BLOWN UP GUNS , SAFETY WARNING !!!

[dan610324]

now Im trying to talk safety with an cannon interested man here in sweden and I just found out that I need more pictures on guns that have failed .
anything that someone have called a cannon at any time , doesnt matter if its bronze or cast iron , or even if its pipe bombs .

I DESPERATELY NEED THOSE PICTURES AS AN WARNING EXAMPLE .

please search in your computers and post them here .

I have saved almost all pictures I found here the last year of exploded guns , but it doesnt matter if I got them already or not , please post all you have .

this is very important for me to have when Im talking cannon safety with people .

hope you can take 5 min and post what you got.

[cannonmn]

This small cannon was filled up to near the muzzle with some kind of powder, then wet wadding was put in.  We think.  This was the first and last shot that cannon fired.

[dan610324]

ooooohhh  holy jesus
do you know if it was nc or bp ??
Ive never seen an bronze gun that much destroyed from bp
mostly they just crack open , but still keep in one piece

[cannonmn]

The person who showed us these cannon fragments did not know what kind of powder was used.

[seacoastartillery]

     Dan,   You can get several examples of Blown-Up cannon from the two threads below:

           "What Happened to Your Weapon, Marine?" "It Blew Up, Gunny"
          

            A Battle-Damaged or Blown-Up Cannon CONTEST, just for fun.  « 1 2 »

      Just right click on any of these blow-up cannon images and hit  'SAVE AS'  to any folder on your computer for any personal, non-commercial use.  All of these guns were most likely blown-up by BP, but we have no direct evidence and therefore cannot state this as fact except on the Marine's cannon.  That one was definitely BP.

Good luck on this worthy project.  Safety First!!

Mike and Tracy

[dan610324]

I already saved those pictures   
they are wounderful .
this are the only pictures I have on blown up cast iron guns .
all I had before was only bronze and maybe some brass .
this kind of pictures are perfect to show people
when they dont seem to understand the power of black powder .
of course I only use them for educational purpose .

[Double D]

Dan,

have you looked at this post?

Cannon Accidents!!! Safety Warning!!!

[Terry C.]

I saved six images of a blown-up cast iron cannon, posted by member Eddiehorror a couple of years ago. Some of you may remember them, the pieces were displayed in the back of a pickup truck bed, along with what was left of the carriage.

This member has been inactive for a long time, and has probably moved on.

Here is the original thread.

Edit: While I was typing this, Double D posted his reply. This thread is listed with the others, but the link is dead. The link above should work.

[Double D]

The links are hot again.

We have two other cannon accidents on the board the two 4th of July Cannon accidents in Thurston WA.

[dan610324]

thanks guys for your help here when I needed it .
if anyone have something more just post it here .

[KABAR2]

Dan,

Here's a link an accident that should never of happened.

a cast iron cannon with no sleeve, ( lawn ornament )

Poor adult supervision, and unsafe loading practice!

a young man lost his life because of it.

http://www.ohsu.edu/croet/face/reports/2003-20-1R.pdf

[KABAR2]

Oops it been about a year since I looked at that thread, and I had the link from another search I did some time back....... I bad. sorry 

If you like I can delete it and this to save band width.....

[dan610324]

please dont delete it
its probably many other who not have read it before and maybe it helps someone to understand that this is serious stuff

[Cannoneer]

Dan, you might also want to tell your friend to beware of what people will sell, because there are those out there that evidently just don't care that their peddling something that could cause serious injuries, or worse.
The first photo shows a barrel that was up for sale on a famous auction site, the stats are, bronze?, (my question mark) M 1841 6 pounder, 17-inches long, 1-inch bore, bore is cracked by breech. You'll notice the split was much wider than it now appears, look at the hammer marks on the top of the barrel. This cannon sold, and I'm guessing the buyer was going to try and braze the split and make a display model, but I don't know.
The second photo shows a later listing by the same seller only this time this champion of safety made some alterations, the bore diam. on this new casting was given as 15/16th's. I sent a message to this guy that went something like: Don't you realize that if someone, especially a kid gets hurt or killed by your gun exploding, that the silly disclaimer you attached to the listing isn't going to do anything to protect you from a legal backlash that will make the sound of your barrel going off sound like a ladyfinger popping, by comparison. Of course, this slouch went ahead and sold the barrel anyway, but I haven't seen any more of them come up for auction.




I saw this iron barrel on another forum, the owner said he had fired the piece hundreds a times before without any problems (well it only takes one time to alter your life forever). The owner thought this barrel was made of steel, (other members of that forum thought he was mistaken, and it was actually cast iron; I concur with their opinion) had a 1-inch bore and a .75-inch wall, he also said that it was loaded as usual with 450 grains of black powder (no grain size given) with a wad. This man is lucky this barrel just split like it did, it could have exploded like a fragment grenade. All I can say on this one is that anyone who is firing iron barrels of any kind that are not sleeved with properly constructed DOM steel liners are simply playing some other form of Russian roulette.

[dan610324]

thanks for the pictures
yeah this pictures show us how careful we need to be to avoid accidents .
cast iron should always be sleeved or just fire very small blanks , but you will never know what the next owner will do with it .
Ive even heared about renactment groups that have cast their barrels in aluminium and just have an thin walled sleeve of just 4 mm walls ( slightly more then 1/8" )
I would never stay closer then 100 yards from such an barrel when its fired