The Portland daily press., 1893-12-21
GREAT GUNS OF GREAT NAwEs.
Costly Weapons That Can be Fired Only
Seventy-Five Times.

Two of the mammoth 11O-ton guns,
upon which the British admiralty has
SO proudly commented as the modern
naval artillery" ard which cost about
100000 each, went down in seventy
fathoms of water with the battle ship
Victoria, and in connection with this
fact there must have been awakened
much interest among readers as to
whether such heavy war weapons, heav-
Ter than any yet made for the United
States navy, and heavier than will prob
ably be built, are wise addition to a
modern war vessel.
And yet this big gun is not new
thing. as it practically dates back
twelve years. About forty of these big
guns have been built, and some of them
were sent to Italy. 1t is easy to compre-
bend among navy officers that such guns
are an expensive luxury, not only in the
actual cost of the gun and its ammuni-
ton, but also in the size of the ships re-
CURED to carry them. But what will
be of most interest to lay people is the
quantity and cost of ammunition and
the life of the gun itself. The best ord
ance experts calculate the life of the
110-ton gun to be seventy five rounds
with full charges The 110-ton gun, and,
indeed, all large guns, are fired with slow
burning coacoa powder, the coacoa being
derived from the brown color of the
powder. 1t is shaped in hexagonal
prisms, this being the ost convenient
form of packing, and 10000 of these
prisms are needed to make a full charge
for OF oah mi, Sc,
pierced with hole i'll the center..to give
ready access to the flame and insure an
equable ignition.
For nearly all naval guns the powder
charge is made up of four cartridges,
but owing to the extraordinary weight
of the 11G-ton gun charges (s66 pounds) it
is divided into eight cartridges, each
weighing 100 pounds. To load the gun
it is necessary to bring it to it's extreme
elevation-that is, the muzzle is pointed
upward as far as it can be on the mount,
and these operations follow: i, unlock
and unscrew the breech block; 2, with
draw the breech block; g. traverse breech
block to one side; A., place the loading
tray in the gun; 5, swab out the gun; 6,
ram home, or put into place, the pro-
jectile; Z, place the first charge; s, place
and ram home the second half charge;
9, withdraw the loading tray; 10, re-
place the breech screw; IL, screw up and
lock the breech screw.
the gun is then ready to be sighted
by the captain of the turret from his
coming tower. 1t is fired by electricity.
The gun can be loaded and fired within
two and half minutes. The projectile
used in the gun, when ships or forts are
attacked, weighs ], 800 pounds or nearly
200 pounds less than ton, and it leaves
the muzZle with velocity of 2,115 feet
a second and has a destructive energy
IN 70 for
before mounting on the Sanspareil three
years ago the shot tore it's way through
specially manufactured steel armor
twenty inches thick, and yet 1.-THE armor
belt of the Victoria ranged from sixteen
to eighteen inches in thickness only.
insaddition to the twenty inches thick
ness of steel the shot went throughsseight
wrought-iron frame, twenty feet of oak
baulks, six feet of granite blocks, eleven
feet of concrete and six feet of brick
In other words, it went through forty
four and one-third feet of wall unique
in history for com bination of width aud
variety and strength of materials. The
cost of one firing of this gun was $500
for the powder and 5000 for the pro-
jectile and fuses, and after seventy-five
rounds there would be the cost of the
gun to add, namely, 100000
In firing the gun against a body of men
Or fotllla of boats it is intended to use
shrapnel, drum-like cylinder of steel,
inclosing 1880 four-ounee billets AS
soon as the ::shrapnelsa bursts the bullets
go flying on, the spinning of the she'll
cased by the rifed grooves Of the gun
spreading them out over large area.
When shell is used it is charged with
powder, which causes it to explode and
scatter it's pieces with great destruction.
Washington Star.