USS Iowa (BB-61) fires a full broadside of 16 in (406 mm) guns. Construction See also Iowa class battleship, Armament of the Iowa class battleship Iowa was the lead ship of her class of "

A gun turret is a device that protects the crew or mechanism of a projectile firing weapon and at the same time lets the weapon be aimed and fired in many directions. Artillery (from French artillerie) is a military Combat Arm which employs any apparātus machine

A turret is a rotating weapon platform. This can be mounted on a fortified building or structure such as an anti-naval land battery, or on an armoured fighting vehicle, a naval ship, or a military aircraft. Fortifications are Military Constructions and Buildings designed for defense in Warfare Humans have constructed defensive works for In Architecture, Construction, Engineering and real estate development the word building may refer to one of the following Any man-made Structure is a fundamental and sometimes Intangible notion covering the Recognition, Observation, nature, and Stability of A Land battery is a special type of gun emplacement or anti-shipping naval interdiction Fortification used in coastal defense to protect areas such as anchorages An armoured fighting vehicle ( AFV) is a military Vehicle, protected by armour and armed with Weapons Most AFVs are equipped for driving in rugged A naval ship is a Ship (or sometimes Boat, depending on classification used for combat purposes commonly by a Navy. Military aviation is the use of Aircraft and other flying machines for the purposes of conducting or enabling warfare including national airlift ( Cargo) capacity

Turrets may be armed with one or more machine guns, automatic cannon, large-calibre guns, or missile launchers. For other uses of the phrase see Machine Gun (disambiguation. An autocannon is a rapid fire projectile Weapon. Autocannon often have a larger Caliber (calibre than a Machine gun (i The term caliber or calibre designates the interior Diameter of a tube or the exterior diameter of a wire or rod It may be manned or remotely controlled, and is often armoured. Artificial Soldier redirects here For the album by industrial group Front Line Assembly, see Artificial Soldier Military robots For body armour see Armour, for armoured forces see Armoured warfare, for other uses see Armour (disambiguation. A small turret, or sub-turret on a larger one, is called a cupola. In Architecture, a cupola or lantern is a radially symmetrical ornamental structure (often dome-shaped or quadrilateral located on top of a larger The term cupola also describes rotating turrets that carry no weapons but instead sighting devices, as in the case of tank commanders. A tank is a tracked, Armoured fighting vehicle designed for Front-line combat which combines Operational mobility and tactical A finial is an extremely small sub-turret or sub-sub-turret mounted on a cupola turret. The finial is an architectural device typically carved in stone and employed to decoratively emphasize the Apex of a Gable, or any of various distinctive ornaments

The protection provided by the turret may be against battle damage or against the weather, conditions and environment in which the weapon or its crew operate.

The term comes from turret - a protective position on a fortification situated on top of a building or wall, as opposed to rising directly from the ground which is a tower. Towers are tall human-made Structures that are always taller than they are wide usually by a significant Margin.

Warships

History

An animation showing the operating principle of a gun turret. This is based on the Mark I turret of the British BL 15 inch /42 naval gun; compare the layout and nomenclature with the American design below. The BL 15 inch Mark I was the first British 15 inch (381 mm gun design and the most widely used and longest lasting of any British designs

Cutaway illustration of an American 16 inch (40.6 cm) gun turret

Before the development of large-calibre, long-range guns in the mid-19th century, the classic battleship design used rows of port-mounted guns on each side of the ship, often mounted in casemates. A battleship is a large heavily armored Warship with a main battery consisting of the largest Calibre of Guns Battleships were A casemate, sometimes rendered casement, is a fortified gun emplacement or armored structure from which guns are fired originally a vaulted chamber in a Fortress. Firepower was provided by a large number of guns which could only be aimed in a limited arc from one side of the ship. Due to instability, fewer larger and heavier guns can be carried on a ship. Also, the casemates often sat near the waterline, which made them vulnerable to flooding and restricted their use to calm seas. Turrets allowed the smaller number of guns to be aimed and fired on both sides of the ship and at the same time provided armoured protection to the gun crew.

