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US Navy Bombs 1920s

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Dreamk

Well-Known Member
Can someone share more details about these bombs (dimensions, weights, etc..) produced for the US Navy in the early 1920s, and apparently used mainly by USN flying boats and blimps (Interestingly, land based navy bombers seem to have used regular US Army bomb types or copies of British types).

usnavy191819bombs.gif


usnavybombs1919.gif


usnavybombunderflyingbo.gif
 
Hi Dreamk,

Well I be dammed if these are not pictures of the USN bombs fitted with the Clarke Bomb fuse!!!

(Thats Louis Clarke of the Autocar company -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Semple_Clarke)

What reference book /manual are the photos from? (This is the first time I have ever seen a picture of bombs with the fuses)

From memory there were 3 bomb fuse patents that Clarke registered in the period around 1915-1920, however due to the complexity of the design had a very short production run (ie the bomb fuses were unreliable - he had better luck with the invention of the spark plug!!!!)

Here's the top fuse from one:

http://www.bocn.co.uk/vbforum/threads/73980-Torpedo-Fuse


Cheers
Drew

BTW - Sorry can't provide any details on the bombs themselves.
 
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The pics come ftom a book called "Navy Ordnance Activities 1917-1918, Washington Government Printing Office, 1920" - chapter Aviation Ordnance p.139 to 150
These are the 2 other pics of these bombs appearing in in this book:
usnimage3.jpg

usnimage1.jpg
 
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