GSh-6-23 (AO-19, TKB-613, VVS UV Index - 9-A-620) - six-barreled aviation 23-mm Gatling automatic gun.

In the USSR, work on the creation of multi-barreled aircraft guns was going on even before the Great Patriotic War. True, they ended in vain. The Soviet gunsmiths came up with the idea of ​​a system with barrels combined into one block, which would be rotated by an electric motor, at the same time as the American designers, but here we failed.

In 1959, Arkady Shipunov and Vasily Gryazev, who worked at the Klimovsky Research Institute-61, joined the work. As it turned out, the work had to start virtually from scratch. The designers had information that the Vulkan was being created in the USA, but at the same time, not only the technical solutions used by the Americans, but also the performance characteristics of the new Western system remained secret.

True, Arkady Shipunov himself later admitted that even if he and Vasily Gryazev had then become aware of American technical solutions, they would still hardly have been able to apply them in the USSR. As already mentioned, the designers of General Electric connected an external electric drive with a power of 26 kW to the Vulcan, while Soviet aircraft manufacturers could only offer, as Vasily Gryazev himself put it, "24 volts and not a gram more." Therefore, it was necessary to create a system that does not work from an external source, but using the internal energy of the shot.

It is noteworthy that similar schemes were proposed at one time by other American firms - participants in the competition to create a promising aircraft gun. True, Western designers could not implement such a solution. In contrast to them, Arkady Shipunov and Vasily Gryazev created the so-called gas exhaust engine, which, according to the second member of the tandem, worked like an internal combustion engine - it took part of the powder gas from the barrels when fired.

But, despite the elegant solution, another problem arose: how to make the first shot, because the gas engine, and therefore the gun mechanism itself, did not work yet. For the initial impulse, a starter was required, after using which the gun would run on its own gas from the first shot. Later, two versions of the starter were proposed: pneumatic and pyrotechnic (with a special squib).

In his memoirs, Arkady Shipunov recalls that even at the beginning of work on a new aircraft gun, he was able to see one of the few photographs of the American Vulcan being prepared for testing, where he was struck by the fact that a tape filled with ammunition was spreading along the floor, ceiling and walls of the compartment, but was not consolidated into a single cartridge box.

Later it became clear that with a rate of fire of 6000 rounds / min, a void forms in the cartridge box in a matter of seconds and the tape begins to “walk”. In this case, the ammunition falls out, and the tape itself is torn. Shipunov and Gryazev developed a special pneumatic belt lifter that does not allow the belt to move. Unlike the American solution, this idea provided a much more compact placement of the gun and ammunition, which is especially important for aviation technology, where designers are fighting for every centimeter.

Despite the fact that the product, which received the AO-19 index, was practically ready, there was no place for it in the Soviet Air Force, since the military themselves believed that small arms were a relic of the past, and the future was with missiles. Shortly before the refusal of the Air Force from the new gun, Vasily Gryazev was transferred to another enterprise. It would seem that AO-19, despite all the unique technical solutions, will remain unclaimed.

But in 1966, after summarizing the experience of the operations of the North Vietnamese and American Air Forces in the USSR, it was decided to resume work on the creation of advanced aircraft guns. True, by that time almost all enterprises and design bureaus that had previously worked on this topic had already reoriented to other areas. Moreover, there were no people willing to return to this area of ​​work in the military-industrial sector!

Surprisingly, despite all the difficulties, Arkady Shipunov, who had headed TsKB-14 by this time, decided to revive the cannon theme at his enterprise. After the Military Industrial Commission approved this decision, its leadership agreed to return Vasily Gryazev, as well as several other specialists who had taken part in the work on the “AO-19 product”, to the Tula enterprise.

As Arkady Shipunov recalled, the problem with the resumption of work on cannon aircraft weapons arose not only in the USSR, but also in the West. In fact, at that time, of the multi-barreled guns in the world, there was only the American one - the Volcano.

It is worth noting that, despite the abandonment of the “AO-19 object” of the Air Force, the Navy was interested in the product, for which several cannon systems were developed.

By the beginning of the 70s, the KBP offered two six-barreled guns: the 30 mm AO-18, which used the AO-18 cartridge, and the AO-19, chambered for 23 mm AM-23 ammunition. It is noteworthy that the products differed not only in the shells used, but also in the starters for the preliminary acceleration of the barrel block. On AO-18 there was a pneumatic one, and on AO-19 - a pyrotechnic one with 10 squibs.

