Breaching walls and sinking ships: the performance of 17th-century artillery

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  • เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ธ.ค. 2024

ความคิดเห็น • 92

  • @lukaszg2280
    @lukaszg2280 3 ปีที่แล้ว +101

    Drach brought me there :D Fantastic material, thank You!

  • @lonegunmanx1824
    @lonegunmanx1824 3 ปีที่แล้ว +44

    As others noted Drach sent me. What a great living history/archeology project. Reminds me of the guys making muskets at Williamsburg. But better.

  • @Lynx7725
    @Lynx7725 3 ปีที่แล้ว +29

    "That ball, however, after it hit the ship's side, continued another 500m before it hit the ground, skipped up, traveled 200m through the forest limbing trees, and bullseyed a 40cm pine tree cutting it in half.
    [Silent beat]
    Spent ammunition."
    I cracked up for a good minute on that one. The ridiculous amount of energy involved here is mind boggling.

  • @hamonryechinaski180
    @hamonryechinaski180 3 ปีที่แล้ว +27

    Great! "Gun nut....Mortar champ 2011...cos I'm one of them" 🤣🤣🤣
    Thanks for upload...and thanks to Drach for bringing me here.

  • @neurofiedyamato8763
    @neurofiedyamato8763 3 ปีที่แล้ว +69

    An absolutely amazing presentation with well timed and relevant humor.

  • @Simon_Nonymous
    @Simon_Nonymous 3 ปีที่แล้ว +8

    Another viewer from Drach's channel - thank you Dr Fred!

  • @VashGames
    @VashGames 3 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    Drachinifel brought me here. Fantastic presentation and great visual material.

  • @NonSektur
    @NonSektur 3 ปีที่แล้ว +6

    Drach brought me there too. And now I want to visit Sweden!

    • @hoegild1
      @hoegild1 3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      Do it! The Wasa museum is great.

    • @marvindebot3264
      @marvindebot3264 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      Great place, friendly people and some very interesting museums (even the Ikea one is worth a half-day visit), good food and drink, well worth a visit.

  • @hoegild1
    @hoegild1 3 ปีที่แล้ว +14

    For 400 years Danes and Swedes fired these things at each other. Finally we understand what actually happens! Great research!

    • @bastogne315
      @bastogne315 2 ปีที่แล้ว

      Why were Danes and Swedes shooting at each other?

    • @bobladsgaardzartov2172
      @bobladsgaardzartov2172 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@bastogne315 In the days before airplanes, trains, trucks and the associated infrastructure, countries tended to wage war much closer to home - mostly against neighbours - as did Denmark and Sweden - and almost all af the rest of the "civilized" world...

    • @JH-lo9ut
      @JH-lo9ut 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@bastogne315 They fought over the control of the baltic straits, the waterway that connects the baltic sea to the atlantic ocean. This means you control all sea trade to and from northern- and a large part of eastern Europe.

    • @Paveway-chan
      @Paveway-chan 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      @@bastogne315
      Sweden was fighting basically everybody between 1500 and 1800 for control of the Baltic sea, because controlling all the coastline would mean incredibly fat stacks of cash from taxing all the maritime trade going in and out of there. We had holdings in modern-day Poland and Germany, Finland was part of the Swedish kingdom (we even controlled the southern part of the gulf of Finland) but then Russia happened, as it always does, and we lost most of it

  • @robburnett2672
    @robburnett2672 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    fantastic presentation..very well done. would enjoy a long form version!

  • @johnbray3143
    @johnbray3143 3 ปีที่แล้ว +9

    A gem of a video, good content and excellent presentation, Thanks to Drachinifel in pointing it out

  • @manitou071
    @manitou071 3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    Amazing, very well and entertainig done presentation - Thank you & THX Drach.

