Steel Bib

Steel bib (Russian:Stalynoi Nagrudnik") is (a type of body armor basically a breastplate developed by the Red Army in World War II. The native Cyrillic abbreviation for the vest was СН, the Cyrillic letters Es and En.) It consisted of two pressed steel plates that protected the front torso and groin.  The plates were 2 mm (.08") and weighed 3.5 kg (7.7 lbs). This armor was supplied to SHISBr (assault engineers) and Tankodesantniki (infantry that rode on tanks) of some tank brigades.

Models


Several models have been created (the number indicates the year of development):


 * SN-38
 * SN-39
 * SN-40, SN-40A
 * SN-42 is made of 2 mm steel 36SGN, the tolerances 1.8 - 2.2 mm, weight of Chest 3.3 - 3.5 kg. Protected area 0.2 square meters. m
 * SN-46

The Steel breastplates (along with the conventional steel SSh-40 helmets equipped the assault engineers and demining brigades of the Supreme Command Reserve STAVKA, for which they are sometimes called "tubular infantry . " Bib SN-42 was designed to protect against attack with the bayonet, small fragments, and 9-mm pistol bullets with lead cores, providing protection against damage from a submachine gun MP-38/40 from a distance of 10 m is also a distance of 100–150 m stand shot from a rifle 7.92mm Gewehr 41, but on condition that the bullet went on a tangent. Following the adoption of the Wehrmacht on the supply of 9mm cartridges, the cartridge code R.08 mE (German: mit Eisen Kern), with a bullet with mild steel (iron) core, required the thickness increased to 2.6 mm Chest (2.5 - 2.7 mm), which received the name of the SN-46.

By modern standards, roughly equivalent to Class II vest.

Combat application Photo of the upper part of the museum's steel breastplate Kamenetz-Podolsk Fortress


 * Flag of the Soviet Union.svg USSR - steel breastplates SN-42 began to arrive in the army in 1942 and later used during World War II.
 * Flag of Poland.svg Poland - Soviet steel cuirass entered service of the 1st Polish Army (as of October 31, 1944 there were 1000 pieces). [1]
 * Flag of the NSDAP (1920–1945).svg The Third Reich - by some accounts, captured Soviet steel breastplates came to supply the German army, also in Germany in limited quantities (only for parts of the SS ) produced similar bibs.

Estimates of Chest front-line soldiers ambiguous: there are both positive and negative feedback. Vest has worked well in the street fighting during the storming of cities, in the melee, when the soldier walked or ran. At the same time in the field more fighters assault teams moved on their bellies, and breastplates became useless noise.

Similar design

 * steel cuirass were mass produced, have proliferated and were used during the First World War, the armies of Germany (Sappenpanzer ), Britain and France.
 * in the 1920s-1930s steel cuirasses were in service with the Polish police.
 * in the 1920s-1930s were developed several options for steel cuirasses for the soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army (used in the fighting in China)

Literature

 * Bashford Dean: Helmets and Body Armor in Modern Warfare, Verlag READ BOOKS, 2008, S. 162–163, ISBN 978-1-4437-7524-3