Initially, representatives of the Air Force, who considered the new gun as an armament for promising fighters and fighter-bombers, made increased demands on the AO-19 for firing ammunition - at least 500 shells in one burst. I had to seriously work on the survivability of the gun. The most loaded part, the gas rod, was made of special heat-resistant materials. Changed the design. The gas engine was modified, where the so-called floating pistons were installed.

Conducted preliminary tests have shown that the modified AO-19 can show much better performance than originally stated. As a result of the work carried out at the KBP, the 23-mm gun was able to fire at a rate of 10-12 thousand rounds per minute. And the mass of AO-19 after all the refinements was just over 70 kg.

For comparison: the American Vulkan, modified by this time, which received the M61A1 index, weighed 136 kg, fired 6000 rounds per minute, the salvo was almost 2.5 times less than that of the AO-19, while American aircraft designers also needed to place on board the aircraft also has a 25-kilowatt external electric drive.

And even on the M61A2 aboard the fifth-generation F-22 fighter, American designers, with a smaller caliber and rate of fire of their guns, could not achieve those unique weight and compactness indicators like the gun developed by Vasily Gryazev and Arkady Shipunov.

The first customer of the new AO-19 gun was the Sukhoi Experimental Design Bureau, which at that time was headed by Pavel Osipovich himself. The Sukhoi planned that the new cannon would become a weapon for the T-6, a promising front-line bomber with variable wing geometry, which later became the legendary Su-24, they were developing at that time.

The terms of work on the new machine were quite tight: the T-6, which made its first flight on January 17, 1970 in the summer of 1973, was already ready for transfer to military testers. When fine-tuning the AO-19 to the requirements of aircraft manufacturers, certain difficulties arose. Shooting well on the stand, the gun could not fire more than 150 shots - the barrels overheated, they needed to be cooled, which often took about 10-15 minutes, depending on the ambient temperature.

Another problem was that the gun did not want, as the designers of the Tula Instrument Design Bureau joked, to “stop firing.” Already after releasing the start button, the AO-19 managed to spontaneously release three or four projectiles. But within the allotted time, all the shortcomings and technical problems were eliminated, and the T-6 was presented to the GLITs VVS for testing with a cannon fully integrated into the new front-line bomber.

In the course of the tests that began in Akhtubinsk, the product was fired, which by that time had received the index GSh (Gryazev - Shipunov) -6-23, at various targets. With the control application of the latest system in less than one second, the pilot was able to completely cover all the targets, firing about 200 shells!

Pavel Sukhoi was so satisfied with the GSh-6-23 that, along with the standard Su-24, the so-called SPPU-6 cannon containers with movable cannon mounts GSh-6-23M, capable of deviating horizontally and vertically by 45 degrees, were included in the ammunition load. . It was assumed that with such weapons, and in total it was planned to place two such installations on a front-line bomber, he would be able to completely disable the runway in one run, as well as destroy a column of motorized infantry in combat vehicles up to one kilometer long.

Developed at the Dzerzhinets plant, the SPPU-6 has become one of the largest mobile gun mounts. Its length exceeded five meters, and its mass with ammunition load of 400 shells was 525 kg. The tests carried out showed that when firing a new installation, there was at least one projectile hit per linear meter.

It is noteworthy that immediately after Sukhoi, the Mikoyan Design Bureau became interested in the cannon, which intended to use the GSh-6-23 on the latest MiG-31 supersonic interceptor. Despite its large size, aircraft manufacturers needed a fairly small-sized gun with a high rate of fire, since the MiG-31 was supposed to destroy supersonic targets. The KBP helped the Mikoyan by developing a unique lightweight, chainless, linkless power supply system, thanks to which the mass of the gun was reduced by a few more kilograms and gained additional centimeters of space on board the interceptor.

Developed by outstanding gunsmiths Arkady Shipunov and Vasily Gryazev, the GSH-6-23 automatic aircraft gun is still in service with the Russian Air Force. Moreover, in many respects its characteristics, despite more than 40 years of service life, remain unique.

GSh-6-23 (AO-19, TKB-613, VVS UV Index - 9-A-620) - six-barreled aviation 23-mm Gatling automatic gun.

