15cm Kanone 18 (15cm K18)

History

The 15cm Kanone 18 series long-barreled heavy artillery was developed during the German military build-up in the 1930s. The German Army needed a long-range artillery system firing 150mm shells to replace their old WW1 15cm Kanonr 16 stockpile.

Long-time firearms supplier Rheinmetall was commissioned to bring in a successor, which was the 15cm K18.

The K18 received a rejected frame design submitted with the 15cm SFH-18 proposal and instead had a Rheinmetall cannon mounted on the Krupp frame. A turntable under the gun allows the gun system to rotate a full 360 degrees without having to move the entire gun and carriage at once.

The gun fired a useful 150mm round at a range of 26,800 yards - farther than anything available at the time.

Despite the promising characteristics of this gun, production was concentrated on the sFH 18 gun series, which forced the K18 to languish for a while. It didn't enter production until 1938, and by 1943 there were only about 100 examples. It soon became apparent that the K18 was not much better designed than the K16 it was intended to replace.

Its long barrel helped improve range and accuracy, but at the cost of making a bulky gun - it often required removing the barrel for long-range transport to move two large, heavy guns. The platter function also became a time-consuming assembly and disassembly process, adding further weight and delay.

Riflemen also didn't like the weapon's low rate of fire, which could be as high as one or two rounds per minute.

All these factors resulted in short production times and limited participation in the war. This led many to view static action as a coastal gun, whose range proved to be excellent, eliminating any complaints about weight and time-consuming assembly/disassembly.

The K18 has a cruising weight of 41,000 lbs, which reduces to 27,500 lbs when set to fire. The overall length is 28 feet and the barrel is 27 feet long. The official caliber is 149.1 mm, but it has been rounded to 150 mm (15 cm). The weapon uses a horizontal breech block to unload spent cartridges and load new projectiles.

The gun mount has an inherent elevation range of +43 to -2 degrees for different attack ranges. Leave the turntable platform and move the center 10 degrees from left to right. The 150mm shell has a muzzle velocity of 2,840 feet per second. The gun and mounting hardware are on a two-wheeled van.

A smaller linkage shaft adds two smaller wheels to the assembly.

Specification

Basic

Roles

Dimensions

Performance

Performance

for everyone else in our database)

Armor

Depends on the ammunition carrier.

Changes