Naval artillery question...

They are expensive, yes. On the other hand they can also do more than just load the gun.
That same 19 year old can help with maintenance on the weapon and the vehicle that transports it, be crosstrained as a gunner or driver, help with close-in defence or sentry duty, stand a radio watch, run over to another vehicle that's resupplying and sling ammo crates around, and serve as an infantryman if things get really desperate. If the same autoloader had to do all those things, I'm not sure they'd be that much cheaper.

Other people do that work. The other three guys on the tank crew just work more.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
As you get bigger guns, it seems like you get a shorter barrel life. So this might well be a big negative against an auto loading 16" gun. Once you have this fixed, you will have issues with storing that much ammo on a ships. Then you have size issues of the autoloader. I can see a prototype being built, I have trouble seeing it put on a ship. To do a really big 16" autoloader 8 or 9 gun ship, I bet you are looking at something closer to the A Hitler concept ship, than say a Montana class.
 
As you get bigger guns, it seems like you get a shorter barrel life. So this might well be a big negative against an auto loading 16" gun. Once you have this fixed, you will have issues with storing that much ammo on a ships. Then you have size issues of the autoloader. I can see a prototype being built, I have trouble seeing it put on a ship. To do a really big 16" autoloader 8 or 9 gun ship, I bet you are looking at something closer to the A Hitler concept ship, than say a Montana class.
Yeah that would be a problem; a rapid fire 16" gun would be murder on a gun barrel. I would not hold my breath on fixing this problem.

As for the autoloaders, those things would not only be bulky as hell, but probably be very tempermental mechanically, especially having to move SUV sized 16" fixed ammo. You may eliminate loaders but you would have to have a LOT of engineers to maintain and repair those autoloaders.

Between the fixed ammo and autoloaders, yeah you'd need a huge and very heavy ship.
 

NothingNow

Banned
Please tell how to get to that wonderful world were government does not keep a close watch on manpower costs, cause were I live we are firing people who actually do good work just to save on salaries...

When purchasing equipment. You write something at 4am and not forget something.

But yes, it's a noticeable pattern. Aside from france, every tank-building nation that has moved to autoloaders has done it because their tankers are damned short. Otherwise, between about 40 and 115 mm, at the firing speed a tank would find effective, the Human autoloader's fringe benefits do outweigh the personell savings of an autoloader. After 115 mm it's dependent on size tiny Russian and Japanese tankers just have trouble with shells that size, while larger, western tankers don't have an issue, which is expected when they're five inches taller, decently well built, and sober.
 
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When purchasing equipment. You write something at 4am and not forget something.

But yes, it's a noticeable pattern. Aside from france, every tank-building nation that has moved to autoloaders has done it because their tankers are damned short. Otherwise, between about 40 and 115 mm, at the firing speed a tank would find effective, the Human autoloader's fringe benefits do outweigh the personell savings of an autoloader. After 115 mm it's dependent on size tiny Russian and Japanese tankers just have trouble with shells that size, while larger, western tankers don't have an issue, which is expected when they're five inches taller, decently well built, and sober.

It's not just the Russians and Japanese who have autoloaders; modern French tanks do as well, and the French aren't physically small. In any case the real reason for autoloaders is to increase the rate of fire; a tank with an autoloader can fire three rounds for every one a tank with manual loading fires. The downside is that the autoloader fires from a clip, so to speak, and when the clip is empty it takes a considerable amount of time for it to be reloaded (between 30 and 60 seconds, depending on ammo size and crew skill). So you get a tank that fires five shells in 15 seconds and then waits 35 seconds to fire again, versus a tank with a manual loader which fires a shell every 10 seconds.

However, there is another benefit to having an extra crewman rather than an autoloader; most crewmen are cross trained, so can fill in for each other at need. That extra crewman comes in handy when your commander or gunner is injured or killed.

BTW, the reason Russian tankers are short is because their tanks are smaller than Western ones and therefore less roomy inside, so a larger crewman won't fit. IIRC the height limit for US tankers is 64" (5' 4", 163 cm), and the Russian limit is probably similar.
 
