V.S.Baranovsky's quick-shooters
History weapons. And it so happened that in the mid-60s, European armies decided to acquire new types of artillery pieces. Unlike the previous rifled, but still muzzle-loaded guns, breech-loading systems with rifled barrels made of steel were adopted. The reason is simple: the experience of the war between the North and the South and the spread of new metalworking technologies, which made it possible to establish the production of fairly cheap and durable steel. All this taken together gave a sharp leap in the development of artillery weapons.
After all, steel has a much greater strength than bronze, from which gun barrels were made before, and it is less susceptible to corrosion than, say, cast iron and iron. By adding various alloying additives, they began to obtain alloys with high toughness and elasticity, which were well suited for the manufacture of new gun barrels.
So in Russia at the end of the 60s of the XIX century, systems of several calibers with steel rifled barrels, wedge locks and iron carriages entered the artillery. Accordingly, new ammunition was also adopted for them, in which not gunpowder was used as a filling, but pyroxylin or melinite. Naturally, the destructive power of such shells has increased significantly. But the range and accuracy of artillery fire also increased.
And only the rate of fire of the new guns remained, as before, low: 1,5–2 rounds per minute and no more.
The reason was that the old, separate loading was used in the new types of guns. First, the barrel of the gun was transferred to a horizontal position and the bolt was opened. After that, a projectile was first put into the charging chamber, and then a charge that looked like a bag of gunpowder. Then came the pallet with the primer. And only after all these manipulations with loading, it was possible to close the bolt (while the percussion mechanism was cocked), direct the gun at the target and fire a shot. All these operations took time, and each time after a shot it was necessary to correct the sight.
It would seem, what is simpler: to enlarge the sleeve of hand-held small arms (fortunately, such ammunition has already been used), attach a projectile to it, and load the gun “in one fell swoop”. Shotguns firing unitary cartridges clearly showed that this path was correct. However, it was so easy to take and enlarge the rifle case and insert it into the gun barrel - for a long time it did not work.
First of all, it was necessary to establish the production of such ammunition, and with very high dimensional accuracy in order to ensure good obturation. During the shot, the gas pressure expanded the sleeve, and it was difficult to remove it from the charging chamber. In addition, the very design of a unitary cartridge for an artillery gun required the solution of a number of very specific problems.
And so one of the first artillerymen who managed to successfully solve all these problems was V.S.Baranovsky, a talented engineer and inventor.
And so, in 1871, tests began on his first two-inch (50-mm) rapid-fire cannon with cartridge loading.
It is interesting that it was arranged "in a rifle" style. To load the gun, the projectile was placed in a special tray on the bolt, then it was turned 180 degrees and sent to the charging chamber. At the same time, the cocking of the percussion mechanism took place at the same time.
But tests have shown that this design does not provide reliable obturation, although it is convenient in that the spent cartridges can be removed from the breech very easily.
A year later, a new weapon was delivered to the test site.
He already had a piston bolt with an automatically cocked drummer. There was also a new screw lift and slewing gear. The barrel was installed on the gun carriage of P.V. Baranovsky, the inventor's cousin. Moreover, to reduce the rollback, the carriage received a hydraulic brake and a spring reel, which, after firing, returned the barrel to its original position. That is, now this tool, in principle, no longer differed from modern ones, where all these devices are also available.
And also V.S.Baranovsky increased the caliber of his gun to 2,5 inches (63,5 mm), since the two-inch shells were too weak.
Horse artillery was the first branch of service to be armed with VS Baranovsky's rapid-fire cannons on a carriage of the simplest design in the Russian Imperial Army. The carriage had to withstand heavy loads, which is why the first thing that was paid attention to when creating it was strength. And it was the high strength of the new carriage that made it possible to adopt the 2,5-inch cannon for equestrian artillery.
But already in 1875 for the field 2,5-inch guns and on the landing 2,5-inch ship guns for fleet new, more advanced gun carriages began to be used.
Simultaneously with the work on the field and landing guns, V.S.Baranovsky began to create a mountain cannon.
This weapon was to be disassembled and transported on horseback. Therefore, it was decided to put a carriage for a 2,5-inch landing cannon on a collapsible iron carriage. Now, four horses were required to transport the new gun, and the gun itself could be easily assembled and disassembled.
In 1877, the gun went to part of the Russian army that fought in the Caucasus.
V.S.Baranovsky's innovation was also reflected in the fact that he installed SK Kaminsky's optical sights on his cannons, which helped to sharply increase the accuracy of direct fire.
