"Were Russian guns and ammo made deliberately large?" Topic

I can't think of a title that will fit, so go with me on this.

For "years" I have heard that the Russians made their standard weapons slightly larger than the comparable weapons of the rest of the field, so that THEY could use captured ammo, but their enemies could not.
Thus, the ammo from a Bad Guy 81mm would work in a Russian 82mm mortar, but not vice versa.

Is this true, a little bit true, almost true, generally true or just a myth?

I've heard that rumour many times over the years, but I've spoken with guys who actually tried it that it doesn't work.

Yeah, on paper their thing might be bigger than our thing by one millimeter, but both things are chambered differently so that nothing from the one is interchangable with the other.

Mostly myth. Yes, you can fire 81mm ammo from an 82mm mortar if you aren't too worried about accuracy, and 120 mm mortar ammo works if the firing pins are in the right place, but that is about it. You can't fire any cased ammo from the other guy's weapon without modifying the chamber.

The reason for the larger caliber depends on the specific weapon. The Soviets made a 45 mm AT gun when everyone else had a 37 mm because they wanted an HE capability. They didn't think the 37 mm was big enough. For some larger caliber guns like the 115 mm smoothbore, the problem was metallurgy. They decided to increase armor penetration by increasing caliber instead of the higher cost of production for improved ammo.

Whenever I heard that rumor, it was usually as some sinister but clever Commie plot. The moral of the story was that "We never learn!"

It might have been true in the days of smoothbore cannon but not since rifling came along. Even then firing shot that was too small through a smoothbore cannon was not very effective.

I read this in a work by Viktor Suvorov, so take it for what it is worth. According to him, it was done so ammunition types would not mixed up.

IIRC, it started after a field test of Katyusha rocket launchers failed because the wrong ammunition was delivered.

The moral of the story was that "We never learn!"

Still haven't, apparently.

120 mm mortar ammo works if the firing pins are in the right place

As regards 120 mm mortars, my understanding is that the Soviets were actually the first to introduce them in the late 30's, at a time when most other armies were mostly busy with 81 mm mortars.

The success of the Soviet design then inspired various other armies to develop their own versions (or just copy the Soviet design).

The only one that works at all is the morter. But, that one millimeter is a very important one. You dont get a good seal on the gas, so it doesnt go anywhere near as far as you want it. It is also bouncing around as it comes out the end, so you dont know where exactly it is going. And not just by a little bit.

think of how accurate a brown Bess musket is. And it has thgter tolerances than that. So it is more accurate than that 82 firing an 81. And the longer the range the greater the divergence is going to be. So out at a thousanf yards, you are going to be lucky to get within a couple hundred yards of your target.

An old myth, one I heard when I first joined the army. Soemthing drill sgts tell young troops for some reason.

owen

The Germans used 7.92mm ammo while the Soviets 7.62mm so somewhere they went wrong.

My understanding is that when the Imperial Russian government bought the rights to manufacture the Schneider-Danglis 75mm gun under license in 1909, they upped it to a 76.2mm which was already their standard. If this was a plot, it was a pre-Commie plot. And wait a minute, weren't the Germans using a 77mm gun in 1909?

Grelber

76.2mm comes from the Vickers 3 inch gun that the Russians bought at the turn of the 19th century, the 152mm comes from a British 6inch design 122mm was from a Schneider design.

This tired old story gets trooped out every few years. No basis in fact (not even close). What's more amusing is the characters who 'on good authority' put this old chestnut out there. They're usually pushing some wacko conspiracy agenda of their own.

I read this in a work by Viktor Suvorov, so take it for what it is worth.

Suvorov was a low-level army intelligence officer who made big broad pronouncements to pump up his own marketability, and wrote what he thought he could sell to a paranoid US public.

According to him, it was done so ammunition types would not mixed up.

IIRC, it started after a field test of Katyusha rocket launchers failed because the wrong ammunition was delivered.

I think you are getting two stories mixed up.

Story one: Clever Russkies make their kit a bit bigger, so they can shoot captured enemy ammo but the enemy can't shoot captured Russky ammo. Examples are Russian 82mm Mortar vs. German 81mm mortar, and Russian 7.62mm Tokarev pistol round vs. German 7.63mm Mauser pistol round.

No, wait, that last one is backwards. What gives? Well in fact the Tokarev cartridge WAS adopted as a copy of the Mauser round. They were both actually the same caliber (who builds pistols to 1/100 of a MM tolerances anyways?). But the Soviets hot-loaded their rounds, so that you could shoot a German 7.63mm round from your Tokarev pistol, but if you tried to shoot a Soviet 7.62mm round from your Mauser broomhandle pistol (or your 7.63mm Luger, or Walther) you just might blow the gun up in your hand. But this was not because of some very clever Soviet plan. It was because they loaded a lot of 7.62mm ammo for use ONLY in submachine guns. They would be dangerous to use in a Tokarev pistol too!

