What in God’s name (heh) is this? What were they thinking of, mechanically?
You’d think they’d put a little more effort into optics.
How are those 23mm?
I don’t know much about guns, but 23 mm should be a little less than an inch - or close twice the diameter of .45 caliber.
Unless those floor tiles are very small - I don’t get it.
I’m guessing those are Russian rounds intended for anticraft or antivehicle guns. The article mentions armor piercing and high explosive versions if the round. The caliber only refers to the diameter of the projectile not the casing and amount of gunpowder.
I imagine it is intended to be used against vehicles in urban areas so no real need for a scope. Quite clever.
You can see some empty shell casings near the feet of the shooter in the top photo. 23mm doesn’t look out of line.
Also note that the rounds are originally for use with a belt-fed weapon.
I think my brain saw the first two pictures and thought the second can’t fit in the first. Obviously they aren’t going to be taken to scale. The diameter of the cases seem about twice the diameter of the bullet - and being that about six of them fit in a floor tile - that would make sense if the tiles were 12". The debris and other stuff makes the tiles look bigger. That being said - the length of the casing (including the bullet) appears twice the size as other 23mm casings I found on line, but they might not have been anti-aircraft - and I’m not sure if the measurements given - like 23x115 include the bullet or just the casing (I was assuming it was both).
Thanks for that - it makes sense now.
Yeah, 23mm is usually a Russian caliber. It’s a modified anti-tank rifle of some sort. I like the recoil damper.
I have a little experience with the .50 BMG round. This would be bigger and badder. Useful for urban warfare in that it would retain a lot of energy after piercing vehicles, building walls and other things enemy fighters might take cover behind. If it’s something they cobbled together they must have seen a need for it and will no doubt refine it to make it more user friendly.
The gun is cobbled together with various parts from other guns. The small caliber cannon round can be effective but overall this is a very impractical weapon.
What I am seeing here is an army that cannot get first line or second class surplus weapons and they have to make do with whatever parts they can scrounge from junkyards and destroyed real weapon systems. All this suggests these troops are having terrible supply issues or having terrible problems financing their ongoing war. This weapon is an embarrassment and I certainly would be afraid to fire this thing and I would not be willing to be in the same room with it when it was fired.
The classic oerlikon 20mm cannon is that sort of size and the ammo is surprisingly large so 23mm sounds about right.
Not sure what you’d “snipe” with that beast though. Must be vehicles as it seems overkill for infantry. Not particularly mobile either and must be a bugger to silence.
I think it’d be effective against APCs (Armored Personnel Carriers) and other lesser armored vehicles. I don’t know what kind of range it has, but it’d be good against aircraft that are parked (landed? Neither flying or moving on the ground, okay?). And I don’t know what the building codes are in the area where it’s used, but it might be good against building walls and probably it works against doors.
23mm was a standard Soviet antiaircraft round. And also a standard anti-APC round. They made a variety of autocannon which shot these rounds. e.g. ZU-23-2 - Wikipedia
It’s pretty straightforward to bodge up a homebrew “sniper” rifle using such parts. IMO it’s not very efficient or effective. But it is strong on scary propaganda value for naïve definitions of “scary”
Why silence it when the round has passed through the side of an armored car 2000m away and bounced around the interior before it’s heard?
My money is on it being something like a 2A14 23mm autocannon pulled from a dual anti-aircraft mount, like the ZU-23-2, then modified for “shoulder” firing of a single shot.
eta: Or what LSLGuy said.
This is funny on many levels. Imagine some ISIS nitwit packing that thing to his hide, then imagine him following the sniper’s golden rule, that is, shoot, move, shoot. Poor dude, if the incoming fire didn’t kill him, lugging that thing around would.
Why they didn’t make a technical out of that, I have no idea. How are they bracing it for recoil? That said, I wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end.
The big brother of it, the ZSU-23, was used to great effect in the anti-personnel role. The Marines in Generation Kill ran into one, and I’m still not sure how the thing didn’t end up eating their entire advance element. AIUI, it was a decent anti-sniper system in the Lebanon Civil War. Of course, the result was that it chewed up the entire high-rise floor the sniper was on, but you can’t have everything.
Thanks for this in particular–it was my initial query, and of course the other posts are good too.
Plus I learned what an Oerlikon is. (Did you not cap it by mistake or is written about as a generic?) They’re iconic for WWII.
Plus I looked up “technical” to find the origin of the name. I wonder also, as Gray Ghost asked, why it was not put to more obvious tactical use.
I envision it as being an anti-technical gun probably lightly armored vehicles as well. From a good high position it could cover a key intersection or road. One shot in the engine compartment would disable the vehicle.
Purely my clumsy typing. They are still in use as well, an old design but obviously an affective one.