One of the earliest turret gun ships was the USS Monitor, which mounted two muzzle loading cannons in a fully rotating armoured drum. Turret ships were a 19th century type of Warship, the earliest to have their Guns mounted in a revolving turret, instead of a Broadside arrangement Design Monitor was one of three ironclad warships ordered by the U A muzzleloader is any Firearm into which the projectile and usually the Propellant charge is loaded from the muzzle of the Gun (i | NOTE Throughout this article "cannon" is used as BOTH the || singular and plural An alternative at the time used a static drum, the barbette, inside which the gun mount rotated - the gun barrel projecting over the edge of the drum. For the early 20th Century female impersonator see Barbette (performer A barbette is a protective circular armor feature around a Cannon In latter designs this was developed to have an armoured portion that sat over the gun and the edge of the barbette, leading to the term "hooded barbette".

With the advent of the South Carolina class battleships in 1908, main battery turrets were designed so as to superfire, to improve fire arcs on centerline mounted weapons. Design The all big gun battleship had been discussed in "Proceedings" (The U This was necessitated by a need to move all main battery turrets to the vessel's centerline for improved structural support. This is a stark contrast to the contemporary HMS Dreadnought which, while revolutionary in many other ways, still retained wing turrets. Genesis Battleships of the era typically carried four large guns mounted fore and aft in twin turrets with a number of smaller-calibre guns ranged along the sides of the A gun turret is a device that protects the crew or mechanism of a projectile firing weapon and at the same time lets the weapon be aimed and fired in many directions The superfiring or superimposed arrangement had not been proven until after South Carolina went to sea, and it was initially feared that the weakness of the previous Virginia class ship's stacked turrets would repeat itself. Ships in class Designation BB-13 Laid down 21 May 1902 Launched 6 April 1904

Another major advancement was in the Kongō class battlecruisers and Queen Elizabeth class battleships, which dispensed with the "Q" turret amidships in favour of heavier guns in fewer mountings. The ships: launched on 18 May 1912, sunk 21 November 1944 by a US submarine with heavy loss of life when a magazine detonated Origins Following the success of the {{convert|135|in|mm|0|adj=on}} gun, the Admiralty decided to develop a {{convert|15|in|mm|0|adj=on}} gun to equip the battleships

While World War I ships commonly had a twin-turret configuration, ships by World War II were commonly using triple and even quadruple turrets, which reduced the total number of mountings altogether and improved armour protection, though quad mount turrets proved to be extremely complex to arrange, making them unwieldy in practice. World War I (abbreviated WWI; also known as the First World War, the Great War, and the War to End All World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including

The largest warship turrets were in WWII battleships where a heavily armoured enclosure protected the large gun crew during battle. The calibre of the main armament on large battleships was typically 12 in (30 cm) up to 18 in (45 cm). The turrets carrying the 18-inch guns of Yamato each weighed around 2,500 tons(?). Construction The Yamato class was built after the Japanese withdrew from the Washington Naval Treaty at the Second London Conference of 1936 The secondary armament of battleships (or the primary armament of cruisers) was typically between 5 and 6 in (127 - 152 mm). A cruiser is a large type of Warship, which had its prime period from the late 19th century to the end of the Cold War. Smaller ships typically mounted guns from 3 in (76 mm) upwards, although these rarely require a turret mounting.

Layout

In naval terms, a turret traditionally and specifically refers to a gun mounting where the entire mass rotates as one, and has a trunk that pierces the deck. A deck is a permanent covering over a compartment or a hull of a Ship. The rotating part of a turret seen above deck is the gunhouse, which protects the mechanism and crew, and is where the guns are loaded. The gunhouse is supported on a bed of rotating rollers, and is not physically attached to the ship; were the ship to capsize, the turret would fall out. The common definition for capsized refers to when a Boat or Ship is tipped over until disabled Below the gunhouse there may be a working chamber, where ammunition is handled, and the main trunk, which accommodates the shell and propellant hoists that bring ammunition up from the magazines below. A shell is a payload-carrying Projectile, which as opposed to shot, contains an explosive or other filling though modern usage includes large solid projectiles A propellant is a material that is used to move ("propel" an object See also firearms magazine for an explanation of the magazines used to load man-portable weapons There may be a combined hoist (cf the animated British turret) or separate hoists (cf the American turret cutaway). The working chamber and trunk rotate with the gunhouse, and sit inside a protective armoured barbette. For body armour see Armour, for armoured forces see Armoured warfare, for other uses see Armour (disambiguation. For the early 20th Century female impersonator see Barbette (performer A barbette is a protective circular armor feature around a Cannon The barbette extends down to the main armoured deck (red in the animation). At the base of the turret sit handing rooms, where shell and propelling charges are passed from the shell room and magazine to the hoists.

