Falconet ball with hole

[Marcus den toom]

I purchased this Falconet ball together with 14 others but only this one has a strange hole into it. The ball itself is around 30mm in diameter and the hole is around 8mm deep before hitting a black surface.

Is there any record of incendiary falconet bullets/ grenades?

The hole seems to be man made.

[fernando]

Isn't that too small to be a grenade, Marcus?
Try and extract some material from inside, to see whatever it is ... or check the dark with some light.
... Or send it down to me for inspection

[Marcus den toom]

I hope it is not Nando

Sure, if you would send me your aljubarrota barrel so i can aim this ball into your mailbox

[Kmaddock]

Hi
work out volume of sphere 4/3 x Pi x radius power of 3

i work it out at approx 14 CM cubed

then density of iron is 7.8g per cm power of 3

approx =112 But I am doing rough calculations here and i might be out a power of 10


weigh your ball and this will tell you if ball is filled with less dense substance

if scraping black stuff I would advise against using metal, and if me i would do it under water, just to be certain
Regards
Ken

[fernando]

Ken's calculation makes sense. Not that i knew how to do it but because my solid ball with 31 m/m weighs 124 grams.
Let's not assume that some smart ass made a hole in that ball of yours in order to use it as a knob or something

[Matchlock]

Hi Marcus,

Yes, I do have records of hollow iron balls/grenades fired from pieces of ordnance from at least the 17 through the early 19th centuries.
So your guess that that piece might be a falconet ball is also backed up by the diameter of ca. 30 mm of the piece.

Until 6 years ago, there used to be a huge and complete original breechloading falconet (German: Bockbüchse auf Lafette) in my collection. The barrel was dated 1619, the second year of the Thirty Years War, and struck with a maker's mark wuith the initals VR in a shield, Zella, Thuringia, and the Saxon coat-of-arms (Zella was part of Saxony in the 17th century). The bore was 35 mm.

The whole ensemble was purchased by the museum of the castle of Burg Stolpen, Saxonia, Eastern Germany, where it is on exhibition today.

Next to that singularly complete ensemble, the first attachment depicts my friend Armin König, who builds the finest replicas of earliest arsenal arms worldwide, many of them made after originals from my collection.

His address is
Armin König
Kirchstr. 3
D-95691 Hohenberg a.d. Eger
Bavaria, Germany
ArminKoenigHbg@aol.com
http://www.engerisser.de/Bewaffnung/.../Firearms.html

The first photo is copyrighted by Armin König, the others are copyrighted by Heinz Grodon and Hermann Historica.

Best,
Michl