Story two: The Katyusha rocket was identified as 132mm. The clever Russkies did this to avoid confusion. This one is true. Stalin attended a test of the 130mm Katyusha rocket launcher, which was shrouded in state secrecy. There was some confusion about the ammunition for this secret weapon, and 130mm cannon rounds had been brought. It had more to do with the secrecy of the ammo and weapon than the caliber issue, as the Soviets managed multiple types of 7.62mm small arms ammo, 76.2mm howitzer and cannon ammo, and 122mm howitzer, cannon and rocket ammo. But Stalin suggested changing the official designation of the caliber to 132mm vs. 130mm, and so it was done.

Not particularly clever. Not particularly Russian, either, as the British (77mm gun in the Comet vs. 76.2mm 17pdr in the Firefly) and Americans (3-inch gun in the M10 vs. 76mm gun in the M18) did similar things.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

Story two: The Katyusha rocket was identified as 132mm. The clever Russkies did this to avoid confusion. This one is true. Stalin attended a test of the 130mm Katyusha rocket launcher, which was shrouded in state secrecy. There was some confusion about the ammunition for this secret weapon, and 130mm cannon rounds had been brought. It had more to do with the secrecy of the ammo and weapon than the caliber issue…

I'm surprised that heads didn't literally roll for that… Uncle Joe was not particularly tolerant of failures of any type.

You all have it wrong. Commie propaganda, and Commie sympathizer who own the media, have obscured the truth for decades. Those Ruskie rounds were a little bit bigger because they were recasts. The Sovs had been pirating German ammo for years. Some of this stuff still turns up on ebay…

geifbringer

the 120 is a French design they seem to get mortars, this Brandt guy seems to have figured it out.

link

Lord Ghee

Why am I reminded of the story of the US trying to stage a propaganda coup during the Cold War, by ordering several million 12 inch condoms from a Russian manufacturer.

The Soviets delivered them in boxes marked 'small'…

:-)

But Stalin suggested … and so it was done.

Yes, as already mention by other Vets, 81mm round fired from 82mm tube … is going to be inaccurate …

I was told it was the Chinese- and this was in about 1989!

Soviet Union is like Texas, everything is bigger.

Looking at the precise (nearest thou) dimensions of some mortar bombs in my '75 edition of Jane's Infantry Weapons, I found that some "81mm" bombs had exactly the same diameter over the bourrelets as some "82mm" bombs.

Given that the original Stokes calibre of 3.2in is 81.28mm, I think it more likely that the Russians just rounded up where everyone else rounded down (don't forget the Germans referred to the GrW34 as an 8cm weapon).

There is more to mortar round compatibility than just calibre; late marks of British 3-in mortar were capable of firing captured German or Italian 81mm rounds because the firing-pin arrangements had been re-jigged from the earlier marks, which couldn't.

All the best,

John.

There is a grain of truth to the rumor, but just a grain.

The Vietnamese used us 81mm mortar rounds in their 82mm Soviet mortars. The Soviet mortars were designed for with that feature in mind. However, as near as I can tell, that is the only example of such a feature in use anywhere.

There are rumors that rifles designed for the the Soviet 7.62x54mm rimmed rifle round would fire fire 7.62x57mm NATO unrimmed ammunition and there are other rumors that heavy machine guns chambered for the Soviet 12.7x108mm can fire US 12.7x99mm Browning ammo. I've even heard those rumors from men who served in the military. However, those rumors are false.

Russian 7.62 rimmed rifles cannot chamber the larger NATO rounds,nor will Soviet HMGs chamber the smaller US rounds, which are nearly 1/2 an inch too short for the Soviet HMGs' firing chamber.

I imagine a good bit of the popularity of these rumors stems from Cold War era servicemen (and women) who had a great deal of time to discuss Soviet weaponry, but little actual opportunity to see or interact with it. Once a rumor spreads it's hard to squash, and all the more so when information was harder to come by (in other words, no one in 1976 could look online to verify these rumors and using books was too much trouble).

It reminds me of the college freshmen I teach who sometimes ask "what did you do when you wanted to know something and you didn't know where to look before the internet?" They're always shocked when I tell them "sometimes, we just didn't know, and couldn't find out, and had to learn to live with it."

Of course, the Puckle gun has them all beat, because it could fire square bullets…. ;-)

Soviet guns sometimes missrepresented their actual calibre to make their names look different as a precaution against incompetent logistics officers. I think German and Russian pistols had interchangable ammo in WW2 as well; reason why the Germans loved the PPSH so much.

Similar stuff went on in allied armies – i.e. the British 3" mortar was actually an 81mm weapon, the 106mm and 107mm recoiless rifles and mortars were both an identical 4.2"…

tended to be evolutionary as re-using the same for new weapons saved on tooling and handling systems, but odd terminology was used to differentiate weapons.

There were exceptions. The British 25 pounder was a new (to the British) 88mm calibre, although the 5.5" gun/howitzer reflected the calibre of a WW1 export gun developed by Vickers for use on light cruisers. Post war 120mm tank guns use, of course, 4.7" calibre, which was the British standard destroyer calibre up until 1943.

