Flements of Ammunition By Major THEODORE C. OHART Ordnance Department, Army of the United States JOHN WILEY & SONS, Inc., New York CHAPMAN & HALL, Limited, London BUREAU OF SHPS LIBRARYTHIS BOOK HAS BEEN MANUFACTURED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE WAR PRODUCTION BOARD IN THE INTEREST OF THE CONSERVATION OF PAPER AND OTHER IMPORTANT WAR MATERIALS. Corvriaut, 1946 BY Joun Winey & Sons, Inc. All Rights Reserved This book or any part thereof must not be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the publisher. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICATo My Wife Whose help and understanding have made this book possible.FOREWORD In volunteering to prepare this brief introduction or foreword for Major Ohart’s excellent volume, The Elements of Ammunition, I feel that I am speaking for that: pathetically small group of ordnance officers (of which I was one), and an equally small group of civilian employees, who were charged with the heavy and almost unbearable responsibility of handling the ammunition program during the critical years from 1937 to 1942, It was realized very early that the gigantic ammunition program which soon would fall upon the Ordnance Department would require, for its successful prosecution, many hundreds of trained ammunition technicians in the various agencies involved in the program. With every available minute devoted to grappling with the myriad details involved in preparing and launching this program, there remained no time for us to properly instruct and assimilate the ever-increasing influx of personnel, yet we realized all too keenly that the job must be done. Somehow we muddled through, as the success of the ammunition program will attest. But how we wished in those early days for a “book” that could be handed to these newcomers to study and absorb quickly the essence of what they would need to know to handle their jobs; a book that would answer most of their many questions and leave us free to work on the big task that confronted us. The Elemenis of Ammunition is such a book. It remained for the author to undertake the arduous and difficult task of compiling and arranging the wealth of the material which must be presented in a book of this type. The author is uniquely fitted for the task he set for himself, having been connected with the Technical Division at Picatinny Arsenal since 1940, and during much of that time he was directly in charge of a large group engaged in the design and development of the ammunition dealt with in this book. During this period he has from time to time lectured to groups of officers at Picatinny Arsenal and has conducted extension courses in ammunition under the auspices of Rutgers University. Much of the material in his book was prepared for use in these courses and lectures and has therefore had the benefit of an exacting trial run, so to speak. It may be said then that the author’s work represents an attempt to fill a very definite need. The various official training manuals and viiviii FOREWORD technical bulletins are excellent in their field but, of course, do not present information from the ammunition designer’s point of view but rather that of the user. Available information of the textbook variety includes two chapters devoted to ammunition in Hayes’s Elements of Ordnance (1937); also the voluminous and well-known four-volume mimeographed text (1939) prepared at Picatinny Arsenal for use in the short training courses for selected reserve officers reporting for duty in the new mass-production loading plants. Some work has been done by various ordnance engineers at Picatinny Arsenal toward preparing a sort of data handbook for the use of ammunition designers, but the material was fragmentary and had not been published. The author makes no claim of originality. He has drawn freely on the foregoing source ma- terial and has augmented his borrowings with material gleaned from the experience and notebooks of his associates at Picatinny Arsenal. Per- sonnel at Frankford, Raritan, and Edgewood Arsenals and the Office of the Chief of Ordnance have made valuable contributions of suggestions and material. It is my belief that this book definitely fulfills the need envisaged by the author. His book will take its place alongside the other standard technical handbooks. It will not only serve as a basic and invaluable tool for the ordnance engineer but also should prove to be a convenient and definitive source of information for all those, military and civilian, whose work or interests carry them into the maze and complexity of modern ammunition. Mus W. Kresce Colonel, Ordnance Department Picatixny ARSENAL October 1945PREFACE Any textbook on ammunition must deal with at least three