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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

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Artilley


Retlaw

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Of the 1000's of artillery field pieces operating in the run up to the battle of the Somme July 1st 1916, is it known how many guns failed and blew up.

What was the life expectancy of a field gun, ie number of rounds fired.

Retlaw.

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I'm no artillery expert but I believe the gun barrels had a lining which could be rotated to save the wear on the rifling inside, and therefore the liners could be replaced when worn out. I think the continual firing results in wear with consequent drop in accuracy and resultant short fall into our own lines, if not properly compensated for.... however you'll need to wait for a proper artilleryman to respond..

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Unless grossly misused and checks not done it would be rare for an artillery piece to fail through being fired too often. A count of rounds fired was kept and guns (or at least the tubes and breech) checked at various key points in their life cycle. Fairly accurate figures were known on MTBF and guns would be retired or sent for overhaul and possible reworking before then. However an alarming cause of failure was defective ammunition, many early HE rounds having an unfortunate tendency to either explode in the barrel or just as they were leaving it. This seems to have been the result of a combination of poor design, shoddy workmanship and inadequate inspection and quality control. These in turn can be put down to the immense pressure to produce the ammo to feed the guns and the consequential rapid expansion of the munitions industry. A gun would be as at much risk from defective shells when it was fired for the first time as after hundreds of rounds.

With some artillery pieces growing inaccuracy due to wear on the lands seems to have been one reason for their recall and reworking rather than imminent danger of bursting.

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In addition to the points Centurion has made it should be remembered that an artillery equipment comprises broadly the gun (or ordnance), the recoil system, and the carriage. The ordnance wore and its condition was monitored as a result of firing, barrel life varried howitzers having, in general a longer life than guns, typical values were of the order howitzers 10,000 rounds, guns 7,000 rounds. Recoil systems suffered if not properly maintained; hydraulic buffers leaked and if not replenished allowed excessive recoil causing damage and deterioration of springs. Much of this was repairable by Ordnance workshops. At one stage the workshops of 4th Army were changing 200 sets of springs per day. Carriages could be damaged by enemy fire. Over a 6 week period the workshops of 4th Army repaired some 1,600 field guns and howitzers and declared several hundred beyond repair. Over the period equipments were firing an average of 2 to 4,000 rounds per equipment.

Old Tom

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In addition to the points Centurion has made it should be remembered that an artillery equipment comprises broadly the gun (or ordnance), the recoil system, and the carriage. The ordnance wore and its condition was monitored as a result of firing, barrel life varried howitzers having, in general a longer life than guns, typical values were of the order howitzers 10,000 rounds, guns 7,000 rounds. Recoil systems suffered if not properly maintained; hydraulic buffers leaked and if not replenished allowed excessive recoil causing damage and deterioration of springs. Much of this was repairable by Ordnance workshops. At one stage the workshops of 4th Army were changing 200 sets of springs per day. Carriages could be damaged by enemy fire. Over a 6 week period the workshops of 4th Army repaired some 1,600 field guns and howitzers and declared several hundred beyond repair. Over the period equipments were firing an average of 2 to 4,000 rounds per equipment.

Old Tom

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typical values were of the order howitzers 10,000 rounds, guns 7,000 rounds.

Old Tom

Thats a lot longer barrel life than I expected considering the material shells were made of and just a copper driving band.

In my experience of full bore target shooting, barrel life to maintain accuracy, is less than 5000 rounds, and the bullet jacket material is a lot softer than than an atillery shell.

Bench rest shooters change the barrels even more frequently.

Are there any recorded cases of guns actually failing at the breech and killing or injuring the gun crew ?.

Retlaw.

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In my experience of full bore target shooting, barrel life to maintain accuracy, is less than 5000 rounds, and the bullet jacket material is a lot softer than than an atillery shell.

And a modern (ie 20th century) artillery tube is made of a lot more sophisticated material than a small arms barrel

Breech failures were common -ish when the breech loaders were being (re)introduced in the 19th century. One reason why Britain was reluctant to let the old muzzle loaders go. Krupp made a fatal design/manufacturing error in his first sliding wedge breech design. As a result there were many blowouts. It was said of the Austro Prussian War of 1866 that Krupp's guns killed more Prussian gunners than Austrian infantry. The Russians who had also bought Krupp breech loaders for their 'stans wars had much the same experience. (The British War Office had turned them down which reinforced their anti breech loader stance). Krupp fled to Switzerland and much money was paid in bribes, oohps blood money oohps compensation to the Prussian and Russian war offices (no one seems to have thought of the gunners families) and Krupp had to replace 600 guns at no cost. After this much care was taken in breech design and by WW1 the designers and metallurgists had got it pretty well right. Breech failures seem to be mainly restricted to carelessness (like over charging where bagged charges were used, using the wrong propellant etc.) In July 1929 this is thought to be the cause of an accident on HMS Devonshire (an 8 inch gun cruiser) when the roof of "X" turret was blown off and 18 men were killed. There have been cases of breech failure in more modern times - this affected the US Army's 175mm guns around about 1970 and there have been allegations of gunners in SE Asia sabotaging the ramming mechanism to avoid having to fire them. This appears a relatively isolated case of a design flaw.

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