Diehl Opens a DiNa 155mm Shell-Body Line at Röthenbach for Nammo's Round
Röthenbach an der Pegnitz, 10 November 2026
Key points
- Diehl Metall and Diehl Defence opened a line for DiNa 155mm shell bodies at Röthenbach an der Pegnitz on 10 November, built with Nammo, which developed the round
- A 7,000-square-metre hall was converted from June 2024 around two new forging presses; pilot series began in October 2026; the investment is in the mid double-digit millions of euros. No annual capacity is given
- Most of the site's former synchronizer-ring workers, who made a car-gearbox component, are being retrained for the line, Diehl says
Diehl is now forging the body of Nammo's DiNa 155mm round in Bavaria, in a converted hall at Röthenbach whose synchronizer-ring workers are moving to shells.
In July 2023 Germany's procurement office signed a DiNa framework that Nammo put at up to 350,000 projectiles over six years; in July 2024 it was substantially extended, an order Diehl calls the largest in its artillery-ammunition history. That extension bought projectiles only, without propellant charges or fuzes, and the Bundestag budget committee asked the government to ensure the shells would be usable as a “complete round”, ESUT reported.
Diehl's release answers the 2024 condition in its own words: the frameworks now let Germany and partner nations call off DiNa rounds “as well as components for a complete ammunition round load”. That turns a shell order into a round on paper; the binding figure is still the one Diehl withholds, annual output. Without it, Röthenbach cannot be set against the 2023 ceiling or against Rheinmetall, whose Unterlüß plant shipped its first shells in July against a target of about 1.5 million rounds a year by 2030. Signal No. 186 recorded the inauguration; the ammunition and energetics tracker carries the plants it joins. What the opening does settle: a Norwegian-designed shell now has its body forged in Germany, under a German framework that partner nations can call off.
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