Can Someone Help With This Little Nugget ?

[checkmate]

I found this hunting around an old farm house with my metal detector. Not to far away, I was told that there was an old army base in the 1800s. I have reed that some of the old cannonballs were hollow and stuffed with gun powder and shrapnel. I'm not sure what this is, but it appears to be made of brass and it is heavy. It measures 2 and 1 half inches from center to center. I am open to any suggestion.

 

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[goldencoin]

Looks a lot like one of the earliest grenades....here is a civil war one that looks the most like yours....you should do a lot more research, because it could be worth $

Excellent find

 

[DCMatt]

Brass bed post ball.

DCMatt

 

[checkmate]

It may be, It has a small round ring next to the big hole on each side. I tried to capture that in the picture but it is hard. When you look inside the ball, you can see the casting of the ring overlaping the inside of the ball like a plug or somthing.

 

[goldencoin]

I would think it is the grenade because of the proximity to the base...maybe a practice one?

HH
-GC

 

[Charlie P. (NY)]

Here's a wild shot. Old steam engines had something called a "Gibbs Governor" to regulate the speed. Two counterweights that would lift the faster they spun, but the lifting would regulate a valve that closed off the pressure to the piston.

This one is a early version. The later ones used round brass balls on the ends of the rods.

 

[BioProfessor]

How thick is the brass? If it is part of an old brass bed, the metal would be pretty thin. If it is thick and hefty, it is probably something else.

Since it has holes of the same size that line up so a rod/shaft can go through, my money is on part of a brass bed.

Daryl

 

[checkmate]

It is a quarter inch think and weighs 1 pound. I thought the bed ball sounded good to but because of the round circles on each side it would not look very nice on a bed. It also has some hefty dents on it that range from a quarter inch to to 3 eights diameter. You can see a couple of the dents on the left side of this pic.

 

[BioProfessor]

Either I gotta quit drinking or you gotta get another camera.

Daryl

 

[trikikiwi]

Either I gotta quit drinking or you gotta get another camera.

Daryl

Don't worry Daryl, I've seen it sober and it looks the same

It may be, It has a small round ring next to the big hole on each side. I tried to capture that in the picture but it is hard. When you look inside the ball, you can see the casting of the ring overlaping the inside of the ball like a plug or somthing.

According to checkmate, the small caps next to the large holes are crimped within the inside of the ball. More like a burst-disk than a plug - so far, I'm going with goldencoin's early practice grenade.
Cheers, Mike

 

[GrantWA]

I have no clue to the age of this thing, but in Vietnam we had Mini-Frags which meet almost all of your description.

Mini fragmentation grenades

 

[Charlie P. (NY)]

I have no clue to the age of this thing, but in Vietnam we had Mini-Frags which meet almost all of your description.

Mini fragmentation grenades

Nah. Think about the material. They make cartridge cases out of brass because it is malleable and expands rather than shatters. Also costs six times as much as cast iron to produce. If it was a grenade or practice grenade it would be cast iron. As they have been since the Civil War to present.