As you get bigger guns, it seems like you get a shorter barrel life. So this might well be a big negative against an auto loading 16" gun. Once you have this fixed, you will have issues with storing that much ammo on a ships. Then you have size issues of the autoloader. I can see a prototype being built, I have trouble seeing it put on a ship. To do a really big 16" autoloader 8 or 9 gun ship, I bet you are looking at something closer to the A Hitler concept ship, than say a Montana class.

a good example is the paris gun, the germans actually had the rounds sequentially numbered because every shot wore away the barrel, and the shots were made to match the wear.
barrel life 65 rounds. more modern alloys reduce the problem, but it indeed is going to be a big problem.
 

NothingNow

Banned
It's not just the Russians and Japanese who have autoloaders; modern French tanks do as well, and the French aren't physically small.
Yeah, I mentioned that the french are pretty much the only exception to that maxim. But the french are usually the weird ones in any comparison.

In any case the real reason for autoloaders is to increase the rate of fire; a tank with an autoloader can fire three rounds for every one a tank with manual loading fires. The downside is that the autoloader fires from a clip, so to speak, and when the clip is empty it takes a considerable amount of time for it to be reloaded (between 30 and 60 seconds, depending on ammo size and crew skill). So you get a tank that fires five shells in 15 seconds and then waits 35 seconds to fire again, versus a tank with a manual loader which fires a shell every 10 seconds.
And that's a very important trade off. Probably why the French went for Autoloaders, while the rest of the West settled on the lower, but more sustainable ROF.

BTW, the reason Russian tankers are short is because their tanks are smaller than Western ones and therefore less roomy inside, so a larger crewman won't fit. IIRC the height limit for US tankers is 64" (5' 4", 163 cm), and the Russian limit is probably similar.
It's a design limit of 160cm in Soviet tanks. The height limit for American Tankers on the M1A1 from the recruiter I spoke to back in the day (before I was told that scoliosis and a bum knee would stop me from serving in pretty much any capacity,) and seems to be the reported norm online is six foot/183cm. Given that the average height of an American male in his 20's is 177.6cm, or 5'10", something like 80% of the Male population in the US can serve in armored units, versus maybe 20-30% in the former Soviet Union.
 
And significantly increasing the workload of the remaining crew when they have to maintain their tank.

I'm all for humans, I just can't get our dammed politicians to agree. It's easier to get money to buy gadgets than to pay people to use them.
 
So 16" is right out.

How's about something smaller - 10 - 12", say, disregarding the issue of whether or not the gun itself has much of a future in a post-war environment dominated by airpower.
 
As for the autoloaders, those things would not only be bulky as hell, but probably be very tempermental mechanically, especially having to move SUV sized 16" fixed ammo. You may eliminate loaders but you would have to have a LOT of engineers to maintain and repair those autoloaders.
Well don't ships require rather a lot of engineers anyway? Oh, and we're theoretically supposed to be talking about shell sizes between 6" and 8".

But yes, it's a noticeable pattern. Aside from france, every tank-building nation that has moved to autoloaders has done it because their tankers are damned short.
Do Poland, Ukraine, Serbia and Croatia have the same height limits as the Russians?

And significantly increasing the workload of the remaining crew when they have to maintain their tank.
How much maintenance can just the crew itself (be it 3 or 4) actually do though?
 
So 16" is right out.

How's about something smaller - 10 - 12", say, disregarding the issue of whether or not the gun itself has much of a future in a post-war environment dominated by airpower.

I have to admit that I'm a fan of the British 9.2" naval/coast defence guns. A Monitor type ship armed with two twin auto loading 9.2 turrets would be hell on any enemy defences and a real boon to a landing force. Korea could be the trigger for this. It's a difficult sell but when you consider that the carrier HMS Unicorn was called on to shell enemy positions the need for a dedicated ship could be demonstrated.
 
