Interesting Video - Canister

[subdjoe]

Canister.  I hope the testing was a bit more methodical than what is shown.

[little seacoast]

That's murderous fire there guys. Wonder how far the balls actually carried and how many skips they got on that recently plowed ground. Now imagine lining up neatly with your buddies and advancing at a walk into that kind of fire from a battery of guns ala Gettysburg.  Takes lots bigger stones that the Maker graced me with.

[Leatherneck]

That was the best demonstration of canister Ive seen so far.
 
From my brief research on this topic:
Only 1/10 of all casualties at Gettysburg were from cannon fire, eventough it was the largest show of force of that type in the history of the continent.
During the Napoleonic era it was said that one shot of grape/canister was equivalent to an infantry battalion's volley. Even more accurate was the second claim eventough I found it myself to be a bit too optimistic.
Lessons learned from trying to replicate grape/canister in 1/6 scale cannons:
You must use BBs of considerable weight if you want them to retain the force of the main charge and have extended range.
Plastic BBs as I found out cant retain the inertia. .17 cal BBs work pretty well. To be safe wooden sabots should serve as a divider between the powder and the balls. In one case I found a small BB stuck in the 1/8in flash hole. Evetough for some reason no divider between powder and balls seems to have a more accurate spread down range.
Sabots can be easily made from wood dowels. The whole idea of canister is to delay the spread of the musket balls inside the can (feel free to correct me  ). I still havent figured out how to replicate this one. I suppose if you wrapped the BBs into aluminum foil or put them into a small container you wouldnt have such an early spread of pellets in all directions.
A line of red balloons is a really fun way to play with this scaled down concept.
 

[subdjoe]

Leatherneck, if I recall correctly, canister for the 12 lb Napoleon use 1 1/4 inch iron balls.  Canister for the 12 lb howitzer use something like 84 musket balls of, I think, .69 caliber.  And the idea of having them in a can was simply for ease of loading.  Much easier and quicker to slam a can into the bore than to try to load loose balls.  The can comes apart almost as soon as it exits the barrel.

For your 1/6 scale (bore about .80"?) you would need balls about .3 inches or so. 

Here is a slow motion of modern canister:

[Artilleryman]

That's murderous fire there guys. Wonder how far the balls actually carried and how many skips they got on that recently plowed ground. Now imagine lining up neatly with your buddies and advancing at a walk into that kind of fire from a battery of guns ala Gettysburg.  Takes lots bigger stones that the Maker graced me with.

I have fired 12 pdr canister at Grayling using 27, 1 1/4 inch zinc packed in sawdust with a 2 lb powder charge of cannon grade.  We found some of these balls that hit a concrete wall at 300 meters that had been broken on impact.   At 120 yards over hard ground this canister will hit every man in an 8 man front (we did this for the History Channel) and have enough energy to take out the man behind him.  When they describe a hole being blown through a line of infantry they were not making up stories.

[Leatherneck]

Nice video Joe, I can even see the ripple as it's breaking the sound barrier.
I had to re-check my source and it was as you said (and the 1st video showed). The can does break after leaving the muzzle.
Alot of (historical) books I have on hand mistakenly reference grape and canister as the same thing. I think by 1820s grape was more common to naval use, where it was wrapped in canvas. Canister remaining as the true anti personnel/defensive ordnance on land.
 

[subdjoe]

Nice video Joe, I can even see the ripple as it's breaking the sound barrier.
I had to re-check my source and it was as you said (and the 1st video showed). The can does break after leaving the muzzle.
Alot of (historical) books I have on hand mistakenly reference grape and canister as the same thing. I think by 1820s grape was more common to naval use, where it was wrapped in canvas. Canister remaining as the true anti personnel/defensive ordnance on land.

The confusion is understandable.  The Brits, I believe, called what we in the Colonies called "grape shot" "canister."  Sometimes. 

Either one can ruin your day if it's coming at you.

[seacoastartillery]

      Thanks Joe for posting the video.  I thought it was tremendously interesting to see the pattern of the canister balls land in the dirt beyond the target.  It gave you a good idea of what the "spread" actually was.

     The video below was taken by Seacoast Artillery when we responded to the call to report and fall in for the Cancer Shoot in 2009.  It gives you a good idea of how very nasty canister is up close. 

