What's new
British Ordnance Collectors Network

Join over 14,000 collectors of inert military ordnance. Get expert identification help for shells, fuzes, grenades, and more — plus access our classifieds marketplace and decades of archived knowledge. Free to register, takes seconds.

120mm howitzer casing question

What I think so far (limited by resolution and Ottoman being pretty difficult) between "brackets" is what I think I read:

1 - "10,5/18" --> shell case dimensions indeed match with Turkish Skoda 10,5 cm L/18 M1914.
2 - "howitzer 14 (very doubtful 4),194 (very doubtful 4)" --> shell case dimensions match with Turkish Krupp 12,2 cm L/14 M1909.
3 - "German howitzer 15/14" --> shell case dimensions match with Turkish Krupp 15 cm L/14 M1905.
4 - "howitzer 10,5/?????" --> shell case dimensions match with Turkish Krupp 10,5 cm L/15,5 M1898/1909.
5 - no text, not sure yet about shell case dimensions.
 
Updated translation of the Ottoman text on the image shared by AKON:

1 - Şekil-Skoda-kovani-2 unknown words-10,5 cm L/18 = Drawing of 10,5 cm L/18 Skoda shell case (2 unknown words). Fits with 105x178R116 for the 10,5 cm Skoda L/18 M1914/T.
2 - Şekil-obüsün-kovani-14,194 = Drawing of howitzer shell case, I think the 14 if for L/14 (Turkish used Krupp 12,2 cm L/14) but ,194 makes no sense to me. Fits with 127,5x159R137 12,2 cm for the Krupp L/14 M1909 howitzer.
3 - Şekil-obüsün-kovani-15 cm L/14 = Drawing of 15 cm L/14 howitzer shell case (indeed a known Turkish used Krupp 15 cm sFH05/T "kurz" export versus the "regular" 15 cm L/17 "lang" known as the German 15 cm sFH M1902 and M1913, shell case 156x113R170).
4 - Şekil-obüsün-kovani-10,5 cm-unknown = Drawing of 10,5 cm howitzer shell case (I have no idea what is written below 10,5). Fits with 110x92R121 shell case for the 10,5 cm Krupp lFH M1898/M1909.
5 - Indeed Krupp shell case 300, measuring 150x660R175. Unknown gun.

Any other views on this are welcome!
 
Because I do not have an "edit" button available: the unknown words for shell case #1 probably mean "short field howitzer". I think I really see "field" and "howitzer" (very compressed into each other and hand written and very low resolution image) but I can't make out "short" and it seems there is another word/letter that I can't explain.
 
Hi Hoeksel
ad4) another drawing of the cartridge case ....110x92R121
Snímek obrazovky z 2026-08-16 18-53-16.png
Akon
 
Last edited:
Thanks a lot AKON, these images are going to be very useful! At first sight the German handwriting is a pretty good translation of the Ottoman text. I am thinking about somewhere this year to combine all my Ottoman translations in a small publication.

Although checking the downloaded files, they are very small and low resolution, this is going to be hard.
 
Hello,
interesting to see 10,5cm FH98-09 case with screw in primer (original german case had pressed in primer). Same modification apllied to german made 7,5cm M15 case (75x129) austro hungarian mountain gun, observed with Turks marking
 
The Boers also had a Krupp L/12 very similar to our own but with a completely different cartridge case, because theirs is 128X105R140 instead of 128x84R140 as can be seen from this drawing. Also, when it comes to the ammunition, the shells have the same height, but everything else is different - for example, their shell has a R255mm ogive, ours is R230, their shell has a solid driving band located 20mm from the bottom ours is 35mm and has two grooves, the length of the cylindrical section is different etc.
It has the same Krupp. M.1891 fuze though, although I've seen theirs also with what we call the M.1880 fuze that is on the 87mm field guns - and, by the way, I noticed Krupp fuzes of the 1890s are designed to be interchangeable in a way very few others from other manufacturers are.

For example, Gruson pretty much had bespoke fuzes for different calibres and sometimes even for the same calibre. I won't get into it now, but neither the shells themselves nor the fuzes for the Gruson 120mm "Kugelmorser" (Speherical mortar) L/7.5 and the 120mm L/13 howitzer are the same or even interchangeable.

View attachment 209452

View attachment 209453
The Boers also had a Krupp L/12 very similar to our own but with a completely different cartridge case, because theirs is 128X105R140 instead of 128x84R140 as can be seen from this drawing. Also, when it comes to the ammunition, the shells have the same height, but everything else is different - for example, their shell has a R255mm ogive, ours is R230, their shell has a solid driving band located 20mm from the bottom ours is 35mm and has two grooves, the length of the cylindrical section is different etc.
It has the same Krupp. M.1891 fuze though, although I've seen theirs also with what we call the M.1880 fuze that is on the 87mm field guns - and, by the way, I noticed Krupp fuzes of the 1890s are designed to be interchangeable in a way very few others from other manufacturers are.

For example, Gruson pretty much had bespoke fuzes for different calibres and sometimes even for the same calibre. I won't get into it now, but neither the shells themselves nor the fuzes for the Gruson 120mm "Kugelmorser" (Speherical mortar) L/7.5 and the 120mm L/13 howitzer are the same or even interchangeable.

View attachment 209452

View attachment 209453
I’d say the same author (of the drawings) ... ORDNANCE COMMITTEE
1792578600256.png1792578102739.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Top