18 Pounder Blind Shrapnel Proof rounds Fuzed or not ?

[Gspragge]

I picked up this aluminium dummy fuze today , it came from the same place as the "Souvenir" round
I posted a week os so back. It is identical to the fuze on that round. So it would have been made also in 1916
at Westinghouse.
So were 18pr proof projectiles fitted with dummy fuzes like the Russian contract projectiles made in the U.S.
or were they just fired with shipping plugs.
It is likely this dummy fuze is made after the prewar aluminium fuzes and is decorative ,
but I put this question out there anyways.
Proof projectiles were fired without charge so that they could be picked up and examined for flaws in
their construction. Testing for function at least with the Russian projectiles was done in a sand pit and they
were stood up and set off upwards so that everything could found and examined.

 

[Darkman]

Gordon, I'm far from an expert, but I think this is just a commercially made souvenir. It is was a ballistic nose cone for a proof shell, there would be no need to mark the time graduations or ring marks. And in true British/Commonwealth tradition if it was an official item it would have nomenclature identification stamped.

I also would have thought that proof shells would need to match service weights etc, and surely they would just use a standard fuze. I've actually seen range recovered fired unfinished or rejected fuzes that were never filled.

Graeme

 

[Gspragge]

I would agree to the above . My proof 18pr is dated 1915 and we hadn't started to produce fuzes by then so
maybe the early ones just used the shipping cap. The Russian dummy fuze follows the shape of the appropriate time fuze
but has no graduations. As a souvenir type item the quality is certainly far above the usual nonsense found on
the 18 prs made into lamps.

 

[Alpini]

The lines are cut by hand (different line length) and the numbers are hand stamped. Both has been well done but it should be a "private" work. In mass production the scales were roll stamped on the fuzes as seen in the following picture. The left ring on this device is the roll stamp and on the right side a No.85 fuze body is clamped. It seems that the lines and numbers were stamped in two separate production steps because in the picture the numbers are already stamped and the roll stamp only has the lines. The picture is from the Scovill Mfg. Co.