47 mm APX anti-tank gun

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canon de 47 mm SA mle 1937
47 SA 37 preserved at Worthington Tank Museum at CFB Borden (Ontario, Canada)
Type	Anti-tank gun
Place of origin	France
Service history
Used by	France, Germany
Wars	WW2
Specifications
Weight	1,070 kg
Barrel length	50
Shell	APCBC
Caliber	47 x 380 R mm
Rate of fire	15 to 20 rounds/min
Muzzle velocity	855 m/s
Effective range	2000 m

The 47 mm APX anti-tank gun was a French anti-tank gun that saw service in the first years of the Second World War.

Contents 1 Development 2 Foreign use 3 Variants 4 References

[edit] Development

In the 1930s the French artillery sought a replacement for the derivatives of the 75 mm mle 1897 field gun it used in the anti-tank role. Despite having a decent anti-armour capability, the venerable soixante-quinze was heavy and was much harder to conceal than the smaller high-velocity, small calibre anti-tank weapons of modern design. The chosen weapon was a design of the state-owned arsenal Atelier de Puteaux (Puteaux workshop, shortened as APX), and was designated as canon de 47 mm semi-automatique mle 1937. It was a very efficient weapon, especially given the (then) thin armour of German tanks of the time, unfortunately the 47 SA 37 still was relatively rare at the time of the Battle of France.

[edit] Foreign use

Examples captured by the German forces were operationally used under the designation 4.7cm Pak 181(f).

[edit] Variants

• 47 mm SA 39 TAZ - a variant on a tripod, capable of 360° traverse, which did not enter production.

[edit] References

• Ferrard, Stéphane. France 1940 l'armement terrestre, ETAI, 1998, ISBN 2-7268-8380-X