I have to admit that I'm a fan of the British 9.2" naval/coast defence guns. A Monitor type ship armed with two twin auto loading 9.2 turrets would be hell on any enemy defences and a real boon to a landing force. Korea could be the trigger for this. It's a difficult sell but when you consider that the carrier HMS Unicorn was called on to shell enemy positions the need for a dedicated ship could be demonstrated.


Why would you want an expensive large calliber gun still, when these are always shorter ranged than an aircraft, carrying a larger warhead further away to any target? (Not even considering stand of missiles and rockets) Guns are limmited in their usefulness, as they need to be relatively in close proximity of the target, while labour intensive to operate, even the automatic ones, while a single pilot on an airplane can do the same thing for less money, more accurate. Warships of the post WW2 period did not away most guns for no reason, except a few small ones for selfdefence. These larger guns were a waist of both weight on the ship, and not potent enough for morre modern warfare.

One problem for warships engaging in coastal bombardment is that they need to be close to shore, which is dangereous, even without defences. Shallow water is not the natural element for ocean going warships and mines are still likely to cause havoc among ships tempting to close to a hostile shoreline. Coastal artillery is a danger too, and last but niot least, warships are vissible and atract enemy airstrikes, which is not the best thing for a warship, which is almost stationary, when engaging in inshore firesupport.
 

NothingNow

Banned
Do Poland, Ukraine, Serbia and Croatia have the same height limits as the Russians?
Considering that it's a design limit, one can only hope they're that sensible.

How much maintenance can just the crew itself (be it 3 or 4) actually do though?
Pretty much everything that doesn't require a crane, very specialized equipment and training, or more than six or eight hands. Things like engine maintenance, track and road wheel replacement, bore sighting, barrel cleaning, etc, spring to mind.

Jobs like replacing a power pack, fixing certain electronics, and long-term repairs to the hydraulics systems would definitely require a maintenance team's assistance though.
 
Considering that it's a design limit, one can only hope they're that sensible.


Pretty much everything that doesn't require a crane, very specialized equipment and training, or more than six or eight hands. Things like engine maintenance, track and road wheel replacement, bore sighting, barrel cleaning, etc, spring to mind.

Jobs like replacing a power pack, fixing certain electronics, and long-term repairs to the hydraulics systems would definitely require a maintenance team's assistance though.

It's not just the maintenance. Someone has to keep watch and man the radio at night, load the ammo from the trucks to the tank, get water and food,etc. soviet reports from Afeghanistam stated that using the older T55, T62 tanks was an advantage because a four man crew could do its job with less fatigue.
 
BTW, the reason Russian tankers are short is because their tanks are smaller than Western ones and therefore less roomy inside, so a larger crewman won't fit. IIRC the height limit for US tankers is 64" (5' 4", 163 cm), and the Russian limit is probably similar.

Having smaller tanks with less crew space was a conscious design choice for the Soviets. It presents a smaller target and provides logistical advantages. I'm pretty sure that was a bigger deal for the designers than crew costs.
 
Why would you want an expensive large calliber gun still, when these are always shorter ranged than an aircraft, carrying a larger warhead further away to any target? (Not even considering stand of missiles and rockets) Guns are limmited in their usefulness, as they need to be relatively in close proximity of the target, while labour intensive to operate, even the automatic ones, while a single pilot on an airplane can do the same thing for less money, more accurate. Warships of the post WW2 period did not away most guns for no reason, except a few small ones for selfdefence. These larger guns were a waist of both weight on the ship, and not potent enough for morre modern warfare.

One problem for warships engaging in coastal bombardment is that they need to be close to shore, which is dangereous, even without defences. Shallow water is not the natural element for ocean going warships and mines are still likely to cause havoc among ships tempting to close to a hostile shoreline. Coastal artillery is a danger too, and last but niot least, warships are vissible and atract enemy airstrikes, which is not the best thing for a warship, which is almost stationary, when engaging in inshore firesupport.

The same reasons that were given for the Iowa battleship reactivations. Shells are not as long ranged as aircraft, but are harder to shoot down and have no pilots to be captured. A gun warship can keep firing for days on end, in all weathers. Aircraft can not do that.

