Steyr-Solothurn Antitank Rifles

Some sources claim the Steyr-Solothurn 20mm S18-100 or S18-1000 antitank rifles were in service with Romania. Any truth to this? Is so, how many were acquired of which model and when? What did the Romanian army think of them?

Many thanks!

Cheers

HANS

I don't know about the Rumanian Army, but the Hungarians did use the Solothurn Model S2-200, made by Waffenfabrik Solothurn A.G., which was a light machine gun, though.
Another Solothurn model was the 36 M 'nehézpuska' ('heavy rifle'), which was indeed an effective AT weapon.

[quote]Some sources claim the Steyr-Solothurn 20mm S18-100 or S18-1000 antitank rifles were in service with Romania. HANS[/quote]

I'm interested in this AT-rifle.Do you have the scan?
Mihai

http://www.amsd.ch/s18/home-s18-solothurn.html

Cheers

Bob

[quote]http://www.amsd.ch/s18/home-s18-solothurn.html

Cheers

Bob[/quote]
Thank you,it look like the long range-snipe rifle.
Mihai

It was actually used as an anti-tank weapon. It worked very well against the lightly armored tanks of 1940 - 41, but was useless against the T-34's and KV1's. The Italians also used the Solothurn, and I am pretty sure that the Dutch did as well (not that it did them much good)

Robert is right, the Italians used it and in a variety of mounts, including in the small CV 33 tankettes.
Another customer not always associated with it is China. I suppose the Solothurn was efficient enough in that area in spite of the small numbers used, for the Japanese tanks and armoured cars had very thin armour. When the Japanese got acquainted with the gun, they developed their own design, the Type 97, a 20mm anti-tank rifle. It was a mamouth of a gun, with a tremendous recoil, and four men were needed as a "crew" (as many as in a "normal", anti-tank cannon)!

You forgot to mention about effect on target. So, how was the results against american tanks? (20m.m. AT japan heavy rifle). Certainly, against Stuarts, and light armored vehicle in general, this 20 m.m. have some succes. What was the power of penetration? At what distances?

Iama

PS - In some missions in Battlefield 1942 and in games like Dirty Dozen (2) i dont find this weapon. For the reality of what it was, maybe we find this weapon in future ww2 games. Not japs with american bazooka.

Iamandi,

Well, huge 20mm “things” like the Type 97 (I am always hesitant about calling them “rifles”, because these beasts really pushed portability to its utter limits) were quite efficient when used against light armour – they were more than capable when facing armour of the late Thirties and the Blitzkrieg era. Reportedly, the already discussed Solothurn Sl8-l000 and the Finnish Lahti L39 were among the most effective of all, since both were designed around the rather powerful 20x138B round, also used by the Germans in their 20mm FlaK 30.
The Japanese Type 97 used a 20x125mm cartridge, which was equally fearsome against practically anything the Chinese had (small numbers of Panzer I’s and T-26’s, together with a few German-supplied armoured cars) and most of the lighter U.S. types. Unfortunately, I don’t possess specific data on the types of ammunition produced for the gun.
The Type 97 was a very unique weapon in other respects too: it had a selective fire capability and it was perhaps the heaviest of all anti-tank rifles, boasting a total weight of 70 kg with the protective shield fitted – yes, it even had provision for a protective shield just like a small artillery piece! All in all, it was a somewhat over-engineered piece of hardware. Anyway, the Swiss also toyed with the S18-1100 by mounting it on a light artillery carriage...
I recall having read that the Japanese even designed a 20mm cannon, using the Type 97 as a basis. I must check it, though, because I am stating this from memory.

Ruy

In English at least, the term "rifles" with respect to these weapons is used to distinguish them from auto-cannon.

Anti-tank rifles fired one shot at a time, whereas auto-cannon (mostly used as light anti-aircraft weapons) were designed to fire multiple shots at a time. The engineering of the two types of weapons was different - automatic weapons, including machine guns and sub-machineguns, are normally designed not to have a live round in the chamber at the end of the firing cycle so that the heat of the firing does not cause the round to go off prematurely. Single shot weapons (even those which have a magazine and automatic loading system) are designed to have a round in the firing chamber at the end of the firing cycle so as to be ready for the next shot.

The term "anti-tank rifles" is also an historical term because the first ATR's were just modified military rifles (the Germans developed the first ATR's in World War I by modifying their standard Mauser rifle).

I'll go look up the penetrating power of ATR's. They would certainly go through most armored cars and light tanks. I would guess that they would have troble with a Sherman, unless fired from very close range and/or the side or back.

One of the problems with light rounds, such as those fired by ATR's though, was that they would not necessarily do much damage even if they did penetrate the vehicle.

In addition to the 20mm Solothurn used by the Italians, Hungarians, Dutch, and possibly Romanians, the British had a 14.5mm ATR (the Boys), the Poles had one (either 11mm or 7.92, I don't recall which) that used a tungsten round, the Soviets had two different models, though I don't recall the calibre, and the Germans used two different models in 7.92mm, so ATR's were fairly common up to 1941 or 42.

