37mm Littlejohn

[SG500]

I do like a challenge - got this one last week for the right price.
May take a while!
Its quite unusual in that its a 37mm littlejohn.
Also show is a decent one in my collection that shows what it would have been like before it was left in the ground for many many years.
I should have taken a photo first, it started as a lump of rust.
Now most of the rust is gone so on to stage 2........... I'll keep you posted!
Dave.

[SG500]

All INERT of course.
Dave.

[HAZORD]

Nice stuff Dave.

Hey, you have written about "LittleJohn" rounds in the past. WHat designates it to be a "LittleJohn"? Is it the specific design of projectile? If so, what are the required characteristics to make it fall into the "LittleJohn" catagory?

Thanks,

John

[RichardB]

Hi John,
I believe Littlejohn is a direct translation of Janacek, a Czech designer of this type of projectile

The primary characteristic of the projectile is that it is a squeezebore, ie it fired down a barrel that is tapered, in the same way as the German Squeezebore rounds, such as the 28/20 PzB41. The only difference to the German 28/20 is that the 2Pdr and 37mm Littlejohn rounds utilise a tapered adapter on the end of a standard 2Pdr or 37mm barrel. (...which subsequently negated the use of standard projectiles !!)

I hope that helps a bit, Im sure Dave or a few others can provide more information.

Dave: I assume this is in the restoration section as you proposed returning to its original appearance...looking forward to the results

Cheers, Rich

[SG500]

Hi John,
I believe Littlejohn is a direct translation of Janacek, a Czech designer of this type of projectile

The primary characteristic of the projectile is that it is a squeezebore, ie it fired down a barrel that is tapered, in the same way as the German Squeezebore rounds, such as the 28/20 PzB41. The only difference to the German 28/20 is that the 2Pdr and 37mm Littlejohn rounds utilise a tapered adapter on the end of a standard 2Pdr or 37mm barrel. (...which subsequently negated the use of standard projectiles !!)

I hope that helps a bit, Im sure Dave or a few others can provide more information.

Dave: I assume this is in the restoration section as you proposed returning to its original appearance...looking forward to the results

Cheers, Rich

Yes I'm going to have a go but it may all go wrong. Don't expect results too fast though.
Dave.

[SG500]

Nice stuff Dave.

Hey, you have written about "LittleJohn" rounds in the past. WHat designates it to be a "LittleJohn"? Is it the specific design of projectile? If so, what are the required characteristics to make it fall into the "LittleJohn" catagory?

Thanks,

John

Thanks John. I've e mailed you some info on this.
Just to add to what Rich has already said:

Frantisek Karel Janecek was born in Prague in 1904. He visited Britain in 1938 to try and sell the anti tank rifle that he had developed.
The first weapon was a .303 version. Several types of rounds were developed by Kynoch including 11/7.92mm and 15/11mm rounds.
In 1941 it was decided to develop the 2 pounder Janecek.

The two pounder "littlejohn" name is merely the English interpretation of the Czeck work "Janecek".

As well as the mk 1 and mk 2 AP versions of the 2 pounder littlejohn I am also aware of the following:-
Several types of 20mm littlejohn (known from specimens)
37mm littlejohn (known from a specimen)
2 pounder HE littlejohn(known from a specimen)
S gun 40mm littlejohn (known from an article on Tony Williams web site)
Bofors 40mm littlejohn(known from a specimen)
47mm littlejohn (known from a specimen)
6pr6cwt littlejohn(known from a specimen)
6pr7cwt littlejohn (known from a specimen)
17 pounder littlejohn (known from a design drawing and the flat head proof version from a specimen)

As Rich says, the taper part was a screw adaptor at the end of the barrel. I've read that some of the gun crews didn't always want to mess around screwing on adaptors in the heat of battle so sometimes just fired the littlejohn rounds without the adaptors in place - the performance was good, the projectiles merely acting like an arrownhead round instead i.e. good short range performance that rapidly tailed off at greater ranges due to poor wind resistance characteristics of the unsqueezed projectile.

Dave.

[HAZORD]

Thanks RichardB and Dave, great info!

[SG500]

I think I may have put too much on here!

Dave.

[SG500]

This was easier than I expected - after a rough sand I realised the tracer fitted in the drill bit. I got it spinning very slowly and the finish was easy with 1500 emery cloth.

[Chris 42 RQ]

Looking very promising SG500 !

Stroke of luck being able to put into the old Black and Decker !