Naval gun fire support is important for amphibious landings, if you want that capability. Troops can get faster fire support from ships off shore than from aircraft on a carrier deck.

Granted, naval artillery is short ranged compare with aircraft and/or missiles, but its range is increasing. A 16" gun coulf fire 20 miles. A modern 155 mm gun can range to 40 km, and the ranes are expected to increase, particularly when railguns or sabot rounds are used. They still will not reach hundreds of miles inland, but there are a vast number of targets within 20 miles of the coast.

As for your other points, modern warships have no reason to remain staionary when firing. They also would not go inshore unless the threats had been suppressed. Longer ranges allow them to stay farther offshore, unless engaging targets near their range limit.

As for crew size, an aircraft may only have a single pilot, but it needs a lot of support personnel. Compare the crew size of an Iowa (app 1200) and a Nimitz (app 5000) and the amount of ordinance each can deliver in a day. The Iowa can empty its magazines with about 900 shells weighing about 2,000 lbs each. The Nimitz would be very hard pressed to drop 900 2000 lb bombs from its airgroup in the same amount of time, since some aircaft must perform CAP and there are limits on sortie rates. Each sortie would risk a captured pilot and the possible loss of a 60+ million dollar aircraft.

Within its range, a battleship is a much more cost effective means of delivering explosives to a target. The carrier is preferred because of its greater range and versatility. That does not mean it is superior to naval gunfire in all scenarios.
 
Hello all,

I found an old thread at another forum that discussed automatic heavy caliber guns. I'll be reposting some comments from that thread here. I hope my cutting and pasting doesn't render the discussion unreadable.
My first posting is a question of mine and the response to it. (I'm dracos over there)

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I'm reading through old threads. One of the posts in this one caught
my eye, about automatic heavy caliber guns used for AA work. I have
been wondering for awhile if a proximity fused heavy shell would be
useful in AA work. 14", 15", 16", 18" shells with proximity fuses,
what would be their lethal radius against aircraft?

dracos

Response to me, posted by Sea Skimmer:
Big, maybe over 100 meters. But remember you only had 200-300 rounds
of barrel life for a heavy naval gun which was an absurdly expensive
weapon. you've got to reserve around 100 rounds of that so that the
ship is always ready for a major surface action.

Firing at aircraft would rapidly have eaten this remaining margin of
life up. This is the same reason why only a handful of anti aircraft
guns larger then 130mm were ever built on land. The Germans built an
auto loading 150mm gun that fed from an eight round drum, fired it at
some bombers passing the proving ground even but then realized that it
would shoot out its own barrel in a single major air raid.

In addition large naval shells had pretty erratic fragmentation
patterns, and you'd pretty much need to have dedicated AA common
shells for the whole idea to be worthwhile. That has to now fit into
ammunition storage for the big guns which was normally around 100
rounds per gun.

In general the idea of using battleship guns as anti aircraft just
highlights the the block obsolescence of the battleship itself. You
could roughly buy a squadron of fighters for the price of buying and
installing a new barrel liner. Plus even with VT you don't solve the
issue of the main battery tracking and elevating slowly.
 
Regarding the British 16"/45 MK IV

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Regarding the British proposed 16"/45 gun.

Posted by Ted:
The British used loading at all elevations, from Dreadnought onwards.
Also, the post-war Lion class designs called for a triple 16" turret with a RoF of 3 per minute.

Posted by Terry Duncan1 (Subject: There were good designs for 16" automatic guns):
Sadly the only designs these guns were looked at for were the Lion class in the mid 1940's. The weight penalty for the automatic 16" guns with a ROF of 3RPM is not prohibitive, with initial studies increasing the weight by about 1,000 tons to 1,500 tons per mount!

You could certainly build the system into a ship as large as the Montana class, but by the time they will complete, there will be little use for them.
However, yes it is possible, and yes it is not impracticle either.