In the USSR, work on the creation of multi-barreled aircraft guns was going on even before the Great Patriotic War. True, they ended in vain. The Soviet gunsmiths came up with the idea of ​​a system with barrels combined into one block, which would be rotated by an electric motor, at the same time as the American designers, but here we failed.

In 1959, Arkady Shipunov and Vasily Gryazev, who worked at the Klimovsky Research Institute-61, joined the work. As it turned out, the work had to start virtually from scratch. The designers had information that the Vulkan was being created in the USA, but at the same time, not only the technical solutions used by the Americans, but also the performance characteristics of the new Western system remained secret.

True, Arkady Shipunov himself later admitted that even if he and Vasily Gryazev had then become aware of American technical solutions, they would still hardly have been able to apply them in the USSR. As already mentioned, the designers of General Electric connected an external electric drive with a power of 26 kW to the Vulcan, while Soviet aircraft manufacturers could only offer, as Vasily Gryazev himself put it, "24 volts and not a gram more." Therefore, it was necessary to create a system that does not work from an external source, but using the internal energy of the shot.

It is noteworthy that similar schemes were proposed at one time by other American firms - participants in the competition to create a promising aircraft gun. True, Western designers could not implement such a solution. In contrast to them, Arkady Shipunov and Vasily Gryazev created the so-called gas exhaust engine, which, according to the second member of the tandem, worked like an internal combustion engine - it took part of the powder gas from the barrels when fired.

But, despite the elegant solution, another problem arose: how to make the first shot, because the gas engine, and therefore the gun mechanism itself, did not work yet. For the initial impulse, a starter was required, after using which the gun would run on its own gas from the first shot. Later, two versions of the starter were proposed: pneumatic and pyrotechnic (with a special squib).

In his memoirs, Arkady Shipunov recalls that even at the beginning of work on a new aircraft gun, he was able to see one of the few photographs of the American Vulcan being prepared for testing, where he was struck by the fact that a tape filled with ammunition was spreading along the floor, ceiling and walls of the compartment, but was not consolidated into a single cartridge box.

Later it became clear that with a rate of fire of 6000 rounds / min, a void forms in the cartridge box in a matter of seconds and the tape begins to “walk”. In this case, the ammunition falls out, and the tape itself is torn. Shipunov and Gryazev developed a special pneumatic belt lifter that does not allow the belt to move. Unlike the American solution, this idea provided a much more compact placement of the gun and ammunition, which is especially important for aviation technology, where designers are fighting for every centimeter.

Despite the fact that the product, which received the AO-19 index, was practically ready, there was no place for it in the Soviet Air Force, since the military themselves believed that small arms were a relic of the past, and the future was with missiles. Shortly before the refusal of the Air Force from the new gun, Vasily Gryazev was transferred to another enterprise. It would seem that AO-19, despite all the unique technical solutions, will remain unclaimed.

But in 1966, after summarizing the experience of the operations of the North Vietnamese and American Air Forces in the USSR, it was decided to resume work on the creation of advanced aircraft guns. True, by that time almost all enterprises and design bureaus that had previously worked on this topic had already reoriented to other areas. Moreover, there were no people willing to return to this area of ​​work in the military-industrial sector!

Surprisingly, despite all the difficulties, Arkady Shipunov, who had headed TsKB-14 by this time, decided to revive the cannon theme at his enterprise. After the Military Industrial Commission approved this decision, its leadership agreed to return Vasily Gryazev, as well as several other specialists who had taken part in the work on the “AO-19 product”, to the Tula enterprise.

As Arkady Shipunov recalled, the problem with the resumption of work on cannon aircraft weapons arose not only in the USSR, but also in the West. In fact, at that time, of the multi-barreled guns in the world, there was only the American one - the Volcano.

It is worth noting that, despite the abandonment of the “AO-19 object” of the Air Force, the Navy was interested in the product, for which several cannon systems were developed.

By the beginning of the 70s, the KBP offered two six-barreled guns: the 30 mm AO-18, which used the AO-18 cartridge, and the AO-19, chambered for 23 mm AM-23 ammunition. It is noteworthy that the products differed not only in the shells used, but also in the starters for the preliminary acceleration of the barrel block. On AO-18 there was a pneumatic one, and on AO-19 - a pyrotechnic one with 10 squibs.

