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How common was that? I'm under the impression Soviet 76mm field guns were primarily used as direct fire weapons. Including the variant mounted in the Su-76.
A bit off topic but...In WW I even the French figured out in a few weeks that field guns use in the direct fire role didn't last long
Other. Please nominate your favorite long range field artillery weapon (i.e. not siege artillery.)
I'm curious as to how the various CW field artillery compared?
Besides the 25 pdr (85mm I think) there was the 4.5 inch how, 60 pdr, 6" gun 6" how.
When employed for indirect fire it had the same shortcoming as all other 75mm artillery pieces. The HE filler was too small to be effective against field fortifications. That's why most nations stepped up to 105mm for division light howitzers as a result of WWI experience.76mm remained in service after the war for quite a few years, and certainly had no issues with indirect fire in its post war guise
The British army spent very little money on artillery between the wars. Most of the money went to the RAF and the Navy.
I cant really comment too much about the US 105mm and in reality my comments were about the limits of the german ordinance in harsh weather conditions. These were reported on numerous occasions by the Germans themselves, starting with the failure of Operation Typhoon and continuing throughout the war. I admit I am not entirely sure what was wrong with the, in entirety, but it appears many of the hydraulic recoil systems seized, the synthetic o-rings, flanges and the like just shattered. German guns were on the heavy side, which affected their mobility. Many mechaisms in the German guns were machined to too finer tolerances, meaning that bearings and sleeves and the like frequently just seized up in the cold. Many of their synthetic oils and lubricants just froze solid. Finally the solid road wheels often prevented them from being moved at all. So, as a piece of equipment in cold conditions, German guns were not a success. Superior German training meant that the Germans maged in spite of their equipment, not because of it.
Now the 25 pounder was never really tested in cold climate conditions, but its predecessor, the 18/25 was used in Norway. Have not heard of any failures when used in that theatre. 25 pounders were used in cold conditions in Korea. AFAIK ther were no serious issues in their performance. British guns continued to operate, I think a lot of that was because of the simplicity of the design, which was a feature conspicuously lacking in German designs. But also the mkaterials used in the manufacture, the tolerances that the gun was designed to all showed no real signs of problem that I am aware of. The lighweight construction of the 25 pounder was a major advantage, as was the pnematic tyresd, which could have the tyres dflated to assist movement through the snow or mud.
So my opinion is that if the British had been called to deply their divisional artillery into arctic subzero conditions they have continued to function
Most nations still had a bunch of 75mm weapons left over from WWI. Typically they were rebuilt with a modern gun carriage that allowed high elevation fire and faster road transport. However not many nations kept 75mm artillery pieces in mass production except as specialized weapons for use by mountain troops and cavalry.
Let's look at German field artillery production for 1939.
Production Stats on German Tube-fired Weapons 1939-1945
8 x 10.5cm K18. Not standard issue. Probably manufactured for export. Very long range.
15 x 15cm K39. Export weapons intended for Turkey. Very long range.
8 x 7.5cm leFK18. Cavalry weapons?
59 x 7.5cm Geb.Gesch. 36. Lightweight mountain howitzers.
483 x 10.5cm leFH18. Standard issue German light howitzer.
190 x 15cm sFH18. Standard issue German heavy howitzer.
58 x 21cm Mörser 18. Limited production weapons for use against fortifications.
290 x 7.5cm leIG18. Light infantry guns. 400kg.
.....WWI era Germany employed the 608kg 7.62cm Infanteriegeschütz L16.5 for direct fire support. This is the replacement.
48 x 15cm sIG33. Heavy infantry guns. 1,800kg.
.....Too heavy to be man handled. Consequently they were mounted on obsolete light tank chassis from 1940 onward. The resulting inexpensive sIG33 SP weapon worked well.
Most of the rest of your list is specialty guns or heavy artillery. The 10.5cm K18 was a 10.5cm barrel on the carriage of the 15cm sFH18. it was not export. but it was a corp level gun and not division.
The 25pdr was barely in production in 1939. The BEF in France used late model 18pdr guns rebarreled to use 25pdr ammunition. The 4.5in gun (not howitzer) and the 5.5in used the same carriage for a big savings in design cost and effort and in manufacturing. Niether shows up in numbers until 1941. The early 7.2in howitzer was another monstrosity that did work, but just barely. It could be quite entertaining to watch one being fired, of course the entertainment value goes up with the distance from the gun.The US did use a 4.5in gun.
The barrel was mounted on the 155 howitzer carriage.
Sure is a big difference but -40c is the same as -40f and Shilo manitoba is colder then Minsk by several degrees for an average winter temp. Suggestion don't clean your car windows when its -40 from personal expierienceTHere is a big difference in how things work at -10 to -20 C than how they work at -40. The British had 10 years to get the guns to work by Korea with plenty of examples to show them how. Changes in hydraulic fluid for different weather conditions might be noted in manuals but usually don't warrant a different MK number for the equipment.
A simple question,
why don't you compare the soviet 76,2mm gun to the the 8,8cm Flak/18/36/37 with near the same duties in WWII?
THe 8,8cm Flak was Flak, anti tank gun, light field artillery and so on.
The 10,5cm howitzer is to my opinion not comparable to the 76,2mm and had totally other duties.
Edit:
Sorry no!
The normal german mobile infantry division and tank division had 4 departmentalism a 3 batteries. The heavy departmentalism had standard 2 Batteries 15cm howitzer and 1 Battery 10.5cm K18 field gun.