considering purchasing cannon, need help

[RocklockI]

Here is a true story about the very first Black Powder cannon I ever saw shoot . I was in gunsmith school in 77' and some guy was going to take out his 4" OIL CAN size mortar !

well holly chickimaguua ! I gotta see this thing ! So I introduce myself and vollenterred (sp it stinks to a ignorant ) so on the apointed Sat . we went to what was known then as "the 400 yard rock" it was a small place that you could shoot from and up on the hillside was a rock 400 yards away .

We haulded this 1791 or somedanm thing up the trail which was normally an easy walk with a rifle or two grunting and straining all the way ropes and sweat .

It went BOOM over and over launching cement filled oil cans and delivering hot death from above and I was hooked BIG TIME .

I went shooting with him agian BUT strangly noted that other than me there were no origanal vollentters the next times . YOU WILL NEED A CREW they are easy to scare up the first time .

Tracy still has that darn mortar but now it sits in a shed like yesterdays news ......... two old guys and me can not move it .

I saw DD's dom mortar sitting in a hardware store as advertising for the shoot last year ..... it is one squattazzedted    piece of steel ungainly to try and move and had no handles .

But if you cammand a tribe of Boy Scouts you may do fine .

as always YMMV Gary

 

[little seacoast]

The point has already been made but I'll say it again,  it's more fun to know someone with a BIG cannon that to own it yourself.  After an initial infatuation with a full size gun I found it was too damn big to move, store, clean, and shoot single handedly.  A half scale 2.25" Parrott has turned out to be my perfect cannon- small enough to move and store by myself and tons of fun to shoot. More is not always better. Consider this very carefully before you part with your hard earned dough. Respectfully, LS

[gulfcoastblackpowder]

I concur with the others, though it's hard for me to say this - it's possible to get too big of a cannon.

When I ordered my cannon from Hern, I was a little disappointed when I got it, and realized I had ordered a different one than I thought I was ordering (my fault, not theirs).  The one I ended up with is a little smaller than the one I intended, and they offered to exchange if I wanted to, though I chose to stick with the one I got.  At ~24" and ~75lbs, it's easy enough for me to put in the "trunk" of my Camaro, and the carriage just fits on top of it.  The one I intended to order would have been about 30" and 105lbs, making transporting it in my car much more difficult.

With a 1.5" bore, it's still a blast to shoot (pun intended), but it's a manageable gun that is big enough to sit on the floor of my foyer and small enough to transport.

[Cat Whisperer]

The tube and trunnion of my 4.5 (at left) weigh in at 102 lbs.  Still 'light' enough for me (age 63) to muscle into the trunk or truck.  Will I be able to do so when I'm 70?  I hope so.

[GGaskill]

Will I be able to do so when I'm 70?  I hope so.

Do it every day between now and then and you will still be able.