Royal Ordnance L9

Royal Ordnance L9 is a British short-barrelled 165 mm calibre gun used for combat engineering, particularly the demolition of defences.

The gun is capable of firing a 64 lb High Explosive Squash Head (HESH) demolition projectile distances up to 2,400 m. The HESH shell contains 40 lb of C-4 explosive.

The L9 gun was mounted on Royal Engineers AVRE versions of the Churchill tank post-Second World War, and on the Centurion tank.

The gun's primary purpose is for clearing obstacles such as walls, fences, roadblocks, bunkers, etc. or for destroying buildings.

Variants



 * L9A1 - improved version
 * The American  M728 Combat Engineer Vehicle variant of the M60 Patton tank used a XM135 gun patterned after the British 165 mm.