page_title: Gangut-class battleship
section_title: Armament
hierarchical_section_title: Gangut-class battleship / Design and development / Armament
context_page_description: The Gangut-class battleships, also known as the "Sevastopol class", were the first dreadnoughts begun for the Imperial Russian Navy before World War I. They had a convoluted design history involving several British companies, evolving requirements, an international design competition, and foreign protests. Four ships were ordered in 1909, Gangut, Poltava, Petropavlovsk, and Sevastopol. Construction was delayed by financing problems until the Duma formally authorized the ships in 1911. They were delivered from December 1914 through January 1915, although they still needed work on the gun turrets and fire-control systems until mid-1915. Their role was to defend the mouth of the Gulf of Finland against the Germans, who never tried to enter, so the ships spent their time training and providing cover for minelaying operations. Their crews participated in the general mutiny of the Baltic Fleet after the February Revolution in 1917, and joined the Bolsheviks the following year.
  All of the dreadnoughts except for Petropavlovsk were laid up in late 1918 for lack of manpower and Poltava was severely damaged by a fire while laid up.
context_section_description: The main armament consisted of a dozen 52-caliber Obukhovskii 12-inch (305 mm) Pattern 1907 guns mounted in four electrically powered triple-gun turrets. The guns could be depressed to −5° and elevated to 25°. They could be loaded at any angle between −5° and +15°; their rate of fire was one round every 30 to 40 seconds up to 15° of elevation and one round per minute above that. The forward turret had an arc of fire of 330°, the second turret had a total of 280°, the third turret 310° and the aft turret 300°. They could elevate at 3–4° per second and traverse at a rate of 3.2° per second. 100 rounds per gun were carried at full load. The guns fired 470.9-kilogram (1,038 lb) projectiles at a muzzle velocity of 762 m/s (2,500 ft/s); this provided a maximum range of 23,230 meters (25,400 yd).
  Sixteen manually operated 50-caliber 4.7-inch (120 mm) Pattern 1905 guns were mounted in the hull in casemates as the secondary battery intended to defend the ship against torpedo boats. Because of the lack of freeboard and a bow-heavy trim the forward casemates were often washed out in even moderate seas. All guns had a firing arc of 125°–30° and at least four could bear on any part of the horizon. Their maximum elevation was +25° and they could elevate at 3.5° per second. They could traverse at six to eight degrees per second. 300 rounds per gun were provided which was increased from 245 rounds during construction. As designed they were 15 feet (4.6 m) above the waterline, but this was reduced in service as the ships were overweight. The guns had a rate of fire of seven rounds per minute and a maximum range of about 16,800 yards (15,362 m) at 25° elevation with a 63.87-pound (28.97 kg) semi-armor-piercing Model 1911 shell at a muzzle velocity of 792.5 m/s (2,600 ft/s).
  The Gangut-class ships were completed with only a single 30-caliber 3-inch (76 mm) Lender anti-aircraft (AA) gun mounted on the quarterdeck. This had a maximum depression of -5° and a maximum elevation of +65°. It fired a 14.33-pound (6.50 kg) shell at a muzzle velocity of 1,929 ft/s (588 m/s). It had a rate of fire of 10–12 rounds per minute and had a maximum ceiling of 19,000 ft (5,800 m). Other AA guns were probably added during the course of World War I, but details are lacking, although Conway's says that four 75-millimeter (3.0 in) guns were added to the roofs of the end turrets during the war. Four 17.7-inch (450 mm) submerged torpedo tubes were fitted with three torpedoes for each tube.
caption: The forward triple turret of Petropavlovsk
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