The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-01-10

1 is that the most important factor in ero- | sion Is temperature; the higher the tem- perature of the powder gases the greater | their erosive action. This it is, more | than anything else, which comments the | use of the pure guncotton smOkeless powder, which the United States, as well as France and Russia, now use. It hap pens that the temperature of combustion of guncOtton is not only many hundreds of degrees lower than that of nitro- glycerine, but 1t Is even lower than that | of ordinary gunpowder, and, accordingly, experience shows that our guns are act< ually less eroded by repeated firings with our present smokelesS powder charges than they used to be with brown powder Only recently a six-inch gun which came from the proving ground at Indian Head with a record of one thousand and | eighty-seven rounds of smokeless powder l fired from it was found upon careful ex- i animation to be practically as good as new, and the same was true of a i've | inch gun which had fired over four hun dred rounds. With the larger guns, such as the twelve and thirteen inch, the erosion is more rapid than this, but even with them it is now beyond doubt that many hundred rounds can be fired from each one before it will be necessary to replace it.. At. the present moment we have afioat number of ten. twelve and thirteen inch guns which have fired from | one thunder to one hunderd and fifty rounds apiece. We have eight-inch guns | which have fired over two g hundred rounds and we have four, five and six inch guns which have fired four hum dred rounds and more. but none of them are as yet anywhere near being worn out. nor, in fact, do they show any signs of being less efficient than when they were first installed on board ship.
 It may we'll be objected to this opti- mistic view that these guns of ours are of older types, firing comparatively small | charges. that most of their firing has been with brown powder. often with re- duced charges, and, most important of | all, that as a rule they have been fired slowly, not at the rapid fire which must | occur in battle. All this Is true, and it has weight. We are only now getting the new high power guns into service, and we are only now beginning to con duct target practice as it should be con ducted, using full charges of smokeless powder and firing each gun as rapidly as possible. It may be that the wear and
 tear of the next ten years will be greater, even much greater, than it has been in
 the past ten.
 Undoubtedly with the small guns, such
 as the three-inch and six-pounder, the
 heating of the gun in rapid firing greatly
 increases the wear caused by a given
 number of rounds. Thus not long ago. at
 Indian Head. a three-inch gun which had
 already fired some 450 rounds and was
 then in good condition had it's accuracy
 completely destroyed by the wearing
 away of its rifiing as a result of firing
 it something oyer an hour at the rate
 of about two shots a minute.
 It Is perfectly possible, then. that sin
 gle battle may ruin the small rapid fire
 guns of a ship, even if they be in per
 feet condition at its outset. and we must
 be prepared to replace such guns ire.
 quently in case of war. With the main
 battery guns. however, which are the
 real fighting force of a battleship, there
 need be no fear of such happening
 Their mass is too great and their fire
 even at round a minute, too slow, to
 heat them to such a point that the ero-
 sion and wear will be greatly accelerated
 In the accompanying illustration is shown the latest pattern of United
 States naval 12-inch gun. such as are mounted on the United States steamer
 Maine and will form the principal arma-
 ment of other battle ships now building ! Its high powder charge. made of pure } guncotton, is also shown. These guns under the new allowance for target prac- ] tice, will be fired about eighteen rounds apiece each year. but 1t may be. safely predicted that should war come within