What's new
British Ordnance Collectors Network

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Unknown French 75mm shrapnel shell nose and beehive fuze?

Darkman

Well-Known Member
I picked up this shrapnel shell ogive and beehive fuze recently and I've been unable to identify it, despite searching old forum threads and looking at the French manuals in the downloads section.

The largest diameter of the ogive is just over 75mm, and this has expanded a little upon detonation, but I'm nominally identifying it as a 75mm shell. However, allowing for a little further curvature at the top of the shell it could be around an 80mm diameter shell. Other dimensions are shown in the photos.

The fuze has no markings other than graduations to 25 seconds and I think it's a 24/38 model of some description (the internal thread caliper measurement shown is very rough).

Most interestingly though the ogive has an internal thread - meaning the shell body had an external thread at the top. I've not seen this before on any other French shrapnel shell and haven't been able to find any documentation or information on this arrangement.

I'd be grateful if someone could identify the shell it came from and also confirm the correct fuze designation.

Thanks, Graeme
 

Attachments

  • 01.jpg
    01.jpg
    152.5 KB · Views: 80
  • 02.jpg
    02.jpg
    130.1 KB · Views: 47
  • 04.jpg
    04.jpg
    152.8 KB · Views: 55
  • 05.jpg
    05.jpg
    185.1 KB · Views: 52
  • 06.jpg
    06.jpg
    128.1 KB · Views: 45
  • 07.jpg
    07.jpg
    208.1 KB · Views: 43
  • 08.jpg
    08.jpg
    139.7 KB · Views: 53
  • 09.jpg
    09.jpg
    248.7 KB · Views: 44
  • 10.jpg
    10.jpg
    202 KB · Views: 37
  • 11.jpg
    11.jpg
    230.7 KB · Views: 39
Last edited:
Hello,
This internal thread for a french shrapnel shell is very not common !
Maybe the shell is not a 75mm, max diameter of head was usually smaller than caliber.
As far as I know this 25s graduated fuze (maybe 25-38mm type) was not used in France.
So this fuze and head could be made for export.
We already talked about a similar 25s fuze here : http://www.bocn.co.uk/vbforum/threa...rapnel-shell-top?highlight=french+fuze+export
Regards
 
Last edited:
Thanks Minenaz16, the nose and fuze in that other thread is very similar, except it isn’t threaded. If someone of your experience doesn’t know what it is then it’s going to be hard to track down, but if it’s rare that makes me even more determined to find out!

The fuze is classic French beehive style so it may have been made for export or just copied, perhaps under licence. Do you know of any other country that made beehive style fuzes?

Thanks, Graeme
 
Top