I thought aluminum would be a lot of fun to work with. Yuck! Very expensive and to weld this gage is... well it is also very expensive. Should look really great when polished though. This is a 1.75" bore and is shy of 3' long That's a Jorgenson clamp with a dollar bill on it for size. The other shot is of my ammo. I make BP at ~5#/batch so I'm almost there. This is the cannon I want to use electronic ignition on. I ordered some stuff that you supposedly dip your wire tips in, it dries and that's it. We'll see. I need an elevator and don't have any ideas as of yet. I also want to sight it and no ideas in that area either. I like a really strong green laser. Sigh, the more cannons one has the better life is.
Dry fit of CANNONMAN'S latest
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Crawdad1
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I'm not buying your argument about life being better with more cannons, CANNONMAN, just ain't buying it. 
Oh Yee of few cannons. Some things in life are arguable and others are the maxims [aka, the cannons] we live by. Certainly the more cannons in ones life, belongs in the latter. [ Yeah, I know. That's stretching the thread pretty thin. funny though.]
I always wanted a cannon, but something like a breach loading mountain gun... Though a nice BP cannon would be fun too.
BCRider
Member
I'd like a cannon. Mind you I'd also like a Maxim too. So I'm officially envious that you've got lots of cannons and maxims to go with them...... PHTTTHHHH!
You could certainly fit a joke of a little picatinny rail on top and fit a common sight. But I'd suggest a more typical sextant style cannon sight that fits into a tapered receiver welded to the side near the breech. I believe that these tended to extend from the side over to the middle line and have a vertical wire as the rear sight which you use to line up a cast or welded on bead at the front to set the windage. It would also have a bubble level or leveling plumb wire so you level the wheels side to side. Then you look at it from the side and it has another plumb wire and protractor face to gauges the elevation angle.
This targeting sextant only goes on for setting up the shot. Then it's removed back to it's felt lined padded box for the shot to be let loose.
The pomp and circumstance of this time honored traditional method lends a weighty value of credence to the whole exercise. Otherwise you're just another joker that can't build a properly sealed pipe bomb.....
You could certainly fit a joke of a little picatinny rail on top and fit a common sight. But I'd suggest a more typical sextant style cannon sight that fits into a tapered receiver welded to the side near the breech. I believe that these tended to extend from the side over to the middle line and have a vertical wire as the rear sight which you use to line up a cast or welded on bead at the front to set the windage. It would also have a bubble level or leveling plumb wire so you level the wheels side to side. Then you look at it from the side and it has another plumb wire and protractor face to gauges the elevation angle.
This targeting sextant only goes on for setting up the shot. Then it's removed back to it's felt lined padded box for the shot to be let loose.
The pomp and circumstance of this time honored traditional method lends a weighty value of credence to the whole exercise. Otherwise you're just another joker that can't build a properly sealed pipe bomb.....
I could not agree more. To me, in my "Leave It To Beaver" mentality, Dinner time was so much more than stuffing your face. I yearn for the day to attend a re-enactment to watch and learn the arts and science of cannons and mortars. I see so little of time honored anything. Kids seem to believe that they were born with self endowed respect. It used to be work hard and the result is self esteem. Now its give me self esteem and I'll work. A receipt that doesn't seem to be going anywhere. And now these kids are having kids. Yep, I'll look into how to aim and shoot my cannons. I'll give them the respect they deserve. And the pipe bombs... nawh, don't really have a use for one. So how about some leads and pics?
Officers'Wife
Member
On of my late uncle's "maxims" was that any freaking fool could put powder in a tube and make it go bang. It takes skill to make the powder push a payload through any appreciable distance. The true art is to not only push the payload the distance but to be able to have the payload go boom exactly where it is intended to go.
While my uncle was talking about skyrockets of the pyrotechnic type I somehow believe he would give a nod of OMB approval to your collection of cannon. While I may give you something of a hard time... reading your posts often remind me of that beloved relative I lost a few days short of 14 years ago.
For what it's worth... Dinnertime here is the time for the four of us to sit together and tell each other of our day. While Donna is getting to the age she would like to stare at her iPod instead, her father or I take it away from her if it reaches the table. And while it's frowned on in Obama's America, we even say Grace before we eat.
Selena
desidog
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Looking at that carriage, you're going to have a lot of moment on those welds when you fire it; with the cannon barrel so far above the axle. I wouldn't want to be standing anywhere behind it when it goes off... and, for that matter, not in front either!
Thanks for your input desidog but... that's aircraft grade aluminum and those welds are not superficial but are a contiguous weld. There is greater "strength" in the carriage than the steel. [for their prospective considerations.] I also am curious how this thing might "leap". I'm considering a counter weight under the axial mounts as well as a weight plate where you sometimes see a "spoon". 1st week of September is the projected finish date. You are all welcome to come by and put in your .02. RaceM, yep, I have been collecting info on sites where you can get rifled tubes. It begins a whole different chapter. I don't see myself going there anytime soon. The biggest gun in my collection is a .50BMG and that may have to suffice.
