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!

Centre cast no5 mills grenade

And here are my three HT & V plugs. One dated 9/15, another 12/15 the third the date has gone. There are no crows feet on any of them.

The 9/15 plug is from the cutaway.

I'm also struck by the differences in how months are shown. In post#1 you can see /1916. On two of mine you can see 9-1915 and 12-1915 and on Dave's there are no months marked at all?

John

DSCN9802.JPG
 
Last edited:
Hello john thank you for the very good pics if the bases. In the post before this one on the grenade forum.( big collection ) on the second page there is a normal no5 with the exact same base as mine with the large crows foot in the same place. So now I'm really confused. Mine is dated /1916 no month and seems the same as the one in the post before mine. Either someone has cast some repro plugs stamped them up and aged them, they are repro plugs but from while ago so they have natural ageing or they are late pattern original plugs with different style of stamping.
 
ftobert said:
Thanks for all the response so far the turned grooves are all different depths and sizes but appear to have been cleaned with a brass wire brush or similar. The casting meets up perfectly. Hope this helps and the pics shed some light on it. Cheers rob
Click to expand...

Hi Rob, did you machine the top of the center tube, its length should be 70.2 mm,,,,,, Dave
 
Yes I saw that one (in the other thread). However the photo is so over exposed the detail is not really clear enough for a decent opinion. All I can say is that untreated Aluminium is the easiest metal to age. Certain chemicals will do it in minutes and a short spell in the garden would have it corroding quickly too.

I will add that bought my Mills Centrecast Cutaway from one of the most respected members of this forum and I'm sure the baseplug is 100% genuine and the fact that is so close in features to another I have that also came with a quality grenade from a good collection.

John
 
Last edited:
I have just had the centre tube back out and I can see why you would think it's been machined Dave as it's fresh metal but it has just polished the surface where I took it in and out as it's a pretty snug fit. Anyway just measured the tube with digital verniers and it's 70.17mm so essentially 70.2mm. John I know yours are all original and am appreciating all the help you Dave and everyone else is giving me and really pleased to see other pics to compare mine to. I know what you are saying about ageing the aluminium but you can normally smell the chemicals use to age it even after quite a period of time. It all just seems like a hell of a lot of effort to go to and doesn't make sense reproducing that specific base plug as the repro plugs you showed a few posts ago would be easy to repro on a lathe and some letter stamps, whereas with this one you would have to mould each one and it's just a lot of effort. The bloke I brought it from was just selling it as a nice no5 grenade and he didn't even mention it was a centre cast. One of you experts need to see it in person really for me to find out for sure cheers rob
 
I should be at the Next Detling fair in March so I'd be delighted to have a look. I'll bring mine along too.

John
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top