Minizini (100 mm)

Description

The 100 mm Minizini is the Soviet designation of the Italian 100 mm/47 O.T.O. Mod. 1928 naval gun, itself a derivative of the Austro-Hungarian Škoda 10 cm K1, imported for use on the Svetlana and Admiral Nakhimov class cruisers. The name Minizini is derived from the designer of the twin-gun mount, General Eugenio Minisini.

Vehicles equipped with this weapon

• Kerch
• Krasny Kavkaz
• Krasny Krym
• Novorossiysk

General info

The Minizini is effective against most small targets, its size allows it to hull-break boats, the base-fuze HE can help damage the interiors of small ships, and the HE-TF can be used against aircraft, though the timed-fuze is not very accurate. The mount has a good traverse speed, and a fast reload of 5 seconds aced. These factors make it an effective secondary weapon for the cruisers it's equipped on, allowing them to easily destroy smaller targets that the main guns can't engage.

Available ammunition

There are 2 choices of shells for the Minizini, a base-fuze HE and a timed-fuze HE.

• HE - Its base fuze allows it to effectively damage the interior modules of destroyers and lightly armoured cruisers
• Anti-air HE

Penetration statistics
Ammunition	Type of warhead	Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm)
		100 m	1,000 m	2,000 m	3,000 m	4,000 m	5,000 m
HE	HE	53	46	40	34	30	26
Anti-air HE	HE-TF	26	26	26	26	26	26

Shell details
Ammunition	Type of warhead	Velocity (m/s)	Projectile mass (kg)	Fuse delay (s)	Fuse sensitivity (mm)	Explosive mass (TNT equivalent) (g)	Ricochet
							0%	50%	100%
HE	HE	800	15.8	0.035	5	1,240	79°	80°	81°
Anti-air HE	HE-TF	880	13.85	0	0.1	2,060	79°	80°	81°

Comparison with analogues

• 100 mm/47 O.T.O. Mod. 1928 - Despite being the same weapon, the Soviet Minizini has a higher rate of fire than its Italian counterpart. The Minizini also fires more powerful HE-TF shells (2,06 kg vs 1.30 kg of explosive mass).
• 10.5 cm SK C/33 AA - Similar twin mount German AA gun, it has a higher rate of fire and muzzle velocity but weaker shells. Depending on the ship, has access to either a selection of shells or just an HE-TF shell.

Usage in battles

The Minizini is a secondary weapon on 3 very different light cruisers, but its use generally doesn't change. It is very effective against small boats due to its fast reload and good traverse speed, which is very useful because of the slow traverse of the various main batteries, and it can hull break boats, which the AA battery cannot. The HE-TF like all timed fuze shells is not very effective or accurate against aircraft, but those ships already have good AA batteries to compensate.

Pros and cons

Pros:

• Can hull-break boats
• Decent explosive mass in shells, comparable to the 102 mm guns on the Frunze
• Twin gun mounts, more firepower per shot
• Fast reload, allows for better sustained fire
• Fast turret traverse, can quickly turn to face unexpected targets

Cons:

• No access to AP shells, cannot effectively damage armoured vessels
• Shell has no tracer, can be hard to see where it will land

History

The Minizini, named for the designer of the mount, Commander Minisini of the Regia Marina (Royal Italian Navy), is the Soviet variant of an Austro-Hungarian naval gun from World War I. Initially known as the Škoda 10 cm K10, the 100 mm gun was the main anti-aircraft gun of the Austro-Hungarian Navy during World War I. Prior to World War I, the Austro-Hungarian Empire's naval power had its ups and downs but, before the turn of the century, was limited to the coastal defense role. By the early 1900s however, railways in the Alpine pass allowed better access to the port city of Trieste (present-day Italy) and the Dalmatian coast (present-day Croatia and part of Montenegro) and the Empire realized they needed more than a coastal defense force, but a proper navy that could contest the Adriatic Sea and possibly extend into the Mediterranean. As part of this new naval build-up, which led to an arms race with their nominal ally and fellow Adriatic power Italy, Škoda built the K07 in Pilsen (present-day Czech Republic). Entering production in 1910, it soon got re-designated the K10 and entered service as a single-mounted tertiary armament on the Radetzky-class pre-dreadnought battleships before being the main armaments on the one-off scout cruiser, SMS Admiral Spaun, the Novara-class cruisers, and the Tátra-class destroyers.