As someone has mentioned, Soviet calibres included .3" (7.62mm),0.5" (12.7mm), 1.5" (37mm), 1.77" (45mm), 2" (57mm), 3" (76.2mm), 3.22" (82mm), 3.35" (85mm), 3.9" (100mm), 4.7" (120mm), 4.8" (122mm) 6" (152mm) and 8" (203mm)… Of these only 45mm, 82mm and 122mm were uniquely Soviet.

Soviet guns sometimes missrepresented their actual calibre to make their names look different…

This is done by all countries, by almost all makers of firearms or ammunition. Sometimes it is done to distinguish the caliber (give it a useful name), and sometimes it is done by happenstance, depending on whether the naming party is measuring the bore to the lands or the grooves, or to high or low precision, or just rounding for convenience.

British .303 guns fire bullets that are actually .311inch caliber.
So also the Argentine Mauser in 7.65mm fires bullets that are .311inch, even though 7.65mm = .301, not .311.
So also the Russian Mosin Nagant in 7.62mm fires bullets that are .311inch, even though 7.62mm = .30, not .311.
So also the Japanese Arisaka in 7.7mm fires bullets that are .311inch, even though 7.7mm works out to … wait for it … .303inch!
The US .30-06 (.30inch m1906) round is actually .308 caliber.
The NATO 7.62mm round is also .308 caliber, notably smaller than Russian 7.62mm bullets.
The US .38 special is .354 caliber, as is the .357 Magnum round.
The pistol cartridge called .32 ACP in the US is called 7.65mm (.301, not .32) in Europe.
And the famous 7.92mm Mauser round fired by so many German guns during WW2 is called 8mm Mauser when it is sold in the civilian market.

So don't get too wrapped up in the 81 vs. 82mm stuff. I would be VERY surprised if there is ANY dimension of an 81mm mortar round that measures out to 81mm.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

"Not particularly clever. Not particularly Russian, either, as the British (77mm gun in the Comet vs. 76.2mm 17pdr in the Firefly) and Americans (3-inch gun in the M10 vs. 76mm gun in the M18) did similar things."

For the 3" vs. 76mm, I believe that the Army was standardizing some of the designations to millimeters, and that this gun wasn't the only one affected.

"As regards 120 mm mortars, my understanding is that the Soviets were actually the first to introduce them in the late 30's, at a time when most other armies were mostly busy with 81 mm mortars."

Soviets tested a single battery in 1939 during the Winter War, although it was in very limited production prior to that.

Have to say it is a myth with legs.

In my long run in intelligence this came up more times over the years then I care to remember. The refrain went something like this:
Our main gun was the 90mm the Russians had the 100
Our main gun was the 105 the Russians had a 110
Our main gun was a 120 they hade a 125
This was usually followed by a comment the then "Soviets" had adaptors so they could use captured NATO rounds!

Dont think theres anything significant in it below the kiloton level.
Ive read that soviet missile payloads were bigger to compensate for poorer guidance systems. And of course giant mortars that noone else makes

For the 3" vs. 76mm, I believe that the Army was standardizing some of the designations to millimeters, and that this gun wasn't the only one affected.

It is true that the US Army Ordnance boys moved from primarily imperial to primarily metric measures, but this was by no means a trigger event in any inter-war or WW2 weapon developments.

The 76mm gun M1 (and M1A1) was named so specifically to distinguish it from the 3-inch gun M1918 (and M5 and M6) that were already in service (or in development). This is made plane in the documents during the proposal and development of the gun.

The Armor Board determined that the 3-inch gun was too bulky and heavy for service in turrets of the size used in the M4 medium and the developmental series T20/22/23 that were intended to replace the M4. (No one mentioned that to the Tank Destroyer Board, who put it into a turret on the M4-based M10!). So a new gun was developed from scratch to replace the 3-inch gun, with a new barrel, breach and recoil mechanism that were substantially lighter in weight and less bulky. It fired a new cartridge that was substantially shorter than the 3-inch gun (to be handier in the confines of a turret), yet generated the same chamber pressure by using more modern propellants, and fired the same projectiles as the 3-inch gun with equivalent ballistic performance.

Given that the two guns would fire the same family of projectiles with almost identical performance, but the cartridges were entirely different, it was decided that the new guns would not be called 3-inch guns in order to prevent confusion.

This is no different from what the British did with the 77mm gun, which was originally termed a 75mm QF gun in development. This gun too used an entirely new cartridge, that would not be usable in any other British gun of the era (nor since). When it was decided to fire the same family of 76.2mm projectiles as the 17pdr, the gun was re-named 77mm to distinguish it from both 75mm and 76.2mm guns.

It is also no different from the Soviets naming the BM-13 rocket launcher projectiles as 132mm, to avoid confusion with 130mm cannon rounds already in service.

As mentioned above, what developers/using armies call the caliber of any particular weapon is seldom the exact actual caliber of that weapon. It is a name, to help people keep track of it's approximate place is within the family of weapons.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)