Chapter 479: too heavy!

Witte’s visit to purchase a tractor for artillery was specifically requested by the Russian Ministry of War. Kulopatkin even claimed: "Whether these heavy artillery can be used is directly related to the future victory or defeat of our army in the Far East! "When such a big hat is buckled, Witte can't help but care!"

Compared with Witte’s troubles, Colonel Kutuzov, who is in charge of the Russian Far East’s heavy artillery units, is now in real trouble. The former is just a liaison, while the latter needs to complete the operation of large-caliber heavy artillery. Let alone the artillery problem, how to make these heavy artillery move on the road and coffee table is a very serious problem.

The overall level of the Russian army is indeed worse than that of the European powers, but it does not mean that there are no great people! Colonel Kutuzov is one of these great men. The American-made 6-inch l30 artillery bought from the United States was integrated into the army's gun carriage. He planned to turn it into a land artillery, and he also gave up the narrow shooting range. The bipod mount uses a new bipod mount, and the wheels of the sports car are also semi-rubber instead of the original iron-clad wooden wheels, which enhances the passability of the artillery to a certain extent.

Then, the Russian colonel discovered a very serious problem. The weight of this 152mm heavy gun is a bit too big, surpassing all field artillery towed by Russia in the past! Of course, don't talk about the Tsar Cannon. The symbolic meaning of this thing is greater than the actual meaning...

Among other things, the barrel of this artillery weighs as much as 4.7 tons! And the weight of the storage is as high as 8.5 tons or more! This is not the deadliest, because the towing weight of the artillery is heavier than the weight of the deployment. If the towing weight is included, the weight will be as high as 9.3 tons! 9 tons of multiple cannons! About 6 times the weight of the Russian 75mm rapid-fire gun! Of course, the performance of this artillery is really good, it can shoot 48kg shells for more than 15 kilometers! So the Russians think it is better to use it as a fortress gun than as a field gun!

Such a heavy artillery is no longer a question of how to maneuver on bad roads, because in Kutuzov's view, the weight of this artillery is not suitable for horse towing. After all, the power of horses is limited, and with more and more horses, its marginal effect continues to decline!

The horses used in the Russian army are the famous Don Heavy Horses, which generally tow around 400kg. In extreme cases, you can walk for 10 hours a day, but if you tow for a long time, it generally does not exceed 8 hours. If it is calculated by simple multiplication and division, then a 9-ton multiple artillery requires at least 25 Don horses to tow...

Of course, you have to say that you don’t care about the life and death of horses. If you use it for life, you may not need so many horses. This problem can also be solved in Europe. After all, the main long-distance transportation in Europe is through trains, and the railway network is relatively developed. That is, from the station to the battlefield. In addition, the best parts of Russia are in Europe, so it is not difficult to find some horses to replace dead horses.

But the problem is that you are in the Far East now! There is no dense railway network, not to mention more serious roads. Dirt roads depend on the situation. When snow accumulates in winter and melts in spring, many places are muddy! The dragging efficiency of this horse has plummeted! More importantly, the Far East is far from Europe, and it is very difficult to supplement this horse! The horsepower is not enough, and the supplement is also worrying. How do you make these artillery maneuver?

And even more frightening is that even if you solve the problem of towing heavy artillery, the demand for horses is so large that it can hardly be solved! According to Colonel Kutuzov's estimation, an artillery regiment with 16 6-inch heavy artillery would need at least 1,200 horses! You read that right, it is 1,400!

(This is estimated by the author. According to the information on hand, a divisional artillery regiment in the German III period had 12 150mm howitzers and 36 105mm light howitzers, which required 2451 men and 2,318 horses. Among them, 12 150mm howitzers It requires 685 personnel and 697 horses. At that time, the German artillery was an SFH18 howitzer, which weighed only 5.5 tons. In fact, the weight of the artillery that this plane gave the Russians had nearly doubled! And it was 16. One cannon regiment, so nearly 700 horses were added)

When officers from the Army Logistics Department came to the door with the colonel’s calculation results, the colonel explained: “First of all, it is impossible for such a heavy artillery to be towed as a whole. It must be divided into two parts. The barrel of about one ton is placed on the trailer, and the other part is the gun carriage. Only in this way can it be barely maneuvered. Even so, the weight of each component should reach about 5 tons when included in the trailer. In this case, do we need 16 horses? In order to ensure a stable and long march.” (The author does not deny that 10 horses can be made if necessary. But it is not too much to say that a part of about 5 tons is 16 horses.)

After the colonel said this, the opponent immediately stopped talking. A cannon and nothing else were counted as using 32 horses first! However, artillery is only a part of it after all, and it is a small part. The supply of artillery shells and horses is the real big problem!

Let’s count the shells like this, one shell is 48kg, plus the propellant pack, to make a total of 60kg, plus a series of packaging. (No one thinks that the heavy howitzer shells are leaked and transported outside.) That is ~www.wuxiaspot.com~ According to 80 rounds of ammunition for an artillery, this base number of shells needs 5.6 tons. And this 5.6 tons cannot be the weight of a light cannonball, and the weight of a vehicle... More than 30 horses will be killed with just one base shell...

Okay, you took away the artillery and ammunition so easily, so now there is another problem. These horses and personnel still have to eat! Let's not talk about drinking water. Suppose you can find water sources along the way. For the time being, I will not consider the problem of bringing water. A horse needs to consume 2.5% of its body weight every day to ensure normal vitality. Well, if the weight of a packhorse is 600kg (the weight of the Russian Ardennes is 550 to 600kg), then it needs about 15kg of forage a day...

So, let’s not talk about anything else, just to transport one artillery and 80 shells, do you need about 70 horses, and the daily feed for these horses is about 1 ton! These feeds are also exquisite. The so-called roughage is hay. Among them, alfalfa, corn straw and straw are used. If the horses are not moving, the roughage can be fed, but if the task of delaying is to be performed, the proportion of concentrated forage will be as high as 30%. Range from 55%! Concentrated feed refers to crops such as oats, barley, corn or bean cakes.

Soon, the Russians collapsed and discovered that for the 16 artillery, they needed a cavalry regiment's horses to transport, and this might not be possible!

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