Recycling Grenade leftovers?

[Bannerman]

Hi Everyone,

Has anyone here worked as a Conducting Officer or Supervising NCO on a hand grenade throwing range and who may therefore be able to answer a few questions for me? My experiences were limited to being a thrower; out of the shelter, into the priming bay, into the throwing bay, two L2's over the wall and then away to the assualt course.

We know that when thrown, the grenade goes one way, the striker lever another and all you should be left with is a split pin and ring. I recall pins and rings were retained by the thrower and attached to combat jacket zip fastener handles in order to render the wearer "macho". But whatever became of the striker levers? Did/do they survive the explosions and if they did, were they collected up for re-use like spent cases and disintegrating link on a small arms range?

I visited a recently de-commissioned throwing range close to where I live and found an L2 lever. It was mangled, but this could easily be caused by it being trodden on. If levers were returned for re-use, could this then be another reason for many of the Mills grenades we see today having levers by manufacturers different to those producing the other components?

Bruno

 

[Taber10]

Recycling Range Residue

Bannerman,
I can only speak for US ranges, and not UK, and not for WWII, but more recent:

The levers, of course not destroyed in the blast, esp. for practice grenades, pins, etc. are recycled, but as scrap metal.

The practice "rebuild kit" came with new fuzes, already equipped with a new "cap," lever and pin as an assembly. In the box was a package of small bags of black powder, and the corks. Ammunition techs would "reload" the grenade bodies.

As far as links, brass, etc. in the American system, there has not been a successful "reuse" program in modern times, and not on any scale since some time in the 1920s, I think. All of this residue is picked up, inspected to assure "free from explosives" and sold as scrap metal. Questions of reloading come up every few years, but in recent times, the labor costs would outweigh the benefits. Speaking of benefits, the "environmental" programs that benefit from the brass recycling would be severely impacted, if not eliminated entirely!

IF anyone else has examples of specific posts, ammunition plants,etc. that did have successful reloading programs, it would be interesting to at least me to hear of them.

Taber

 

[Bannerman]

Taber,

Thanks for your observations, most interesting. I might assume therefore that the economies of scale would be the same here in the UK and anywhere else, and that we scrap our range residue rather than reload/re-use. It would be great to learn what other members know/think about this.

Apologies if this thread is moving away somewhat from grenades, but what happens to other range ordnance residue, such as charger clips, cloth bandoliers and wooden/metal ammunition boxes?

Bannerman

 

[LCplCombat]

other range ordnance residue, such as charger clips, cloth bandoliers and wooden/metal ammunition boxes?

Bannerman

There is a recycling system in place that reuses or scraps ammunition containers and associated packaging. Using your phrase, economies of scale, is very apt. The tax payer has a right to know that revenue spent is not wasted.

Some items can't be reused although you wonder why when you see the time spent on the ranges collecting it. SAA brass is scrapped :bawling: 105mm is reused but a lot of it is scrapped because it is too badly damaged. Bandoliers are reused. Charger clips and SAA link is scrapped. Wooden and metal containers are emptied of all their contents, scrapped if BER (beyond economical repair) refilled with internal containers if applicable and sent out to a civilian company to be stripped to bare metal and repainted. You can see this when you look at a box because it has a manufacture date stamped onto every lid or base. There are still some of the very first ammunition boxes using the Letter/Number system which was introduced in WWII. A few examples are the H.50, C.238 and the C.235.

 

[Bannerman]

LCplCombat,

Many thanks for your input; again very interesting stuff I did not know before. I'm now off into my loft to check markings on my ammo boxes.....

Regards Bannerman

 

[hangarman]

In the 80's i used to go to the Pistol competitions at Bisley. After a days firing on the range the Army would burn all their empty bandoliers and wooden ammunition packaging, (unless i managed to get there first) but all spent cases, chargers and links were collected for scrap. I did find a nice South African H13 type box from 1944 that someone had stripped the handles off but left all the labeling and i salvaged some nice cardboard boxes from both the rifle and pistol ranges.
Hangarman

 

[LCplCombat]

Cutting rope handles off wooden boxes is part of the scrapping process, the wood recycle geezer won't take them otherwise. So if you see a box without handles or lid you know it was rediscovered at the scrap yard.