Gustav Gun - The Largest Gun Ever Built

I did a search on ATS and found nothing about the Gustav Gun. This was 1 "Big Bad Boy"!

The largest gun ever built was the "Gustav Gun" built in Essen, Germany in 1941 by the firm of Friedrich Krupp A.G. Upholding a tradition of naming heavy cannon after family members, the Gustav Gun was named after the invalid head of the Krupp family - Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach. The strategic weapon of its day, the Gustav Gun was built at the direct order of Adolf Hitler for the express purpose of crushing Maginot Line forts protecting the French frontier. To accomplish this, Krupp designed a giant railway gun weighing 1344 tons with a bore diameter of 800 mm (31.5") and served by a 500 man crew commanded by a major-general.

I'm amazed that I've never heard of this before. I'm also amazed that it basically had not been put to use at all. Something with this much firepower and mobility (using railway lines), one would think the Germans would have been itching to use it.

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Look at the size of these shells!

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Having a weapon with this much firepower and not using it, begs the question: "What were the Germans thinking?"

Two types of projectiles were fired using a 3000lb. charge of smokeless powder: a 10,584 lb. high explosive (HE) shell and a 16,540 lb. concrete-piercing projectile. Craters from the HE shells measured 30-ft. wide and 30-ft. deep while the concrete piercing projectile proved capable of penetrating 264-ft. of reinforced concrete before exploding! Maximum range was 23 miles with HE shells and 29 miles with concrete piercing projectiles. Muzzle velocity was approximately 2700 f.p.s.

They built 2 of them, and had a 3rd in production at the end of the war. 1 was destroyed by the Germans so the Russians could get it. The other was cut up and used for scrap metal.

So ATS members, any thoughts?

Link to original source: www.worldsbiggests.com...

Credits: Printed in the American Rifleman, February 1998. Page 26.

All i can say is i am glad Hitler didnt put these to more use or I would be speaking German right now. Un-freaking-believable!!

[edit on 28-7-2010 by thedarktower]

reply to post by thedarktower


Exactly. This thing could do some serious damage, but as you said thank God they didn't use it. Why they didn't, remains a mystery to me

I know they had some massive cannons in WWII. If I'm not mistaken, the largest in use by the NAZI's were nicknamed Big Bertha's.

Those shells are almost as big as daisy cutters!

Pardon my ignorance, but why is this a gun and not a cannon?

What is the difference?

reply to post by TortoiseKweek


I'm digging ..but I'm affraid I'll have the same results as the last time I looked ....so ty for the post star for you...

I have to ask, if anyone else can point me in the direction of the other gun they "Germans" had in progress that was underground....non-mobile...much much bigger than Gustav...but I read this 15 years ago and have never been able to find the source again...
The diagram I remember seeing looked not unlike a tunnel, but was a bit too steap to drive in or out of.
There was many many stories or levels to this gun, going really deep underground.

reply to post by jokei


I have no idea, but could you imagine the fear and terror this thing would strike into the enemies hearts when they see this thing over the horizon. Never mind seeing on of those shells heading your way

[edit on 28-7-2010 by TortoiseKweek]

"Germans" had in progress that was underground....non-mobile...much much bigger than Gustav...but I read this 15 years ago and have never been able to find the source again...

Holy moly, something much much bigger than this thing. Please, if you find some info on that, I'd love to read about it.

reply to post by Doc Holiday


Was this it?

To all intents their target appeared to be a railway tunnel. In fact, inside the hill itself was an emplacement that would have fired the V3 if the chance had been there for it to do so - part of the firing mechanism is in the photo above.#

However, the Lancasters attacked the hill with 35 tons of high explosive bombs. Their target were the concrete and steel-lined covers of the massive gun barrels that were meant to attack London with the intention of reducing the inner city to rubble. The V3 was not a rocket like to V2 nor a pilot-less plane like the V1. It was a dart-shaped shell nine feet long and the 416 feet gun barrels targeted by the Lancasters were, on paper, capable of firing 600 of these shells every hour. However, one of the 'Tallboy' bombs (12,000 lbs of explosives) developed by Dr Barnes Wallis penetrated one of the five gun barrel shafts and did so much damage to the 'guts' of the project that it was eventually abandoned.

www.historylearningsite.co.uk...

Serious inner Earth ufo shooter for sure. I meen what was he planning on shooting with that up in the air aside from regular aircraft?
2nd



[edit on 7/28/10 by Ophiuchus 13]

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


I'm looking and yes I think that is it...It has been awhile ty so much...I've looked for this for a while now...

WW2 was the swan song of the big guns, on land and on sea.
Airplanes can deliver explosives much farther and better than big guns.
Not to mention that aircraft could easily reduce this thing to a heap of scrap metal, just like they did to battleships. A range of 20 some miles is paltry compared to aircraft.
Another example of impractical and ultimatly useless weapons that Germany spent so much time and money on.

reply to post by jokei


What's the difference?


A cannon fires a solid cannon ball...this uses a shell (propellant is built in) - which explodes on or near the target.

There's also velocity, trajectory and range differences that allowed the round to get over walls, but that wouldn't help my simple generalization.

reply to post by TortoiseKweek

reply to post by altered_states


Thanks for the Youtube link. I didn't think there would be any footage of either Gustav or Dora in action, so I didn't even search for it

Did the track have the ability to rotate? If not,then this thing could only shoot in 2 directions 0° and 180°. Not very effective IMO...unless it was built to target a specific line of long. or lat. Cool nonetheless!

I remember seeing a movie about a large "gun" like this called Doomsday Gun. It was about Saddam Husein's "Project Babylon".

en.wikipedia.org...

EDIT: to add Project Babylon youtube videos





[edit on 28-7-2010 by Aggie Man]

Originally posted by Aggie Man
Did the track have the ability to rotate? If not,then this thing could only shoot in 2 directions 0° and 180°. Not very effective IMO...unless it was built to target a specific line of long. or lat. Cool nonetheless!

That is the only reason I could think of why this weapon may have not been as effective as it could be. I didn't find any information if it could rotate, possibly its Achilles heel

[edit on 28-7-2010 by TortoiseKweek]

pfft, I have like 3 of those.

I believe if you look at the second-to-last picture you will see the gun emplaced on an arc of track so the gun could be aimed. I believe I read somewhere that the gun was used in the Crimea at the siege of Sevastapol (but that could be wrong).

Big Bertha was used in WWI and was much smaller.

Although this gun was larger, the Paris Gun of WWI had a longer range, and in fact actually shot it's shells beyond the atmosphere.

I think the gun the GI's are standing is another - smaller - railroad gun.

Originally posted by obixman
I believe if you look at the second-to-last picture you will see the gun emplaced on an arc of track so the gun could be aimed. I believe I read somewhere that the gun was used in the Crimea at the siege of Sevastapol (but that could be wrong).

Yeah, I was looking at that, but it's hard to tell. It does seem the muzzle is actually aiming a bit to the right, compared to the angle of the tracks

I think the gun the GI's are standing is another - smaller - railroad gun.

I didn't notice that before, but you are right, that definitely does not look like the Gustav - well spotted