Cannonball question for TheCannonballGuy

[cti4sw]

Found this today. Diameter appears to be exactly 2 inches (5.1 cm), will get a weight tomorrow. Should I get the weight in lbs/oz or kilograms?




UPDATES:

Weight:



Diameter:

Diameter was measured with reference calipers in 4 places (measurement spots are limited due to roughness from corrosion): 1.9", 1.9", 1.91", 1.92".

I did use a soft buff grinding wheel on it, to wear down some of the corrosion. There are 3 spots on this ball that came out very smooth, indicating (to me at least) that at one time it was a very smooth-surfaced ball. I may take it to the buffer again periodically (and the belt sander too) to see if these "peaks" of corrosion can be eroded. But, for the most part, I think it looks pretty cool the way it is.

On another note, although my county was a hotbed of American Revolution activity (and, if this turns out to be a period cannonball, it will be my 3rd RW relic from here), I cannot rule out that since the house that fed the dump was dwelt by a man with a rather eccentric taste for collectibles, he may very well have picked this up elsewhere and it was discarded or lost much later.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Family Maps of Hinds County, Mississippi, Deluxe Edition - Grab it through Amazon!

[pippinwhitepaws]

Definitions and Information about Naval Guns - Part 1


http://www.thepirateking.com/historical/cannon_smoothbores_early.htm

 

[cti4sw]

The second link there is interesting. My area isn't known so much for CW activity but there has been a lot of RW activity around here. The Battle of Whitemarsh & Whitpain are about 10 miles away, Valley Forge is across the county, and a farm in my town here was a RW field hospital for the Battle of Germantown. We're talking early RW activity, before the Brits started moving around the colonies.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Cti4sw wrote:
> Should I get the weight in lbs/oz or kilograms?

Pounds/ounces is much preferred, because the historical records telling the extremely-precise weight of cannonballs and other artillery balls used in North America are in pounds/ounces.

By the way, please check the ball's diameter in several directions, making sure to do so at "clean spots." You may need to knock the rust-encrustation off of it to do that.

 

[cti4sw]

Cti4sw wrote:
> Should I get the weight in lbs/oz or kilograms?

Pounds/ounces is much preferred, because the historical records telling the extremely-precise weight of cannonballs and other artillery balls used in North America are in pounds/ounces.

By the way, please check the ball's diameter in several directions, making sure to do so at "clean spots." You may need to knock the rust-encrustation off of it to do that.

Will do. I don't much want to damage the ball, and I've run out of ACV. Any other suggestions?

 

[cti4sw]

Updated weight measurements.

 

[cti4sw]

Updated diameter measurements.

 

[cti4sw]

CBG? Any further input? Don't want this thread to get lost...

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

I hadn't forgotten your ID-request about your iron ball. I was out-of-state for 4 days and I'm now catching up on what I missed. Please pardon the delay.

You wrote:
> I did use a soft buff grinding wheel on it, to wear down some of the corrosion.

Let me deal with that part of your information first, because there is a very important difference between "corrosion" and "concretion" in regard to super-precisely measuring a relic, and especially, an iron or steel relic. Please do not think of this as nitpicking. "Corrosion" is the eating-away of the iron/steel relic's original surface. Corrosion subtracts from an object's size. "Concretion" is a build-up of rust-petrified dirt on the iron or steel relic's original iron surface. Concretion adds to an object's size.

That is how concetion and corrosion complicate getting a precise measurement of the ball's original size -- which is what we need to know in order to authenticate it as being an Artillery ball, or not. It is why I asked you to remove the rust-petrified dirt concretion before measuring your iron-or-steel ball.

Next... pardon me for cut-&-pasting the following information from a lengthy reply I wrote (at http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/what/351559-please-id.html#post3357943 ) about another iron ball here in this forum. After the quote from that post, I'll answer you specifically about the ball you found.
--------------------------
[Begin quoting]
As I've said previously, multi-millions of iron (or steel) balls exist which were manufactured for civilian use (such as ball-bearings and Stonemilling Industry rock-crusher balls, etc). So, to distinguish between an Artillery ball and a civilian-usage ball, we artillery historians rely on historical records which tell the very-precise diameter and weight of the various kinds and calibers of Artillery balls used in America from the Colonial era through the Civil War. That very important data is viewable online, for free, here: Cannon bore, shot, and shell diameters for smoothbore guns

People ask me, "Well, why do the balls have to be exactly the size (in hundredths-of-an-inch) which is specified in the Ordnance Manual?" The answer is: just as with bullets for a rifle, artillery balls must fit perfectly into the cannon's bore, or into the Grapeshot assembly, or into the Canister (a tin-can) which contained them. If the projectile is a little too small or too big for its intended use, it won't perform properly. Of course, combat soldiers (and the Ordnance Department) don't like that. So, very strict ammo-size rules were issued, which were enforced by the army and navy's Ordnance Inspectors.
[End of quoting]
---------------------------------------------------

Cti4sw, you say your cleaned ball's diameter averages 1.91-inches. The "nearest" ball-size match-up in the Ordnance Manual's Shot Tables charts is a Revolutionary War 1-Pounder cannonball, at 1.95-inches in diameter. So far, so good. But we also have to consider the ball's weight... and I'm genuinely sad to have to report that the weight of your 1.91" ball disqualifies it from being an Artillery ball.

