A mysterious 152 H/30

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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#16

Post by Juha Tompuri » 20 Jul 2013, 00:05

And these:
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2740.JPG
2741.JPG

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JTV
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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#17

Post by JTV » 20 Jul 2013, 11:32

Juha, very nice photos, but it seems you may have missed the money shot. I visited the museum yesterday and noticed these in front end of the recoil mechanism under the barrel. Is that diamond inside a circle a factory identification marking?

Jarkko
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152H30_marking_under_barrel.JPG
152 H/30 markings


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Juha Tompuri
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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#18

Post by Juha Tompuri » 20 Jul 2013, 21:04

JTV wrote:Juha, very nice photos, but it seems you may have missed the money shot.
Yep.
Last May Me & family were just passing Hämeenlinna during a family tour, and I managed to "negotiate" a half an hour stop at the "new" museum. Just when leaving the museum (indoor exhibitions) I remembered the ain92 questions about the at the outdoor exhibition gun and rushed there (on "overtime" ) to get even some shots in order to help a friend.
Gladly you seemed to have concentrated better than me to the gun and it's markings.

Regards, Juha

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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#19

Post by ain92 » 22 Jul 2013, 20:16

Juha and Jarkko, thank you both for your photos. Although I expected for a photo of the breech block itself (two lines of text can be seen on the attached image; besides them I'm interested in markings of the gunsight), markings are quite interesting. I've never seen any markings on the front flat end of cradle. I have already asked an artillery enthusiast in Perm to look for information about this artillery piece.
152mm_m1930_hameenlinna_2_crop.jpg
Derivative of a photo by User:Balcer
152mm_m1930_hameenlinna_2_crop.jpg (23.01 KiB) Viewed 488 times
I also attached my photo of breechblock of a M1909/30 No. 1804, (this's number of barrel, its year is 1938, carriage No. 750 marked in 1941, and number of breechblock you see on the photo) for comparison.
JTV wrote:Is that diamond inside a circle a factory identification marking?
ain92 wrote:markings almost always include not only two numbers, but also a lot of useful things:
… factory sign (encircled diamond for Motovilikha)
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100_9151_crop.jpg
My photo of breechblock of 152 mm M1909/30
Last edited by ain92 on 22 Jul 2013, 21:26, edited 1 time in total.
With best regards, Ilya.

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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#20

Post by JTV » 22 Jul 2013, 20:52

ain92 wrote:Although I expected for a photo of the breech block itself (two lines of text can be seen on the attached image)... .
I had similar expectations, since it would be the obvious place to search them, but they seem to be Finnish markings. Top line says "152 H/30" and lower one says "No 32" (number 32) with the same font. The selector switch right of it also has Finnish texts, so it seems that for some reason the Soviet markings in this area were replaced with Finnish ones. Could be that the original breech block was replaced during the earlier mentioned repair done in 1944 - or maybe State Artillery Factory (VTT) was under orders to replace certain markings with Finnish ones in those guns that it repaired?

BTW: I have to admit, that did not notice markings on the gun cradle until I had already inspected the gun once and almost given up hope.

Jarkko
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152H30_breech_block.jpg
152 H/30 breech block markings

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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#21

Post by ain92 » 25 Jul 2013, 18:02

Thank you for the photo of the breechblock. It seems to be Finnish-produced, and I surmise that the original one is rusting in one of numerous waterbodies near Soviet-Finnish border. Could you also provide a photo of howitzer from the same side as in my post of 21 June for comparance?
I have good news from Perm — I got quite a lot of information from there (can attribute the source if needed). I'm sorry, but I have to disappoint Esa Muikku — the gun a little bit less precious than we thought before because it's not a development prototype but a production model. ;-) This is a very interesting story though absolutely unknown.

So this artillery piece was developed by V. Sidorenko, A. Ploskirev, S. Kunashev and other constructors of Technical bureau of Motovilikha Plant in 1930. The project was called there "152-mm howitzer, capitally improved", shortly "KM". The carriage was left unchanged, so the traverse remained the same (5°40′), but the muzzle velocity was increased from 381 m/s to 480 m/s. The maximum range (firing on full charge with a long-range round) was 11,800 m vs. 8,850 m. However, new howitzer was quite heavier (3125 kg vs. 2725 kg).
The development prototype (on the black and white photo earlier) was build in 1931 but the technology complexity and absence of the metal wheels with rubber (non-pneumatic) tires that should be produced on Factory No. 7 (better known as "Arsenal") in Leningrad. So the serial production was started only in 1934 (six howitzers). In the next year the factory manufactured 50 artillery pieces (plan — 50) and production was continued later. In 1941 Red Army had 101 howitzers summarized, of which 36 were in southern military districts and 65 in "inner" (non-near-border) ones.
P.S.
Can't this howitzer have a Beute number 444 and be so 15,2 cm s.F.H. 444(r)?
With best regards, Ilya.

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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#22

Post by JTV » 27 Jul 2013, 08:57

ain92 wrote:. Could you also provide a photo of howitzer from the same side as in my post of 21 June for comparance??
Sorry, I do not have such picture. It is in middle of gun field with long row of artillery pieces on its sides. The way it is located, it is basically impossible to take side profile picture of this gun without at least one of the other guns next to it getting in a way.

Jarkko

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Re: A mysterious 152 H/30

#23

Post by Esa Muikku » 27 Jul 2013, 23:51

I visited the not-so-rare gun today. ;-)

Here is some additional data:
- Text in barrel says "152 mm howitzer mod. 1930 g. N 32 * 1934. Weight with breech block and muzzle brake 1542 kg. Weight without breech block and muzzle brake 1422 kg."
- As you can see, the muzzle brake is not exactly as in 152 mm ML-20: it is longer and the last three openings are divided.
- Breech ring has text (below the breech block, close to the pull eye): "N 1124. F 230". I wonder what that F 230 stands for.
- Yes, from the Finnish style markings (152 H/30 No 32) we can suspect that the original breech block was removed and hidden/destroyed so a new one had to be assembled from the spare parts of model 09-30, adjusted and numbered according to the barrel.
- Cradle text is, as shown in the photo provided by Jarkko: "N 1047 - 1934 g".
- I could not find the original carriage number anywhere. It is not there, where it should be. However, the barrel winch has the number 1024, but that device, if damaged or lost, may have been taken from another gun (152 mm howitzer 09-30 seems to have a similar one) and adjusted to this gun. According to my opinion, chances are 50-50 that the Finnish carriage label is correct (cradle number matches the carriage number and barrel winch is from another gun) or not (cradle number does not match the carriage number but to the barrel winch number).

I wonder, how the limber for this gun looked like. It may have been similar to 09-30, which this one resembles in quite many ways.
However, this one has two pairs of elevation gears and teeth arcs, loading tray hinged in a different way, bulkier travel lock pieces on cradle sides,...

PS. Ain92, I sent you a PM.

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