1) These guns, like most large caliber German guns, used a "fore charge" which was propellant in a silk bag, and a "main charge" which was propellant in a brass case.  The brass case helped to seal the breech of the gun.

2) This is the design figure.  "German Warships 1815-1945" says that the actual outfit ranged from 105 to 120 rounds.  Admiral Graf Spee carried 100 rounds per gun during her war cruise.  Her outfit consisted of 200 AP, 200 HE Nose Fuze and 200 HE Base Fuze rounds.  Of these, 414 were fired during the Plate River battle - all 200 HE Nose Fuze rounds, 184 HE Base Fuze and 30 AP rounds, leaving her with 170 AP and 16 HE Base Fuze rounds at the close of the action.  She scored seven hits and one damaging near miss on HMS Exeter while HMS Ajax received one hit and one glancing blow and HMNZS Achilles escaped with a single damaging near-miss, a total of about 2.7 percent.  Although this hit percentage was better than that recorded by the British and New Zealander crews, it was disappointing to the Germans, who blamed Capt. "Langsdorff's torpedo officer's tendency to over zigzag" - Eric Grove.

3) Fore and Main charges were rammed together.

4) APC and HE ballistic caps had a radius of 8.5 calibers.  The tangent of the ballistic cap to the shell body was inclined at 5 degrees, which resulted in a projectile with a short overall length.

5) Actual Projectile designations were as follows:
   APC L/3,7 - Pz.gr. L/3,7 (mhb)
   HE L/4,2 base fuze - Spr.gr. L/4,2 Bdz (mhb)
   HE L/4,2 nose fuze - Spr.gr. L/4,2 Kz (mhb)

1) Turrets had electric training, auxiliary elevation, auxiliary hoists but otherwise they were hydraulically powered by two electrically driven pumps in each turret using a water / glycerine pressure medium.  Main gun elevation was by hydraulic cylinder driving the elevation arc by a rack and pinion.

2) Each gun was served by a shell cage which picked up the charge cage on its way to the gunhouse.  The hoists came up between the guns and the shells were transferred to the loading tray by rammers.  The shell hoist for the left gun came up between the left gun and the center gun.  The other two cages came up between the center and right gun.  The charge cage carried the fore charge on the bottom and the main charge on top.  The fore charge was loaded by hand and then the main charge rammed in behind it.  There were also auxiliary hoists for each gun.  The auxiliary hoist for the center gun came up behind the gun and had a tiltable cage.  The other auxiliary hoists came up behind and to the side of the guns, with the shells and main charges being transported by overhead gear.

3) The width of the gunhouse was smaller than the diameter of the barbette, necessitating armored semi-circular "wings" on the sides of the gunhouse in order to provide protection to the top of the barbette.