  • @gracesprocket7340
    @gracesprocket7340 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Several thoughts about 'long range accuracy' as presented here...
    1) in the absence of accurate range finding and a regular timing of the discharge from giving fire, you get a vertical ladder of fire from a moving platform. This reduces the probability of a well pointed gun striking a properly ranged target, but it also provides for incorrectly ranged targets to be struck by improperly pointed guns... and there are 24 on each side, not just a single one. A full broadside of 24 fired under these conditions gives a ladder in range of first graze and ensures (more or less) that one or two hits should be obtained when properly pointed.
    2) the delay between giving fire and the discharge is variable but has a predictable mean value, which could be learned. Not every point on the roll is occupied for the same duration and pointing appropriate to the extreme gives the shortest ladder in range due to the slowest part of the roll being at the maximum roll... alternatively you can increase the length of the 'cover' of the firing ladder by discharging with the deck approximately level, though this gives the fastest rolling velocity and the greatest spread of shot for a smaller fraction of the whole rolling cycle.
    3) shot which strike the water can ricochet - for the Vasa type gun fired flat from a small distance above the water, the first graze might be at ~200yds, but the skipping of an iron shot over relatively smooth water will reach ~1000yds in 8 grazes, and still have sufficient force to drive through a ship's side, never rising above the gun's height. Less smooth water degrades accuracy, and consistency, and probably force available to the shot on average, but not every miss 'short' will be lost, and many will pass beyond the target below the upper rail. Rough weather makes ricochet fire uncertain, but Vasa is not suited to rough water actions in any case, having insufficient freeboard and stability.
    4) many hits on the hull can be seen to be relatively unimportant - hits at or near the waterline (almost assured in ricochet fires), or to the rigging, as with shots which pass long/high are more likely to cause critical damage to a vessel, forcing her out of action, and allowing her to be closed on and boarded. (Without controllable sails, or with dismantled spars, a ship cannot manoeuvre to bring ordnance to bear, or to run or keep formation with her allies, with damage between wind and water, crew must be taken from the guns to man pumps, or to bail manually - even a few shot holes below the effective waterline can cause many tons of water to enter a ship... and with marginal stability this can be very dangerous, very quickly).
    I agree that fires at 1000yds at first graze are unlikely to strike when considering a single round fired by a single gun, but en-mass the prospect of single hits is not vanishingly small... and strikes in ricochet are possible with roughly half of all misses in calm weather (assuming that first graze is attempted and well pointed), and that half of the shots form a ladder short of the target aim point and half beyond.
    Very short initial grazes and low subsequent grazes tend to be consistent with divergence in line at around 1000-1200yds, but those which fall at around 600-800yds retain a reasonable proportion of their initial force and have fewer grazes with a slightly higher apex on each, and retain line much further. Grazes very close to the range of the target might 'deaden' rather too much to be effective, with a limit of around 6.5 degrees of fall of shot being a fairly hard cap to consistent ricochet, and that with nearly all the velocity lost before the shot re-emerges. A flatter entry and retention of around 90% of the 'first graze' performance through 'several' grazes is expected.
    The presentation does note that ricochet from soil is seen, and to be expected with considerable effect down-range, but forgets that shot will also ricochet from water, under a more constrained set of conditions. (sandy soil permits ricochet up to around 24 degrees or so, but otherwise the conditions and effects can be similar and should not be ignored).

  • @tjteknik1
    @tjteknik1 3 ปีที่แล้ว +7

    This is interesting. I can see similar results but on a smaller scale, when firing muzzle loaded rifles with large caliber led bullets. Most loads are subsonic in the higher range (depending on load) and quite accurate considering a smooth bore and a spherical bullet.

  • @maasbekooy901
    @maasbekooy901 3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    Amazing presentation. Thank you

  • @terrancecoard388
    @terrancecoard388 3 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Drach sent me!! Great video.

  • @MaxGarrett
    @MaxGarrett 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Excellent presentation!

  • @bastogne315
    @bastogne315 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    Man that explained EVERYTHING!!

  • @futsk01
    @futsk01 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    I'm in the lucky 7000 who have seen this beautiful work.

  • @josephgreeley5569
    @josephgreeley5569 ปีที่แล้ว

    My sound card is dead, so I couldn't hear any of Dr. Hocker's lecture, but even without sound it was extremely impressive. Even better than the testing done with the reproduction of USS Niagara's side.
    Certainly beats the Mythbusters' test all hollow. No offense to them but they were firing a light 6 pounder field gun against a merchant ship's side. Not even remotely comparable to a 24 pound ball penetrating a foot or more of solid oak. I was particularly impressed by the blow through that was tossing the huge chunks or oak around. Getting hit by one of those might or might not be immediately fatal, but you'd be in very rough shape for a very long time if you survived.