Posted by Smurf:
From Campbell Naval weapons WWII and Warship
John Campbell gives details of the Mk4 gun and goes on

"The chamber was 113.4 in long, propellant charge about 610lb nitroguanidine type.

Only limited work seems too have been done on the triple mounting. Breech blocks to have opened upwards presumably during runout [like Richelieu]. Shell and charge to be rammed in one stroke with coaxial rammer. Firing cycle planned at 20 sec gun axes 102 in apart. Vickers sketch design [not there and I’ve never seen it] shows an earlier horizontally opening breechblock. Roller path dia 34’ Elevation +45 to –3 deg loading at +3, rack and pinion

Complete charges in sixths stowed horizontally in tubes in the magazines b rammed into large tilting and training bucket which brings them into line with the three endless-chain charge hoists. Shells .. stowed vertically in shell rooms, rammed to shell ring and then to buckets at the base of the three pusher shell hoists where they are inclined from the vertical to the angle of the hoists. In the gunhouse shells are tipped into loading trays but transfer of complete charges to interior of coaxial rammer not shown. These look like those for the 8” twin mounts [Counties]. The charge hoists come up in rear of shell hoists and there seems to be very little space for the complete charge to be tilted.

An earlier and much more spacious design with any angle loading to +45 deg needed roller path dia 39’ and had separate hoists for HE and APC shells and separate shell and charge rammers."

(These are Smurf's comments again) All this, forgive me, reminds me of the years I spent correcting descriptions of “automated” brickworks which had in fact no more than (sometimes much) improved mechanical handling. Green Mace at 60 rpm was an automatic weapon, as is Bofors 40mm and much more recent US 5” and 8” unmanned turrets. Read the loading cycle description for the 16in Mk1 in Peter Hodges The Big Gun and you'll see the complexity of actually making it really automatic. Problems come from keeping the magazine-to-gun path flash-tight which don't arise in an AA gun with one-piece ammo in drum magazines behind the gun. Even a 16in metal cartridge case is open from magazine to rammer

From NavWeaps.com
“The redesign of the Lion class battleships near the end of World War II prompted the development of the last British large-caliber naval gun, the 16"/45 (40.6 cm) Mark IV. This design was to use flashless powder and heavier projectiles than the Mark II and III. However, work never progressed much beyond the design stage and none were actually built. A prototype was constructed using one of the Mark III guns, but this conversion could not have been used at anywhere near the intended pressure. It has been speculated that the mountings for the Mark IV would have achieved a ROF of about 20 seconds, but there is little evidence to support this figure, as no detailed design of the turrets was ever completed and all work was suspended at the end of the war.”
 
This is the longest of my three posts. My apologies if I am making a mistake in posting these comments.

Notes: "Smurf" is an acutal naval researcher and author. I know he has had a number of articles in the Warship Annuals, mostly about RN cruiser designs of the last century. MJBurmaster is a retired naval architect, I believe.

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Posted by Smurf:
If you fire again before you know whether the range etc is right, you waste very expensive ammunition. 8" and 6" is a lot cheaper than 16" 18"
Des Moines 8" is to fire at destroyers, short range
Worcester 6" at aircraft, short range and a bit of a scattergun effect.

BBs firing at 7-10 miles there's not a lot of point in firing more than about 2 rpm. If you do there's likely to be lower percent hits and you will need much bigger magazines. Don't forget the target moves.

Shore bombardment is another matter, but you don't need a 30 kn BB for that.

Des Moines size not due to bigger turrets, but bigger ammunition spaces and the armour to protect them which drives up the power needed etc.

Posted by Marek Gutkowski (Russian, I believe)

I meant to say that your guns well overheat fast.
100 rounds at RoF 2rpm gives 50minut sustaind fire
100 rounds at RoF 6rpm gives 16minut sustaind fire and by that time your Guns have to cool off and you diss engage.But is not a big problem give that late 1940' BB role is to protect the carries from heavy enemy wessels.

Sending at your enemy 900 rounds in a time in wich they sends you only 288 round gives you a big advantege.