Ok. Good data. But, anyone explain the effect of these antitank bullets at the target?

Iama

The PTRD and PTRS were 14.5 mm rifles.

Robert,

I am aware of the meaning of the term "rifle", in English language, as used in this context. However, the Japanese Type 97 is a weird, atypical weapon in that it fits somewhat between the two realms, both because it was huge and heavy and also because it had provision for single shot, semi-auto mode or full automatic fire. Please note also that in some U.S. and English gun literature, ATR's of 20mm calibre are referred to as "cannons", especially if endowed with semi-auto or automatic fire capability.

In spite of its sheer effectiviness as far as anti-tank rifles were concerned, I do not think the Type 97 could pose a serious threat to mid/late war U.S. armor... We must also admit that, by then, the Japanese had already fielded 47mm anti-tank cannons, albeit in small numbers. They were not up to the standards set by German or Soviet anti-tank guns, but I am sure it was better to face a Sherman with a 47mm anti-tank cannon than with a 20mm Type 97 ATR... After all, the best guns in the category - namely the 14,5mm Soviet ATR's and the biggest 20mm guns - could penetrate up to 40mm of steel plate at very short ranges, but it must be taken in mind that this reasonable performance was considerably reduced as the distance from the target increased, not to mention the fact that it also worsened with the inclination of the impact angle ... Besides, around 1939, tanks with 30mm of armour were still few and far between, but by the middle of the war things were much different as armour thickness increased at a brisk pace.

The first rifle actually designed for anti-tank work was the German Mauser Tank Gewehr 1918, of late Great War vintage. The weapon was devised as quickly as possible to counter the new threat of British and French tanks. Basically, it was a classic bolt-action rifle that looked like an oversized version of the normal Gew 98. The weapon fired a specially designed 13x92SR cartridge, capable of piercing through 20mm of armour at 100 metres and 15m at 300 metres, at a convenient angle of 90 degrees, which was more than enough to defend the infantry against the first tanks, which had only 12 or 15mm of armour. The recoil was monstruous, as no effort was made to reduce its effects and this was the case in most of first generation anti-tank rifles, with wooden furniture and a simple, steel recoil plate bolted to the stock as in a normal rifle...

The Polish ATR mentioned by Robert is the Kb ppanc. wz. 1935 Maroszek. It fired a very unusual round, the 7,92x107 DS. Like its German cousin from 1918, it was basically an enlarged bolt-action rifle, with a classic wooden stock and provision for a detachable magazine, but it was much slimmer and lighter, at only 9kg. According to Polish sources, it could penetrate 15mm of steel armor at 300m, at an angle of 30 degrees. At a distance of 100m, it is claimed that the bullet could penetrate 30mm of armor, a very optimistic prospect.
The Germans followed a similar path in the late Thirties, developing a weapon in their regulation calibre, 7,92mm, the Panzerbüchse P.z.B. 39, but having, as the Polish rifle, a big case: 7,92x94 - the projectile had a hardened steel core, and, perhaps to increase the meagre post-penetration effect, a tiny tear gas capsule! Later, it was replaced by a more conventional bullet with a tungsten core. The Germans and the Poles were the only nations, as far as I know, to rely on small, high-velocity calibre projectiles for ATR's. The main intention behind this approach was to maintain recoil and portability within reasonable levels, while trying at the same time to obtain a good performance by using very high velocity ammunition. The last goal wasn't achieved at all, and it conducted the Germans to introduce the P.z.B. 41, a 20mm ATR, a gun based on the S18/1000. Big, complex and cumbersome, the P.z.B. 41 was born too late, since it was totally uneffective against modern tanks, like the T-34.

The British .55 (13,9mm, not 14,5) Mk I Boys ATR used by several Commonwealth armies during W.W. II, was also supplied to the Portuguese Army early in the war, in an attempt to alleviate the shortage of anti-tank guns. Its performance, at least according to Portuguese contemporary reports, left much to be desired. The only tanks - still according to the reports I read - that could be "put out of combat" (but not "destroyed", a word avoided by the authors of the report...) were the Pz. I's and T-26's Civil War left-overs used by Spanish Army well into the Forties, but not the newly received Stug III's and Pz. IV's. Most of the Portuguese .55 rifles were put in storage. The few actually used were detested by the poor soldiers that had to carry and fire them.

Ruy

This post has been edited by Ruy Aballe on October 09, 2004 11:13 am

Thank you for enlightening us, Ruy. I am not sure how well everyone on the list reads English and e-mail is a particularly poor medium for conveying facial expressons, so I added an explanation of the term. No offense intended. I appreciate it when people explain German and Romanian terms. Who knows, if I stay on this list long enough, I may learn to read and write Romanian.

