German 8cm Granatwerfer 34

I've been meaning to load these pics up for a while now but sadly my Cam seems to have lost some of the photos (together with some of other on going projects) and I only now came round to take new ones. So here it is for you to enjoy, the German 8cm Granatwerfer 34 (kurz). Miniatures and decals by Warlord Games again.

The 8cm Granatwerfer 34 was the standard German heavy mortar of WW2. Its developement began in 1932 at the Rheinmetall company in Düsseldorf and was introduced into the Wehrmacht arsenal in 1934. From 1940 on the 'kurze 8cm Granatwerfer 42' was developed and put into production in 1941 as a replacement for the 5cm Granatwerfer 36. Weighing about half as much as the 'lange' (long) version and hence beeing more mobile it was primarily meant to be used by the Fallschirmjäger Divisions but was adopted later by the Wehrmacht as well.

The heavy mortar was deployed in the so called 'Granatwerfer Zug' (Mortar Platoon) as part of the 'Maschinengewehrkompanien' (Machine gun companies) of the 'Infanteriebataillone' and motorised 'Schützenbataillone'. The platoon consisted of six mortars.

It was feared by the Allies because of its great accuracy and rapid fire. Much or better most of the credit should go to the highly trained crews though. The weapon itself was of conventional design and broke down into three loads (i.e. barrel, base plate and bipod). It fired Smoke and High Explosive shells, which weighed about 3,5 kg, at about 2400 metres.

Trained crews were able to fire salvos of about 6-7 rounds before the first round impacted. So a Zug of six mortars was able to lay down a barrage of up to 84 rounds per minute.

Unfortunately Warlord Games have messed up this kit by depicting the 'kurze' version instead of the 'lange' therefore it's more or less only of use if you're doing Operation Barbarossa and onwards. This means if you're so picky... I for one have not decided yet if I do another mortar for my 'Fall Rot' army or if I just live with the inaccuracy ;-)