I need help to Id mortar

[Sturm78]

Hi all,

Can anyone help me to identify this mortar in use with the German troops?



Thanks in advance. Regards Sturm78

[Alanmccoubrey]

It looks like the French Mortier Brandt de 81mm 31/38 but it could as easily be the Italian copy both of which the Germans used.

[Sturm78]

Hi all,

I found on Ebay this image showing a mortar in action with german troops in Italy. Can anybody help me to Identify it

Thanks in advance. Sturm78

[s.pak]

thi is 12cm s.Gr.Werfer 42

patrick

[Sturm78]

Hi all,

Could someone help me to identify this mortar used by Spanish troops (Division Azul) on the Eastern Front?

Thanks in advance. Regards Sturm78

PD: Thank you for your help, Patrick, and sorry for delay

[SASH155]

This is probably a captured Soviet 82mm PM-36 (note the square baseplate, length of ordnance beyond the yoke and recoil cylinders, and the form of the reinforced muzzle). It also might be a German 8cm sGrW-34, but it does'nt seem to match in ceratin particulars. By the way the French Brandt mortar in the top photo (which was the progenitor of all the mortars mentioned above) was designated "Mortier de 81 Brandt mle. 1927/31"; if instead its the Italian made copy it's the "Modello 1935".

[Sturm78]

Hi SASH155,

Ummmh, I am not sure about 82mm PM 36. See http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=16166.
It seems that 82mm PM36 had a round plate base

It is a pity that there are so few photos of Soviet weaponry

Regards Sturm78

[SASH155]

If I am not mistaken the original PM-36 82mm mortars had a square baseplate, whereas it was changed to the round one with the PM-37 model. I am going to go over this photo again to be totally sure (if it's not a captured P-36 then it is probably a German 8cm sGrW-34).

[Grzesio]

I am not sure about 82mm PM 36

it was changed to the round one with the PM-37 model

O boy, there's a lot of mess with designations here!
NONE of these mortars was ever designated as the PM-whatever. The abbreviation PM (ПМ) comes from Polkovoi Minomet or Regimental Mortar and refers to 120 mm mortars. I.e. one could talk about PM-38, PM-41 or PM-43 - but, to be honest, I've encountered the PM-38 only. The full designation of a mortar was like this: 120 mm regimental mortar mod. 1938 yr.
Then - 82 mm mortars were classified as battalion mortars (batalionnyi minomet),
50 mm mortars were classified as company mortars (rotnyi minomet),
and finally, the 107 mm mortars were classified as a mountain-mounted mortar or chemical mortars (e.g. MS-107 or KhM-107).

82 mm battalion mortar mod. 1936 had a rectangular base plate, mod. 1937 - a round plate, mod. 1941 and 1943 - a round plate and a monopod with wheels.
The one in the picture looks like the mod. 1936 indeed.

Regards

Grzesio

[SASH155]

I have usually seen the 120mm mortars designated as the HM-38 or its slightly modified version (with longer recoil system cylinders) as the HM-43; I will double check what I have in my Russian source books.

[Grzesio]

There's no need to check, the problem is obviously with Cyrillic!

Because - in English transcription rotnyi minomet is abbreviated as RM of course, BUT it is written as РМ in Russian - from ротный миномет. This is why 50 mm mortars in the link above are designated as PM - what is incorrect, as this is a Cyrillic not English abbreviation.

Then, 82 mm batalionnyi minomet is abbreviated as BM in English, and written in Cyrillic as БМ - from батальонный миномет.

And finally, 120 mm polkovoj minomet should be abbreviated as PM in English, what corresponds to ПМ - from полковой миномет in Russian.

It's pretty obvious, that someone was fooled by the Russian letter П and wrote it as the H due to no better idea - and so gave birth to non-existing 120 mm HM mortars.

This last abbreviation can be even more confusing, as it dangerously resembles a chemical mortar - химический миномет, abbreviated as ХМ in Cyrillic and KhM - from khimicheskyi minomet - in English. The problem is, the Russian letter х phonetically transcribed as kh, actually corresponds to the Latin letter h - so this incorrect abbreviation HM can be confused with KhM.
(HM in Cyrillic actually means NM in Latin, while ИМ in Cyrillic is IM in Latin. )

And so - if we write correctly transcribed abbreviations in English, we have 50 mm RM mortars, 82 mm BM, 107 mm KhM and 120 mm PM.

Regards

Grzesio

[Sturm78]

Thank you very much for your information, Grzesio

Have you another wartime photo of a 82mm M1936 soviet mortar?

Regards Sturm78

[Sturm78]

Hi all,

I guess standard 8cm Gr.Wfr.34 but I am not sure. I know it is a difficult question but....

Image from Ebay
Regards Sturm78

[Sturm78]

Hi all,

I need help with this captured mortar:

Image from Ebay
Thanks in advance. Sturm78

[Sturm78]

Hi all,

I found this image on Ebay. I think it is the same mortar of my last image on this thread. Can somebody identify them?

Thanks in advance.
Regards Sturm78