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The 100-ton gun (also known as the Armstrong 100-ton gun) [6] was a british coastal defense gun and is the world's largest black powder cannon. It was a 17.72-inch (450 mm) rifled muzzle-loading (RML) gun made by Elswick Ordnance Company, the armaments division of the British manufacturing company Armstrong Whitworth, owned by William Armstrong.
The Armstrong gun—mainly the 12-pounder—was used extensively in the 1863 conflict in New Zealand between British troops and Maori in the Waikato. A well preserved 12-pounder which was used in the battle of Rangiriri is at the Te Awamutu museum. The barrel can traverse 6 degrees left or right without moving the gun carriage.
A rifled muzzle loader in the forecastle of HMS Gannet (1878). A rifled muzzle loader (RML) is a type of large artillery piece invented in the mid-19th century. In contrast to smooth bore cannon which preceded it, the rifling of the gun barrel allowed much greater accuracy and penetration as the spin induced to the shell gave it directional stability.
The Armstrong 100-ton gun In 1873, Italy began construction of the two Duilio -class ironclads , each protected by 22-inches of steel armour and armed with four Armstrong 100-ton guns. These could threatened the sea lines of communication of the British Empire through the Mediterranean Sea ; the Suez Canal provided a route to India after ...
In 1883 the British Government installed a single 100-ton gun: a 450 mm rifled muzzle-loading (RML) gun made by Armstrong Whitworth, at the battery by Rosia Bay that they named Napier of Magdala Battery after Field Marshal Robert Napier, 1st Baron Napier of Magdala, who had served as Governor of Gibraltar from 1876 to 1883.
The abandonment of the Armstrong breech-loading design led Britain to begin a major program of building rifled muzzle-loaders to equip its fleet. The Armstrong 110-pound gun was succeeded by various RML 7 and 8-inch guns. 7-inch Armstrong breech-loaders under construction at the time of cancellation were completed as RML 64-pounder muzzle-loaders.
The gun at Cambridge was eventually scrapped, and today only two 100-ton guns survive, at Rinella and Napier of Magdala. The British felt the need for such large guns as a response to the Italians having, in 1873, built the ironclads Duilio and Enrico Dandolo with 22 inches of steel armour and four 100-ton Armstrong guns per vessel.
The Armstrong gun retained a larger number of smaller coils, [12] which was more expensive to make. On pictures these coils show as humps as the gun gets smaller while it protrudes to the front. The Rijksmuseum model of the RML 7-inch Armstrong Gun shows 5 coils. The picture of the RML 7-inch gun (Woolwich) Mark I shows 1 more. [11]