Initially, representatives of the Air Force, who considered the new gun as an armament for promising fighters and fighter-bombers, made increased demands on the AO-19 for firing ammunition - at least 500 shells in one burst. I had to seriously work on the survivability of the gun. The most loaded part, the gas rod, was made of special heat-resistant materials. Changed the design. The gas engine was modified, where the so-called floating pistons were installed.

Conducted preliminary tests have shown that the modified AO-19 can show much better performance than originally stated. As a result of the work carried out at the KBP, the 23-mm gun was able to fire at a rate of 10-12 thousand rounds per minute. And the mass of AO-19 after all the refinements was just over 70 kg.

For comparison: the American Vulkan, modified by this time, which received the M61A1 index, weighed 136 kg, fired 6000 rounds per minute, the salvo was almost 2.5 times less than that of the AO-19, while American aircraft designers also needed to place on board the aircraft also has a 25-kilowatt external electric drive.

And even on the M61A2 aboard the fifth-generation F-22 fighter, American designers, with a smaller caliber and rate of fire of their guns, could not achieve those unique weight and compactness indicators like the gun developed by Vasily Gryazev and Arkady Shipunov.

The first customer of the new AO-19 gun was the Sukhoi Experimental Design Bureau, which at that time was headed by Pavel Osipovich himself. The Sukhoi planned that the new cannon would become a weapon for the T-6, a promising front-line bomber with variable wing geometry, which later became the legendary Su-24, they were developing at that time.

The terms of work on the new machine were quite tight: the T-6, which made its first flight on January 17, 1970 in the summer of 1973, was already ready for transfer to military testers. When fine-tuning the AO-19 to the requirements of aircraft manufacturers, certain difficulties arose. Shooting well on the stand, the gun could not fire more than 150 shots - the barrels overheated, they needed to be cooled, which often took about 10-15 minutes, depending on the ambient temperature.

Another problem was that the gun did not want, as the designers of the Tula Instrument Design Bureau joked, to “stop firing.” Already after releasing the start button, the AO-19 managed to spontaneously release three or four projectiles. But within the allotted time, all the shortcomings and technical problems were eliminated, and the T-6 was presented to the GLITs VVS for testing with a cannon fully integrated into the new front-line bomber.

In the course of the tests that began in Akhtubinsk, the product was fired, which by that time had received the index GSh (Gryazev - Shipunov) -6-23, at various targets. With the control application of the latest system in less than one second, the pilot was able to completely cover all the targets, firing about 200 shells!

Pavel Sukhoi was so satisfied with the GSh-6-23 that, along with the standard Su-24, the so-called SPPU-6 cannon containers with movable cannon mounts GSh-6-23M, capable of deviating horizontally and vertically by 45 degrees, were included in the ammunition load. . It was assumed that with such weapons, and in total it was planned to place two such installations on a front-line bomber, he would be able to completely disable the runway in one run, as well as destroy a column of motorized infantry in combat vehicles up to one kilometer long.

Developed at the Dzerzhinets plant, the SPPU-6 has become one of the largest mobile gun mounts. Its length exceeded five meters, and its mass with ammunition load of 400 shells was 525 kg. The tests carried out showed that when firing a new installation, there was at least one projectile hit per linear meter.

It is noteworthy that immediately after Sukhoi, the Mikoyan Design Bureau became interested in the cannon, which intended to use the GSh-6-23 on the latest MiG-31 supersonic interceptor. Despite its large size, aircraft manufacturers needed a fairly small-sized gun with a high rate of fire, since the MiG-31 was supposed to destroy supersonic targets. The KBP helped the Mikoyan by developing a unique lightweight, chainless, linkless power supply system, thanks to which the mass of the gun was reduced by a few more kilograms and gained additional centimeters of space on board the interceptor.

Developed by outstanding gunsmiths Arkady Shipunov and Vasily Gryazev, the GSH-6-23 automatic aircraft gun is still in service with the Russian Air Force. Moreover, in many respects its characteristics, despite more than 40 years of service life, remain unique.

The universal cannon container UPK-23/250 (UPK-23-250) is a gondola with a built-in double-barreled 23mm rapid-fire gun GSh-23 (GSh-23L, GSh-23M) designed by Gryazev-Shipunov UPK-23-250 is suspended on standard underwing hardpoints for helicopter armaments. Designed for completing objects of the type: 28, VM, 48, 82, 94, 24B, 24BN, 32, 24, 23, 11, S-22, T-43, S-32MK, t-58, S32M2K, S52K, S52UK, 242, 243, 246, 249, 80T, 80MT, 502, 72P.

