Cannone da 47/32


The Cannone da 47/32 mod. 1935 was an Italian artillery piece that saw service during World War II. It was originally designed by Austrian firm Böhler, and produced in Italy under license. The Cannone da 47/32 was used both as an infantry gun and an anti-tank gun at which it was effective against light to medium armored tanks.

History

The Austrian firm of Böhler originally designed and manufactured the gun. In the 1930s Italy bought some of these guns from Böhler, and then began to produce the weapon under license, continuing its development. The Cannone da 47/32 M35 was the main armament in the M13/40 medium tank, the M14/41 medium tank, and experimentally on the AB 41 armored car, and the 47/32 self-propelled gun.
The 47/32 was built in two versions, the first with semi-pneumatic disk wheels, and the second with improved barrel and suspension. To tow this piece, the Fiat-OCI 708 CM tractor and the L3 tankette were used, but these projects were soon abandoned as the gun was subjected to breaking at the axles spindles and shanks. Due to its shape, the 47/32 was commonly called "elefantino" by the troops.
The 47/32 was primarily an anti-tank gun but was also used as a close support weapon. In 1940 it had roughly the same degree of armor penetration of its contemporaries such as the British 2-pounder gun, the German PaK 36 and the Soviet 45 mm gun. It outperformed the French 25 mm gun and a High Explosive shell was available unlike the 2-Pounder. Its major drawbacks were the inadequacy of the gun to be towed by truck, and the lack of a gun shield. The failure of the Italian Army to produce and deploy a more powerful gun in numbers meant that by 1942 the 47/32 gun was still seeing frontline service despite being ineffective against the heavier tanks it had to face.
For use in the M15/42 tank the 47/32 gun was redesigned with a longer L/40 barrel and an enlarged ammunition chamber. The larger amount of propellant combined with the longer barrel greatly increased the armour penetration capability of the 47/40 gun.

Service with other nations

The original Böhler and license-produced versions were also used in the Austrian, Chinese, Dutch, Finnish, Romanian, Estonian, Latvian, Soviet and Swiss armies. Romania purchased 545 Austrian-made pieces and 275 Italian-made pieces in 1941. While not an original user, the German army captured several of these guns during their annexation of Austria, and their conquest of the Netherlands and the Soviet Union and took them into service. Some of these guns were donated to the Italians. After their surrender, these were recaptured along with Italian models. These guns were then reassigned to German and RSI units or donated to Croatia.
The British also made use of some captured guns which inlcluded shipping them over from North Africa to Malaya.

Characteristics

  • Caliber:
  • Barrel length:
  • Length of Bore:
  • Length of Rifling:
  • Travelling Weight:
  • Weight in Action:
  • Elevation: -15 degrees to +56 degrees
  • Traverse: 62 degrees
  • Muzzle Velocity: 630 m/s for AP; 250 m/s HE
  • Range: - HE
  • Shell Weight: AP; HE
  • Armor Penetration AP : at ; at
  • Armor Penetration AP : 70 mm at 100 m, 50 mm at 500 m, 38 mm at 1000 m, 25 mm at 1500 m, 20 mm at 2000 m
  • Armor Penetration HEAT: 55 mm at 90 degrees contact