The handling equipment and hoists are complex arrangements of machinery that transport the shells and charges from the magazine into the base of the turret. Bearing in mind that shells can weigh around a ton, the hoists have to be powerful and rapid; a 15 inch turret of the type in the animation was expected to perform a complete loading and firing cycle in a minute^[1] The loading system is fitted with a series of mechanical interlocks that (in theory) ensure that there is never an open path from the gunhouse to the magazine down which an explosive flash might pass. Interlocking is a method of preventing undesired states in a state machine, which in a general sense can include any electrical electronic or mechanical device or system An explosive material is a material that either is chemically or otherwise Energetically unstable or produces a sudden expansion of the material usually accompanied Flash-tight doors and scuttles open and close to allow the passage between areas of the turret. Generally, with large-calibre guns, powered or assisted ramming is required to force the heavy shell and charge into the breech. A breech-loading weapon is a Firearm (a Rifle, a Gun etc in which the Bullet or shell is inserted or loaded at the rear of the As the hoist and breech must be aligned for ramming to occur, there is generally a restricted range of elevations at which the guns can be loaded; the guns return to the loading elevation, are loaded, then return to the target elevation. The animation illustrates a turret where the rammer is fixed to the cradle that carries the guns, allowing loading to occur across a wider range of elevations.

Earlier turrets differed significantly in their operating principles. It was not until the last of the "rotating drum" designs described in the previous section were phased out that the "hooded barbette" arrangement above became the defining turret.

Wing turrets

The late pre-dreadnought HMS Agamemnon, with 9. Technical Characteristics HMS Agamemnon was ordered in 1904 and was the first warship order for the William Beardmore and Company's Dalmuir Naval Construction 2 inch secondary guns shipped in wing turrets

The dreadnought battleship HMS Dreadnought had a main battery 12 inch wing turret on either beam. Genesis Battleships of the era typically carried four large guns mounted fore and aft in twin turrets with a number of smaller-calibre guns ranged along the sides of the

A wing turret is a gun turret mounted along the side, or the wings, of a warship, off of the centerline. A warship is a Ship that is built and primarily intended for Combat.

The positioning of a wing turret limits its arc of fire, so that it generally can contribute to only the broadside weight of fire on one side of the ship. A broadside is the side of a Ship; the battery of Cannon on one side of a Warship; or their simultaneous (or near simultaneous fire in This is the major weakness of wing turrets as broadsides were the most prevalent type of gunnery duels. Depending on the configurations of ships, such as the HMS Dreadnought but not the SMS Blücher, the wing turrets could fire fore and aft, so this somewhat reduced the danger of crossing the T and the turrets could fire to enemies at the rear. Genesis Battleships of the era typically carried four large guns mounted fore and aft in twin turrets with a number of smaller-calibre guns ranged along the sides of the See German cruiser Blücher for World War II ship Design The design for the ship was influenced by early reports of a new British class of Crossing the T or Capping the T is a tactic in Naval warfare, in which a line of Warships crosses in front of a line of enemy ships allowing them to

Attempts were made to mount wing turrets en echelon so that they could fire on either beam, such as the Invincible and SMS Von der Tann battlecruisers, but this tended to cause great damage to the ships deck from the gun blast. Design In early 1906 three ships were laid down to the final specifications of Admiral Fisher's vision -, and. Development The preceding German large cruiser design ''Blücher'', was an incremental increase over previous armoured cruisers

