1870

[KWorld]

1870 technology
1860s technology means black powder weapons, with breechloading artillery making inroads at the small end of the scale, but muzzle-loading weapons still dominating for heavy naval applications.  In 1872 the De Bange obdurator will be invented, which will make breechloading heavy weapons much more practical, to be followed by improved  breeches which will enable more rapid firing.  Soldiers of the period are armed with black powder rifles, the most modern being breech loading cartridge rifles, though muzzle-loading rifles are still in wide use.  Magazine-fed rifles suffer from weak locking systems, so are limited to lower-power cartridges  than the primary weapons of the day, limiting their range and effectiveness.  As far as rapid fire weapons go, the only ones available are the mitrailleuse and the Gatling, the larger Hotchkiss and Nordenfeldt guns have not yet been invented, nor has the Gardner (or further into the future, the Maxim). 

[Darman]

And I can't speak for the reliability of mitrelleuse but the Gatling is not very reliable.  I saw one being operated once.  When the gunner started turning the crank this is what we heard: Pop....Pop...Silence...Pop...Silence...more Silence...More Silence....Pop....Silence...Pop...Pop...Pop...Pop...Silence....

He put thirty rounds through the gun, only twelve went off.  Granted this is a late Civil War -era gun, not a possibly more reliable later Gatling. 

[Walter]

Even that 40% has the potential to kill people.

[Darman]

Even that 40% has the potential to kill people.

yes.  I agree.  However I would NOT want to be that gunner when he has a regiment of angry cavalry charging at him.  Even if there are 6 or 8 gatlings in his battery plus infantry supports, unless the infantry can provide massed fire at the last second, he wont be living very long if his gun only gets off 40% of its rounds.  Cuz it took him a while to reload.  Course he was using a magazine of some sort for the gatling, I was too far away to see the detail. 

[Delta Force]

Actually, the De Bange system just made it possible for breechloading artillery pieces to fire at a heavy charge. The cartridge casings themselves were strong enough to contain the charge in early small arms. Some .45-70 loads actually have more energy than 7.62 mm NATO rifles, so it's really not an issue for small arms. There are even modern revolvers made for .45-70 ammunition, which is something you could never do with a semi-automatic pistol. The semi-automatic .50 AE Desert Eagles have enough problems with their comparatively much less powerful cartridge.

[KWorld]

Actually, the De Bange system just made it possible for breechloading artillery pieces to fire at a heavy charge. The cartridge casings themselves were strong enough to contain the charge in early small arms. Some .45-70 loads actually have more energy than 7.62 mm NATO rifles, so it's really not an issue for small arms. There are even modern revolvers made for .45-70 ammunition, which is something you could never do with a semi-automatic pistol. The semi-automatic .50 AE Desert Eagles have enough problems with their comparatively much less powerful cartridge.

Modern .45-70 loads, for modern weapons, can be a lot more powerful than the original loads were, because the actions are much stronger.  A Trapdoor Springfield or (later) an 1886 Winchester is designed for about 25,000 Copper Units of Pressure, where more modern designs can handle up to 40,000 or 50,000 CUP.  Period cases are also a lot weaker than modern ones, which would probably make a period .45-70 revolver a pretty dangerous game.  Certainly none were manufactured in quantity..

[KWorld]

Even that 40% has the potential to kill people.

yes.  I agree.  However I would NOT want to be that gunner when he has a regiment of angry cavalry charging at him.  Even if there are 6 or 8 gatlings in his battery plus infantry supports, unless the infantry can provide massed fire at the last second, he wont be living very long if his gun only gets off 40% of its rounds.  Cuz it took him a while to reload.  Course he was using a magazine of some sort for the gatling, I was too far away to see the detail.

That's not a fault of the weapon, odds are, it's most likely bad ammunition.  That would have the same effect whether it was in a Gatling, a Mitraeileuse, or any other weapon that the operator can easily clear or that isn't affected by a round not working.  The good thing about a Gatling in this situation is that a dud has very little effect on the weapon: as long as the bullet stays in the cartridge, a dud is just ejected like a fired round, it doesn't cause a jam or anything else.

