Bronco Military 1/48 Su152 (KV14) Russian Self-Propelled Gun 1943 Production Tank Kit
When the Soviet Army began to repel the German Army from around Stalingrad, they realized that they did not have armored self-propelled artillery to deal with German fortifications that had been erected around the city. At that time, their heavy guns like the 152mm ML-20 was towed by horses and was vulnerable to attack during transport. Their closest capability was the KV-2 mobile pillbox that was so high-centered that even the slightest terrain risked rolling the vehicle over.
Development started on the KV-14, a mobile ML-20 gun mount with fully enclosed armor protection for the crew and a low center of gravity for mobility. Built upon the KV-1S heavy tank chassis, the KV-14 was redesignated as SU-152 (Samokhodnaya Ustanovka 152, or self-propelled carriage w/152mm gun) and soon filled another urgent combat need - the ability to fire heavy direct fire rounds and mobile German fortifications also known as Panthers and Tigers. The SU-152 became an effective cat hunter on the battlefield prompting an improved version to be built upon the IS tank chassis and becoming the ISU-152.