Carriage for a herns 1/2 scale any advise.

[Doc Brown.]

Me and my father had a request to build a ship carriage for a Herns 1/2 scale Napoleon. Any advise or opinions would be appreciated thanks.

[onegreatshot]

Jeez, the music was great. AAAARRRRRRRRRRRRR

[Double D]

Two suggestions.

One get a copy of Building 18th Century Naval Artillery by Damian Siekonic http://www.privateermedia.com/Publishing/publishing.htm.  The book will guide you through to correct way to build a carriage and will help you avoid some of the mistakes you are making now. Also it wouldn't hurt to get yourself a copy of Round Shot and Rammers so you will know what a Naval carriage is supposed to look like.  Right now the cheeks are to tall, the trucks are the wrong size and the carriage has no draft.

Second thing get the camera man a tripod--I was getting seasick and wanted to to see all the cool tools in a great shop

 

[Doc Brown.]

The draft is not going to happen but what if we take off the top step? Would that be better than having it so tall? The bottom cheeks haven't been slotted yet so it will drop down a little bit still. Thanks for the reply and I will pick up that book thanks.

[Double D]

Since cannons barrels are tapered the cheeks have to have draft so the breech will fit between them and the rim bases will seat against the cheeks

Taking the top step of will make an immense difference.

The trucks-wheels need to be a smaller diameter.  Often the rear trucks are smaller than the front.

Take a look at the pictures of the carriage on the HMS Victory to see what I am talking about.

http://www.houseoftheorangemonkey.co.uk/monkey/trips/trip1461615.htm

Here is a carriage on the U.S.S. Cairo

http://www.nps.gov/vick/forteachers/upload/Great%20Guns.pdf

Here is my 1841 42 PDR model before refurbishment made from drawings from the Original gun . 



Draft



Here is the original gun and you can see why you have to have draft.



If the cheeks were parallel the trunnion probably wouldn't t reach the cheeks.

This sort details not only make your carriage look a lot less amateurish, but will give you a stronger more stable carriage.

[GGaskill]

The draft in the naval carriage allows the rimbases to sit flush against the cheeks and the breech ring to fit between the cheeks at maximum depression since the breech ring is usually wider the the rimbases.  However, the rimbases are wider than the breech on a Napoleon.

[Doc Brown.]

Thanks for all the tips. I'm going to take a step off and make the wheels smaller. Thanks so much. I'm going to be picking up some of them drawings for the next half scale.