When I was in Elementary School I really looked forward to Wednesdays, because every Wednesday we had an activity called "Show and Tell" for which I was always prepared. I brought in everything from Volcanoes (home made) to voles. From golf ball centers to centipedes. From dynamite wire to a weasel's skull, all these items made it to school and I had the highest % of teacher confiscated items. I was proud of that, being a bit of a rebel even then.
So when Rocklock came over today to turn some sabots for his Confederate Parrott, I sat everyone down and said, "What's in that sack that you dragged in, Gary?" Of course there was some poplar wood for sabots and some .54 cal lead balls for canister rounds (1.75" bore Parrott). Then Mike saw the glint of polished brass, Gary pulled out a Blunderbus, a .45 Colt Auto, and a U.S. Marine equipment catalog. He can tell you about the brass blaster and 45 if he wants, but I must tell you that I felt nothing would trump all that, so I gave up on the spectacular and dragged out my old 155mm U.S.Army Gun made by Britains and given to me on my seventh Birthday. I assembled it and we put three rounds through it for the first time in more than 50 years. Still propelled the projectiles 15 feet.
We had some good story telling then got to work on sabots and showed off our latest chassis work on the 7" Treble-Banded Brooke Rifle. See the photos below.
Regards, Mike and Tracy
Kitchen table Show and Tell
After some safety tips about this particular lathe, Gary turned and formed (shown) the sabot's ball recess for his steel solid shot. The form tool Mike made with relief like a spade drill W/O the point.
Gary stacked the finished sabots up quickly, only about two minutes process time each, about 30 in an hour.
After getting the bottom surfaces of the transoms parallel to the rotary table surface with wedges, Mike drilled a very important Pintle hole in the Pintle Plate. There was terrific stress on the center transom, so it's Pintle Plate was braced and securely bolted. So is ours!
Set-up for drilling the Pintle Plate hole and Routing of the Traverse Wheel recesses with 3 Deg. wedges. The 3 Deg. angle is mainly to ease the Heavy Artillery crew's labor in returning the tube and upper carriage back into Battery. The angle provides very little recoil reduction. We have run the numbers.
The Traverse Wheel recesses are laid out 22.5 Deg. off the carriage centerline. We made the router blade from an old brazed carbide lathe tool. 1,100 RPM did the trick and cut a nice smooth pocket. Used a small diamond stone to get the carbide very sharp.
Routing in-process.
The Traverse wheels are in their recesses loosely w/o wheel forks and axles. The 3 Deg. angle of the iron shod rails is shown here. Wrought iron bracing on the center transom can be seen as well as the "end of rail" stops (right end).
