PTRD-41

The PTRD-41 (Russian: Противотанковое самозарядное ружьё образца 1941 года системы Дегтярёв, romanized: Protivotankovoye samozaryadnoye ruzhyo obraztsa 1941 goda sistemy Degtyaryova, lit.

'Anti-tank self-loading gun pattern 1941, Degtyaryov system') is an anti-tank rifle that was produced and used from 1941 by the Soviet Red Army during World War II.

A Russian engineer Vasily Degtyaryov copied its lock[8][9] and several features[clarification needed] of the German Panzerbüchse 38 when hasty construction of an anti-tank rifle was ordered in July 1941.

[citation needed] The PTRD and the similar but semi-automatic PTRS-41 were the only individual anti-tank weapons available to the Red Army in numbers upon the outbreak of the war with Germany.

During this war, William Brophy, a US Army Ordnance officer, mounted a .50 BMG (12.7 mm) barrel to a captured PTRD to examine the effectiveness of long-range shooting.

Anti-tank riflemen with PTRD on the Kursk salient.
PTRD rifle at Great Patriotic War museum in Smolensk
Soviet soldiers with PTRD-41 defending Moscow, 1942.