Tracy


Stats: (110)  .735 cal. lead balls were loaded in a bag ahead of a .75" thick circle of heavy duty plywood and 7 oz. of Fg Goex BP in my 4" 1797 U.S. Land Service Mortar with a two caliber bore length.  Distance to target was 75 feet.  Note the muzzle flash, then the shock wave, then the cloud of balls flying thru the target.  There are three balls which are late arrivals.  Can you spot them?

      Click on image to run movie clip.


I would hate to be "almost to the gun" and then receive this blast.  Other than about six previous hits, this pattern was from one blast, the last of four.  We shot 40 pounds of lead balls that day!  All shots went high except the last one.  The last was fired with ZERO elevation.

[Doc Brown.]

I really cant imagine how Americans could fight Americans like this. How could they have believed in there cause so much that they would be willing  to run straight into something like that knowing they was as good as dead and at that hands of possibly there cousin or father.

[Artilleryman]

I really cant imagine how Americans could fight Americans like this. How could they have believed in there cause so much that they would be willing  to run straight into something like that knowing they was as good as dead and at that hands of possibly there cousin or father.

Peer pressure of family and friends and the belief that their fate was determined by God.

[keith44]

Both videos are attention getting

[GGaskill]

Correct me if I am wrong but I thought canister was hundreds of musket balls in a can.  Grape was the large shot in much smaller quantities and was pretty much obsolete by the Civil War.

[subdjoe]

Correct me if I am wrong but I thought canister was hundreds of musket balls in a can.  Grape was the large shot in much smaller quantities and was pretty much obsolete by the Civil War.

Grape was a stand of 9 balls held together with rings, two disks, and a long bolt through the center.  Always 9 balls I think, so the balls varied in size according to the bore of the gun.  Some large bore guns used balls that look like they were the solid shot for a 12 pounder.

Canister, for the 12 pound Napoleon, used 27 iron balls. Canister for the 12 pound howitzer used, I think, 84 lead balls of .69 caliber. 

[Cannoneer]

Thanks for starting this topic, Joseph. I still do not fully understand the opening statement of the video.

Grapeshot wasn't always fashiond with nine balls, it could be (and often was) made up of varying numbers of balls, and quilted grapeshot was a somewhat different construction than the form you mentioned.

[subdjoe]

Thanks for starting this topic, Joseph. I still do not fully understand the opening statement of the video.

My pleasure, sir.  When I saw the video I knew it would be appreciated.  And, yeah, that statement in kind of odd.  I bet they had to come up with something to get funding for their little outing and that was the best they could come up with.

Grapeshot wasn't always fashiond with nine balls, it could be (and often was) made up of varying numbers of balls, and quilted grapeshot was a somewhat different construction than the form you mentioned.

True, the quilted is a different beast.  Although most of the photos I have seen of that stick to the 9 balls. 
If I recall, the Ordnance Manuals specify 9 balls, and give the sizes for each size gun. 

In that ubiquitous "somewhere" on the internet, and also posted "somewhere" on this forum, is a photo of a captured?  destroyed? artillery depot or arsenal, shows various guns, carriages, etc, and lots of munitions scattered about, including many different sizes of stands of grape.  All have only 9 balls.  I have a vague recollection of seeing a drawing of a stand with 12 or 15, but it seems to be an exception.

[Artilleryman]

Eight inch grape shot without sabot and 12 pdr grape.  Each made as described in the Gibbon's Artillerist's Manual.  The 12 pdr grape was considered obsolete and had supposedly discontinued by the time of the civil war, but there are descriptions and photographs that would indicate otherwise.  Quilted grape was replaced by this style probably because it could be stored for long periods without the worry of having the canvas rot, and because this type is easier to assemble.  I prefer quilted grape because I believe it holds a tighter pattern, but given a choice canister is more effective. 

[oltom]

They could of used a RPV on this. I have taken arial photos from a small R/C plane and now the electronic camera's would of been great for this. There's alot of R/C guys that would of gotten in on it, filming from the air would of given the pattern on each shot~

[Cannoneer]

Thanks for starting this topic, Joseph. I still do not fully understand the opening statement of the video.

My pleasure, sir.  When I saw the video I knew it would be appreciated.  And, yeah, that statement in kind of odd.  I bet they had to come up with something to get funding for their little outing and that was the best they could come up with.