Mounted on helicopters: Mi-24, Mi-8, Mi-28 (and their modifications), Ka-50, Ka-52, etc. In general, almost any Russian helicopter with underwing pylons for armament suspension. Designed to solve a wide range of tasks: the destruction of lightly and medium armored ground targets, the destruction of slow-flying air targets, the destruction of enemy manpower, etc. In general, it performs almost the same tasks as on-board helicopter machine guns and cannons and serves to enhance the firepower of a helicopter. The weight of the gondola with guns and full ammunition is about 300-310 kg. The rate of fire of the GSh-23 cannon is about 3000 rounds per minute with a projectile speed of 690-700 meters per second ... The firing range in this case reaches 3000 meters! The ammunition capacity of one container is 250 shells, which is why the container is called UPK-23-250. Ammunition of four containers (max, Mi-28 ammunition) is equal to 1000 shells, respectively. It is a good means for contact air combat

Tactical and technical characteristics of UPK-23-250

Gun GSh-23L

The development of the twin 23-mm cannon AO-9 began at NII-61 in 1955 under the leadership of chief designer V.P. Gryazev and head of department A.G. Shipunov. The gun was developed under the AM-23 cartridge. In fact, these were two guns combined into one block and having an associated automation mechanism. Rolling forward of one gun was carried out due to the energy of powder gases during the rollback of the second, which made it possible to abandon knurlers and return springs and reduce the mass of the structure. The presence of two barrels made it possible to increase their survivability with an overall high rate of fire (2 times higher than that of the AM-23). To increase survivability, a shockless mechanism for smoothly sending cartridges into the chambers was used. On the first prototype of the gun, a sliding scheme for the tape feed mechanism was adopted, but it turned out to be unsuccessful. On the second sample, a star drive was already used.

Since 1957, OKB-575 was engaged in finalizing the gun, but factory tests were carried out at NII-61. State ground tests were completed at the end of 1958. In June 1959, flight tests were carried out, after which it was decided to launch the gun into mass production at the plant. Degtyarev under the designation GSh-23. The first production samples showed low survivability, which required a number of design improvements. Officially put into service in 1965.

The operation of automation is based on the use of the energy of powder gases, which are supplied alternately from one barrel, then from another. Gun feed - tape (both left and right feed are provided). The supply of cartridges in both barrels is carried out by a common mechanism from one tape. Each barrel has its own nodes for reducing the cartridge from the tape to the chamber, its chambering, locking and extraction of the tape. The mechanisms of one barrel are kinematically connected to the mechanisms of the second with the help of rocker levers, alternating the operation of the nodes and the feed between the two blocks: locking one barrel is necessary for unlocking the other, ejection of the sleeve is for sending a cartridge in the next one.

Fire control is remote, electric direct current (27 V).

For firing from the GSh-23 cannon, 23-mm cartridges with high-explosive fragmentation, armor-piercing explosive and armor-piercing incendiary projectiles are used. The gunpowder of the cartridge is ignited by an electric primer.

The gun can be used in hanging containers GP-9, SPPU-22, UPK-23-250.

Gun GSh-23L is available in three versions

  • 9-A-472.00-01 - with a horizontal location of the localizer;
  • 9-A-472.00-02 - with a vertical location of the exhaust windows of the localizer;
  • 9-A-472.00-03 - with localizer exhaust ports at 45°

Pendant for UPK 23-250

Depending on the type of suspension, the container is divided into 6 types:

