Photo above shows a single 16 Inch Mark 7 gun firing.
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The 16inch/50 caliber Mark 7 gun fires two basic rounds; a
2,700 pound AP (Armor Piercing) and a 1,900 pound HC (High Capacity) shore bombardment
projectile. Nine of these guns, the most powerful ever mounted on a United States
Warship, are mounted in well-protected turrets. These gunes, with their combination
of a longer barrel and heavier propelling charge, are a vast improvement over the earlier
Mark 6 guns on earlier battleships. Each gun is
mounted on a separate slide with its own elevation drive. The assembly includes a
firing lock, gas ejector, breech mechanism and yoke. All of the individual slide and
gun assemblies, both sight stations and the station for the rangefinder are all located in
separate flame-proofed compartments. |
The three turrets are virtually identical,
each consisting of an armored gunhouse (turret armor is 17" front, 9.5" sides,
12" aft and 7 1/4" roof) with a rotating structure and a fixed structure.
A central column extends down to the turret foundation supporting the turret and shell
decks. Turrets I and III have two shell decks and Turret II, being a deck higher,
has three. The turret structure is protected by a non-rotating barbette of heavy
armor (17.3" on the sides and 11.6" fore and aft). There is a weather seal
between the barbette and the gun house but the gun does not rotate on, nor is it supported
by the barbette.
The rotating weight of the turret, less projectiles, is
approximately 1,700 tons. The outside diameter of the roller path is 34 feet, five
inches. The maximum training rate is four degrees per second, and the elevation rate
is twelve degrees per second. The maximum recoil for the gun is four feet. All
turrets have training arcs of three hundred degrees. A minimum crew of 77 men is
required for each turret and the rate of fire is two rounds per minute per gun.
In 1969, Captain Edward Snyder of the New Jersey was quoted
as saying that the AP shell is capable of penetrating up to 32 feet of reinforced
concrete. The HC round carries a high-explosive charge of 154 pounds. The
maximum rang eis 41,622 yards when fired with the normal propelling charge of 660 pounds,
with a muzzle velocity of 2,690 feet per second.
Typical armor penetration of the 2,700 pound Mk 7 AP
projectile is 14.5 inches of horizontal armor at a range of 42,300 yards (angle of fall is
53.25 degrees and a striking velocity of 1,686 feet per second.) At "point
blank" range, with a striking velocity of 2,500 feet per second, the vertical armor
penetration is 32.62 inches.
Lingering smoke from a main battery firing on the USS Missouri.
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Photo above shows the firing of a 15-gun broadside
(9x16-inch, and 6x5-inch)
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