Higher RoF is like having more guns, so a 35000t ship with 6 automatic 15'' gives fire power of 12-15 normal guns.

An egzample South Dakota with 6 automatic 16'' in twins(lets dont forget the higher weight of automatic guns) only dubling not tripling HoF per gun.
Fires not 18 round per minut but 24rounds.the ship isnt bigger that others but hase more fire power. althou 6 more rounds per minut isnt all that impresing in 10minuts its 60rounds more.(240vs180)

In battle line tactics it gives you following in ten minuts you fired more that means,acording to N-sqeard law,you hit more now your guns are overhited they nead to cool of a bit you RoF drops to 1 or 2 rpm.

The enemy hase a dilema you made more damege to him that he had done to you.He can either reatret and lose the battle or continue on still knowing that even thou your RoF droped dramaticly if the battle goes hard for you your captains still have an option to puch ther guns over the seafty margins firing the guns at higher RoF destroying the guns in the proces(my friend that were in the altylery sead that thers guns had 2 HoF susaind harasing fire or short rapid fire,althou they were thout that in an event that the enemy is charging at the they are to fire in rapid fire till the gun turn red).

Modern Sowierenny class Destroyer has only 4x130mm but high RoF of its guns give it fire power almost equal to Atlanta class CLAA.

Posted by Smurf:
But it only gives a 6 shell salvo, after which the target has moved
The reason for more guns is not just greater weight of broadside, but to increase the chance of hitting, given that there is an inevitable spread in the salvo due to small differences in manufacture of shells, quality of propellant etc. No 'next shell' goes exactly where its companion goes. You fire 10 or 12 rather than 6 so that you have a better chance of hitting. You fire salvos of half your guns to obtain in effect greater rate of fire with the same (smaller) number of shells arriving at once.

So a 6 gun auto ship firing broadsides puts down the same number of 6 shell groups as a 12 gun ship firing 6-gun salvos. With half the rate of fire per gun, because salvos are fired twice as often as broadsides, the 12 gun ship and the 6 gun auto then have the same chance of hitting overall.

But the 12 gun ship can fire if desired 12-shell patterns and increase its chance of hitting with one attempt, if you think that's the only chance you might get. What you do depends on range, visibility (pre radar) whether it's line of battle or single ship action, smothering or armour penetrating fire etc.

You can't really go to 3-gun salvos - chance of hitting at all is so small
Also, simpler mechanism is generally more reliable - hence sticking to twin turrets against triples or quads. Auto loading involves more mechanism and so increases the chance of mechanical failure which decreases the chance of hitting. If you don't fire, you can't hit


Posted by MJBurmaster (subject: Loading Equipment):
whilst all involved are thinking about automated equipment to increase ROF, let me point out a very practical reason for increased, not full, use of machinery, and that is the weight of the "things" being used.
You don't want full automation without alternatives. For example, it is quite possible to lift a 16" shell with cable and tackle provided you have suitable passageways. But in a sea state above the 3/4 level or such then things begin to get a wee bit chancy. Not that a shell will fuze, but certainly shell utility is reduced when beaten up on various objects. (If you think a shell is so solidly built to defy such problems....:( ) Add to that personnel "discomfort" (such as getting equally banged around on steel ) and increased mechanization is required.

One could have an argument which is better, electric motors or hydraulics. I would say that electric in my experience is better because hydraulics do take up more space and can't get moved about as easy as a 440 cable. As for the disruptions caused by shock or water, let's just say that shock will dislocate any system and if water is entering the barbette ring, you probably have the makings of a very bad day in any event.:(

Posted by Aglooka:
The heavy German guns didn't use brass cartridges in its usual meaning. German guns didn't have gas check pads (sliding breech block) and a short brass cartridge containing the aftermost charge had a "cartridge", in front of that were the usual silk lined powder bags. The cartridge was used to seal the breach, not to contain the (majority) of the charge.

Im' skeptical about the feasibility of brass cartriges for bs size guns. How thick would the cartridge wall have to be to maintain the mechanical integrity of the cartridge as it was being handled ?
 
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