Cracking the 'F': The mysterious 'F' on Japanese headstamps explained!

[ogreve]

Hi,

Hold the press!
Here's an incoming bomb shell for the collectors of Japanese artillery ammunition!

Did you ever wonder just what that mysterious letter 'F' means that can be found on many IJA headstamps?
Well, so did I! Enough so to have made it a bit of a personal mission to get to the bottom of it.
It has taken many years and quite some effort, but on March 1[SUP]st[/SUP] 2015 precisely that was achieved when I finally learnt the true meaning of that letter!
Read all about it in the article that I wrote about it.
I wanted to upload it so it would appear along with this post, but the filesize exceeds the 500KB limit of this forum.
The article can be downloaded in full from my website, from this specific page: http://www.japaneseammunition.com/start.php?main_cat=31&sub_cat=281&access=view&exp_sub_cat=281

Enjoy! I know you will....
Olafo

 

[Slick]

FINALLY!!!!!!

Thanks for finding the answer.

 

[ogreve]

Hi Rick,

You're most welcome!
It has taken quite some time to get to the bottom of that one, but it's great to see that puzzle solved!

Cheers,
Olafo

 

[highlandotter]

Most impressive end of a long hunt. Congratulations!!.

 

[bacarnal]

Olafo, Again, Thanks.

 

[Hoeksel]

Great quest and thanks for explaining! Do you have a new quest in mind? ;-)

 

[sksvlad]

Olafo,
Do you know the meaning of a sabre looking symbol under the Kanji ideogram ‘鉄’ in the 2nd (right) photo of your article's illustration of steel Japanese shells?

 

[ogreve]

Hi,
It appears to be a Katakana character 'ソ' (= 'So'). But the meaning of it is not (yet) known to me.
I hope to come to learn the meaning of that character too. Same for the numbers that are sometimes seen along with the 'F'.
Cheers,
Olafo