  • 9-A-681,
  • 9-A-681-01,
  • 9-A-681-02,
  • 9-A-681-03,
  • 9-A-681-04,
  • 9-A-681-05

In gun mode With the advent and constant modernization of aviation weapons, including missiles, some of the nomenclature of which today already belongs to a full-fledged class of high-precision weapons, the need for traditional small arms and cannon weapons of aircraft has not disappeared. Moreover, this weapon has its own advantages. Among them are the ability to use from the air against all types of targets, constant readiness to fire, immunity to electronic countermeasures. Modern types of aircraft guns are actually machine guns in terms of rate of fire and at the same time artillery pieces in caliber. The principle of automatic firing also makes the air gun related to the machine gun. At the same time, the rate of fire of some samples of domestic aviation weapons is a record even for machine guns. For example, the GSH-6-23M aircraft gun developed at TsKB-14 (the predecessor of the Tula Instrument Design Bureau) is still considered the fastest weapon in military aviation. This six-barreled gun has a rate of fire of 10 thousand rounds per minute! It is said that during comparative tests of the GSh-6-23 and the American M-61 Vulkan, the domestic gun, without requiring a powerful external source of energy for its operation, showed almost twice as much rate of fire, while having half its own weight. By the way, in the six-barreled gun GSh-6-23, an autonomous gas-operated automatic drive was also used for the first time, which made it possible to use this weapon not only on an airplane, but also, for example, on ground firing installations. The upgraded version of the GSh-23-6 with To this day, Su-24 front-line bombers are equipped with an ammunition load of 500 rounds: this weapon is installed here in a suspended movable cannon container. In addition, the MiG-31 supersonic all-weather long-range fighter-interceptor is armed with the GSh-23-6M cannon. The six-barrel version of the GSh cannon was also used for the cannon armament of the MiG-27 fighter-bomber. True, a 30-mm cannon has already been installed here, and for a weapon of this caliber it is also considered the fastest in the world - six thousand rounds per minute. A barrage of fire from the sky It would not be an exaggeration to say that aviation weapons with the GSh brand became, in fact, the basis of this type of weapon for domestic military aviation. In single-barreled and multi-barreled versions with the use of innovative technologies for ammunition of various calibers and purposes - in any case, Gryazev-Shipunov guns have earned their recognition from pilots of many generations. 30 mm caliber guns have become the development of aviation small arms and guns in our country. So, the famous GSh-30 (in a double-barreled version) is equipped with no less famous Su-25 attack aircraft. These are machines that have proven their effectiveness in all wars and local conflicts, starting from the 70-80s of the last century. One of the most acute drawbacks of such weapons - the problem with the "survivability" of the barrels - is solved here by distributing the queue length between the two barrels and reducing the rate of fire per barrel. At the same time, all the main operations for preparing fire - feeding the tape, sending a cartridge, preparing a shot - occur evenly, which ensures a high rate of fire for the gun: the rate of fire of the Su-25 reaches 3500 rounds per minute. Another project of the Tula aviation gunsmiths is the GSh-30- 1. It is recognized as the lightest 30mm cannon in the world. The mass of the weapon is 50 kilograms (for comparison, a six-barrel of the same caliber weighs more than three times more). A unique feature of this gun is the presence of an autonomous water-evaporative barrel cooling system. In the casing there is water, which in the process of firing when the barrel is heated turns into steam. Passing through the screw groove on the barrel, it cools it, and then goes out. There is information that this caliber will also be the main one for small arms and cannon weapons of the fifth generation fighter T-50 (PAK FA). In particular, as the press service of the KBP recently reported, flight tests of the modernized 9A1-4071 rapid-fire aircraft gun (this name was given to this gun) with the testing of the entire ammunition load in various modes were carried out on the Su-27SM aircraft. After testing is completed, development work is planned to test this gun already on the T-50. "Flying" BMP The Tula Design Bureau (TsKB-14) became the "Motherland" of aviation weapons for domestic rotary-wing combat vehicles. It was here that the GSh-30 gun variant appeared in a double-barreled version for Mi-24 helicopters. The main feature of these weapons is the presence of elongated barrels, due to which the initial velocity of the projectile is increased, which is 940 meters per second here. But on the new Russian combat helicopters - the Mi-28 and Ka-52 - a different cannon armament scheme was used. The basis was the well-proven 2A42 gun of 30 mm caliber, mounted on infantry fighting vehicles. On the Mi-28, this gun is mounted in a fixed mobile gun mount NPPU-28, which significantly increases maneuverability when firing. Shells are fired from two sides and in two versions - armor-piercing and high-explosive fragmentation. Lightly armored targets on the ground can be hit from the air at a distance of 1500 meters, air targets (helicopters) - two and a half kilometers, and manpower - four kilometers. The NPPU-28 installation is located on the Mi-28 under the fuselage in the nose of the helicopter and works synchronously with the sight (including helmet-mounted) of the pilot-operator. The ammunition is located in two boxes on the rotary part of the turret. The 30-mm BMP-2 gun, also placed in a mobile gun mount, was also adopted by the Ka-52. But on the Mi-35M and Mi-35P machines, which, in fact, became a continuation of the legendary series of Mi-24 helicopters, they again returned to the GSh gun and to the 23rd caliber. On the Mi-35P, the number of firing points can reach three. This happens if the main guns are placed in two universal cannon containers (placed on pylons on the sides of the vehicle), and one more gun is installed in a fixed bow mobile gun mount. The total ammunition load of aviation cannon armament of helicopters of the 35th series in this version reaches 950 shells. Shooting... with a lunch break Do not refuse cannon weapons and when creating combat vehicles in the West. Including ultra-modern aircraft of the fifth generation. So, on the F-22 fighter, the above-mentioned 20-mm M61A2 Vulcan with 480 rounds of ammunition is installed. This fast-firing six-barrel cannon with a rotating block of barrels differs from the Russian cannon in a more primitive cooling system - air rather than water, as well as pneumatic or hydraulic drives. Despite all the shortcomings, among which, first of all, a small caliber, as well as an archaic system shells and limited ammunition at a very high rate of fire (four to six thousand rounds per minute), the Vulcan has been the standard armament of US combat aircraft since the 50s. True, in the American military press there was information that at present it was possible to cope with delays in the ammunition supply system: a linkless ammunition supply system was apparently developed for the M61A1 gun. The AH-64 "Apache" - the main attack helicopter of the US Army - is also equipped with an automatic gun . Some analysts call it the most common rotorcraft of its class in the world, without, however, citing any statistics. The Apache carries a 30mm M230 automatic cannon with a rate of fire of 650 rounds per minute. A significant drawback of this weapon is the need to cool its barrel after every 300 shots, and the time for such a break can be 10 minutes or more. For this weapon, a helicopter can take 1200 rounds on board, but only if an additional fuel tank is not installed on the machine. If it is available, the volume of ammunition will not exceed the very 300 rounds that Apache can fire without the need for a “break” for mandatory barrel cooling. The only advantage of this gun can be considered only the presence of shells with armor-piercing-cumulative element in its ammunition load. It is stated that with such ammunition, Apache can hit ground targets equipped with 300 mm of homogeneous armor. Author: Dmitry Sergeev Photo: Russian Ministry of Defense / Russian Helicopters /
Design Bureau of Instrument Engineering. Academician A. G. Shipunov

