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SURVIVING GUN FILE (# 596)
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Germany

10.5cm leicht Feld Haubitze 16

Light artillery

Contributor :
Alain Bohée     
     
     
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Location :
France
Saint Marcel (56)
Musée de la Resistance
Coordinates : Lat : 47.80280 / Long : -2.41920
General comments on this surviving gun :


Identical items in the same location : 1
Items covered by this file : 1

Very nice item. The camouflage WW2-like, and its presence in a Museum of the French resistance seem to prove that this gun was used by the Wermacht in France between 1940 and 1944.


Historic and technical information
Denomination :     10.5cm lFH 16 Origin :       ( RheinMetall)          

Historic context :

Since 1915, the increase of the depth of the front lines demonstrated the need for a substantial increase of the range of the fieldguns and fieldhowitzers in order to hit targets from safer positions.

The 7000m maximum range of the regular light fieldhowitzer '10cm lFH 98/09' was clearly not sufficient, so that in 1916 a new light fieldhowitzer was introduced by Rheinmetall on the base of the studies made for the new light fieldgun 7.7cm FK 16.

The old Krupp fieldhowitzer carriage was therefore kept, but a much longer tube (from 16 to 22 calibres) allowed a big increase of the new light field howitzer range, newly named '10 cm lFH 16' ('lFH' = leichte Feld Haubitze = light field howitzer). The noticeable 1500 m range increase was obtained at the price of a slight weight increase, less detrimental since the end of the movement war.

The profile of that howitzer may look similar to the light fieldguns '10 cm K 14' (even if the latter is much heavier), and these guns may be difficult to differentiate in low-quality war-time pictures.

At the end of the war, more than 3044 such howitzer were in service, compared to only 1144 of the previous mark. Some of these guns survived until 1945 within different armies.

Technical data :

  • Complete description : 10.5cm light field howitzer M 1916
  • Design year : 1916
  • Calibre : 104.90 mm
  • Weight in firing position : 1380 kg
  • Weight for transportation : 1380 kg without ammo trailer, 2305 kg with it
  • Tube length in calibres : 22.00 (total tube length)
  • Grooves : 0
  • Projectile weight : 15.7 kg
  • Initial speed : 395 to 427 m/s depending on the shell and propulsive load
  • Fire rate : 6 rounds / min
  • Range : 8400 m to 9725 m max depending on the shell and propulsive load
  • Elevation range : -10 / +40 degrees
  • Direction range : 4 degrees total field


Sources
  • German Artillery of World War One           Herbert Jager                   Crowood   2001  
  • L'Artillerie de Campagne de l'Armée Impériale Allemande - Tome IV - 10,5cm Feld Haubitzen 1898/09 & 1916       Bernard Delsert                   B.D.   2013