Wing turrets were commonplace on capital ships and cruisers during the late 1800s up until the early 1910s. The capital ships of a Navy are its "important" warships the ones with the heaviest Firepower and Armor. A cruiser is a large type of Warship, which had its prime period from the late 19th century to the end of the Cold War. In pre-dreadnought battleships, the wing turret contributed to the secondary battery of sub-calibre weapons. Pre-dreadnought battleship is the general term for all of the types of sea going Battleships built between the mid-1890s and 1905 The secondary armament of a capital ship are smaller faster-firing weapons that are typically effective at a shorter range than the main (heavy weapons In large armoured cruisers, wing turrets contributed to the main battery, although the casemate mounting was more common. The armored cruiser, or armoured cruiser (see spelling differences) is a type of Cruiser, a naval warship. A casemate, sometimes rendered casement, is a fortified gun emplacement or armored structure from which guns are fired originally a vaulted chamber in a Fortress. At the time, large numbers of smaller calibre guns contributing to the broadside were thought to be of great value in demolishing a ships upperworks and secondary armaments, as distances of battle were limited by fire control and weapon performance.

In the early 1900s, weapon performance, armour quality and vessel speeds generally increased along with the distances of engagement; the utility of large secondary batteries reducing as a consequence. For body armour see Armour, for armoured forces see Armoured warfare, for other uses see Armour (disambiguation. Therefore, the early dreadnought battleships featured "all big gun" armaments of 11 or 12 inches calibre, some of which were mounted in wing turrets. The dreadnought was the predominant type of Battleship of the 20th century This arrangement was not satisfactory, however, as the wing turrets not only had a reduced fire arc for broadsides, but also because the weight of the guns was putting great strain on the hull and it was increasingly difficult to properly armour them.

Larger and later dreadnought battleships carried superimposed or superfiring turrets (i. e one turret mounted higher than, and firing over, that in front and below it). This allowed all turrets to train on either beam, and increased the weight of fire forward and aft. The superfiring or superimposed arrangement had not been proven until after South Carolina went to sea, and it was initially feared that the weakness of the previous Virginia class ship's stacked turrets would repeat itself. Ships in class Designation BB-13 Laid down 21 May 1902 Launched 6 April 1904 Larger and later guns (such as the US Navy's ultimate big gun design, the 16"/50 Mark 7) also could not be shipped in wing turrets, as the strain on the hull would have been too great.

Modern turrets

The GRP gunhouse is a common feature on modern naval gun turrets, this example being on the frigate HMS Grafton. Glass-reinforced plastic ( GRP) is a Composite material or Fiber-reinforced plastic made of a Plastic reinforced by fine fibers

Many modern surface warships have mountings for large calibre guns, although the calibres are now generally between 3 and 5 inches (76-127 mm). The gunhouses are often just weatherproof covers for the gun mounting equipment and are made of light un-armoured materials such as glass-reinforced plastic. Glass-reinforced plastic ( GRP) is a Composite material or Fiber-reinforced plastic made of a Plastic reinforced by fine fibers Modern turrets are often automatic in their operation, with no humans working inside them and only a small team passing fixed ammunition into the feed system. Smaller calibre weapons often operate on the autocannon principle, and indeed may not even be turrets at all, they may just be bolted directly to the deck. An autocannon is a rapid fire projectile Weapon. Autocannon often have a larger Caliber (calibre than a Machine gun (i

Naming

On board warships, each turret is given an identification. In the British Royal Navy, these would be letters: "A" and "B" were for the turrets from the front of the ship backwards, and letters near the end of the alphabet (i. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British armed services (and is therefore known as the Senior Service) e. , "X," "Y," etc. ) for turrets in the rear of the ship. Mountings in the middle of the ship would be "P," "Q," "R," etc. Confusingly, the Dido class had a "Q" and the Nelson class had an "X" turret in what would logically be "C" position; the latter being mounted at the main deck level in front of the bridge and behind the "B" turret, thus having restricted training fore and aft. Armament The class were intended to be armed with ten 525 inch (133 mm guns in five twin turrets but a shortage of the guns due to difficulties in manufacturing them History and design The Battle of Jutland had shown the value of firepower and protection over speed and manoeuvrability

Secondary turrets were named "P" and "S" (Port and Starboard) and numbered from fore to aft, e. Port is the nautical term (used on Boats and Ships) that refers to the left side of a ship as perceived by a person on board the ship and Starboard is the nautical term that refers to the right side of a vessel as perceived by a person on board a vessel and facing the bow (front g P1 being the forward port turret.