  • @archimedesnation
    @archimedesnation 10 หลายเดือนก่อน

    Amazing job! Congratulations.

  • @khaelamensha3624
    @khaelamensha3624 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Amazing video and conference. Thanks for this great work

  • @trythinking6676
    @trythinking6676 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    love love love lectures like this. more please.

  • @timmaxwell2348
    @timmaxwell2348 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    I'm another Drach redirect. Fascinated by Dr. Hocker's insights (from the Vasa site, and this one.) He seems to have the ability to present geeky information in a straightforward and fun way, while also revealing fascinating details for the uber-geek :)

  • @titanscerw
    @titanscerw 11 หลายเดือนก่อน

    Drachinifel sent me here, Dr. Hocker had awesome videos with him. It blast of presentation here! :)
    God bless your work and advances in experimental archaeology you did and in the future.
    +][+

  • @MinSredMash
    @MinSredMash 3 ปีที่แล้ว +8

    5:35 I wish scholars would apply the proper emphasis here. While capturing enemy ships was indeed desirable, this preference is not terribly relevant when they actually lacked the ability to reliably destroy enemy ships using the weapons of the day. The smoothbore cannon was an anti-ship weapon, holistically speaking. There was no alternative branch of technology which they could have theoretically developed for destroying ships. And in fact they were quite happy to destroy enemy ships when they could not be captured. Simply put, shooting the crew into submission and then setting fire to the disabled hulk was the most effective way of destroying a ship, using the same approach as taking prizes.

  • @danielleriley2796
    @danielleriley2796 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    Brilliant.

  •  3 ปีที่แล้ว

    Ver interesting talk. Now I want to visit the Vasa even more :)
    Nice that you did some proper tests.

    • @markhenderson9391
      @markhenderson9391 11 หลายเดือนก่อน

      Great place to visit an Vasa is great

    •  11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      @markhenderson9391 since I wrote this comment I did indeed visit the Vasa Museum on a lovely day which coincidentally also was the I think 500 Birthday of the Swedish navy. It was quite a day 😃

  • @danielleriley2796
    @danielleriley2796 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    So you have 146mm dia guns but balls from 135mm to 143mm. How does the muzzle velocity and accuracy get effected by having the ball over 10mm under sized.
    10mm less ball is a huge weight reduction so a faster muzzle velocity, however the poor fit would substantially reduce gun charge pressure. So does that even out or does one factor win out over the other? Does the very high pressure white hot (gunpowder can burn at a few thousand degrees Celsius for an instant when ignited under pressure) gas streaming past the ball cut or gouge the canon bore? I’m so curious.

    • @apathyboy
      @apathyboy ปีที่แล้ว

      remember they wadded the guns, the wadding is providing the gas seal, not the cannon ball

    • @gracesprocket7340
      @gracesprocket7340 2 หลายเดือนก่อน

      @@apathyboy The wad stops the ball rolling away from the powder, giving too much room for expansion of the gas before an impulsive shot-start - which can burst the gun tube - splitting a gunmetal ordnance, but potentially violently bursting an iron gun.
      The use of straw as a wad will have negligible influence on the windage of propellant gas and solids.
      As for the expected impact of windage - using a fudge factor to powder constant used in the equations developed from the Gavre tests to fit the mean shot diameter velocity to 1167fps, I get an estimate of between 1242 fps for the high gauge and 1094fps for the low gauge. (A much wider spread than expected from post machine tool solid-bored barrels, cylinder powder and reduced gap between the two gauges - an 'equivalent' Gover pattern 24pdr would show for the same assumptions (save powder fudging factor) 1284 fps mean, 1265 fps low gauge and 1303 fps high gauge, before the 1825 tightening of the low gauge allowance; 1294 fps mean, 1283 fps low gauge, 1306 fps high gauge, post 1825 (for hammer milled powder)).
      With a 1 degree angle of fire from a port some 4.5ft above the water, I estimate the mean distance to first graze to be something on the order of 465m, with the MPI of the low ball falling at 425m and the high ball at 509m. (There would be dispersion and deviation around these mean distances for any particular mean trajectory. Impact momentum and hitting spaces are roughly 25% more significant than the simple range difference.
      For the 3.5 degree carriage limit indicated in one of the papers about the Vasa tests, I estimate that the high shot would carry from the 4.5ft port to 1210m with the high gauge, 1120m with the mean shot, and 1030m with the low gauge shot (again MPI for the three cases, with substantial dispersion and error from platform movement.
      This is a typical 'medium gun' performance, and the full guns used for chase and retreat guns on the Vasa would have considerably longer hitting spaces and momentum of impact.
      The light gun is a substantial gun for it's weight (roughly that of a 9pdr of full construction), but hits somewhat harder than a 12pdr.
      Windage consumes more of the efficiency of the gun system than you get back from a smaller solid shot being lighter. Further even at similar velocity the smaller/lighter shot will also lose velocity faster in flight and will have less velocity at target impact, as well as a lower sectional density. Recoil also falls less rapidly than the velocity of the lighter shot, as the gas bypassing the shot acts to boost the recoil, while (mostly) being lost to driving the ball.

