Making Cannon

AllanKP69 said:
Making long gun cannon and carriages

There were no less than seven long cannon patterns in the Royal Navy from about 1625 into the early nineteenth century. Each came in as many as six calibers. Each caliber came in as many as 9 lengths. This amounts to over 300 different barrels. Add just three of our most common scales and there are nearly 1000 different barrels. Add in the Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese and French pattens and there are multiple thousands. It is highly likely that model ship manufacturers cannot provide that many different guns in bronze or brass and make a profit so we as builders have had limited choices.

On the other hand we as model ship builders, can make or acquire any of these thousands of choices with relative ease and at costs that are a relatively low price per piece.

The most common cannon making methods with which I am familiar are below.

Turned brass - The below photo is a home made brass Blomefield cannon before being blackened. Making dozens of these is something I do not want to do again.
View attachment 451384

Cast metal: The below is from a popular kit maker. I have no idea what pattern this is as it does not match any pattern I could find in any navy.
View attachment 451385

Cast resin: Once the desired pattern/sized barrel is made or purchased it is not difficult to make as many as one needs with a home made silicone mold. The ones below are Blomefields
View attachment 451386

3D printed
Relatively new technology compared to the above methods has made it possible to get any pattern, caliber, length and scale for less cost than any of the above three methods. The one below is an Armstrong Frederick barrel in 1:24 scale.
View attachment 451388

The following posts will go into details of the various methods. As always in our hobby, there are options from which to choose for each of us as our preferences do vary. Hopefully the following information will be useful for each of the methods described.

Allan
Click to expand...
I like the 3D printed method. In the slicer software, the cannon can be scaled up or down easily. Using AutoCAD Fusion 360, drawings can be created and saved to a printable file and using drawings, acurate copies can be made. Additionally, the artillery can be printed in parts or as a one-piece cannon....20240114_062333.jpg20240114_062326.jpg20231230_123345.jpg
 
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AllanKP69 said:
Making long gun cannon and carriages

There were no less than seven long cannon patterns in the Royal Navy from about 1625 into the early nineteenth century. Each came in as many as six calibers. Each caliber came in as many as 9 lengths. This amounts to over 300 different barrels. Add just three of our most common scales and there are nearly 1000 different barrels. Add in the Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese and French pattens and there are multiple thousands. It is highly likely that model ship manufacturers cannot provide that many different guns in bronze or brass and make a profit so we as builders have had limited choices.

On the other hand we as model ship builders, can make or acquire any of these thousands of choices with relative ease and at costs that are a relatively low price per piece.

The most common cannon making methods with which I am familiar are below.

Turned brass - The below photo is a home made brass Blomefield cannon before being blackened. Making dozens of these is something I do not want to do again.
View attachment 451384

Cast metal: The below is from a popular kit maker. I have no idea what pattern this is as it does not match any pattern I could find in any navy.
View attachment 451385

Cast resin: Once the desired pattern/sized barrel is made or purchased it is not difficult to make as many as one needs with a home made silicone mold. The ones below are Blomefields
View attachment 451386

3D printed
Relatively new technology compared to the above methods has made it possible to get any pattern, caliber, length and scale for less cost than any of the above three methods. The one below is an Armstrong Frederick barrel in 1:24 scale.
View attachment 451388

The following posts will go into details of the various methods. As always in our hobby, there are options from which to choose for each of us as our preferences do vary. Hopefully the following information will be useful for each of the methods described.

Allan
Click to expand...
Those cannons are beautiful! It is a shame that more manufacturers fail to pay attention to such details!

Bill
 
I forgot that I had saved the spreadsheet below giving carriage parts sizes. This is from about 1775 for British guns so I do not know if they are appropriate for other nationalities or eras. The dimensions are all based on the caliber dimension as a base line so easy to calculate. One of the things I cannot figure out is if the carriages varied in length for a given caliber but different length barrels. Would a carriage for a 9,5 foot 18 pounder be the same length as a carriage for a 8.5 foot 18 pounder? I have never been able to find any information about this based on contemporary sources.

Regardless I hope the following is found to be useful.
Allan

1729249146276.jpeg
1729249111537.jpeg
 
AllanKP69 said:
I forgot that I had saved the spreadsheet below giving carriage parts sizes. This is from about 1775 for British guns so I do not know if they are appropriate for other nationalities or eras. The dimensions are all based on the caliber dimension as a base line so easy to calculate. One of the things I cannot figure out is if the carriages varied in length for a given caliber but different length barrels. Would a carriage for a 9,5 foot 18 pounder be the same length as a carriage for a 8.5 foot 18 pounder? I have never been able to find any information about this based on contemporary sources.

Regardless I hope the following is found to be useful.
Allan

View attachment 478189
View attachment 478188
Click to expand...
Hi Allan, see if this table can help you.Frank
to be more precise, gunboats also vary in size in relation to gun caliber.

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Thanks guys, very much appreciated. These are similar to what I have as they do not show the carriage bracket lengths for various length guns. Maybe they were the same for every gun length of a given caliber. I thought the length of a carriage for a 10 foot gun would be different than for a 9 foot gun of the same caliber, but it appears not to be the case based on these spreadsheets.

Thanks again!

Allan
 
AllanKP69 said:
Thanks guys, very much appreciated. These are similar to what I have as they do not show the carriage bracket lengths for various length guns. Maybe they were the same for every gun length of a given caliber. I thought the length of a carriage for a 10 foot gun would be different than for a 9 foot gun of the same caliber, but it appears not to be the case based on these spreadsheets.

Thanks again!

Allan
Click to expand...
the difference is there not by much but it is there
 
Ciao Frank. Can you share your source as I would like to investigate further to get the details. Many thanks!
Allan
 
Thank you Frank!! My Italian - io non parlo bene, ma........I will try to muddle through it and find the information on the carriage lengths.
Thanks again, your help is very much appreciated.
Allan
 
Jimsky said:
@Frank48 Franchesko, can you give the name of the book and who the author is, ISBN by chance?

Thanks in advance
Click to expand...
Hi Jimsky, these volumes came out back in 1994, it will be a bit difficult to find them, they are four volumes , “ The Maritime Military Teconlogy are two and two more ‘ The Navy and Naval Arms ’. They are very detailed with accurate descriptions.Frank

fc3dfdea-bcde-4aa9-873b-b2b09f7dd4bb.jpeg

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4989c118-54cd-4c58-b915-5c4cb5a8dd18.jpeg

fb1f9ab9-9bce-4647-85ff-ae806289cd9f.jpeg
 
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