Exceptions were of course made; the battleship (HMS Agincourt) had the unusually large number of seven turrets. Design Agincourt was single-class vessel laid down by Armstrongs at Newcastle upon Tyne as the Brazilian Rio de Janeiro These were named "Monday", "Tuesday", etc. up to "Sunday".

In German use, turrets were generally "A," "B," "C," "D," "E" going backwards from stem to stern. Usually the radio alphabet was used on naming the turrets, e. A spelling alphabet, radio alphabet, or telephone alphabet is a set of words which are used to stand for the letters of an Alphabet. g. "Anton", "Bruno" or "Berta", "Caesar," "Dora" as on the German battleship Bismarck. Background Design of the ship started in the early 1930s following on from Germany's development of the ''Deutschland'' class cruisers and the ''Scharnhorst'' class

Land fortifications

Turret of the Maginot Line

Gun turrets have been placed in static, land fortifications such as the Maginot Line forts in France and particularly in coastal artillery defences such as Fort Drum, the "concrete battleship", near Corregidor Philippines. The Maginot Line (IPA, Ligne Maginot named after French Minister of Defense André Maginot, was a line of concrete Fortifications tank obstacles artillery The Maginot Line (IPA, Ligne Maginot named after French Minister of Defense André Maginot, was a line of concrete Fortifications tank obstacles artillery Fortifications are Military Constructions and Buildings designed for defense in Warfare Humans have constructed defensive works for This article is about the country For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic France topics. Coastal artillery is the branch of Armed forces concerned with operating anti-ship Artillery or fixed gun batteries in coastal Fortifications. FortDrum_Afterjpg|thumb|220px|Fort Drum]] Fort Drum (El Fraile Island also known as the “concrete battleship” is a heavily fortified island fortress situated at the mouth of For the Spanish historical administrative position see Corregidor (position Corregidor is an island in the entrance of the Philippines The Philippines ( Filipino: Pilipinas, officially known as the Republic of the Philippines (fil ''Republika ng Pilipinas'' RP Some nations, from Albania to Switzerland and Austria, have embedded the turrets of obsolete tanks in concrete fortifications (usually to secure choke points such as mountain passes). This article is about the country in southern Europe For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Albania topics. Switzerland (English pronunciation; Schweiz Swiss German: Schwyz or Schwiiz Suisse Svizzera Svizra officially the Swiss Confederation Austria (Österreich ( officially the Republic of Austria (Republik Österreich

Aircraft

Avro Lancaster tail turret at Imperial War Museum Duxford

B-17 chin turret at Imperial War Museum Duxford

B-29 ventral turret at Imperial War Museum Duxford

At first, guns on aircraft were either fixed in orientation or mounted on simple swivel mounts. "Lanc" redirects here Distinguish from Lank (adjective and from Amon Lanc (a place in Tolkien's fiction The Imperial War Museum Duxford in Cambridgeshire, England, commonly referred to simply as 'Duxford', houses the Imperial War Museum 's WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft. Please see WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft/page content for recommended layout The Imperial War Museum Duxford in Cambridgeshire, England, commonly referred to simply as 'Duxford', houses the Imperial War Museum 's The Imperial War Museum Duxford in Cambridgeshire, England, commonly referred to simply as 'Duxford', houses the Imperial War Museum 's The latter evolved into the Scarff ring, a rotating ring mount which allowed the gun to be turned to any direction with the gunner remaining directly behind it. The Scarff ring was a type of Machine gun mounting developed during the First World War by Warrant Officer (Gunner F As aircraft flew higher and faster, the need for protection from the elements led to the enclosure or shielding of the gun positions. The first bomber in the Royal Air Force to carry a power operated turret was the Boulton Paul Overstrand which first flew in 1933. The Boulton Paul P75 Overstrand was the last of the twin-engine Biplane Medium bombers of the Royal Air Force, a series that had begun during the First The Overstrand had a single turret, which was at the front of the bomber fitted with one machine gun. In time the number of turrets carried and the number of guns mounted increased. RAF heavy bombers of the Second World War typically had three powered turrets, with the rear one - the Tail gunner or "Tail End Charlie" position - mounting four 0. Tail Gunner is a monochrome vector arcade game created by Vectorbeam in 1979 303 inch machine guns