23-mm aviation double-barreled gun GSh-23.

Developer: NII-61, V. Gryazev and A. Shipunov
Country: USSR
Trials: 1959
Adoption: 1965

GSh-23 (TKB-613) is a double-barreled aircraft gun designed to equip mobile and fixed gun mounts of aircraft and helicopters. The effective firing range of the GSh-23 is 2 km. The first aircraft to use the cannon was the MiG-21PFS (PFM). GSh-23L was located in the GP-9 container in the center under the fuselage, the ammunition load was 200 rounds. In addition to stationary placement, the gun is used in a hanging container UPK-23-250, SPPU-22, SNPU, VSPU-36.

The gun was developed at the Instrument Design Bureau (Tula) and entered service in 1965. The production of the GSh-23 cannon is carried out by JSC "Plant named after V.A. Degtyarev" (Kovrov).

Structurally, the GSh-23 is made according to the scheme of the Gast double-barreled gun.

The GSh-23 gun was developed under the guidance of the chief designer V. Gryazev and the head of the department A. Shipunov for cartridges for the AM-23 gun of 23 x 115 mm caliber.

The first prototype gun was assembled at NII-61 at the end of 1954. After many technological and design changes (only the trigger mechanism of the gun changed radically five times) and a painstaking five-year refinement of the GSh-23, in 1959 it was decided to put it into production. The first serial samples of the gun showed low survivability, which required a number of design improvements. The GSh-23 was officially put into service in 1965.

In this gun, two barrels were installed in one casing and mechanisms were placed that ensured their alternate loading. The automation of the weapon was set in motion by a gas exhaust engine, into which powder gases were supplied when fired from one or the other barrel. The general unit produced the supply of cartridges from one cartridge belt. Instead of the previously popular rack and pinion feed systems, the GSh-23 device used a gear drive with an asterisk pulling through the cartridge belt. Each barrel had its own nodes for lowering the cartridge from the tape into the chamber, sending it, locking it and extracting the cartridge case. The mechanisms of one barrel were kinematically connected to the mechanisms of the other barrel with the help of rocker arms, alternating the operation of the nodes and the feed between the two blocks: locking the barrel of one accounted for unlocking the other, ejection of the sleeve - for sending the cartridge in the next one.