I agree that the Japanese ATR was a strange beast. Ian Hogg's "Encyclopedia of Infantry Weapons of WWII" states that it was a poor weapon that was only able to penetrate 12mm of armor at 0 degrees at 300 meters (if I recall correctly). He also states that it was rarely used, and that there are very few examples still in existence. Most other ATR's seem to have been able to penetrate about 30mm of armor at 2-300 meters. I have not seen penetration tables for these weapons at various ranges, but I would suspect that the penetration fell off much beyond 3-400 meters because the bullet was light (think of your highschool physics class - an object in motion tends to stay in motion..., and the more mass it has the more this is true). 7.92mm to 14.5 mm shells just do not have that much mass, compared to a 76mm shell. So although the maximum range of these weapons was probably 2-3 km, the effective range was probably out to about 500 meters, perhaps 750 meters in the case of the 20mm weapons.

The front hull armor on an M-4 Sherman was about 60 - 65mm, when you take into account the slope, and the front of the turret was 3 inches or 76mm (2.54 cm = 1 inch). The armor on a T-34 would have been thincker, but I don't have that information on me right now.

So ATR's were useful against the early German tanks (including the early model Pz III and IV, which only had 15 - 30mm of armor). In late 1941/early 1942 the Germans increased the armor on their later model Pz III and IV, and bolted additional armor on to the Pz III and IV that had previously been build. They would also have been useful against the many models of armored cars, light tanks (i.e. Pz I and II, T-37, T-40, T-60, and T-70), and self-propelled guns (i.e Marder, SU-76) that both the Germans and the Soviets used . The tanks used by the Romanians, Slovaks, Italians and Hungarians were, (with the exception of a few modern tanks sold to Romania and Hungary in 1943-44, and a few captured Soviet tanks), all designed in the pre-war period and were not up-armored like the German Pz III and IV, and so would have been vulnerable to Soviet ATR's.

To respond to Iama's question, the Soviets continued to use ATR's throughout the war in part because German armor was actually very scarce on the Easter front (the Germans just never produced that many tanks - the total production run of Panthers for the entire war was only about 5,000 or 6,000, if I recall), and was used in mass formations. The Soviets figured that they could usually tell from intelligence where the German tank assault was going to occur (consider Kursk), and that they could rush real anti-tank weapons, such as the 76mm ZIS 3 (?) gun, SU-85's and SU-100's, to that sector. For the rest of the front, ATR's and the lighter anti-tank guns, such as the 45mm and 57mm, were more than adequate to deal with armored cars, etc. Also, from June 1941 to mid 1943, the Soviets could not afford the time or resources to design new weapons, and very few were designed in this period.

By 1943 Soviet armor was becoming much more common, and the Germans had to provide anti-tank weapons to defend against T-34's for the entire front. Thus the Germans abandoned ATR's in 1941, and issued their individual infantry more powerful weapons, such as the panzerfaust and panzerschreck (spelling?), while issuing 75mm anti-tank guns to the divisional anti-tank units.

I will provide the information that I have on ATR's from Ian Hogg's work next week (I only have e-mail at work, and my reference books are at home.)

Two excellent references on Polish firearms, including, of course the wz. 35 ATR:

"Bron Strzelecka i Sprzet Artyleryjski Formacji Polskich i Wojska Polskiego w Latach 1914-1939", by Andrzej Konstankiewicz; Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii Curie-Sklodowskiej (U.M.C.S. for short), Warswaw, 2003.

"Polskie Konstrukcje Broni Strzeleckiej", by Zbigniew Gwóźdź and Piotr Zarzycki; Sigma, Warswaw, 1993.


On the German P.z.B. 39 ATR:

"7.92mm Panzerbüchse (P.z.B.) 39 German Anti-Tank rifle: small caliber tank buster" by Frank Iannamico, in ""The Small Arms Review", Vol.6, No.8, May 2003, pp. 62-64.

On the Soviet PTRD and PTRS ATR's:

"The PTRD & PTRS anti-tank rifles", by Chuck Madurski, in "The Small Arms Review", Vol. 5, No. 12, December 2002, pp. 17-19.

Note: I have also an article on the 14,5mm Russian rifles, published in the French periodical Militaria, but unfortunately I only have recent numbers stored in my flat. I can check it next weekend, though.

The author of the last article (p.19) quoted points out the same problem - the low damage level inflicted to a tank after an ATR projectile managed to pierce the tank's armour, while discussing one of the best rounds, ballistically speaking, developed for ATR's, the Russian 14,5x114:

"Tanks in WW II were not as tightly packaged as today, and while the 14.5mm cartridge was generally capable of piercing the armor of many of the tanks it faced, often the bullet just sailed right on through, missing anything that would disable the tank, like main gun ammunition or one of the crew members. It was not unusual to find a German tank after a battle with as many as a dozen or more holes in the armor as Soviet infantry anti-tank rifle teams did their jobs".

This post has been edited by Ruy Aballe on October 09, 2004 10:56 am