Los Angeles herald., 1909-10-13

| 10 VI Bl be a giant barker as long
! ia AAl and as heavy as rail-
lsSssa2h4zaD road engine, shooting
projectile as heavy as the
combined weight of ten average men
and sending it through space at a rate
that would hurl it around the earth in
thirty-three hours, or whether 1t be
the automatic gun that can shoot
eight rife bullets a second as a con-
tinuous performance, it shows that
men are now forging mightier thun-
derbolts than old Jove himself ever
dreamed of.
Big guns had their beginning when
/ the Chinese found out the principle of
uniting harmless ingredients and by
| their ignition creating a tremendous
/ force. But gunpowder was practically
the same for many a century. At the
beginning Of the Civil war, however,
General Rodman of the United States
ordnance department began series Of
| studies which were the root of the
present tremendously high-powered eX-
plosives that will now drive a projec-
| tile as many miles as the older pow
ders would drive 1t rods Since his
| experiments each year has taught
some new lesson, until at last the
| gun has been declared the victor in
| the long race between gun power and
armor resistance. For years each
step forward in gun power was met
with a Roland for Its Oliver in the
shape of armor that could resist the
! increased penetrability of the gun and
projectile. But now the gun is too
much for the armor. No steel sides
that ship can carry can prevent the
protectiles entering her armOr-lt is
now a question of who can hit first
and oftenest In the most vital places
The United States has two princi-
pal gun factories of It's own-the naval
/ 70 Chi In crtn and the
army factory at Watervliet. The
Washington factory contrary to popu-
lar belief, is the finest gun factory in
the world. There again one is re-
minded that it pays to advertise. Nine
men out of ten believe that the Krupp
establishment holds the place of prim-
acy, and that idea comes from long
sustained, worldwide press agency
work. But all experts acknowledge
that the naval gun factory at Wash
ington Is the finest plant of It's kind
on earth. Truly II is a place of Won
ders. There giant planes make steel
shavings fly as thick and fast as the
wood ribbons from a carpenters plane,
and huge machines cut the hardest
steel with less noise than a child
makes in hacking a board with a dull
edged hatchet. There sixty-ton can
non are picked up and carried around
with as little seeming exertion as a
boy makes in lifting his air rifle to his
shoulder and giant magnets lift as
much in tons as a toy magnet lifts
in pennyweights.
Among the most interesting sights
one sees at a big-gun factory is the
tailor shop where packets are fitted to
the big barkers, and the man tailor who
could fit a jacket on his customer as
we'll as the gun tailor fits one on gun
would be a shining example of the ex-
| pert filter. Skin tight is an expression
| OF superlative looseness as compared
with the snug fitting jackets the guns
tailor puts on his guns. In these days
of projectiles weighing more than half
| a ton, and powder charges in propor-
ton, the breech end of a big gun must
be made powerfully strong lest it be
| burst asunder. Hence the big steel
! jackets that hug the gun tighter than
| ever bear hugged his victim. Anyone
who has ever seen rural blacksmith
"cut a tire" on Farmer Browns wagon
will understand the principle Of logging
| out a big gun in a new Jacket.
| TO begin with, there is a great pit
some fifty feet deep. Into this a huge
band of steel is placed, where for a
full day and a half 1t is subjected to
baking process with the heat at 675
degrees. After thirty-six hours Of such
! intimate acquaintance with fervent
heat the jacket attains a diameter un-
equaled in it's whole life history. Then
a huge gun Is picked up by one of the
big electric travelling cranes and set
down into the jacket. Even with this
jacket expanded to the limit by the
expansive force of heat the fit must be
snug one-within one fourhundredths
of an inch perfect. Then the cooling
process begins. For eighteen hours a
stream of water is kept pouring on the
jacket, and if at the end Of that time
anyone can tell where the Jacket begins
and gun ends he must be possessed of
microscopic eyes. 1t is said, however,
that the jacket is stronger than the
gun itself.
But even the steel-jacketed gun is
not regarded as strong enough to with
stand the terrific strain that 1t is de-
sired a gun shall undergo. An effective
range of twelve miles Is not great
enough for the modern gun expert; he
wants to begin shooting before the
enemy reaches such close range, and
to keep 1t up until one side or the other
surrenders or goes to Davy Jones' lock-
er. So a wire-wound gun has been de-
vised, one modification of which is the
Crozier wire-wound gun, and another
the Brown. the inventor Of the latter
gun laid high claim upon its qualities
He figured that with 800 pounds of
| 1t II