Chapter 545: Bavaria's Hammer 3

Originally, the plan was almost ready, but when it was submitted to Prince Leopold, the latter raised some objections, and he agreed to a significant increase in the number of 105mm and 150mm howitzers. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. biquge。 info, but at the same time opposed the exclusion of 77mm rapid-fire guns.

"Infantry needs some field guns to provide direct fire at close range. It is impossible to equip all our troops with assault guns or mobile artillery with a half-track chassis. Therefore, it is necessary to have a gun that is as light as possible, the gun weight is smaller, and the muzzle velocity is as fast as possible. Prince Leopold said.

"But some of the 105mm guns themselves are not necessarily much heavier than the 75mm guns of the French, or even lighter, and if it is to destroy bunkers, the 105mm howitzer's 15kg shells should be more powerful than the 7-8kg 3-inch rapid-fire guns, right?" The prince said with some puzzlement.

The prince took this into account, in fact, the German LEFH16 105mm howitzer in history was a good gun, weighing only 1525kg, and the muzzle velocity was also good, with a muzzle velocity of 395 meters per second. And it can shoot a 14.81kg grenade more than 9,000 meters away. And this gun can also be equipped with armor-piercing shells, whether in terms of power, weight or other aspects far beyond the 77mm rapid-fire guns of the Germans and the 75 Miss of the French, the only problem is that this gun came out relatively late, in 1916, but even if it does not reach the technical level at that time, sacrifice some initial velocity, then it is okay.

"I have always believed that the 105mm gun and the 75mm gun cannot replace the other with one gun, and you once talked to me about the light howitzer, and I have to admit that it is indeed much stronger than the French 75mm rapid-fire gun, and even better than any 3-inch gun. But the biggest problem with this gun is that it can't be high or low. ”

"It's really lightweight, it's more mobile, and it can be used wherever the 75mm gun can be used. The power of the shells is indeed great. However, do not forget about his old profession, which was originally a suppression artillery. Range is its key attribute. At a maximum elevation angle of 40 degrees, it is only about 9,200 meters. I find this a bit hard to accept. I once asked the artillery designers of Skoda and Krupp that any two-ton gun could have the ability to easily suppress this 1.5-ton light howitzer, which is very difficult for a divisional artilleryman! “

"In short, I don't agree with the fact that I want my army to be equipped with this kind of short-range and light-weight 105mm gun as a support artillery, I would rather use a heavier but long-range 105mm gun, and then specially equipped with a 77mm rapid-fire gun as a supplement. It is also reluctant to use all short-range 105mm guns of uniform specifications. Prince Leopold's opinion was very strong, and as the head of the Bavarian army, his opinion forced the prince to consider it carefully.

"Damn, my appetite is raised." His own uncle did not agree, and the prince could not force his way through. First, you are not the king, and second, you have to be reasonable. Then the prince was depressed, obviously the LEFH16 howitzer used by the Germans after 1916 in history was used very well, although the range was shorter, but it didn't say that the army would refuse to accept it. Why is there something wrong with this plane? It's the same thing as a machine gun, and my subordinates are all kept in good things!

However, after calming down, the prince had to admit that what Prince Leopold said did make sense...... The weight and performance of artillery itself are directly proportional, and the emphasis of suppression artillery and field artillery is different, and if you have to mix them up, there will indeed be a situation where nothing can be done well. The original intention of the prince was that the 2nd World War retained a large number of 3-inch guns because it was anti-tank. The absence of anti-tank in the 1st World War naturally made the existence of 3-inch field guns very weak. Similarly, individual 105mm light guns and 77mm rapid-fire guns weighed about the same, so they wanted to be universal, but the prince ignored the effect of lighter weight on the performance of 105mm guns.

In fact, there are indeed quite a few contemporaneous 105mm guns in history that can stabilize the German LEFH16 guns. For example, the French M1913 105mm howitzer has a column weight of 2300kg. The pitch angle was from 5 to 37 degrees, and the maximum elevation angle was even smaller than that of the German LEFH16 gun, but the muzzle velocity of the shell was 550 meters per second. You can shoot a shell out 12 kilometers! As long as the gun mount is slightly changed and the elevation angle is increased, the firing range still has the potential to increase, but even so, it is already almost 3 kilometers farther than the German ledh16.......

The Russians' M1910 107mm gun is not bad, with a column weight of only 2172kg, and the pitch angle is the same as that of the French artillery, but the muzzle velocity of the shell is as high as 630 meters! The maximum range is 12.5 km, which directly throws off lefh16 several streets! At the cost of a 600kg gun, it is really worth it to gain an absolute advantage in range as a suppression artillery. Of course, it will be very difficult for the nearly 2200kg artillery to accompany the infantry in battle, and this weight is a bit large.

Having understood this, the prince realized that the Bavarian artillery units could not be at a qualitative disadvantage in a confrontation at the division level, and what if they were to bet on the French M1913 105mm guns and the Russian M1910 107mm guns with good performance? You can only lengthen the body tube and enlarge the medicine room, which is the simplest and most realistic choice ....... Of course, the weight is up. It's a bit difficult to accompany infantry or commandos.

Therefore, in the subsequent improvement plan for Prince Leopold, although the prince was very depressed, he agreed with the prince's opinion and eliminated the original LEFH16 howitzer from the Bavarian army in order to replace it with a heavier, but longer-range 105mm howitzer!

"Is that right? Originally, we had an advantage in transporting equipment, and in this case, we could naturally equip more artillery. Looking at the papers in his hand and the somewhat depressed prince opposite, Prince Leopold said with great satisfaction, and the prince assured that at least a third of the uncle's good mood was due to the fact that he was ...... deflated.

"Actually, there is another reason why we can't eliminate medium-caliber artillery, in the future, our army will be equipped with aircraft, and the enemy's army will also be equipped with aircraft and airships, so the problem of air defense of the ground forces is obvious, it is impossible to completely rely on the air force, all kinds of machine guns have limited range and firing height, at this time we need to get some anti-aircraft artillery, and a long-barreled, high muzzle velocity artillery is indispensable." Prince Leopold's words completely untied the knot in the prince's heart.

"yes, I forgot about that." The prince said with some shame. Although the Air Force in World War 1 is not very powerful, and Germany will not encounter strategic bombing at the level of the United States and Britain similar to World War 2, air defense is still needed, at least on the Western Front, and the British V400 and V1500 are not vegetarians! The bomb load of the latter is also about 3 tons! Absolutely nightmare level for the ground forces of this era!

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