The Gnevny class were a group of 29 destroyers built for the Soviet Navy in the late 1930s. They are sometimes known as the Gremyashchiy class and the official Soviet designation was Project 7. These ships fought in World War II. In the early 1930s the Soviets felt able to restart construction of fleet destroyers and forty-eight ships were ordered under the Second Five-Year Plan. The design was produced with Italian assistance despite ideological differences between the Soviets and Fascist Italy. They resembled contemporary destroyers built in Italy for the Greek and Turkish navies. They suffered from some of the same weaknesses of contemporary Italian ships with structural weakness and limited seaworthiness. There were also significant machinery problems in the earliest ships. The design flaws were apparent after trials of the first units in 1936–1937 and production stopped after 29 ships. A modified design was then placed into production as the Type 7U. Four surviving ships from the Pacific Fleet were transferred to the People's Liberation Army Navy and served as the Anshan-class destroyers.

Design and description

Having decided on the specifications of the large 40 kn Leningrad-class destroyer destroyer leaders, the Soviet Navy sought Italian assistance in designing smaller and cheaper destroyers. They licensed the plans for the Folgore-class destroyer and, in modifying it for their purposes, overloaded a design that was already somewhat marginally stable. The Gnevnys had an overall length of 112.8 m, a beam of 10.2 m, and a draft of 4.8 m at deep load. The ships were significantly overweight, almost 200 MT heavier than designed, displacing 1612 MT at standard load and 2039 MT at deep load. Their crew numbered 197 officers and sailors in peacetime and 236 in wartime. The ships were powered by two geared steam turbine sets, each driving a single three-bladed 3.18 m propeller using steam provided by three water-tube boilers that operated at a pressure of 26.5 kg/cm2 and a temperature of 350 °C. The turbines, rated at 48000 shp, were intended to give the ships a speed of 37 kn. The designers had been conservative in rating the turbines and many, but not all, of the ships handily exceeded their designed speed during their sea trials. Others fell considerably short of it; SOVIET DESTROYER Boyky reached 34 kn during her trials in 1943. Variations in fuel oil capacity meant that the range of the Gnevnys varied between 1670 and 3145 nmi at 19 kn.

Armament and fire control

As built, the Gnevny-class ships mounted four 50-caliber 130 mm B-13 guns in two pairs of superfiring single mounts fore and aft of the superstructure. Each gun was provided with 150 rounds. The development of the gun was troubled by excessive barrel erosion problems and three variants were built in a not entirely successful effort to resolve the problem which complicated logistical and operational support as each performed slightly differently. The manually operated mounts had an elevation range between −5° and +45° and had a rate of fire of 6–10 rounds per minute. They fired a 33.4 kg shell at a muzzle velocity of 870 m/s, which gave them a range of 25597 m. Anti-aircraft defense was provided by two 55-caliber 76.2 mm 34-K AA guns and two 46-caliber 45 mm 21-K AA guns, all in single mounts as well as a pair of 12.7 mm DK or DShK machine guns. The 34-K guns could elevate between −5° and +85°, had a rate of fire of fire of 15–20 rounds per minute, and the ships carried 300 rounds per gun for them. Their muzzle velocity of 801 m/s gave their 11.9 kg high-explosive shells a maximum horizontal range of 14640 m and an effective ceiling of 6500 m. The 21-K was a converted anti-tank gun with a rate of fire of 25–30 rounds per minute with an elevation range between −10° and +85°. The gun fired a 1.41 kg shell at a muzzle velocity of 760 m/s. This gave them a range of 9200 m. The Project 7s stowed 500 rounds for each gun. The DShK had an effective rate of fire of 125 rounds per minute and an effective range against aircraft of 2500 m. The ships were equipped with six 533 mm torpedo tubes in two rotating triple mounts amidships; each tube was provided with a reload. The Project 7-class ships primarily used the 53-38 or the 53-38U torpedo, which differed only in the size of their warhead; the latter had a warhead 100 kg heavier than the 300 kg warhead of the 53-38. The torpedoes had three range/speed settings: 10000 m at 30.5 kn; 8,000 m at 34.5 kn and 4,000 m at 44.5 kn. The ships could also carry a maximum of either 60 or 95 mines and 25 depth charges. They were fitted with a set of Mars hydrophones for anti-submarine work, although it was useless at speeds over 3 kn. Fire control for the main battery of the Gnevnys was provided by a Mina-7 fire-control system that was derived from an Italian Galileo system. It included a TsAS-2 mechanical analog computer that received information from a KDP2-4 gunnery director on the roof of the bridge which mounted a pair of DM-4 4 m stereoscopic rangefinders. Anti-aircraft fire control was strictly manual with only a DM-3 3 m rangefinder to provide data to the guns.

Ships

Black Sea Fleet

Baltic Fleet

Pacific Fleet

All the Pacific Fleet ships were built by Dalzavod, Komsomolsk na Amure and towed to Vladivostok for fitting out due to the shallow depth of the Amur River. One unit, Reshitelny (i), was lost by stranding on passage 7 November 1938, being damaged beyond repair. The material for these ships was assembled in Nikolayev and then shipped east via the Trans-Siberian railway.

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