40 cm / 45 Type 94 ship gun
| 40 cm / 45 Type 94 ship gun | |
|---|---|
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| General Information | |
| Military designation: | 九四 式 艦炮 |
| Manufacturer country: | Japanese Empire |
| Developer / Manufacturer: | Marine workshops Kure |
| Development year: | 1934 to 1939 |
| Production time: | 1939 to 1944 |
| Number of pieces: | 27 |
| Weapon Category: | cannon |
| Technical specifications | |
| Overall length: | 21.30 m |
| Caliber : |
460 mm (18.11 inch ) |
| Caliber length : | 45 |
| Number of trains : | 72 |
| Cadence : | at least 1.5 rounds / min |
| Elevation range: | -5 - +45 degrees |
| Side straightening area: | depending on the tower |
| Furnishing | |
| Closure Type : | Screw lock |
| Charging principle: | Grenade and propellant bag |
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The 40 cm / 45 Type 94 was a ship gun of the Imperial Japanese Navy . The actual caliber was 46 cm (18.11 inch ), for reasons of secrecy it was officially listed as a 40 cm gun. It was the heaviest gun ever used on a warship.
development
The gun was part of a new strategy of the Japanese naval planners, who wanted to escape the arms race in warship building with the United States through a superior weapon system. The battleships of the Yamato class were to surpass other battleships in armor protection and armament so clearly that their small number was outweighed by the technical superiority and so the naval supremacy of the Japanese empire was to be secured.
The engineer C. Hada in Kure led the development . The later production also took place in the naval workshops in Kure.
The weapon to be developed for this new class of ship should be able to fire a 1.5 ton grenade up to 42 kilometers. In order to solve this problem, the designers resorted to tried and tested techniques. They had already developed the locking system of the future weapon in 1934, so that the later gun was designated as Type 94 after this year.
construction
The cannon consisted of a core tube onto which a second tube was shrunk along the length of the rear half. These pipes were then wrapped with several layers of steel wire under high tension , the whole thing was closed off with another shrunk-on pipe and the construction was then enclosed with a jacket pipe . Then 72 4.6 mm deep were trains in the core pipe milled .
At the rear end, a screw cap was placed on the pipe. The weapon weighed 165 tons with the breechblock. The locking system and the rear part of the barrel had to withstand the pressure at maximum firing range, which was created when six propellant bags with around 330 kg of cordite exploded and reached up to 3.2 tons per cm². The muzzle velocity reached 780 meters per second for an armor-piercing projectile.
Hydraulic pipe brakes were mounted under and next to the pipes.
The weapon was initially only developed to fire the types of ammunition customary for a battleship: armor-piercing grenades and HE shells . In the course of the Pacific War , the 1.3-ton type 3 incendiary cluster grenade was added, which released around 900 small incendiary stick bombs at a preset time , which were intended to defend against enemy aircraft formations.
An armor-piercing shell, fired from one of these guns, could penetrate a horizontal armor plate up to 230 mm thick at a distance of 30 km at an impact speed of 475 meters per second. When impacting vertical armor plates, this value was up to 416 mm. The armor-piercing Type 91 shells had a hydrodynamically favorable shape. If the volleys are just too short, they should be able to continue their way better under water and hit the enemy ship below the waterline and the vertical belt armor. The development of hydrodynamically shaped grenades was a result of testing the unfinished battleship Tosa in 1924.
The guns had a comparatively short barrel length in relation to their long range, so that the dispersion of the impacts at maximum firing range was quite high. In order to increase the probability of a hit, the ships of the Yamato class each had nine of these guns, divided into three triple turrets, on board. When firing four and five volleys, the two outer tubes of a triple turret could be fired at the same time, while the charge in the middle ignited with a delay of 0.08 seconds. The range of these volleys was up to 550 meters. When all nine guns were fired in a single salvo, the spread was greater.
The guns had to be lowered to recharge to 3 ° so that at maximum firing range a cadence of 1.5 rounds per minute can not be exceeded. With shorter firing ranges, the reloading time was shortened, so that a shot could be fired every 30 seconds with a barrel elevation of 3 °.
The lifespan of the tubes was due to the design of 200 to 250 rounds - depending on the type of ammunition used - quite short.
commitment
The guns were installed on the battleships Yamato and Musashi . Until the sinking of the two ships, they were never used against other battleships, but instead fired anti-aircraft grenades or - in the case of the Yamato - fought lightly armored targets.
The types of grenades listed below could be fired, whereby the model 3 fire scatter grenade with the code name "beehive", which was used from 1944 onwards, was said to wear down the gun barrel particularly heavily due to its inferior guide bands.
| 46 cm grenades | |||
| designation | Type 91 | Type 0 | Model 3 "beehive" |
| Art | Armor piercing | HE grenade | Incendiary grenade |
| Fuse type | Delay 0.4 sec. | Surcharge / delay | time |
| total weight | 1,458 tons | 1,360 tons | 1,360 tons |
| charge | 24 kg of trinitroanisole | 61 kg of trinitroanisole | Stick bombs |
| aims | armored ship targets | Ship and land destinations | Aircraft formations |
| effective effective radius | - | 68 meters | 242 meters |
| Muzzle velocity V / 0 | 780 m / s | 804.6 m / s | 804.6 m / s |
Of the 27 guns produced, 18 went down with the two battleships, the rest were scrapped after the end of the war. A Type 91 and a 46 cm Type 0 grenade can be seen in Yasukuni Shrine today.
Evidence and references
Remarks
- ↑ The designation Type 94 is based on the year of development, the year Kōki 2594 or 1934 according to the Gregorian calendar
- ↑ Resulting from the steering angle of about 31 °
- ↑ The weights for the ballistic hood and cap of the grenade are missing here. According to USMTJ, O-19, p. 30
literature
- William H. Garzke Jr., Robert O. Dulin Jr .: Battleships. Axis and neutral battleships in World War II. US Naval Institute Press, Annapolis MD 1985, ISBN 0-87021-101-3 .
- Janusz Skulski: The Battleship Yamato (= Anatomy of the ship ). Conway, London 1988, ISBN 0-85177-490-3 .
- Report of the United States Naval Technical Mission To Japan: Japanese 18 "Gun Mounts. O-45, 1946.
- Report of the United States Naval Technical Mission To Japan: Japanese Projectiles General Types. O-19, 1946.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ USMTJ, O-45, p. 9
- ↑ a b c USMTJ, O-54, p. 9
- ↑ USMTJ, O-45, p. 22
- ↑ USMTJ, O-19, p. 30
- ↑ David C. Evans, Mark R. Peattie: Kaigun. Strategy, Tactics and Technology in the Imperial Japanese Navy. 1887-1941. US Naval Institute Press, Annapolis MD 1997, ISBN 0-87021-192-7 , p. 96.
- ↑ USMTJ, O-45, p. 1
- ↑ USMTJ, O-45, p. 50
- ↑ Russel Spurr: A Glorious Way to Die. The Kamikaze Mission of the Battleship Yamato. April 1945. Newmarket Press, New York NY 1999, ISBN 1-55704-248-9 , p. 81.
- ↑ according to USMTJ report O-19