Brace yourself for superlatives in a notice dedicated to the railroad gun "Dora". With a 800 mm bore and up to seven tons shells, it was the largest gun in the history of World War II (and of all times). To put one of it into firing position, eight complete trains, 5000 men and six weeks were necessary. It used two parallel rail tracks to move and the overall weight was equal to the one of a little destroyer. One of its shells successfully destroyed an ammunition depot buried 30 meters deep. Such examples could go on.
That profusion of resources wasn't worth it. The development started in 1936 and took five years while the operational life of the weapon was exactly two weeks. Only one example took part in a real battle, during the siege of Sebastopol in June of 1942. It fired in total 40 shells and later fell in Russian hands in Crimea in 1944. The existence of a second "Dora" is not sure, but shells and a replacement barrel was found in 1945 after the German defeat. Most certainly, it did not fire any rounds on a battlefield.
Note: there are discrepancies between my sources on the name of the gun engaged against Sebastopol: the German ones speak about a "Dora", the Anglo-American about a "Gustav". There is also discrepancies about the number of pieces completed: three according to the Germans, two for the Anglo-Americans
if only my lagg had one of those
Remember reading stories about the armour plating given to secondary armourment positions on Battleships being put there as much to protect from the blast of the big guns as it was against incoming fire. That gun was 800mm lololol, thats about 31 and a half inches. The biggest guns ever mounted on b/ship to my knowledge were on the Yamoto/Musashi classs at 18.1. I would love to have watched that being fired.................. from a very safe distance.
