The Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-6-30 (

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

: Грязев-Шипунов ГШ-6-30) is a Russian 30 mm

rotary cannon A rotary cannon, rotary autocannon, rotary gun or Gatling cannon, is any large-caliber multiple-barreled automatic firearm that uses a Gatling-type rotating barrel assembly to deliver a sustained saturational direct fire at much greater rate ...

aircraft-mounted and naval

autocannon An autocannon, automatic cannon or machine cannon is a fully automatic gun that is capable of rapid-firing large-caliber ( or more) armour-piercing, explosive or incendiary shells, as opposed to the smaller-caliber kinetic projectiles (bull ...

used by

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

and later

CIS Cis or cis- may refer to: Places * Cis, Trentino, in Italy * In Poland: ** Cis, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, south-central ** Cis, Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, north Math, science and biology * cis (mathematics) (cis(''θ'')), a trigonome ...

military aircraft A military aircraft is any fixed-wing or rotary-wing aircraft that is operated by a legal or insurrectionary armed service of any type. Military aircraft can be either combat or non-combat: * Combat aircraft are designed to destroy enemy equipm ...

. The GSh-6-30 fires a 30×165mm, projectile.

Description

The GSh-6-30, designed in the early 1970s and entering service in

1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 - Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...

, has a six barrel design that is similar to the

Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-6-23 The Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-6-23 (russian: Грязев-Шипунов ГШ-6-23) (GRAU designation: 9A-620 for GSh-6-23, 9A-768 for GSh-6-23M modernized variant) is a six-barreled 23 mm rotary cannon used by some modern Soviet/Russian military ...

. It was based on the naval AO-18 used in the

AK-630 The AK-630 is a Soviet and Russian fully automatic naval, rotary cannon, close-in weapon system. The "630" designation refers to the weapon's six gun barrels and their 30 mm caliber. The system is mounted in an enclosed automatic turret and dir ...

system. Unlike most modern rotary cannons, it is gas-operated rather than hydraulically driven, allowing it to "spin up" to maximum rate of fire more quickly, allowing more rounds to be placed on target in a short-duration burst. This makes the weapon advantageous in dogfights, where pilots often have a very small window for engaging the enemy. Ignition is electrical, as with the smaller GSh-6-23. On the MiG-27 "Flogger" the GSh-6-30 had to be mounted

oblique Oblique may refer to: * an alternative name for the character usually called a slash (punctuation) ( / ) * Oblique angle, in geometry *Oblique triangle, in geometry *Oblique lattice, in geometry * Oblique leaf base, a characteristic shape of the b ...

ly to absorb

recoil Recoil (often called knockback, kickback or simply kick) is the rearward thrust generated when a gun is being discharged. In technical terms, the recoil is a result of conservation of momentum, as according to Newton's third law the force requ ...

. The gun was noted for its high (often uncomfortable) vibration and extreme noise. The airframe vibration led to fatigue cracks in fuel tanks, numerous radio and avionics failures, the necessity of using runways with floodlights for night flights (as the landing lights would often be destroyed), tearing or jamming of the forward landing gear doors (leading to at least three crash landings), cracking of the reflector gunsight, an accidental jettisoning of the cockpit canopy and at least one case of the instrument panel falling off in flight. The weapons also dealt extensive collateral damage, as the sheer numbers of fragments from detonating shells was sufficient to damage aircraft flying within a 200-meter radius from the impact center, including the aircraft firing. The principal application for the GSh-6-30 is the

MiG-27 The Mikoyan MiG-27 (russian: Микоян МиГ-27; NATO reporting name: Flogger-D/J) is a variable-sweep ground-attack aircraft, originally built by the Mikoyan-Gurevich design bureau in the Soviet Union and later licence-produced in India ...

, which carries the weapon in a gondola under the

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an engine as well, although in some amphibious aircraft t ...

, primarily for strafing and ground attack. It was fitted to some Su-25TM aircraft, but subsequently replaced with the

GSh-30-2 The Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-30-2 (ГШ-30-2) or GSh-2-30 is a Soviet dual-barrel autocannon developed for use on certain ground attack military aircraft and helicopters. The cannon is not related to the Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-30-1, but is a recoil- ...

twin-barreled

of the original Su-25. It is also used as the gun component of the CADS-N-1 Kashtan

Close-in weapon system A close-in weapon system (CIWS ) is a point-defense weapon system for detecting and destroying short-range incoming missiles and enemy aircraft which have penetrated the outer defenses, typically mounted on a naval ship. Nearly all classes of ...

Variants

*GSh-6-30M; *AO-18L; version used by ABM-BCM30 remote weapon station. *GSh-6-30K; Naval variant of Gsh-6-30, also known as AO-18 used in

CIWS system. *AO-18K; Modernized AO-18 used by

Kashtan CIWS The Kortik (russian: Кортик, "dirk") close-in weapon system (CIWS) is a modern naval air defence gun-missile system deployed by the Russian Navy. Its export version is known as Kashtan (russian: Каштан, English: Chestnut), with the N ...

. *AO-18KD; Further improved AO-18K with a higher rate of fire and extended range used in

M2, Palma/Palash and

Pantsir-M Pantsir-M (russian: Панцирь-М, translation="Carapace-M") is a Russian jamming-resistant naval close-in weapon system (CIWS) which entered service in 2018. Pantsir-M will replace Kashtan-M systems in Russian Navy. According to Rostec ...

CIWS systems.

Users

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Former User

References

General references

External links

Russian Ammo Page - with more detail
{{Modern Gatling Guns Artillery of Russia 30 mm artillery Aircraft guns of the Soviet Union Aircraft guns Multi-barrel machine guns Rotary cannon KBP Instrument Design Bureau products Military equipment introduced in the 1970s