Requesting a non-tech answer please -

[calibre792x57.y]

For Centurion - The only other thing I recall about the account is that each shrapnel bullet from the 15 inch weighed 1 lb. I suppose that the naval gunnery chaps expected to fire ship to shore bombardments then as now. - SW

[centurion]

For Centurion - The only other thing I recall about the account is that each shrapnel bullet from the 15 inch weighed 1 lb. I suppose that the naval gunnery chaps expected to fire ship to shore bombardments then as now. - SW

But not usually against infantry and shrapnel wouldn't be a lot of use against shore batteries. I do know that 15inch shells were in short supply at the time and the QE was ordered to go easy on using them.

A one pound ball would surely not qualify as shrapnel (originally spherical case shot) but would be grape shot?

[calibre792x57.y]

Well the fixed batteries were knocked out quite early in the game and much of the fire directed against traffic in the Straits came from heavy field howitzers which depended upon their mobility rather than fortifications, - lacking time fuzed H.E. shell, heavy shrapnel would be a logical and deadly answer to these. Certainly there is a history of field batteries being used in this role so it would not be surprising if a heavy shrapnel round was developed earlier for Naval use in a coastal role. We already know that six-inch guns were equipped with shrapnel shell. Many of these guns had Naval origins. I'm sure that one of our artillerists could check to see if the 15 inch naval rifle was equipped with such an item at that time. I think I may have come across the original account in Purnells History of the First World War or possibly Twenty Years After. Have to start looking. AS for bullet weight, that surely depends purely on the size of the carrier shell. It is still a shrapnel bullet. - Cheers - S.W.

[Piorun]

I do technical if you really want to be confused, but you can't have real understanding of anything without some mental effort, I'm old fashioned on this one. If pictures/diagrams are your thing then there's some on the ammunition page of my web site http://nigelef.tripod.com/ammo.htm

When one possesses knowledge, it's useful if one also possesses the wisdom not to appear condescending. Cheers, Antony

[truthergw]

I have an old book referring to technical wonders and inventions of the Nineteenth century. The section on weapons refers to shrapnel shells, named after their inventor, and also to fragmentation shells. These latter were intended to burst on impact and seem to have been an artillery version of a Mills bomb.

[nigelfe]

Bursting shells were used well before the 19th C, and were just like a Mills bomb, ie a fixed length burning fuze, to ensure they reached the ground in the target area, no attempt at airbursting. The 19th C development was an impact fuze so that the shell burst when it hit the ground, nothing like a Mills (or No 36 as it was known when I threw them) grenade. There had been earlier attempts at an impact fuze but it wasn't really possible until spinning shells with a nose were invented. See Wikipedia 'Artillery fuze', it is accurate, historically reasonably comprehensive and also has lots of pictures of WW1 artillery fuzes taken from the various UK War Office handbooks. Modesty prevent me naming a major contributor.

[auchonvillerssomme]

The term Shrapnel shell is used for the complete shell, not specifically the balls, if you go back to the Treatise on Ammunition corrected to December 1877 there is no mention of the balls as a seperate entity being called 'Shrapnel balls' so surely therefore the whole shell is 'Shrapnel' and the balls should be correctly termed 'balls from a shrapnel shell' or even just 'balls'.

[MikB]

The term Shrapnel shell is used for the complete shell, not specifically the balls, if you go back to the Treatise on Ammunition corrected to December 1877 there is no mention of the balls as a seperate entity being called 'Shrapnel balls' so surely therefore the whole shell is 'Shrapnel' and the balls should be correctly termed 'balls from a shrapnel shell' or even just 'balls'.

No, the military nomenclature habit that defines the widest category first would normally result in 'Balls, Shrapnel'.

But frankly I doubt it's philosophically possible to deduce the existence or nature of an entity from its appearance in military terminology...

Regards,

MikB

[nigelfe]

The balls varied in size, usually defined by the number per pound. Thinking about it I think they were officially called bullets. I'd guess that the same shell bodies were used when other payloads, such as star and incendiary, were introduced for 18-pr.

[Piorun]

I believe that fragmentation shells were a development of shrapnel shells which improved the killing efficiency by spraying its fragments in all directions rather than in a line-of-flight direction like a shrapnel shell discharged its bullets. The velocity of shrapnel bullets depended more on the volocity of the shell than the charge which released them. Fragmentation shells increased the explosive velocity over the flight velocity. Antony

[Rockdoc]

I think what surprised me most when I started to read about shell manufacture was the very high quality of steel needed for HE shells. Tests had been carried out with cast-iron bodies but they shattered into particles that were too small to do any subsequent damage. Higher-tensile steels produced a size of fragment that carried a significant amount of energy and was capable of damaging buildings and, of course, troops.

Keith