Such a scheme made it possible to somewhat simplify the kinematics, since the sliders moved linearly during rollback and rollback, only forward and backward, and their movement was carried out forcibly by the action of gas pistons, without any return springs, unlike the same Kalashnikov assault rifle. Thanks to this, it was possible to achieve a good dynamic balance of automation in the direction of rollback and to realize high reliability of the system.

Another innovation was the introduction of pyrotechnic reloading of the gun instead of the usual pneumatic reloading, which distorted the shutter with compressed air in the event of a misfire, delay or other failures. At the same time, high-pressure air acted as "regular" powder gases in guns with a gas outlet or was fed into a special reloading mechanism in systems with a barrel recoil, providing kinematics.

In fact, the GSh-23 consisted of two guns combined into one block and having an associated automation mechanism, where the “halves” work on each other, rolling the shutter of one of them due to the energy of powder gases while rolling back the neighboring one. Such a connection made it possible to obtain a gain in the weight and dimensions of the weapon compared to two unrelated guns, since a number of nodes and mechanisms were common to both barrels included in the system. Common were the casing (receiver), feed and firing mechanism, electric trigger, shock absorber and reloading mechanism. The presence of two barrels solved the problem of their survivability with a sufficiently high overall rate of fire, since the intensity of firing from each barrel was halved and, consequently, barrel wear was reduced.

The features and advantages of the double-barreled scheme of automatic weapons in combination with the shockless chambering of the cartridge made it possible to increase the rate of fire of the GSh-23 gun compared to the AM-23 with a slight increase in the weight of the weapon (only 3 kg). The achieved rate of fire of 3200-3400 rds / min significantly exceeded the capabilities of previous systems. Thanks to new structural materials and rational solutions in the design of the units, it was also possible to improve the operational properties of the system, simplifying the work with weapons: if the bulkhead and cleaning with complete disassembly of the NR-30 guns were required to be carried out after every 500 shots, then the maintenance regulations for the GSh-23 allowed to perform these procedures after firing 2000 rounds. After 500-600 shots, the GSh-23 cannon was allowed not to be disassembled for maintenance, but limited only to washing and lubricating individual parts - gas pistons, barrels and a receiver. The links of the GSh-23 cartridge belt, reinforced in comparison with those used on the AM-23, allowed their use up to five times in a row.

GSH-23 is the last complex from a series (A-12.7; YakB-12.7; GSH-30-2; GSH-23) of small arms installed on the Mi-24 and the successor to the evolution of a number of small arms systems installed on this attack helicopter. With the introduction of the GSh-23, the combat effectiveness of small arms on the Mi-24VM has become an order of magnitude higher than that of the Mi-24P with the 30-mm GSh-30 gun.

In addition to Russia and the CIS countries, the gun is operated in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Bulgaria, Cuba, Czech Republic, Ethiopia, Ghana, Hungary, Nigeria, Poland, Romania, Syria, Thailand, Vietnam, Serbia, Montenegro, Brazil.

Modifications:

GSh-23 - basic modification.
GSh-23L - with localizers that serve to directional removal of powder gases and reduce the recoil force. Length increased to 1537 mm.
GSh-23V - with water cooling.
GSh-23M - with an increased rate of fire and without a localizer.

Media:

GSh-23 - MiG-21 (starting with the MiG-21PFM modification), An-2A, Il-76, Ka-25F, Yak-28.
GSh-23V - Mi-24VM (with the installation of NPPU-24).
GSh-23L - An-72P, Il-102, L-39Z, Mi-24VP, MiG-23, Tu-22M, Tu-95MS, Tu-142M3.

Specifications:

Type: GSh-23 / GSh-23L
Caliber, mm: 23 / 23
Gun length, mm: 1387 / 1537
Gun width, mm: 165 / 165
Gun height, mm: 168 / 168
Barrel length (trunks), mm: 1000 / 1000
Gun weight without magazine, kg: 50.5 / 51
Projectile weight, kg: 173 / 173
Rate of fire, rds / min: 3000-3400 / 3200
Initial projectile speed, m/s: 715 / 715
Continuous queue length, shots: 200 / 200
Ammunition, shells: 250 / 450.

Aviation gun GSh-23.