The Martin B-10 introduced turret-mounted defensive armament within the United States Army Air Corps, nearly a year ahead of the Overstrand, with a power-operated nose turret. WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft. Please see WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft/page content for recommended layout The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC was the predecessor of the U

The UK introduced the concept of the "turret fighter", likely based on the World War I success of the two-seater Bristol F.2 Fighter against the single-seat fighters of two decades earlier, in planes such as the Boulton Paul Defiant where the sole armament (4 x 0.303 in (7.7 mm) machineguns) was in a turret mounted behind the pilot rather than in fixed positions in the wings. WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft. Please see WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft/page content for recommended layout WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft. Please see WikipediaWikiProject Aircraft/page content for recommended layout The concept came at a time when the standard armament of a fighter was only two machine guns. In the face of heavily armed bombers operating in formation it was felt that a group of turret fighters would be able to concentrate their fire flexibly on the bombers; making beam, astern and from below attacks practicable. Although the idea had some merits in attacking bombers, it was found to be impractical when dealing with other fighters; the weight and drag of the turret slowed the aeroplane relative to a fixed armament single seater. The defensive turret on bombers fell from favour with the advent of the jet age, though the Boeing B-52 jet bomber and many of its contemporaries featured a tail-mounted barbette, or "remote turret" - a form of turret but with more limited field of fire. For the early 20th Century female impersonator see Barbette (performer A barbette is a protective circular armor feature around a Cannon However like other turrets these were soon phased out to reduce manpower needs as well as to increase payload and speed.

Aircraft carry their turrets in various locations:

• "dorsal" - on top of the fuselage
• "ventral" - underneath the fuselage
• "rear" or “tail” - at the very end of the fuselage
• "nose" - at the front of the fuselage
• "chin" - below the nose of the aircraft

Armoured fighting vehicles

This early 75 mm gun turret on a Sherman tank shows the single hatch. The fuselage (from the French fuselé "spindle-shaped" is an Aircraft 's main body section that holds crew and passengers or Cargo World War II foreign variants and use Lend-Lease Sherman tanks.

In modern tanks the turret is armoured for crew protection and rotates a full 360 degrees carrying a single large-calibre tank gun, typically in the range of 105 mm to 125 mm calibre. A tank is a tracked, Armoured fighting vehicle designed for Front-line combat which combines Operational mobility and tactical A tank gun is the main armament of a Tank. Modern tank guns are large- Caliber high-velocity guns capable of firing Kinetic energy penetrators Aiming machine guns may be mounted inside the turret. For other uses of the phrase see Machine Gun (disambiguation. The turret houses two or more crewmen, typically a tank commander, gunner, and often a gun loader.

For other armoured fighting vehicles, the turrets are equipped with other weapons dependent on role. An armoured fighting vehicle ( AFV) is a military Vehicle, protected by armour and armed with Weapons Most AFVs are equipped for driving in rugged An infantry fighting vehicle may carry a smaller calibre gun or an autocannon, or an anti-tank missile launcher, or a combination of weapons. An infantry fighting vehicle ( IFV, also known as (mechanized infantry combat vehicle, (MICV) is a type of Armoured fighting vehicle (AFV An autocannon is a rapid fire projectile Weapon. Autocannon often have a larger Caliber (calibre than a Machine gun (i Anti-tank refers to any method of combating military Armored fighting vehicles notably Tanks The most common anti-tank systems A modern self-propelled gun mounts a large artillery gun but less armour. A self-propelled gun (SPG is a gun whether it be an Artillery piece anti-tank gun or anti-aircraft gun mounted on a motorized wheeled or Lighter vehicles may carry a one-man turret with a single machine gun.

See also

• Sponson

References