Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: tmetal on August 27, 2013, 09:56:08 PM
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...this 37mm shell, and I figured the community here would have more fun figuring it out than some google search would provide. The one on the top is the 37mm and the one on the bottom is just a 30mm casing used by the A10 for scale. On the bottom of the 37mm casing is stamped "37mm..M1 / Lot 6175-41 * FA. 1941" The * represents what i think is an amory's symbol that looks like it might be two crossed cannons imposed over a circle.
(http://i1164.photobucket.com/albums/q569/bryguyw/WP_20130826_005_zps3722242b.jpg) (http://s1164.photobucket.com/user/bryguyw/media/WP_20130826_005_zps3722242b.jpg.html)
So anybody here able to shed some light on this mystery for me? Light tank round? AA round? Aircraft round? Help a brotha out oh gurus of the AH BBS. :pray
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My guess would be a round for this, but it's so far from my area of expertise that I'm likely talking out of my arse:
http://www.antiaircraft.org/37mm.htm
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Possibly it's a 37mm round for the light artillery / anti tank gun from early in the war period. That same caliber was carried by some light armor like the Stuart. Crossed cannons is the symbol for the Field Artillery Branch of the Army, assuming the crossed cannons you see are similar in shape to the tubes of a napoleanic gun.
In looking for other pics of WW2 37mm ammo I am not finding much similar to that. The semi rimmed base it just not quite right for most of the Army guns, they were typically rimmed cartridges. How long is the overall round? Can you get a measurement of it? That might help in pinning it down, possibly a round from the P39?
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After some searching of my own I found that there was a 37mm AA gun with the designation of M1. (the gun in the link scherf provided is most likely a 37mm M1 AA gun), but all the photos I have found of ammunition used by the 37mm M1 shows rimmed casing bases and not the semi rimmed base of my 37mm shell; this is leading me to :headscratch:. After looking at the symbol for the US Army field artillery I am inclined to believe that it is indeed the symbol on the bottom of the shell. Anybody else have some insite on this 37mm shell?
On a slightly different note I found this picture showing the drawing process used to make a 20mm hispano casing out of a hunk of brass and thought it was pretty interesting.
(http://i1164.photobucket.com/albums/q569/bryguyw/20mmdraw_zpsbfdfbd36.jpg) (http://s1164.photobucket.com/user/bryguyw/media/20mmdraw_zpsbfdfbd36.jpg.html)
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The same process is used to make small arms brass today. My money is on the P39 as the likely user of the round given the rimless design depending on the length of it. I can't tell from the pic if is fits the dimensions for the 37mm on the plane.
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Yeah I forgot to measure it last night. I'll try to get the length measurement tomorrow morning and let you know
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Tmetal,
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/index.htm
Check this site out,if you look around enough I'm sure you will find your round!
I'm pretty sure they have a picture of most rounds in all the different calibers.
:salute
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The same process is used to make small arms brass today. My money is on the P39 as the likely user of the round given the rimless design depending on the length of it. I can't tell from the pic if is fits the dimensions for the 37mm on the plane.
x2
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the length of the round is about 11 1/8 inches, but of course this without the fuse installed on the tip, so actual length of a live round will be somewhat longer.
Thanks for the link morfiend, I will have to check it out when I get the time. :salute