British Ordnance Collectors Network
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you won't beleive this!
- Thread starter phantomf4
- Start date
Major score! You should find out which scrap yard they are going to, and make that a regular place to visit. You might even befriend someone there who can call you whenever they get new shipments, or at least point you to the spot where they dump the trucks.
Yes, the cylindrical submunitions come from 155mm and 8 inch projectiles. The yellow lifting lugs are from pallets of 155mm projos. The lead slug in the middle of the lifting lug is to releive pressure if the projo gets too hot, so the expulsion charge in the ogive section doesn't blow the grenade submunitions out the base of the projo. If you get enough submunitions you could make a cutaway projo. There is also a flat pusher plate you will need that goes on the top of the grenades in the projo, and a baseplate.
Now that's really lucky for you (not the tractor driver), well done!!!!!!!! Great photos.
Dave.
The "Pusher" plate will be about 3/8" thick, usually with an "O" ring around it to protect the grenades from the expulsion charge. It will fit snugly inside the projectile body and works like a piston to push the grenades out. They usually have circular marks on the grenade side, where the columns of grenades make contact. The base plates will have external threads and will screw into the bottom of the projectile body. There will also be some hollow pipe pieces the same diameter as the grenade, that fit on top of the top grenade in each column to protect the fuze from the pusher plate. Also look for wedge shaped plastic pieces. They act as spacers between the round columns of grenades. Finally there are some aluminum keys that engage a lengthwise groove inside the projectile. They keep all the grenades from spinning inside the projectile body when it is fired and rotating towards the target.
Good luck!
Good luck!
dano1917
RIP
ordnance chicks beer
Hi phantomf4, Must be a dream, you couldn't write a script any more perfect. Only thing to make it better would have been if scantilly clad horny women fell out of truck with ordnance (of course these chicks have all the beer you can drink too). I think I would S.M.P. if a truck overturned and ordnance came a tumbling out. Nice stuff too, you lucky dog...Dano
Hi phantomf4, Must be a dream, you couldn't write a script any more perfect. Only thing to make it better would have been if scantilly clad horny women fell out of truck with ordnance (of course these chicks have all the beer you can drink too). I think I would S.M.P. if a truck overturned and ordnance came a tumbling out. Nice stuff too, you lucky dog...Dano
You know what i was so damn excited i forgot to look for beer clad women:tinysmile_eyebrow_t i'm goin back and i'll try to get a picture of the pile, hopefully there not cleaning it up yet.
Well i did find some thin sheet metal plates that looked like they had clusters sitting on them, in the picture the bottom left piece i found 2 of, it's plastic with 2 o rings is this the baseplate? no other stuff except the hollow pipe pieces. anyway i grabbed a bunch of everything. thanks for the info.
Attachments
looks like you have a M557 PD fuze with a burster adapter attached
The plates that I can see in the photos, with all the holes around the outer edge are the base plates from the cluster bomb dispensers. I couldn't see any other plates in a close-up view to recognize pusher plates.
It appears from your photos, that all of the grenades have been through a burn furnace to remove the HE that was inside. The HE bulged the bodies of the grenades when it burned. Normally they would be straight cylinders. There aren't any projectile bodies or baseplates that I can see.
All of this demilitarization is the result of treaties that required submunitions to self-sterilize themselves to minimize UXO. They might be reloading the projectile bodies with new submunitions that have the self-destruct fuzes, so you might not find projos or pusher plates.
The U.S. went through this exercise about 5 to 10 years ago, with a number of projos finding their way to surplus dealers. I heard stories of scrap yards filled with projo bodies making piles 20 ft high and hundreds of yards long.
Your tax dollars/pounds at work
It appears from your photos, that all of the grenades have been through a burn furnace to remove the HE that was inside. The HE bulged the bodies of the grenades when it burned. Normally they would be straight cylinders. There aren't any projectile bodies or baseplates that I can see.
All of this demilitarization is the result of treaties that required submunitions to self-sterilize themselves to minimize UXO. They might be reloading the projectile bodies with new submunitions that have the self-destruct fuzes, so you might not find projos or pusher plates.
The U.S. went through this exercise about 5 to 10 years ago, with a number of projos finding their way to surplus dealers. I heard stories of scrap yards filled with projo bodies making piles 20 ft high and hundreds of yards long.
Your tax dollars/pounds at work
Some of the grenades went though a furnace they were the ones that had a fuze attachment on the top, these, the bulge is made into it, plus they still have the parkerization, and paint stripes on them, i'll get you a picture of the sheetmetal plates i was talking about. Thanks again.