  • @pvccannon1966
    @pvccannon1966 3 ปีที่แล้ว +7

    Drach sent me. Did i detect a small anti American gun culture in his tone? But of course, when looking for the best, he goes to the men who keep the art alive in the only country that allows it.

    • @gamarus0kragh
      @gamarus0kragh 3 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      I'd say the anti-gun culture you detect is a slightly ironic dig at the audience in as much as he himself is a sub-set of the American gun culture (Shooting black powder mortars).

    • @JH-lo9ut
      @JH-lo9ut 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      As an american living in Sweden, I bet he is acutely aware of how the rest of the world views American gun culture as completely bizarre.
      (Sweden is btw not a gun-shy country, but no country in the world comes close to US)
      He has a great sence of humor about it and I am absolutely sure they had no trouble finding swedes who were more than eager to participate in this project.

    • @randomnickify
      @randomnickify ปีที่แล้ว +1

      You missed "I'm one of them" :)

  • @Colonel_Overkill
    @Colonel_Overkill 3 ปีที่แล้ว +7

    Never heard of the project before, look forward to any further reports to come out of it.

  • @justian5950
    @justian5950 3 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Surprised no-one's had a go at the 'extra points if you can identify all three films' line from a minute in!
    Captain Blood, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End?
    You can argue which of the first two is better, but the last one is definitely the worst...

    • @neddyladdy
      @neddyladdy 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      Sorry, it was a trick question, they were all stills.

  • @danielleriley2796
    @danielleriley2796 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    So can you reuse round ball shot? The first question should have been did you manage to dig any round shot out of the earth bern?

    • @ToreDL87
      @ToreDL87 4 หลายเดือนก่อน

      If it kept it's mass and shape, yes, if not you'll have to re-melt it

  • @lutzderlurch7877
    @lutzderlurch7877 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    A rather random question: what is the song in the title card?

    • @openpast
      @openpast  3 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      It is from the conference opening. They had traditional Lithuanian musicians sing some songs and that is a clip from their mini-concert. I believe it is medieval in date but I could be wrong on that.

    • @lutzderlurch7877
      @lutzderlurch7877 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@openpast Thank you kindly. I had hoped there was a CD waiting to be purchased somewhere :'(
      :)
      Thanks again!

    • @openpast
      @openpast  3 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      @@lutzderlurch7877 Here is the recording of that opening, in the info is the list of songs - not sure how accurate they are - look to be automatic by TH-cam but they do list a band that sings these songs. They will likely have a CD you could purchase th-cam.com/video/R2k3rn0LlsE/w-d-xo.html

    • @openpast
      @openpast  3 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      And just double checked the music list is correct - the band is Ugniavijas so you should be able to purchase the music.

    • @lutzderlurch7877
      @lutzderlurch7877 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      @@openpast Thank you kindly!

  • @deth3021
    @deth3021 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    Don't pigs find acorns by scent?

  • @joelcorrea7860
    @joelcorrea7860 ปีที่แล้ว

    Parabéns! Interessante...👏👏👏👏

  • @iamnolegend483
    @iamnolegend483 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    Fascinating!

