Jump to content
I Forge Iron

Anvil Cannon


SinDoc

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 65
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

42 minutes ago, Frosty said:

I'd hate to ruin a perfectly good tank

just use a French tank they will be able to transport faster that way. they put the 14speed tranny the wrong way they only got 1 speed forwards:D:rolleyes:

canada has slacked off on our military for the last while and now we are in a bad spot if any one attacks us but instead of increasing strength they use the take guns from legal owners

M.J.Lampert

Link to comment
Share on other sites

21 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

the US Civil War travelling forge had an anvil that fit inside the wooden stand for transportation. Halfway to a sabot already! 

A sabot would certainly work. Of course, that gets me thinking that one could add fins to the anvil to turn it into the world's least aerodynamic fléchette.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well to start with it will probably not achieve meteoritic speeds and if chunks of space craft which tend to be light and not very dense can make it to the ground I'm betting that a whole lot of of anvil will!   (There have been some discussions in SF on using orbital launch "crowbars"---search on Flying Crowbars and you can probably dig out some decent math done on the idea.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oooo that reminds me!

Have you ever heard of Project Thor? Long story short and simply put, it is an idea on more or less dropping/firing Tungsten rods from space to cause massive kinetic impacts. When the rod hits its target, it would be moving several times the speed of sound (I think somewhere like 6-8 times). The kinetic energy would then more than likely obliterate whatever it hits. 

The idea is fascinating yet terrifying.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, Frosty said:

Lobbing a T80 a few hundred yards satisfies me on so many levels

I have not lobbed one, but we did pop the turret off one about 20' in the air. 120mm HEAT got 'er did. 

(HEAT: high explosive anti-tank, for anyone wondering, also rarely used on tanks, sabot is the tank killer.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For comparison with anvils the 155 mm (6.1") howitzer HE projectile weighs about 100 lbs.  The 155 is the commonest field artillery caliber in use today.  For comparison, the 105 mm (4.1") HE projectile, the commonest US  WW2 artillery weapon, weighs about 33 lbs. and an 8" (203 mm) is about 200 lbs..

Of the 100 lbs of a 155 round only about 15 pounds is explosive filler (TNT) while the other 85 pounds is the steel projectile and mainly brass fuze.

I believe the Acme Company tried to develop an anvil round but it didn't work out because of unreliability. 

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OTOH one of the 16" Navel guns had projectile weights from 1900 to 2700 pounds, a range of 24 miles with a projectile spending about 1.5 minutes in travel time, max speed of 2690 FPS.

The steel casting company had mentioned that after WWII they had done a custom pour of scrapped ship armour into anvils for a Smith who then sold them.  That would probably have been a nickel alloy; but probably not very high carbon.  (Anybody know what they used for armour back then?)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not sure what the projectile weighed but a tank HEAT round is about 75#. It is shaped like a bottle and the nose blasts a small hole to allow the main explosive entry to cuase a bit of a ruckus. The sabot or APFSDS-T was about 65#, basically a depleted uranium dart with fins. Traveling at 2 miles a second it to would cuase a small bit of mayhem. 

Sometime at gunnery ranges we would play with the rounds. A roll of TP soaked in diesel or a  pop can full of grease stuck on the end of an inert heat round when it hits a wooden target makes a nice fire ball. A bottle cap taped to the end would make an ear piecing whistle. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

21 minutes ago, SinDoc said:

Was that the weapon commonly known as the Paris Cannon per chance?

No, the Paris Gun was the largest gun of WWI, at 211mm (8.3") which was later rebored to 238mm (9.37"). 

The Schwerer Gustav was WWII and was only deployed on the Eastern Front. There was a later model in production with a smaller bore and a longer barrel that could have shelled London, England from Calais, France. Fortunately, that one was destroyed by the RAF before it was finished.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/7/2021 at 2:39 PM, ThomasPowers said:

The voices in my head sometimes worry about you, Frosty.

Then they're slacking, Thomas

Sometimes.:rolleyes:

Dropping an anvil from orbit would hardly heat it, 17,500 mph. Sure some of the thin bits would make sparklers on the way down but a nickel iron something the size of a softball is often enough to survive to the ground. I have to wonder about that stat though, how did they measure it before the ground. 

Yes, flying crowbars = Project Thor. KEW (Kinetic Energy Weapons) have been with us since we invented thumbs. 

I'll bet a little guidance and maybe fins would get a Pig anvil to fly pretty straight, pointy end first. The fins could impart spin of course making it even better.

Frosty The Lucky.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use .50 tungsten carbide AP cores as center punches.
 

The Paris gun of WW1 certainly had the longest barrel and the longest range of anything else in that conflict but there were other guns with bores up to about 18" which fired much heavier projectiles, up to about 3k pounds IIRC.

Some of the compressed air punkin chunkin' cannons have a large enough bore that they could probably throw a medium size anvil with a wooden discarding sabot.

I have seen razor blades inserted into artillery rounds between the fuze and projectile  body.  They give a really nice whistle.  You have to be careful that anything you attach to a projectile will not be dislodged by the shock of firing.  I have seen the results when the projectile overrode an obstruction in the bore which caused an in bore explosion which killed and inured several members of the gun crew.  Having a round explode in the bore or at the muzzle is a really BAD thing.

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

I knew a guy who was straddling a piece of artillery trying to reduce a misfire.

His name isn't Wile E. is it?

The thought of doing that boggles my mind. I can't even visualize how that'd work if it didn't turn out bad. 

Frosty The Lucky.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.


×
×
  • Create New...