posted March 14, 2000 07:11 PM            

Now i have kept the bore size the same (4 inches) and decided to go with the easier smooth bore instead of rifling it. This is because of the sabot flechette rounds... they would be pretty useless in a rifled barrel because it would spin them all over the place, loosing any kind of pattern as soon as it left the barrel. I did however have to make the barrel a bit longer, because my new action is quite a bit heavier, and longer. The barrel is longer now to help ballence the unit. It now has a 52 inch barrel, and is no longer electically fired. It now uses a large firing pin to ignite "muskett" primers for most loads. Even though the old barrel didn't sustain any damage from my last failure... i decided to start new anyhow. The new barrel is made of 316 stainless (as are most parts.. no rust!!) and is tapered from being 1.000" thick at the muzzel to 1.750" thick (wall thickness) where it meets the action at the breech. This wasn't done just to make it look cool, (even though it REALLY DOES!) it was for weight reduction. It is still mounted on a tripod (i used the old one) because there is no way in hell this will ever be a man portable unit. I modified the tripod to be bolted to a small utility trailer of mine. This is because i am expecting the recoil to just flip the whole damn thing over unless it is bolted down.

Ok on to the new action...

The new action screws onto the end of the barrel using ACME (square) treads with a second locking ring to ensure that it stays tight, but still allows me to remove the barrel. The action "folds down" similar to a break action (as in shotguns) for loading the shells/rockets. It has a manual cocking lever on the side because it would have been to much of a pain in the ass to incorporate the cocking action into the "break". It still has eight locking lugs, however they are all 0.75 thick now. These lugs attach to action to the barrel with a large locking ring, that only needs about 1/8 of a turn of its handle to release the action. Now for the fun part.. i made the action to "float" rearward about six inches upon firing. I've put some rather heavy springs (require about 800 pounds of pressure to fully compress) behind this floating action, in the hopes that it will take some, if not most of the pressure off my locking mechanism (fingers crossed).

Now to extract the shells i've incorporated an extractor into the action. This only brings the empty case out about half an inch when opened, but should be enough for a secondary extractor (or hands ..HOT HOT) to grab the empty. I havn't yet designed the second extractor .. because i'm not sure the cannon won't self destruct again.. so i'll leave that for later if it all survives.

Lets see... what else is new...

Ohh yeah, the sights on this thing. I've put a simple ramp front sight (at the muzzle) and ..hmm.. best way to describe it, is a large tang site just in front of the action. Its adjustable with thumb screws, but until i fire this.. i have no idea what the ranges will be. Also... this cannon is quite a bit heavier than the last... so i added a geared handwheel to adjust elevation (scavenged the wheel from an old bridgeport mill). Windage is still adjustable by swiveling the whole unit atop the tripod. This locks in place with a simple clamping, cam lever.

On to the trigger... as i said.. it was mechanical, but this is in function only. It is still fired using an electrical circuit. This is simply two small electro magnets that when switched on, repel each other, and free the firing pin. Its kinda hard to explain... but I'll draw it up if anyone wants to try something like this. I needed the electrical trigger, because i NEED this thing able to be fired remotely. Don't wanna blow myself up ya know

Well thats about it for now... except i know you guys wanna know what this damned thing weighs!!!

Ok complete unit barrel, action, tripod, and remote firing station, tipped the scales at 583 pounds!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The only saving part of this is that probably half that weight is in the tripod, so it CAN be moved if broken down, and carried by a few people.

I'll do another post later this week on the new shells and rockets that i designed, mostly because i've typed a friggin book already, and my fingers are tired

If anyone see's anything seriously WRONG with this design ... PLEASE TELL ME, BEFORE I FIRE IT!!!

Also if ya got any ideas for modifications... post them.

Later.

posted March 15, 2000 05:20 AM            

Hope that helps.

BaDSeeD

posted March 15, 2000 10:23 PM            

Trust me it is PLENTY!
Read about my old cannon, and see what it did to it.

Its 250 grains, and consider this... that my 12 gauge shot shells that i load only use 30.5 grains in them.

BaDSeeD

posted March 15, 2000 10:37 PM            

it is less than a matchbox.... probly 1cm or less in the bottom of a 4" case! It was only a question as i obviously cant contest you as your the one that has done it.

why did you choose "win. super ball powder" ??
maybe you'd be better off with a slower rifle powder.

posted March 16, 2000 01:24 AM            

whats your opinion on using a slower powder to keep the pressure down..