  • @marvindebot3264
    @marvindebot3264 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    This deserves way more than 9400 views.

  • @Seegras
    @Seegras ปีที่แล้ว

    Now I'm wondering what these did to the much thicker walls of something 120 years later. Like the 100cm of the HMS Victory.

    • @nothing461
      @nothing461 ปีที่แล้ว

      32 pounder which was base gun for 1st class ship would still punch through side of HMS Victory, so thicker wall even more splinters?

  • @Tkharbik
    @Tkharbik 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    would have been nice if they tried to shoot at an slight angles.

  • @RealNotallGaming
    @RealNotallGaming 3 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    15:25
    WTH?????? 😱😱😱😱

  • @randomnickify
    @randomnickify ปีที่แล้ว

    Now I'm kind of interested what about the balls that hit the far side of the ship. Would they always go through? Would they fragmented due to the material stress and explode the crew in the face? What about the balls that hit the thick parts? Did they had enough energy left?

    • @mateuszmattias
      @mateuszmattias ปีที่แล้ว

      He says it towards the end of the presentation that they weren't able to shoot a round that would not penetrate both side of a ships hull. Even the smallest charges created enough kinetic energy to blast through an entire ship. (That is of course unles you hit something really hard in between, like an actuall cannon, or a box of cannonballs waiting to be fired etc.) The cannonballs mostly ended up hitting granite rock farther down range, and even then only about 10% of the balls shattered.
      Al inall these were clearly terrifyingly lethal weapons for their time.

  • @docstockandbarrel
    @docstockandbarrel ปีที่แล้ว

    👍🏻 Sent by Drach

  • @juniperpansy
    @juniperpansy 4 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Neat experiment. How much momentum did the balls have left after penetrating the wall? Would they still be able to penetrate the floor/walls on the other side of the ship?

    • @GoldenCroc
      @GoldenCroc 3 ปีที่แล้ว +12

      Wasnt that exactly what he said they did?

    • @runakovacs4759
      @runakovacs4759 3 ปีที่แล้ว +9

      Ball flew 500 meters and chopped a tree in half after bouncing.

    • @Joelsfilmer
      @Joelsfilmer 3 ปีที่แล้ว +7

      Listen at 17:17
      He said that the round not only went through but would have gone out the other side [of the ship] as well.

  • @samstewart4807
    @samstewart4807 3 ปีที่แล้ว +4

    WOW! I am most upset your video only has 5586 views. I hope Drach's Channel will change that. Maybe you want to try more links to him? I have found this video chasing links. Yes I think this must have been more fun then any gov. backed businees would allow. Maybe that is why you are not making more videos like this????????

    • @cp1cupcake
      @cp1cupcake 3 ปีที่แล้ว

      Its over 10k now.

  • @jed-henrywitkowski6470
    @jed-henrywitkowski6470 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    I know about someone I know going over to the enemy... I have family members of partial German origin! Lol.

  • @fwqkaw
    @fwqkaw 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    Eek!

  • @danielleriley2796
    @danielleriley2796 2 ปีที่แล้ว

    “Hey what’s up honey?. “Well there are a lot of police with guns outside, what did you do?” “Well I did ring around several places trying to buy 1000 kg of gunpowder and get it air freighted here. The quotes were outrageous.” “Well I suppose that would do it.”
    If this was the USA then every cop would shot the house up, reload and then fire again. Then go to the boot of the police car and get more ammunition and go again. All because “they felt they were still in danger from the house”.

  • @goobfilmcast4239
    @goobfilmcast4239 3 ปีที่แล้ว +13

    Nice Trump Smackdown !!!

  • @Numl0k
    @Numl0k ปีที่แล้ว

    Of course he had to make it political...

  • @HO-bndk
    @HO-bndk 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    So what did all that effort produce? Shot makes holes in planking and blows frames and futtocks apart? This is groundbreaking research...how? And how are "casualties much lower than we think"? It has always been known that the safest place to be in action in a sea fight was on the main gun decks. The quarter deck was the most dangerous.

    • @bastogne315
      @bastogne315 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      Did you know shot went through both sides of ship or a canon ball could penetrate a oak plank/masts at 1km???

  • @johnv341
    @johnv341 3 ปีที่แล้ว

    Fascinating!