Posted on 09/27/2003 8:39:41 PM PDT by mhking
Ah, serendipity. Being in the right place at the right time.
As it happened, this fine and sunny September Sunday morning found me and a few others at the local gun range, sighting in- or trying to- some rifles. Some were cooperating, some weren't. A normal outing to the range, really...
Until this fellow pulls up and starts unloading a big 'ol hunk o' pipe.
I thought he was going to bury it as a new target stand or something.... 'til I saw the Bowling Balls. I then immediately knew it must be what some call a "punt" mortar! I'd seen similar handmade ones on the 'net and in magazines... naturally, we all completely forgot about our own rifles for the moment.
The Gun Range is a nice place- raised, covered shooting line, plenty of tables, well-kept grounds. The first line of targets is at 100 yards, with small berms and pipe target stands at 200, 300 and 400 yards as well, plus a trail/road to drive up to 'em if you need to. And at 500 yards, right at the base of the stand of trees off in the distance, is a full-size steel cutout of a moose, painted day-glo orange. Above, the guy with the mortar is pouring in some three ounces of Fg (coarse) Pyrodex black powder...
This thing is huge! Probably weighing some 150 pounds, half-inch-nominal wall pipe with a massive two-inch-thick breechblock welded on one end. The touchhole or fuse passage leads to a small "chamber" in the center that holds the powder in a single spot, rather than letting it cover the whole 8.5" bore.
Crude, yes, but it works. The owner is reluctant to do any additional welding on the pipe, for fear of making a weak or brittle spot, so he just stacks up whatever's handy to hold it, oh, 'bout there or so. This thing's so cool I want to make the guy some adjustable legs like the old 4.2" Chemical Mortar had....
Three ounces of Pyrodex, an old garage-sale-special bowling ball, an old chair and some sewer pipe... Fire in the hole!
He's not running, but he ain't dawdling either! Let's see, the fuse burns at about one minute per foot, there's about six inches there... dum da dum... carry the three...
HOLY FREAKING BATTLESHIP MISSOURI! By the time the shutter snapped, the ball was, in relation to this picture on your screen, about six monitors up and climbing. It was whistling. I lost track of it since I was trying to get the picture, but the guys say it cleared the treeline by probably another hundred yards.
Let's do that AGAIN! Rod out the fuse hole, make sure there aren't any errant embers, pull the mortar up out of the divot it created, weigh out another charge of powder, another bowling ball... This time I was watching downrange with the camera pointing at the cannon... Holy Creeping God, ladies and gentlemen! That ball was screaming out of there! I'd wager it landed over 600 yards downrange.
I should have brought out my Radar Chrony. I'd guess that ball wasn't moving over 700 fps, possibly as low as 400 fps, but jeez, think of the mass! That ball's what, eight to ten pounds?!? What's the Hatcher's Index of a projectile weighing fifty-thousand grains moving at 400 fps? "Body armor" against this thing is eight feet of dirt over a concrete bunker!
Think Grandpas' old thirty-thirty is a kicker? How about a hundred-plus-pound gun that pushes itself into the dirt six to eight inches each time it goes off? This is not a shoulder arm.
After all four balls were expended, we helped load it back in the guy's car. I noted that there were some divots from earlier shoots... he said he gathers up old balls whenever he can find 'em, then when he has a few, on a nice day he'll come out and blow 'wm downrange. Says it always draws a crowd. I said "so there's already a few balls out there in the swamp, eh?"
"Oh, more than a few, yeah."
He says he also has a short cannon that takes small tomato-sauce cans and another mortar that takes soda cans. The soda cans, it seems, don't hold together well- the force of firing blows the can off the concrete fill, which then blows up in the air.
Besides, he says, NOTHING beats seeing that bowling ball howl downrange as far as the eye can see.
I agree. :) The pictures don't do this justice; this is something every Tinker or gadget freak should see in person at least once in their life.
I'd prefer magnesium wool, taken out of an old flash bulb. Takes much less voltage to set off compared to a spark plug, and actually produces a very hot flame for igniting the powder.
Great idea. Eaker does have a history of things like this blowing up in his face!!!
Don't waste your money boys, I have been trying for years to kill off Eaker - the old SOB just won't die!!
Stay Safe !......BTW where do ya get magnesium wool ?
Keep him Stay Safe anyway as we couldn't buy this much entertainment !
Stay Safe !
This guy is an idiot. He didn't make a cannon, he made a suicide machine. He says they probed the vent hole after each firing but mentions nothing about swabbing the tube. he's in for a huge flashburn.
I gave that some thought. Harvey Pennick, a man who brought honor to the already honorable game of golf, is from Texas. For the most part, I trust you Texans.
Besides, you wouldn't cheat at a shooting competition, would ya. That's almost a sacriledge. :)
Collectors Firearms on Richmond carried both items last time I checked.
Waterproof fuse, great stuff, burns under water.
So do I, but I'm only guessing.
Likewise, the bowling-ball mortars made from cutdown oxygen welding gas cylinders are thinwall, though strong.
But then too, look at the aluminum barrel of the M79 and M203 grenade launcher, and the thin-walled cartridge case of the 40mm grenades they use. Using a high pressure chamber built into the base of the projectile, which then directs the high pressures generated against the much wider base of the projectile, the resulting high/low combination has proven safe and reliable. Something similar may be in use with at least some of the bowling ball launchers.
I considered a spark plug ignition, but a model rocket igniter runs off of a simple 12 volt circuit, whereas a spark plug requires voltages ranging into the thousands, and requires more complexity in the circuit design behind it, increasing the chance of failure.
I need to shut up. If this competition comes about, you're on the other team. :)
What does the ATF say about all this?
A pal of mine shoots Revolutionary War muzzleloading cannon, mostly firing blank charges for reenactments and parades, occasionally other ceremonies, as when the Queen came to the US for the anniversary of the surrender of the British forces during the Revolutionary War. He was resplendant in his redcoat in uniform for that one, and was awarded for his appearance and effort, as well as the honours offered by his two Guns, by a few words of encouragement from HRH herself.
But in our case, he was around for a local annual reenactment, and we invited him to put on a soldiers' familiarization on the period Brown Bess musket at a nearby gun club range, with both members and those from the local National Guard infantry company in attendance. He brought his two Wicked Sisters along, and using a large cardboard shipping box for a motorcycle as a target, laid and fired his guns for a five-shot volley while a crew of assistants performed the reloading drill, about 15 seconds taking place between shots.
At the end of the exercise, the target, set up at about 275 meters, was retreived. The five three-inch holes in it could have been covered with the lid of a 55-gallon drum; I had no idea smoothbore guns could be so accurate.
He had us reset the target out at about 50 paces, and we found out that when the last crew reloaded their piece, they did co with a grapeshot loading instead of a solid projectile. He let fly, and the target was shredded into unrecognizable shreads.
I am not no longer particularly surprised by excellent results by large-bore gunners familiar with their weapons, though sometimes still in awe of their skill.
-archy-/-
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