Grapeshot wasn't always fashiond with nine balls, it could be (and often was) made up of varying numbers of balls, and quilted grapeshot was a somewhat different construction than the form you mentioned.

True, the quilted is a different beast.  Although most of the photos I have seen of that stick to the 9 balls. 
If I recall, the Ordnance Manuals specify 9 balls, and give the sizes for each size gun. 

In that ubiquitous "somewhere" on the internet, and also posted "somewhere" on this forum, is a photo of a captured?  destroyed? artillery depot or arsenal, shows various guns, carriages, etc, and lots of munitions scattered about, including many different sizes of stands of grape.  All have only 9 balls.  I have a vague recollection of seeing a drawing of a stand with 12 or 15, but it seems to be an exception.

These are photos of the Richmond, Virginia Arsenal grounds taken April-June 1865. You can see 4 and 5 tier grapeshot stands, and the tiers contain more than 3 balls; but were these grapeshot stands peculiar to the South?

[seacoastartillery]

      Mike and I found this unique round of grapeshot at the Castillo de San Marcos in 2005 when we visited St. Augustine, Florida.  It was located in a magazine within the fort very near an interesting display of the material used to construct the fort’s walls, Coquina.  This rock like substance has the unique ability to resist deep penetration of cannon balls, but also to show not the slightest tendency to fracture when they enter.  They just disappear beneath the outer surface of the wall, without causing any real damage.  This fort was never attacked by forces using exploding shells, so their effect is unknown.  This munition was shipped to the fort during it’s brief Confederate Period, 1861 to 1862.  The fort was called Fort Marion at that time, named for the crafty “Swamp Fox”, Francis Marion, of Revolutionary War fame.

     The Fort came back into Union hands on March 11, 1862 after the USS WABASH, a Union gunboat, took the city and Fort without firing a shot when it found that Confederate forces had evacuated the area and the local authorities were willing to surrender to preserve the town.

     Defying all previous descriptions of “Grapeshot” this round of ammunition is also rare in that it is designed to be used in a smaller 6 pounder cannon.  When we quizzed the fort's historian, he admitted that this particular round was a replica, but that they had the historical evidence which allowed them to make it correctly. 

Tracy and Mike


Confederate 6 Pdr. Grapeshot very similar in construction to the larger 8 or 10 inch grapeshot in the Richmond Arsenal photo.

[subdjoe]

These are photos of the Richmond, Virginia Arsenal grounds taken April-June 1865. You can see 4 and 5 tier grapeshot stands, and the tiers contain more than 3 balls; but were these grapeshot stands peculiar to the South?

Ah!  I've seen the first, but not the second.  Thank you sir.  Those would clear a deck in a hurry.  I'll have to revise my talk.  I would doubt that they would have been peculiar to the South, since so much of what they did came straight from the US Ordnance Dept. manuals.  I have to re-read some of those.  Or maybe look to a naval manual.

CORRECTION:

I think I have seen that one before, I just never enlarged it enough to notice the stands with more than three layers of three. 

[bluelake]

Great thread!  I have long been fascinated with canister.  It's especially interesting when one can do a bit of research, put that research to the test and find canister balls right where they were estimated to be. 
The canister rounds used by the US Navy in 1871 for the Dahlgren 12-pdr. boat howitzer consisted of 48 1.05" lead balls, stacked in four tiers of twelve.  They were used on masses of troops 200-400 yards away.  I would not have wanted to be on the receiving end of that.
My son and I--while searching the line of march American Bluejackets and Marines took on June 11, 1871 on Ganghwa Island, Korea--found canister balls right where my research said they would be.  When made, the sprues were left on the balls. 


 
We also found some 1" iron shot in other areas, so that was used, too.
 

[keith44]

hmm, so the sprue was left in place to aid dispersal of the shot. or so I would assume

[Smokin Joe]

And today............

XM1028 120mm Canister Tank Cartridge

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cgn1nhUEgo8

[subdjoe]

hmm, so the sprue was left in place to aid dispersal of the shot. or so I would assume

Likely it was left on to save production time and cost.  Fill the mold, let it cool, knock the cutter, dump the balls, do it again. Not as if they have to worry about it turning in the bore and sticking like a ball in a rifle might do.