varieties of ammunition: the conventional older types in existence during World War I, of which small-arms and artillery ammunition are examples; the types developed between World Wars I and II, such as aircraft ammuni- tion, improved types of small-arms, artillery, and pyrotechnic ammuni- tion; and the types developed primarily during World War II, such as rocket ammunition and the many new varieties of all types of ammuni- tion. I consider this book an effort to reduce to writing my technical am- munition experience of the period 1940 to 1945, in the attempt to make available in one volume a book which the future beginner in ammunition design and development work can use in his efforts to become oriented in a most interesting and complex field. In writing this book I have tried to keep in my mind the beginner rather than the advanced and experienced ammunition man, so that an explanatory sentence here and there may serve to remove some mental barrier and pave the way for better understanding of the subject, or, at the very least, to better coordinate the parts. For example, the ammunition designer looks at military explosives from an entirely different viewpoint from that of the chemist, and the chapter on explosives may prove rather elementary to a chemist because not one chemical formula is mentioned. But it is hoped that the designer of a new ammunition component will be able to select the proper explosives to do a certain job after reading that chapter. The chapter on rocket ammunition is merely an attempt to give the reader some picture of this new and fascinating subject. It is admitted that in a short time it will need revision. Many phases of ammunition design are not covered because of security reasons. ‘My sincere appreciation is hereby given to all those engineers, chem- ists, and chemical engineers of the Technical Division at Picatinny Arsenal who have instructed me in the science of ammunition and cor- rected the manuscript. Space does not permit enumeration of all their names, but I owe a particular debt to Colonel Miles W. Kresge, for whom I have worked for the past three and one-half years, and who, in my opinion, has a grasp of this subject of ammunition most fundamental ixx PREFACE and complete. Thanks are also due to Colonel L. C. Leonard, Major W. W. Carr, Lt. L. W. Hall, Dr. F. E. Myers, Dr. G. C. Hale, Mr. 8. Feltman, Mr. W. L. Lukens, Mr. A. F. Teitscheid, Mr. J. M. King, Mr. D. R. Beeman, Mr. R. H. Wood, and Mr. M. H. Neumann for reviewing the manuscript. My assistant, Capt. C. R. Dean, Jr., has contributed much to this book both directly and by handling a great many routine matters while I gathered material for it. I wish also to express my appreciation to my Commanding Officer, Colonel W. E. Larned, to whose post I have been assigned for over four years. Miss A. Fogelson and Miss June Horning typed the manuscript. Raritan Arsenal furnished the many excellent illustrations. The ideas and opinions expressed in this book are mine and do not necessarily express the attitude or views of any governmental agency. If someone becomes interested in ammunition because of reading this book and thereby helps avert World War III by making American ammunition unexcelled, my efforts will have been rewarded. Tueopore C. Ouart Prcatisny ARSENAL October 1945CONTENTS PART I EXPLOSIVES, PRIMERS, DETONATORS, AND TRACERS Caarter 1. Intropuction arr. PAGE 1. What is Ordnance? 2 ee 1 2. What is Ammunition? 0 ee 1 8. General Types of Weapons. 22. 3 4. Modem Relationships between Weapon... = «= = «s+ 6 5. General Types of Ammunition ©... 02.0... 2 2 eee 6 6. Nomenclature 10 7. Specialized Words 12 8 General Classifications of Ammunition... 2... 2.22 ee 12 9. Ammunition Lot Numbers... 2 2 2 6 6 ee ee 13 10. Corrosion Prevention and Sealing... 2.22. eee eee 1B Cuaprer 2. Minrrary Expvosives 1, General . 16 2. High and Low Explosives 2 ee 17 3. The Explosive Train 2 0 1 1 1 1 ee ee 19 Propellants 4, General Requirements... 2 2. 2 ee ee ee 21 5. RateofBuming ... 0.0.0.2... eee eget eeeeeteeeeeee ay 6, SingleBasePowder 2. ee 25 7. FNH and NH Powders 22 es 25 8, Double-Base Powders 2 2-2 2 2 ee ee 27 9. Blending, Lot Numbers, and Loading Authorizations... .. . . . 28 Other Low Explosives 10: Blacks Powder ics eieren i eneseeeececaad anne eseaaecccaaaas 28 11, EC Blank Powder»... 0... . eee 30 Ie TN cian ED RecN Sen eee eee eee ene eee ea eee 30 13, General 30 14. Important Properties of High Explosives. 30 15. General Classification of Important High Explosives... ss... 34 16, Explosives Considered from Viewpoint of Application... 2... . . 35 17. Summary of Properties of Important Explosives . . . eee eee eed ee 33 18. Compatibility of Explosives with Ammunition Materials... ss. 39 xi