruWiki where three articles with my participance now is a candidates to FA. Also my knowledge of English is not so great to free expression of my ideas about articles expanding.
• ISU-152 and ISU-122 differs in some aspects of their combat use. E. g. the Russian enthusiasts about ISU-152 history dig out from the archives two facts and a photo of its indirect fire usage (along with many memoirs mention about this) but no such proves were found about ISU-122 - only direct fire usage. ISU-152s at the end of war relatively rare fought with German heavy AFVs but ISU-122s did. Once again explanations of this circumstances will make the merged article cumbersome.

So I'll be defend this point of view as Breat Fortress heroes :-) LostArtilleryman 08:01, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. I suppose one of my main arguments for merging, the common employment of these vehicles, probably also applies to the earlier SU guns too, so a lot of the common information could someday find itself in articles about the Soviet Mechanized Corps, Soviet armoured doctrine, or Soviet antitank guns. Wikipedia has a lot of technical articles about individual AFVs, but is lacking overview articles like these. —Michael Z. 2006-11-05 02:55 Z