Posted 3 years ago
hotairfan
(388 items)
A friend sold me a scale model Civil War Field Cannon that needs work. All is there, but everything is loose and needs either replacing parts or repairing it. An example is..... the carriage wheels are loose and lost their dish shape. They must have the steel tires shrunk down.
Before I left his home with my new project, my friend asked if I would want another black powder cannon bbl. that is just lying in his shed floor. The parts of the existing carriage are beyond repair and must have been left outside for many a year.
I said "of course", I never turn down anything pertaining to the American Civil War.
This is the cannon that he gave me. It's a Navel cannon and I copied the carriage from what I saw on the internet.
The wood is walnut (I don't think that they used walnut wood on their guns, but it looks good). The bbl. is cast iron and is of 5/8" bore and it is approx. 11" long.
The touch hole is rather small. If I use a fuse to fit, I will have to drill out the touch hole, I'm reluctant to do that. I could leave it as it is and use finely ground black powder to the hole and touch it with a burning wick. This might have been the way they originally did their ignition. Any info would be helpful...
My friend is in a Veteran's Care Center now and I want to visit him and show him his Civil War U.S. Navel Cannon.
I think that he will be happy to see it all together again.
P.S.
After showing my friend the restored naval cannon, he told me to acquire some small "salute" firecrackers and use the thin fuse to ignite the cannon.
I'm not a young man anymore, but I still marvel at what the old timers can teach us about dealing with our problems.
Incredibly realistic scale model!
I wish I had friends like that! Nice job..
The field gun wheels are dry and need soaking. My orig. field gun's wheels would lose their dish and I would tire ropes to them and roll them into a pond. They would get their dish back overnite. Of course you aren't dealing with 57" 150 lb. wheels either. Lighting loose powder on the touchhole ain't easy unless you have something that creates a little hotter spark. Maybe nitre treated cord etc.. Cannons, I know. The trunnions on cannons (western world) moved from lower to center of bore height at almost exactly 1800, so that may help with carriage design.
thank you jscott, dav2, and bb2