Chi-He

Description

The Type 1 Chi-He (一式中戦車 「チへ」) was a tank designed to streamline the design of the Type 97 Chi-Ha Kai and improve on armour and engine power. While the streamlining of the design featured welded armour instead of riveted armour, a 5th crew member and slightly more armour, the final design only weighed 1.5 tons more than the Chi-Ha Kai. Production only caught on in 1943 due to the Navy's priority in raw materials and all Chi-He's were reserved for the defence of the Home Islands. While the Chi-He did improve on the Chi-Ha Kai, it didn't improve enough to compete with the likes of a M4 Sherman, and served its hull to build the Type 3 Chi-Nu.

It was introduced in Update 1.65 "Way of the Samurai" along with the initial Japanese Ground Forces Tree. Featuring better armour, slightly better mobility with the same 47 mm Type 1 gun as its Chi-Ha Kai predecessor, the Chi-He is an enjoyable tank to play in the early ranks of the game. Stick to allies and use mobility to get to the point with other fast vehicles. Use its good gun depression to hide behind hills and snipe enemies. With its good reverse speed, it can easily get out of nasty situations or hide quickly.

General info

Survivability and armour

There is nothing impressive here in terms of armour, the Chi-He features 50 mm, poorly angled, frontal armour. This is not the kind of plate that can take any punishment at the battle rating, it will only bounce poorly aimed shots. The five-man crew inside makes the tank very survivable, leaving some room for mistakes. Side armour is vulnerable to heavy machine gun and autocannon fire, so beware flanking fast tanks.

Armour Type:

• Rolled homogeneous armour
• Cast homogeneous armour (Gun mantlet, Machine gun ports)

Notes:

• Suspension wheels both 15 mm thick
• Tracks are 20 mm thick.
• Front of turret has bolted on 25 mm armour to total up to 50 mm thick as the rest of the front.

Mobility

This is one of the main feature of the Chi-He, it enables it to do anything a commander want with it. Want to be first on the spot? With some skill/luck, the Chi-He can! Want to flank? follow other light tanks in the move, provide them with enhanced firepower! The enemy team is coming over? Hit the gas (in a rearward position) and fire while retreating.

Modifications and economy

Armaments

Main armament

Comparatively to other light/medium tanks at this battle rating, the 47 mm Type 1 gun is quite surprising with 77 mm of penetration at point-blank range and has a good reload speed. Plus, this fires APHE shells, which do great post-penetration damage. Comparatively, the 20-K (45 mm) gun on Russian BR 1.0-2.7 tanks has only 62 mm of penetration in similar conditions. Furthermore, a shoulder stabiliser allows for safer advances on enemy positions (although it is important to note that it only works at low speed). A top-mounted MG is really useful when dealing with unarmoured SPG and SPAA one might encounter at the battle rating.

One thing to keep in mind compared to Chi-Ha Kai is that it still retains the same hand-cranked turret with additional 25 mm plates to improve the frontal armour to a max of 50 mm. This however slows down the turret rotations speeds due the added weight.

Ammunition

Ammo racks

Ammo racks of the Chi-He

Note:

• Turret empty: 73 (+47) shells.

Machine guns

Usage in battles

As the successor of the Chi-Ha, the Chi-He has a redesigned hull with thicker armour, a more powerful engine and an up-armoured turret from the Chi-Ha Kai, so the front is overall at 50 mm effective. This will result in a very similar playstyle as the Chi-Ha Kai with the added benefits of being an upgrade.

Unlike the Type 97 Chi-Ha Kai, the Type 1 Chi-He has some more armour and a stronger engine to rely on and it is able to brawl on its own with the fast rate of fire. But as previously mentioned on Main armament, the Chi-He retains the same hand-cranked turret with additional armour, slowing down the already mediocre turning time by a slight amount.

Literally on top of armour and engine upgrades, the Chi-He gets an additional pintle point anti-aircraft machine gun, even though the Type 97 7.7 mm has a low clip capacity, it can prove useful for pinning enemy units and even getting hits to down enemy planes.

The best practice for the Chi-He (and other WWII-era Japanese tanks) is to always point forward, the front armour has pre-angled sides, so angling only hurts your pre-angles and weaker side armour. It's not worth trying to get more out of the 50 mm frontal effective protection.

