Armour-piercing ammunition (AP) is a type of projectile designed to penetrate armour protection, most often including naval armour, body armour, vehicle armour.
Rifling is the term for helical grooves machined into the internal surface of a firearms's barrel for imparting a spin to a projectile to improve its aerodynamic stability and accuracy. It is also the term for creating such grooves.
The 8.8 cm KwK 36 was an 88-millimetre (3.5 in) tank gun used by the German Army during World War II. This was the primary armament of the PzKpfw VI Tiger I tank. It was developed and built by Krupp.
The 8.8 cm KwK 43 was an 88 mm 71 calibre length tank gun designed by Krupp and used by the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War. It was mounted as the primary armament on the Panzerkampfwagen VI Ausf. B Tiger II. The 8.8 cm Pak 43, an anti-tank gun, was very similar in design but mounted on tank destroyers or deployed stand-alone on the field.
An anti-tank gun is a form of artillery designed to destroy tanks and other armoured fighting vehicles, normally from a static defensive position. The development of specialized anti-tank munitions and anti-tank guns was prompted by the appearance of tanks during World War I. To destroy hostile tanks, artillerymen often used field guns depressed to fire directly at their targets, but this practice expended too much valuable ammunition and was of increasingly limited effectiveness as tank armor became thicker. The first dedicated anti-tank artillery began appearing in the 1920s, and by World War II was a common appearance in many European armies. To penetrate armor, they fired specialized ammunition from longer barrels to achieve a higher muzzle velocity than field guns. Most anti-tank guns were developed in the 1930s as improvements in tanks were noted, and nearly every major arms manufacturer produced one type or another.
The Model 35 antitank rifle was a Polish 7.9 mm anti-tank rifle used by the Polish Army during the 1939 invasion of Poland. It was designated model 35 for its design year, 1935: It was also known by its codename "Uruguay", after the country and by the name of its designer, Józef Maroszek.
The Ordnance QF 2-pounder, or simply "2 pounder gun", was a 40 mm (1.575 in) British anti-tank gun and vehicle-mounted gun employed in the Second World War.
The 7.5 cm Pak 40 was a German 75 millimetre anti-tank gun of the Second World War.
The 7.92×57mm Mauser is a rimless bottlenecked rifle cartridge. The 7.92×57mm Mauser cartridge was adopted by the German Empire in 1903–1905, and was the German service cartridge in both World Wars. In its prime, the 7.92×57mm Mauser cartridge was one of the world's most popular military cartridges. In the 21st century it is still a popular sport and hunting cartridge that is factory-produced in Europe and the United States.
The Littlejohn adaptor was a device that could be added to the British QF 2 pounder (40 mm) anti-tank gun. It was used to extend the service life of the 2-pounder during the Second World War by converting it to squeeze bore operation. "Littlejohn" came from the calque, i.e. literal anglicization, of the name of František Janeček, the Czech designer and factory owner who had been working on the squeeze-bore principle in the 1930s and his son František Karel Janeček, who had brought his know-how to Britain after fleeing from German-occupied Czechoslovakia.
The 7.5 cm KwK 42 L/70 was a 7.5 cm calibre German tank gun used on German armoured fighting vehicles in the Second World War. The gun was the armament of the Panther medium tank and two variants of the Jagdpanzer IV self-propelled anti-tank gun. On the latter it was designated as the "7.5 cm Panzerabwehrkanone 42" anti-tank gun.
Sub-caliber ammunition is firearm ammunition where the projectile has a smaller diameter than the bore of the gun barrel from which it is fired. Firing sub-caliber ammunition has several potential benefits compared to full-caliber ammunition. It can for example allow for much higher muzzle velocities due to smaller lighter projectiles being fired from relatively larger propellant charges, but it can also lower the cost of ammunition due to less material being used to produce the round compared to a full-caliber ammunition etc.
The Pak 43 was a German 88 mm anti-tank gun developed by Krupp in competition with the Rheinmetall 8.8 cm Flak 41 anti-aircraft gun and used during World War II. The Pak 43 was the most powerful anti-tank gun of the Wehrmacht to see service in significant numbers, also serving in modified form as the 8.8 cm KwK 43 main gun on the Tiger II tank, the open-top Nashorn and fully enclosed, casemate-hulled Elefant and Jagdpanther tank destroyers.
2.8 cm schwere Panzerbüchse 41 or "Panzerbüchse 41" was a German anti-tank weapon working on the squeeze bore principle. Officially classified as a heavy anti-tank rifle, it would be better described, and is widely referred to, as a light anti-tank gun.
The 7.5 cm KwK 40 was a German 75 mm Second World War era vehicle-mounted gun, used as the primary armament of the German Panzer IV medium tank and the Sturmgeschütz III and Sturmgeschütz IV assault guns which were used as tank destroyers.
7.5 cm Pak 39 (L/48)(7.5 cm Panzerjägerkanone 39) was a 7.5 cm German Second World War era anti-tank gun. The gun was used to equip Jagdpanzer IV/48 and Jagdpanzer 38 tank destroyers; no towed version of the weapon was made. The Pak 39 was an electrically fired weapon fitted with a semi-automatic breech mechanism and a 48 caliber long barrel. The gun was able to destroy the most common allied tanks at up to 1,000 meters. It used the same 75 x 495R ammunition as the 7.5 cm KwK 40 of Panzer IV and 7.5 cm StuK 40 gun fitted on the Sturmgeschütz assault guns. The Pak 39 was manufactured from 1943 onwards by Rheinmetall-Borsig AG in Unterlüß and by Seitz-Werke GmbH in Bad Kreuznach. The main types of ammunition used were: Panzergranatpatrone 39 (APCBC), Sprenggranatpatrone 37 (HE) and different versions of the Granatpatrone 39 HL (HEAT).
The PAW 600 was a lightweight anti-tank gun that used the high-low pressure system to fire hollow charge warheads. In 1945, it was used operationally by the Wehrmacht in small numbers. Only about 260 were produced before the war's end.
The 7.5 cm Pak 41 was one of the last German anti-tank guns brought into service and used in World War II and notable for being one of the largest anti-tank guns to rely on the Gerlich principle to deliver a higher muzzle velocity and therefore greater penetration in relation to its size.
The 4.2 cm Pak 41 was a light anti-tank gun issued to German airborne units in World War II. This gun was externally similar to the 3.7 cm Pak 36, using a modified version of the latter's carriage, but used the squeeze bore principle to boost its velocity, and hence armour-piercing ability. The bore had a diameter of 42 mm (1.7 in) at the chamber, but tapered down to 28 mm (1.1 in) at the muzzle. Production was terminated in June 1942, after the delivery of 313 guns. By November 1943, 47 remained in service.
Panzerabwehrkanone, usually referred to as Pak, is the German term for anti-tank gun. Before and during World War II, the German Army produced a series of 13 anti-tank guns which they designated Panzerabwehrkanone, i.e. Pak. In addition, they produced a weapon designated an anti-tank rifle, which is generally considered to be an anti-tank gun; another gun they designated Panzerabwehrwerfer (PAW) the anti-tank launcher.
