Robustness of german 1 kilo incendiaries

[LEI-13-HG]

Sorry I have no idea why it was empty. This was about 1989 on the North Yorks Moors, so over 45 years since it may have been dropped.

Don't forget, dud IBs were almost 10 a penny after a raid. Very often parents made their children chuck their post-raid souvenirs away in the nearest pond or bury them at the end of the garden. I spoke to a former air raid warden who said there is a pond on Hampstead Heath which is supposedly full of them. After each raid they were told to dispose of the UX IBs in the pond.

I have often heard the rumour that dud IBs were due to slave labour who worked in the factories deliberately sabotaging the IBs by not filling them. I am sceptical as I have never seen any proof to back this up and think it may just be the fact that the fuzes in IBs were very basic - just a spring-loaded pin and percussion cap.

I have seen photos of the damage a SNIB did after it bounced off a parked Sherman tank - it left a right dent in the armour! More astoundingly, another photo showed the explosive power of the charge in a IBSEN - it left a 3ft x 1ft crater in a tarmac school playground. Then again, I suppose it was the equivalent to a hand grenade attached to an IB...

 

[butterfly]

Don't forget, dud IBs were almost 10 a penny after a raid. Very often parents made their children chuck their post-raid souvenirs away in the nearest pond or bury them at the end of the garden. I spoke to a former air raid warden who said there is a pond on Hampstead Heath which is supposedly full of them. After each raid they were told to dispose of the UX IBs in the pond.

I have often heard the rumour that dud IBs were due to slave labour who worked in the factories deliberately sabotaging the IBs by not filling them. I am sceptical as I have never seen any proof to back this up and think it may just be the fact that the fuzes in IBs were very basic - just a spring-loaded pin and percussion cap.

I have seen photos of the damage a SNIB did after it bounced off a parked Sherman tank - it left a right dent in the armour! More astoundingly, another photo showed the explosive power of the charge in a IBSEN - it left a 3ft x 1ft crater in a tarmac school playground. Then again, I suppose it was the equivalent to a hand grenade attached to an IB...

I also doubt sabotage was the reason they didnt go off - I'm sure if they didnt strike the ground correctly or hard enough then the fuze was likely to malfunction. These were dropped in huge quantiites and I suspect if 10% or even 20% didnt function in a container holding 1000 then it wouldnt really cause too much concern - these were simple, cheap and effective.

The photos sound interesting Austin, any chance of posting the images here? Dont see too many pics of the explosive head incendiaries or of the damage they could do.

regards Kev

 

[LEI-13-HG]

Hi Kev

My deliberate vagueness was because I can't remember which book they were in! They were from a local area war history - but my memory eludes me! I can narrow it down to somewhere in my 3,500+ WW2 books... Will post when I stumble across the images again, usually when I'm looking for something else completely unrelated...

 

[butterfly]

Hi Kev

My deliberate vagueness was because I can't remember which book they were in! They were from a local area war history - but my memory eludes me! I can narrow it down to somewhere in my 3,500+ WW2 books... Will post when I stumble across the images again, usually when I'm looking for something else completely unrelated...

oh no!! ......dont worry, I do that all the time. I can sometimes spend hours looking for something I thought I knew where it was, only to find out it wasnt!!

Sounds like you have quite a library there............

regards Kev

 

[millsbomber]

There are some good pictures in the Blitz then and now..... Dave

 

[butterfly]

There are some good pictures in the Blitz then and now..... Dave

Dave, are they the ones where the Fireman is removing one from the pavement with an axe?

....Kev

 

[millsbomber]

I cannot Remember Kev as i lent by book out and never got it back, i do rember there was a Inc buried half way in the road, there is another book i read about the A.F.S in the London Blitz and was horrified when a fireman told the story about one raid when his assistant fireman ran away with a Inc buried in his back,,,,, Dave

 

[brand]

Hi All,

after trawling images on Google I found a pic of a well knackered one on the IWM website.

http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/30082938

It is labelled as an incendiary bomb tail and shrapnel from a raid in Old Trafford, 1940. That said, it is not entirely clear whether the bits are actually from the same bomb as the tail, which clearly is an IB. Do they look to you as though they could all be bits from an IB ?

I am wondering if the quality of the cases varied ? I was aware of magnesium electron from usage in aircraft parts, which would have been high quality. The manufacture of these ten a penny bombs may not have been so highly controlled ?

The image of that one embeded in the pavement clearly shows how strong a good one could be !

 

[millsbomber]

The shrapnel dont look like its from IB to me, too thick and jagged,,,,, Dave

 

[Nismosonic]

The shrapnel done look like its from IB to me, too thick and jagged,,,,, Dave

The fragments are definately iron, not magnesium. I have quite a large amount of fragmented shell and bomb fragments, all are quite simmilar to the ones in the photo.