Enemies worth noting:

• B1 bis / ter: the B1 can easily destroy the Chi-Ha when using both of its guns, but when angling only the 47 mm gun is available, meaning that the Chi-Ha can take some more hits. It is very hard to destroy the Char B1 from a distance, so get as close as possible with the ideal range being no more than 300 m. Aim at their flat hull side, turret side, hull cannon mount or the driving compartment (the near-vertical frontal armour right below the turret). Upon penetrating, the Chi-Ha's 47 mm APHE can knock out several crews, and your quick reload allows you to finish the rest off in time. However if the B1 has folded armour plates on their hull sides then it is a B1 ter, avoid shooting at its sides.
• M4A3 (105): This low-rank Sherman posts a huge threat to every of its opponents due to its superior armour and destructive firepower. Its armour is overall quite tough to penetrate with your small 47 mm gun, but it can be solved by careful aiming. If the M4 is within 200 m, shoot at the vertical part of its gun mantlet or its side if exposed. One penetration might not kill all the crew, however two are generally enough. If it's up close and hull down, try shooting at its gun barrel to disarm it, but one shot is not guaranteed to destroy the barrel. When the M4 is further than 400 m away, all of your shells will perform poorly at penetrating its armour, so disengage or wait until it gets closer. Remember to not get hit by it, its HEAT is able to knock the Chi-He out with ease.

Pros and cons

Pros:

• 47 mm cannon can do some decent damage
• Small profile
• Gunner supported stabilization, can take accurate shots at low speeds
• Top-mounted MG
• Fast reverse speed (2 reverse gears)
• Fast in forward motion
• Frontal transmission
• Awesome gun depression of -15°
• Fast reloading rate

Cons:

• Thin side armour means angling front armour could expose weak armour
• 47 mm gun is so inaccurate, to the point where it can barely be used past 500 meters.
• Packed 5-men crew can lead to an easy knock out if penetrated
• 50 mm front armour, poorly angled
• Big ammo racks in the turret (carry only half-ammo load)
• Long and narrow hull: hard to turn on the spot

History

Development

The Imperial Japanese Army's main tank, the Type 97 Chi-Ha, was becoming rather outdated by the turn of the decade in 1940. The 30 mm front plate armour was vulnerable to standard anti-tank weaponry and the riveted design post a hazard to the tank crew by spalling. In 1941, work began on modernizing the design up to new industrial standards.^[1]

The first step in the modernizing design was to go towards a welded design rather than rivveted. The front glacis plate was also simplified into a large flat 50 mm armour plate rather than the curved one. The increased armour meant an increased weight, so the Japanese added the improved Type 100 diesel engine, capable of pumping out 240 hp to propel the tank. This new tank was accepted as the Type 1 Chi-He.^[1]

During the tank's preparation for mass-production, a request by the commander of the 7th Tank Regiment calling for an improved armament on the Type 97 Chi-Ha was received by the Mitsubishi factory. With the Type 1 Chi-He still needing time to enter production levels, let alone the resources needed to manufacture completely new tanks, it was placed on hold and priority was placed on improving the Type 97. This lead to the cheaper method of adapting the Type 97 to using the Type 1 turret with the 47 mm cannon, producing to the Type 97 Chi-Ha Kai. This delayed the mass-production of the Type 1 Chi-He until February 1944, resulting in only 170 tanks produced before the end of the war.^[2]

Combat usage

Despite its relatively early production life over late-war Japanese tanks and its improved characteristics, the Type 1 Chi-He would see its combat life held in reserves in the Japanese home islands. They would never see use in the battlefield before Japan surrendered in August 1945.

Media

Skins

• Skins and camouflages for the Chi-He from live.warthunder.com.

Videos

See also

Related Development

• Chi-Ha (Family) - (Predecessor)
  • Chi-Ha Kai
• Chi-He (Family)
  • Ho-I - (Gun tank variant)
• Ka-Chi - (Inspired navy amphibious variant)

Other vehicles of similar configuration and role

• Pz.38(t)
• Pz.III (Family) - (Early models)
• Turan I
• M15/42
• S.35
• Crusader
• Lago I

External links

• [Devblog] Type 1 Chi-He – An Updated Classic
• [Wikipedia] Type 1 Chi-He medium tank

References