<img src="http://www.sura.com.ru/~tam/images/AFV/PART2/ML-20_01.jpg" alt=" - " />

Since I know a good source of deactivated artilery, I was wondering the following:

What gunpowder do modern cannons use? Did it vary from country to country? Whats a possible homemade substitute?

Also, what kind of primer is used and can it be improvised?

Thanks.

<small>[ October 04, 2002, 04:00 AM: Message edited by: Zyklon_B ]</small>

i know that they use cordite in modern(ish) artillery, that looks like
some 105mm artillery, possibly argintinian (guessed from the look of it) so i would say that gun-cotton would be a good substitute, building up the charge is advisable (originally the gun-cotton was kept in silk bags as they disintigrated without leaving fouling in the bore, but i'm sure you dont want to bother with that)

i would like to know how they de-activate artillery, is it the same method as on small arms (breech-block cut at 45' angle, steel rod welded in bore etc,) or do they just nip the firing pin??

the primers should reloaded with some primary explosive, as a last resport you could always use those (impossible to find) blue-tipped matches <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

the charge of guncotton is going to be heavy if you want to get the same range as the real-deal (about 15/25km) and i'm sure that the accuracy wont be great (over anything more then 5 km it'll probably screw around with any predictions due to the variation of charge/purity etc etc etc..) That's where the artillery piece would be best as something more in the way of direct fire

it would be a badass weapon if you could remotely set it off. :D

p.s. i dont think that the charge type varies much from country to country, as gun-cotton/ NC is usually so easy to make and it allows for greater pecision in large batches (everything that the army likes)

Well artilery where I am located, and for and from europe is normally deactivated by having a steel rod welded into the barrel and the recoil mechanism is welded. This allows them to be used for blank firing.

Above is a russian ML-20 152mm howitzer. Used in WW2. Deactivated they can be had for 4000$ to 5000$.

The modern army uses a whole array of different types of chemical black powder. It’s all based upon gun cotton, the most common is a mixture of gun-cotton, ethanol and ether. A more powerful mixture is gun cotton and nitroglycerine. The big drawback with this compound is the high combustion temperature that causes gunbarrel fatigue. Because of this is this compound mainly used in anti-aircraft guns and antitankguns. In some 10,5 and 15,5 cm calibre they uses gun cotton and dinitroglycol this mixture has less energy but causes less fatigue. They also use a mixture of gun cotton, nitroglycerine and dinitroglycol. This mixture isent as powerful as the other mixtures with NG, but is’t produces less combustible gases than the previous mixtures. This results in a redial drop in muzzlefire. To the more heavy artillery they also bring additives to the gunpowder out to the field. For example can they ad sulphurless black powder to reduce the muzzelfire. This is only used at night because it produce more heavily smoke witch can give away the artillery positioning in daylight.

I’ll hope I have answered a few questions about modern gunpowder.
If there are any Swedish blokes reading this I recommend reading the book
Amlära A (M7730-850020).

-----------------------------
chemical blackpowder?!?!
blackpowder refers to the common pyrotechnic mixture of 75% KNO3, 15% charcoal and 10% sulphur.
gun powder refers to the powder used in guns usually being nitrocellulose based. try and make it clear what you are talking about to avoid confusion - kingspaz

<small>[ October 07, 2002, 05:55 PM: Message edited by: kingspaz ]</small>

On the subject of primer, I have heard that most tanks of WW2 used electrical primers in their main cannons. Are there any way of improvising this primer?

I’m sorry if I used wrong and confusing terms. But it’s hard to translate technical terms.
I wasn’t aware of the different between Gunpowder and Black power, so I made a literal translation from Swedish to English.
So by the term “chemical blackpowder” I meant all low order explosives that have been prepared through a chemical reaction such as gun cotton.

…and on the subject of primer, they are quite simply constructed. Every large calibre canon has a primer that consists of a shell with a small aluminium ampoule at the bottom. In a regular canon that has a mechanical firing mechanism this ampoule is filled with lead azide. But in the case with electrical firing this ampoule is filled with black powder with a filament leading throw it. When current is running through the filament it’s igniting the black powder in the ampoule (1 in the picture). This ampoule explodes and ignites the main black powder charge in the primer (2). In the next stage the propulsion charge in the shell explodes and propels the projectile. This electrical firing mechanism is still used in the modern tanks.

[pic] <a href="http://www.geocities.com/rdxgames/Primer.jpg" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/rdxgames/Primer.jpg</a>