The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1892-11-23
GREAT GUN MAKING.
The United States Far in Ad.
vance of All Others.
ORDNANCE. BUREAU REPORT.
How the American Navy Compares With
That Of Foreign NAtions-The Ap-
preparations Asked For

dore Folger, chief of the bureau of ord
nance, in his annual report to the secretary
to the navy, which is very lengthy one,
asks appropriations aggregating nearly two
and half millions Of dollars for his bu-
reau. The request seems moderate in
view of the achievements of the present
year and promises for the future. The
voluminous report is filed with interest
ing details as to how the American navy
compares with the navies of foreign Da
tons, and how native skill and inventive
ness have placed this country in ADVANCE
of all others in The comparatively rev so
far as the United STATES is concerned,
field of armor construction and great gun
making. To arm the vessels of the new
navy, 3S1 guns, varying in calibre from
four to thirteen inches are required, and
of these 116 are aAoat. A marked step in
advance has been made in improving me-
chanism and the twelve-inch guns SO they
may be worked easily and rapidly by
hand.
The bureau is now building nickel-steel
guns on new designs, invented by William
Sellers, which will doubtless inalgurate
the entire use Of nickel steel for naval gun
construction. 1t is stronger and b5tter
than ordinary gun steel, and the designs
permit the reconstruction of gun when
ever the tube Is worn by use in guns up to
6 inches in cali bre of fixed metallic ammu-
milton, has resulted SO satisfactorily it is
said to be merely question OF time before
the idea will be applied to larger calibres.
Rapid fire mechanism, as applied to the
5-inch guns, has enabled FIVE shots to be
fired from one gun in nineteen seconds,
but the result of the application of this
mechanism to 4-inch guns was followed by
results still more remarkable, for it has
been possible to fire five shots in fourteen
seconds
Improvements are noted in the quality of
domestic brown powders supplied during
the year. and it Is stated the bureau has
taken steps to establish the manufacture of
brown powder on The Pacific coast, sup
plying the California Powder company. Of
Santa Cruz, Cal, with testing implement
and guns and securing for it the use of the
Dupont formulaes. Marked progress was
made in the development Of navy smoke
less powder duriag the year. It Is now
made in large quantities, is much safer
than other powders, unaffected by climatic
conditions and superior in marked degree
to the best European smoKeless powders.
Tests with the high explosive emmensite
were made with great success, and shells
filled with this material were fired at the
high velocity of 1000 feet a second from
rifled guns and exploded upon impact with
water at 5000 yards range. Experiments
with another American explosive have
shown that common shells filed with this
material can be fired through six one-inch
plates and burst detonatives az will be-
yond them. These experiments are re-
garded as settling the discussion with re-
gard to the relative merits OF firing high
explosives from air guns or powder guns
The report speaks in terms Of praise of
the developments in this country of the
manufacture of armor piercing projectiles
and says In q test recently made at an In
dian head of 8-inch shells two of the cele-
brated German holtzdor, two of Carpenter
and two of Stirling product, the Carpenter
shells were clearly equal to, II not superior
to the best OF Holtzdor manufacture thus
far delivered in this country. One of the
Stirling proiectiles showed qualities of very
superior character. Deliveries of automo-
bile by torpedoes have been delayed by the
difficulty experienced in securing suitable
TASKS, but these at last have been OBJ
tanned from a domestic steel company
and a number OF Howell, Whitehead and
other torpedoes are expected to be pre-
sented for testing at an early date. Com
modore Folger speaks approVingly of the
submarine boat, now g subject of expert
ments az Chicago. While full success was
not attained, the inventio Is promising
and he suggests q combination with it in
effective warfare of comfortable floating
torpedoes, or submarine gun. Under the
head of torpedo boats the report makes 8
strong accommodation that petroleum be
their effectiveness.
The report says the labor troubles at
Homestead put temporary stop to srmor
manufactured by the Carnegie company,
but work has again begun, and 1t is hoped
in q short time that the total armor pro-
duct of the Carnegie and Bethlehem COM
paties will reach 600 or 700 tons of finished
plate per month. Orders for armor to the
full amount Of both contracts have been
placed, and there being about 1000 tons
still needed for ships authorized by law,
the department is preparing to advertise
for bids for the above quantity of armor
nickle steel, aud treated by the Harvey
process at the direction of the department..
Touching the developments of armor in
this country the report describes
two Harveylzed ten inch nickel steel plates
on one of these fve-eight inch Holztdor
shells were smashed without injuring the
plates, tests more severe than any ever
before made The commodore thinks the
result of this great development of armor
will doubtless be to check the tendency. in
Europe to abandon guns of large calibre
which is caused by belief that the guns
were more than ample to penetrate the
heaviest armor.
Some information that may lead to a
revolution in gun making, and also have
far reaching effects in other directions. is
contained in part of the report which
treats of nickle steel alloys following up
certain suggestions made by James Riley
Of Glasgow. The ordnance bureau sue
ceeded in making an alloy of steel with %
per cent. Of nickel that possesses ell the
test qualities and strength of steel with
high elasticity distributed throughout the
mass of metal, and best of all practically
non-corrodible in air, and almost so in
water. Experimental gun barrels and tor
pedo nets are to be made of this material at
once, and it is believed that the gun bar
rels viii not only be rust proof, but resist
the corrosive action of powder gases be-
cause the metal has only one-tenth of tie
Susceptibility of steel to magnetic forces.
1t is also proposed to construct an armored
tower which shelters the compasses of one
Of the new vessels of this material.
A New Loan by the Government
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