After World War I, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was dismantled and the ships of its former navy were ceded to Italy and France as war reparations. The Italians fell in love with the design so much, they had O.T.O. (Odero Terni Orlando) build a copy in 1924. The result ended up becoming the 100 mm/47 O.T.O. Mod. 1928 a twin-gun mount whose guns were virtually identical to the K10. Just before World War II began, the Soviet Navy worked to refit their Admiral Nakhimov-class cruisers the Chernova Ukraina, and Krasny Kavkaz along with the Krasny Krym. 10 twin mounts of Minizinis were purchased from Italy. The Krasny Krym had three mounts, the first on the forecastle and the other two on each side of the quarter deck. On the Krasny Kavkaz and Chernova Ukraina, four Minizinis replaced the Lender AA gun, pattern 1914/15 guns previously installed during a refit. Two additional Minizinis were installed on the Krasny Kavkaz in 1942 while she was undergoing repairs in Poti (present-day Georgia) after they were salvaged from her sister ship, sunk the previous year by the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) during the Siege of Sevastopol. The remaining Minizini from the Chernova Ukraina was installed as part of the port defenses after being salvaged. However, these cruisers were not the only Soviet Navy ships to use the Minizini. The Italian light cruiser Emanuele Filiberto Duca d'Aosta, of the fourth wave of the Condotteri class, was ceded to the Soviet Union in 1949 as a war prize where it was renamed the Kerch.

Media

Excellent additions to the article would be video guides, screenshots from the game, and photos.

See also

• 100 mm/47 O.T.O. Mod. 1928 (100 mm) - Italian variant of the twin mount.
• 100 mm/47 O.T.O. Mod. 1937 - Further Italian development in a single mount

External links

Paste links to sources and external resources, such as:

• topic on the official game forum;
• other literature.

USSR naval cannons
20 mm	ShVAK
25 mm	2M-3
30 mm	AK-230 · 30 mm/54 AK-630 · 30 mm/54 AK-630M · BP "Plamya"
37 mm	37 mm/67 70-K · V-11
45 mm	45 mm/46 21-K · 45 mm/68 21-KM · 45 mm/89 SM-20-ZIF · 45 mm/89 SM-21-ZIF
57 mm	AK-725
75 mm	75 mm/50 Canet patt.1892
76 mm	34-K · 39-K · 76 mm/60 AK-176M · AK-726 · D-56TS · F-34 · Lender AA gun, pattern 1914/15
85 mm	85 mm/52 92-K · 85 mm/54.6 ZIS-C-53 · 90-K
100 mm	100 mm/56 B-34 · 100 mm/70 SM-5-1 · Minizini
102 mm	Pattern 1911
120 mm	120 mm/50 pattern 1905
130 mm	130 mm/55 pattern 1913 · 130 mm/58 SM-2-1 · B-13
152 mm	152 mm/57 B-38
180 mm	180 mm/57 B-1-P · 180 mm/60 B-1-K
305 mm	12-inch/52 pattern 1907 · 305 mm/54 B-50
356 mm	14-inch/52 pattern 1913 (356 mm)
	Foreign:
40 mm	2pdr QF Mk.IIc (Britain) · Skoda (Czechoslovakia)
47 mm	3 pdr QF Hotchkiss (Britain)
76 mm	76 mm/40 Ansaldo mod.1917 (Italy)
88 mm	SK C/30 (Germany)
120 mm	120 mm/50 Mk.4 Bofors M1924 (Sweden) · 120 mm/50 O.T.O. Mod.1933 (Italy)
152 mm	152/53 mm O.T.O. Mod.1929 (Italy)
320 mm	320 mm/44 Ansaldo model 1934 (Italy)