[Darman]

then I would want to hand-load my own ammunition to be sure it was good enough if I was a gatling gunner.  My understanding was that gatling ammunition was $5 a pop.  I don't know how true that is, was just hearsay.  Of course I couldn't get up close enough to the gentleman who owned the piece to ask any questions about it, he had a very large crown around him. 

[KWorld]

then I would want to hand-load my own ammunition to be sure it was good enough if I was a gatling gunner.  My understanding was that gatling ammunition was $5 a pop.  I don't know how true that is, was just hearsay.  Of course I couldn't get up close enough to the gentleman who owned the piece to ask any questions about it, he had a very large crown around him.

Bad ammo is a problem for anyone.  The early Gatling rounds, before the use of standard cartridges, are going to be more vulnerable to this.  But black powder is very susceptible to water damage, so this sort of thing isn't all that unusual for the period, and it's certainly not going to be limited only to the Gatling.  It's certainly a far, far worse problem in a muzzle-loader.


If it's wasn't bad ammo, it could also have been a badly maintained gun: if there was a distinct pattern to the silences, it could be that he had some firing pins that were broken or had weak springs that wouldn't set off the primers in the barrels.  Again, not a problem that's specific only to Gatlings, any period weapon could have that happen (you can break a firing pin or spring to this day). 

[Darman]

(you can break a firing pin or spring to this day).

Or even something as silly as your vent got clogged.  Thats why most reenactors carry either a vent pick or a sergeant's tool to clear those quickly.  When skirmishing just take a knee and work it, when in line hand it back to your sergeant to clean.

[KWorld]

There is, of course, a problem with an 1870 start: the rules currently don't go back that far for a number of technology areas.

[KWorld]

One other thing that I've found is that SS3 doesn't really like smoothbores: their projectiles (shot or shell) are too light for it and it complains.  For example, the 9" Dahlgren smoothbore, widely used on USN ships of theUS  Civil War period, fired solid shot weighing 90 pounds or shell weighing 75 pounds.  Either one of these is too light for SS3 for a 9" gun, so you end up having to shrink the bore size to get SS3 to stop complaining.  The good thing is that period smoothbores are lighter than SS3 expects as well, so shrinking the bore size gets the weight down closer to what it should be.

[Nobody]

How about ignoring SpringSharp on this matter?

[Darman]

One other thing that I've found is that SS3 doesn't really like smoothbores: their projectiles (shot or shell) are too light for it and it complains.  For example, the 9" Dahlgren smoothbore, widely used on USN ships of theUS  Civil War period, fired solid shot weighing 90 pounds or shell weighing 75 pounds.  Either one of these is too light for SS3 for a 9" gun, so you end up having to shrink the bore size to get SS3 to stop complaining.  The good thing is that period smoothbores are lighter than SS3 expects as well, so shrinking the bore size gets the weight down closer to what it should be.

in other words use the weight of the heavier projectile and then make a note in the SS file of what calibre the guns are?

[KWorld]

One other thing that I've found is that SS3 doesn't really like smoothbores: their projectiles (shot or shell) are too light for it and it complains.  For example, the 9" Dahlgren smoothbore, widely used on USN ships of theUS  Civil War period, fired solid shot weighing 90 pounds or shell weighing 75 pounds.  Either one of these is too light for SS3 for a 9" gun, so you end up having to shrink the bore size to get SS3 to stop complaining.  The good thing is that period smoothbores are lighter than SS3 expects as well, so shrinking the bore size gets the weight down closer to what it should be.

in other words use the weight of the heavier projectile and then make a note in the SS file of what calibre the guns are?

The only way to really make that work out would be to try to recalculate the total weight of the incorrect (heavier) ammunition and then divided that by the weight of the correct ammunition to get the right number of rounds.

Or, of course, don't use smoothbores (even though they're quite common on 1860s vessels).