Nevertheless, the rapid-fire guns of V.S.Baranovsky, which gave five rounds per minute, which was a very high rate for that time, did not become the main type of field artillery of the Russian Imperial Army.
Their caliber was too small. Meanwhile, by the beginning of the twentieth century, both in our army and abroad, guns of much larger calibers and, accordingly, with a more powerful projectile were adopted.
First of all, the caliber 76,2 mm (3 inches) was used. In France, the famous Schneider 75-mm cannon (1897) was adopted. In Germany, the basis was the 77-mm Krupp gun (1896). In Austria-Hungary - Skoda gun, caliber 76,5 mm (1905).
And only in Great Britain the caliber was chosen more - 18 pounds or 83,8 mm (1903). The fact is that with an increase in the caliber of the projectile by only 20%, its mass almost doubled, and the firing range increased by 2,5-3 times. These guns could already fight not only the enemy's manpower, but also hit his fortifications, fire at rear targets.
And 2,5-inch guns could do none of this ...
V.S.Baranovsky also designed a six-barrel canister of 4,2 line (10,68 mm) caliber - more advanced than the Gatling mitrailleus. The shooter rotated the handle, a block of six barrels began to rotate, and the canister began to shoot. The magazine for 25 unitary cartridges was inserted from above. The cartridge, when turning the block of barrels by 1 step (1/6 of the circle), was sent to the chamber, while the percussion mechanism was cocked, and since the block continued to rotate, a shot followed. When turning one more step, the spent cartridge case was thrown away, and the bolt itself retreated back to the extreme position. Such a device made it possible to achieve a rate of fire of 250 rounds per minute, but, again, this depended on the physical capabilities of the shooter, who simply could not turn the handle for a long time.
That is why mechanical grape-shots were completely supplanted by machine guns, which did not have such problems in principle.
And although VS Baranovsky's "quick-fighters" did not play a special role in the wars of the Russian Empire, it was the design decisions that he put into these guns that had a huge impact on all subsequent field guns in Russia for many years to come. And not only in Russia.
TTX cannon Baranovsky
Caliber - 2,5 inches (63,5 mm).
Barrel length - 1260 / 19,8 mm / clb.
Barrel bore length - 1070 / 16,8 mm / cb.
The length of the threaded part is 778 mm.
The number of grooves is 20.
The steepness of the grooves - 30 calibers.
The depth of the grooves is 0,635 mm.
The initial velocity of the projectile - 427 m / s.
Tabular firing range - 1830 m.
Maximum firing range - 2800 m.
The weight of the lock is 8,4 kg.
Barrel weight with lock - 106 kg (96,6 kg - mountain gun).
The mass of the gun in the firing position is 272 kg.
Rate of fire - 5 shots / min.
Baranovsky also developed unitary shells for his guns.
So, the ammunition of the mountain gun of the gun included: a double-walled grenade made of cast iron with two copper belts, having a length of 3,5 klb and weighing 4 kg. The weight of the explosive was 72,5 g. Fuse: shock tube designed by Baranovsky; shrapnel, which had iron walls and a cast-iron screw-in bottom, also with two copper belts and a length of 3,5 clb. The weight of the explosive was 30 g. And its filling consisted of 88 bullets, 10,7 g each, with a diameter of 12,7 mm. The distance tube was calculated for 10 seconds of maximum burning.
Buckshot was not relied on for Baranovsky's mountain guns. If necessary, the shrapnel was simply set for 0,1 s. The cartridge for all types of guns consisted of an iron pan and a tin sleeve.
A cast-iron grenade weighing 2,55 kg, 2,6 clb in length and a charge of 90 g of gunpowder was relied on for the landing cannon. The shrapnel had a weight of 2,4 kg and a length of 2,9 klb. The buckshot was in a tin shell, had a weight of 3,35 kg, a length of 3,9 klb and contained 96 bullets with a diameter of 19 mm and a mass of 25,6 g. The casings and tubes were the same for all types of shells for Baranovsky's cannons. The cartridge case was composite: a steel pallet and a body rolled up from tin-plated sheet metal.
All the warships of the Russian Imperial Navy were armed with Baranovsky's landing guns, and as such they were actively used in the battles of the Russo-Japanese War and in the suppression of the uprising of the "Boxers" in China.
PS
The author and the administration of the site express their sincere gratitude to N. Mikhailov and A. Bazhin for the photographic materials they provided from the Central Naval Museum named after Emperor Peter the Great (TsVMM), St. Petersburg.
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