Even though the diameter of your ball is very close to the 1-pounder cannonball, your ball's diameter-to-weight ration proves beyond doubt that it is a late-1800s-or-later steel ball.

The Ordnance Manual says a 1.95" cast-iron cannonball weighs precisely 1.0 pound. You've reported that your ball is slightly smaller than that, and it weighs 1 pound 2.5 ounces. The Scientific/Metallurgical explanation for the 2.5-ounce difference in weight is that your 1.91" ball is made of steel -- which is approximately 10% heavier than simple iron. There is no historical record of the use of steel cannonballs in civil war or earlier combat in America. Please believe me, I'm sorry to have to give you a disappointing answer. I appreciate the effort you put into providing very-precise measurement of your ball's diamter and weight.

 

[cti4sw]

I hadn't forgotten your ID-request about your iron ball. I was out-of-state for 4 days and I'm now catching up on what I missed. Please pardon the delay.

You wrote:
> I did use a soft buff grinding wheel on it, to wear down some of the corrosion.

Let me deal with that part of your information first, because there is a very important difference between "corrosion" and "concretion" in regard to super-precisely measuring a relic, and especially, an iron or steel relic. Please do not think of this as nitpicking. "Corrosion" is the eating-away of the iron/steel relic's original surface. Corrosion subtracts from an object's size. "Concretion" is a build-up of rust-petrified dirt on the iron or steel relic's original iron surface. Concretion adds to an object's size.

That is how concetion and corrosion complicate getting a precise measurement of the ball's original size -- which is what we need to know in order to authenticate it as being an Artillery ball, or not. It is why I asked you to remove the rust-petrified dirt concretion before measuring your iron-or-steel ball.

Next... pardon me for cut-&-pasting the following information from a lengthy reply I wrote (at http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/what/351559-please-id.html#post3357943 ) about another iron ball here in this forum. After the quote from that post, I'll answer you specifically about the ball you found.
--------------------------
[Begin quoting]
As I've said previously, multi-millions of iron (or steel) balls exist which were manufactured for civilian use (such as ball-bearings and Stonemilling Industry rock-crusher balls, etc). So, to distinguish between an Artillery ball and a civilian-usage ball, we artillery historians rely on historical records which tell the very-precise diameter and weight of the various kinds and calibers of Artillery balls used in America from the Colonial era through the Civil War. That very important data is viewable online, for free, here: Cannon bore, shot, and shell diameters for smoothbore guns

People ask me, "Well, why do the balls have to be exactly the size (in hundredths-of-an-inch) which is specified in the Ordnance Manual?" The answer is: just as with bullets for a rifle, artillery balls must fit perfectly into the cannon's bore, or into the Grapeshot assembly, or into the Canister (a tin-can) which contained them. If the projectile is a little too small or too big for its intended use, it won't perform properly. Of course, combat soldiers (and the Ordnance Department) don't like that. So, very strict ammo-size rules were issued, which were enforced by the army and navy's Ordnance Inspectors.
[End of quoting]
---------------------------------------------------

Cti4sw, you say your cleaned ball's diameter averages 1.91-inches. The "nearest" ball-size match-up in the Ordnance Manual's Shot Tables charts is a Revolutionary War 1-Pounder cannonball, at 1.95-inches in diameter. So far, so good. But we also have to consider the ball's weight... and I'm genuinely sad to have to report that the weight of your 1.91" ball disqualifies it from being an Artillery ball.

Even though the diameter of your ball is very close to the 1-pounder cannonball, your ball's diameter-to-weight ration proves beyond doubt that it is a late-1800s-or-later steel ball.

The Ordnance Manual says a 1.95" cast-iron cannonball weighs precisely 1.0 pound. You've reported that your ball is slightly smaller than that, and it weighs 1 pound 2.5 ounces. The Scientific/Metallurgical explanation for the 2.5-ounce difference in weight is that your 1.91" ball is made of steel -- which is approximately 10% heavier than simple iron. There is no historical record of the use of steel cannonballs in civil war or earlier combat in America. Please believe me, I'm sorry to have to give you a disappointing answer. I appreciate the effort you put into providing very-precise measurement of your ball's diamter and weight.

I think I misread your post earlier; I missed the part where you said it disqualifies it from being an artillery ball. I guess that means it's NOT a cannonball? Or does it mean it could be a cannonball but a late-19th century one rather than CW/RW?

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Sorry to have to disappoint your hopes -- your 1.91-inches steel ball is not a cannonball from the late-19th-Century or any other time in artillery history. The 1-Pounder caliber of Smoothbore cannon (which fired only balls, not bullet-shaped projectiles) had been declared obsolete in America a few decades after the War-Of-1812. No ammunition was manufactured for that caliber of Smoothbore cannon after it was declared obsolete. There is no such thing as a latter-1800s 1-Pounder cannonball.