self-propelled artillery

Class of armoured fighting vehicle that mounts a heavy gun or missiles, moves under its own power, usually on tracks, and provides fire support in forward areas of the battlefield.

The first British self-propelled guns were produced in the second half of 1916, and were known as Gun Carriers Mark I. During World War II self-propelled artillery was used extensively by the German army which mounted large-calibre guns on tank chassis as field artillery, and high velocity guns in self-propelled mountings as tank destroyers. The British made little use of self-propelled guns, converting only a small number of Valentine tanks into 25-pounder mountings (Bishop), and adopting the American 105-mm/4.1-in M7 in its original form (Priest), and later as a mounting for the 25-pounder gun (Sexton). More recent types of self-propelled artillery include the British Abbot (FV433) mounting a 105-mm/4.1-in gun in a fully traversible turret, the US M-109 155-mm/6.1-in self-propelled howitzer, the M-107 175-mm/6.88-in gun which can fire a high explosive shell to a range of 32,000 m/35,000 ft, and the M-110 203/25-mm/0.98-in howitzer.