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Is this a K.Gr.rot.Pz?

Tsarbombaad

New Member
I recently got this AP projectile, seller claimed that it was a french shell captured by the germans and thus sold me it with a 75x380 shell casing (No clue what it is as well, thought it was a mle1897 family of shells but it was a little too long) . Other people commented that that is unlikely though. After some digging, I suspect that it is a K.Gr.Rot.Pz used by the kwk37 75mm cannon is most likely due to its deep bursting charge cavity, but I am not sure and am not knowledgable about this subject. The width of the driving band and the space between the bottom of the shell and the driving band matches with the documentation I found though.

It's approx 230 mm tall, 74mm in diameter, internal cavity widest diameter 55mm, the bursting charge cavity at least 145mm deep.

Is this a K.Gr.rot.Pz, and if so, was 70 pounds (That includes the shell casing) a good price for it?
Additional, approx. how much will it cost to get a shell casing for it? Thank you!
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I think that is indeed a K.Gr.Rot.Pz, it seems to match the dimensions from the Geschossringbuch.

The casing however is a Russian 3-inch Putilov 1902 (76X380mmR). French manufacture during WW1 and looking at the markings, I'd say they are Finnish rather than German, so probably captured during the Winter War. I have a similar one so here is the headstamp.

EDIT: had a brainfart - I entirely forgot Finland was part of the Russian Empire during WW1 and gained independence in 1918, so of course they could have just had those Putilov 1902 guns in inventory, no need for captures.
 

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I think that is indeed a K.Gr.Rot.Pz, it seems to match the dimensions from the Geschossringbuch.

The casing however is a Russian 3-inch Putilov 1902 (76X380mmR). French manufacture during WW1 and looking at the markings, I'd say they are Finnish rather than German, so probably captured during the Winter War. I have a similar one so here is the headstamp.
I see, the Schneider at the bottom threw me off on identifying the case.

Do you know if the 75mm casing for kwk37 is common? I haven't seen any dealers selling either the projectile or the short 75 case in the UK online, so I have no idea of the projectiles value and if trying to find a case for it will be difficult. Thank you!
 
Quite the contrary, I'd say they're rare, because I've been looking for one at a reasonable price for a while and no luck - the last one I saw for sale was 300 euros by a guy from Latvia, which is a bit much.

On the other hand, the Germans used the K.Gr.Rot.Pz on a variety of guns and mated to a variety of cases - the only criterion seems to have been a smaller muzzle velocity.
For example, we can find it on the 7.5 cm FK 16 nA (75×200mmR), 7.5 cm FK 18 (75x260mmR), 7.5 cm le.IG 18 (75x89mmR) as well as captured guns like the 7.5 cm FK 231(f) and 7.5 cm Pak 97/38 (French "Canon de 75 modèle 1897", 75x350mmR), 7.5 cm FK 235(b) (Belgian "Canon de 75 mle TR 1905" 75x278mmR ), etc.

Here are a few plates from various manuals.


 

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