BCRider
Member
I'm assuming you've run a Google or other search engine for "cannon sights" images?
https://www.google.ca/search?q=cann...oTCOCj6YG3kscCFQ6ViAodjPAL6Q&biw=1680&bih=925
https://www.google.ca/search?q=cann...oTCOCj6YG3kscCFQ6ViAodjPAL6Q&biw=1680&bih=925
Naw, If it ain't here its not worth looking for. Kidding. Actually when I started to build my first cannon, as I had started with mortars and needed more, I started a thread about how to aim a cannon and I was flooded with info. I'll go back and find that. [I got scolded once for re-posting and had to have a time out.] I've got a friend who's a QA Monitor for an airline and he's gonna lend me some type of level that will determine top center. When I know these front and back, I plan on making something for a sight. However, if anyone knows where I can get a two hundred yard visible daytime green laser, please let me know.
BCRider
Member
I doubt that it would be what you want really. The laser is a straight line while the ball is going to be lobbed up over a rather higher trajectory arc. So to my admittedly cannonless way of looking at this issue I'd want to;
-ensure the trunion axis is dead nutz level so the elevation angle has no sideways component.
-use a slotted rear sight or a ladder style rear sight with a notched or peep sight traveler and with numbered range settings on the fixed staff of the rear sight. And much like my slow and steady single shot rifles I expect to use a fair rise on the rear staff to aim that barrel up high enough that I lob that ball into the target.
A laser doesn't really have a great role to play in any of this that I can see. Or a typical red or green dot virtual sight either. They don't have enough minutes of angle for the elevation setting.
-ensure the trunion axis is dead nutz level so the elevation angle has no sideways component.
-use a slotted rear sight or a ladder style rear sight with a notched or peep sight traveler and with numbered range settings on the fixed staff of the rear sight. And much like my slow and steady single shot rifles I expect to use a fair rise on the rear staff to aim that barrel up high enough that I lob that ball into the target.
A laser doesn't really have a great role to play in any of this that I can see. Or a typical red or green dot virtual sight either. They don't have enough minutes of angle for the elevation setting.
I don't know where your located, but AFAIK, there's a cannon shoot at the Stuckenhoff shooters complex in Casper, WY every father's day. Here is a link with some photos and a contact to the Casper Cannon Club:
http://www.hatchergun.com/blkpwdrcannon.htm
http://www.hatchergun.com/blkpwdrcannon.htm
WOW! Awesome stuff! Thanks stoky. Yesterday I hit a bull's eye at 200yds on my first sighting shot with my 2"cannon. I finally outshot my buddy with my own cannon. I missed a bull by 1' at 350yds on my first sighting shot. I've been considering all you folks have shared as for sights and this particular cannon has none. Out of all the guys I go shoot'n cannons with, my buddy, "Professor Scott" seems to be a cannon whisperer when it comes to aiming one of my cannons. Damn frustrating to be out shot by your own cannon! I really got to thank my Darling Wife who told me to get the heck out of my office and go have fun. I think she just wanted to get rid of my bad office attitude when my buddy showed up. 96 degrees f made it for a shortened day but my attitude is better. Yeah I know Gary. Darn thing is gonna jump like a frog in a hot buttered skillet. But I kind of wanted that and for it to look soooo very different. I'll let you know how good [or bad] it is when I get it done. I still like the laser idea. The POI - or hitting the little green dot takes into account the ballistics. Similarly, the sights on any gun do pretty much the same thing. Straight line of sight.
Brad_Bradsher
Member
Hey, Cannonman, I haven't posted on your cannon threads before, but have read them avidly. Consider an M1 Garand grenade launcher sight as a prototype for mounting a sight on your cannon. It comes with a disk to mount on the cannon, the sight can be attached and removed from the disk easily, and it's built on the principle of "set desired elevation--adjust gun's elevation till the bubble level is happy-- shoot!". It might make a good mount for a 5 kw green laser. If the shot misses the mark, you can always melt a hole in the target with the laser..
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Kool idea! The whole concept of this cannon is to make it a lot not like other cannons. I've not seen this idea on a cannon... not that that means much! I like both ideas. As I see it, most all scopes and sights work off the principle of direct line of sight. Weather it be photons of light coming back from the target or going to the target they all are in direct line of sight. We all know trajectory and ballistics and all sorts of stuff affect the aim. It's a matter of how I want to be able to "look" at the target. There are some neat levels that may modernize this thing in a similar fashion to how it was done in the past. Thanks!
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