Batterie 1 - XV. Waffendrill 16-17 April 2011

Série de 13 salves (65 tirs au total) pour l'ensemble des 5 pièces de la Batterie 1, le tout originellement en 24 minutes.

Canonniers :

Mani (der Zweite)
La Source
La Trucquoise
De Courte
Christo
Le Stéphane
La Plume
Peter
und der Dritte an der Paulina

Zeugmeister :

Christian

Feldzeugmeister :

Bernhard

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• artillery
• artillerie
• black
• powder
• poudre
• noire
• schwarz
• pulver
• reenactment
• medieval
• history
• bund
• oberschwäbischer
• landsknechte
• reconstitution
• historique
• lansquenet
• massing

[BigDummy23]

Thanks for replying! Was it normal then to try to fire in volleys? My understanding is that the hand-culverins and arquebus of this era were not very accurate for hitting individual targets, maybe 15 or 20 meters (is that correct?), but obviously a salvo or fusilade would improve the chance of a hit at longer range, I was wondering if they did this in XV century. Are any of the larger weapons firing 'shot' or only balls? How good are the smaller guns against armor? Have you done tests?

[GoranGoranovic666]

2. We tested it with verry raw black powder as main charge. The result was terrifing with only half a load. It projects à hail of slow burning grains at 10 meters away with a devasting result. Just like a flamethrower or burning phosphore.

[GoranGoranovic666]

3. The range of all this guns were limited by the primitive sight they used. Another limiting factor was that the rifling of the barrel was unknown at that time. Even if they could shoot precisly at long range, with a well balanced projectile, the remaning problem was the quality of black powder. A that time, the powder quality was quite poor, making a lot of smoke. The last and unsolved problem was the heating of the guns. After 10 to 20 shots it would have been too dangerous to fire once more.

[GoranGoranovic666]

4. We can imagine that the effective range for firing directly at a massed infantry group would be a few 100 meters (100m up to 500m), depending of the field and the gun. You have to think that’s quite a long distance for a group moving slow to retain its cohesion with pike (less than 1 mile/h).

[GoranGoranovic666]

5. At least enough time to fire some 5 to 10 volley. In all, that’s between 25 to 50 solid iron balls flyin at enough speed to harm anything that’s standing in its way until it’s stucked in the ground. Armour could spare you enjuries if not directly hitten, otherwise it would have been useless.

[GoranGoranovic666]

6. The main reason to fire volleys is for safety. Imagine, if in one battery some are reloading when other are firering it would lead to dangerous situations and no overview of the results. The volley is the simplest way to control the fire and effectivness of more than 2 guns.

[GoranGoranovic666]

1. Most of the XVth,XVIth century artillery were firing solid shots. Some projectiles made of stone, or later made of iron. There’s no real evidence of grappeshots beeing used at that time. And if you think, a double or triple load of powder is more effective à close range (10-20m) than an improvised projectile that could damage the gun and kill the crew instantly.

[BigDummy23]

Do you know anything about guns in the XV century being used to shoot something like arrows or darts for armor-piercing?

[GoranGoranovic666]

These mixed batteries were not so uncommun at that time. Having an uniformed artillery consisting of only one type of gun was very expensive to maintain and the guns were often a one piece masterwork, like our guns. There were more than 20 types of guns at the begining of the XVIth century. Each type reflected only a size or a weight, or even a employment of those guns, not an efficency category.

[GoranGoranovic666]

The battery 1 was made of : (From left to right)

1. (name unknown) a mid XVth-early XVI century wall gun (about 18 to 20mm)

2. The Isabelle, a 25mm late XVth century-early XVI « robinet » or long haquebute

3. The Douce, a 50mm mid XVth-late XV century burgundian forged culevrin

4. The « Maggy », a 50mm late XVth-early XVI century light culevrin (long barrel)

5. The Paulina, an 80mm XVIth century bronze canon