My cannon/Mountin Howitzer

RRR

New member
I made this about 15 year ago been setting in a buddy's yard for about ten. I am reworking the hole thing new breech plug,carriage(field,navy and swivel)and adding a cannon lock. it is 24 inchs long 2 9/16in. around and has an 1 1/8in. bore 3/4 inch thick walls with a 1/8 inch hard steel liner( its so hard a steel cutting band saw would not cut it! Also it has set outdoors for 10 years or so and the liner has no trace of rust.. The test fire was with about half pound of powder and about a pound of shot. Had to dig it out of the ground about 3 feet.
 

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Pretty cool. I've been wanting to build one but so far all I've got is a pair of steel six spoke wheels. A trailer ball makes a more realistic looking cascabel
 
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That's the mine one, made by me and some friends!
bye
Rusty
 
Hi Rusty,
That's one beautiful cannon!
Does it have a name?
Maybe it should be named "Vesuvio" or "Vesuvio II"! :D
 
New breech plug is all ready at the shop the be welded. Will have some lavth( Did I spell that right?) work done the the barrel, Mine may never look the real deal But when I getter done most(people) will not bealbe to tell. Plus mine(barrel) is so strong it can't be blown up with black powder if I rember right(?) it had like a 300,000 psi burst limit.
 
Pics of my 1680's deck gun are coming. It's a 6#er. I didn't realise that we spoke cannons here.

Be careful with that homemade thing. I haven't measured the bore on mine but it's smaller than a tennis ball and bigger than a can of concentrated OJ (which makes a pretty fine projectile when filled with concrete). The average that I use is 1/4# of Fg which is enough to recoil about 200-250#s a good 10+ ft. depending on the surface. On concrete or pavement I have no idea how far it would go.

Fun stuff that I've shot through mine: Two, pint boxes of BB's, a pound or two of cut nails (really cool), Spam (another story), MM OJ cans filled with concrete, about 3#'s of 36 cal. lead balls, I'll think of more. Almost every round has a unique story.

Bear in mind that your breechplug is only going to be as secure as the dude welding it.

Here's a pic of the boat that it came off of.

Barracuda2.jpg
 
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It would be much better to have a threaded breech plug. I want to make one to shoot golf balls. Don't care about being perid correct(for once:D), I know I can't afford that.
 
Nice cannon RRR... It reminds me of them old pictures I see lookin through my Civil War book. Just has that sorta feel. nice work. Have a blast!
 
Welded breech plugs are dangerous!
Even if the weld is good, firing the gun drives corrosive residue into the weld pores. Rust starts, unseen, and weakens the breech from the inside.
 
Ok I see were some of you guys are comming from on the welded breech plug. Here what I did I just welded a Ball hitch ball to my allready threaded breech plug to make it look more realer(:D) its all. I did lots O research be for I had any work done. First step was the find a ball with the right size shank in my case it was a 3/4(wide) inch. I cut off the the shank to about half inch(long) drilled out my torch hole (it was in the breech plug) press fitted ball to plug with a 100 ton press. The welding I am having done wil be on the inside just to tack it in place. The outside weld will be the real holding power. Get all that done thread it back into the barrel and there you go. Now the only thing is to figger out to weld the plug itself or leave it removable. Plus I will have pix Tuesday and you all can see what I mean.
 
Hey Rusty,
I like the name Vesuvio II because then you can say to it,
"Don't worry Vesuvio II, some day you will you get the chance to go Boom! and make real fire and smoke just like the big Mt. Vesuvio does!" :D
 
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Quote:
since his cannon is an Italian one it needs an authentic Italian name


Guido.

Horrible, "guido" is the exact translate of "drive" :)
I need a name taked from old "spaghetti western" :)
Something like "sartana" or "trinity or "django" :D
ciao
Rusty
 
More pix

Breech plug,weld and how it will look more or less till I have the barrel turned down a bit.
 

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