Japanese charge bag

[BOUGAINVILLE]

Hi all out there :tinysmile_grin_t:
I have here a Japanese Naval charge bag. It isn't for the Naval 81mm mortar as that had doughnut shaped charge bags.

I would like to know what this charge bag was for.:questionmark:
Can anyone help me?

The only Japanese characters that I can read is a 61 in the lefthand column as well as the mark for the Sasebo Naval Arsenal and in the righthand column a 2 as well as the mark for the Kure Naval Arsenal.

The rest has me beaten.:hmmmm: I couldn't find any light in the Japanese Military Dictionary that I have or any of the other material that I have.

I would really appreciate any help,

Cheers
BOUGAINVILLE :tinysmile_grin_t:

 

[US-Subs]

I've sent an e-mail back to work. Part of the reason you may be having problems is that the Japanese military "borrowed" a lot of characters from the Chinese. I frequently have requests to my Japanese colleagues that they refer back to my Chinese colleagues.

Of course if its anything like western markings, what's on a powder bag may never mention the projectile it's for - I'll let you know what they say.

 

[US-Subs]

The response the I got back from your photos was:

Regards the attachments. The Japanese characters on the right, crossed out with two red lines, reads "24".

The characters on the left read "16 grammes"

 

[BOUGAINVILLE]

Japanese navy charge bag

Gee thanks US-subs :tinysmile_grin_t:
That has been a great help. So the left column reads 16 grams and the right column reads 24 ????. That 24 something must be another measure but it certainly isn't "momme" which is equivalent to 3.75 grams.

As the Japanese Navy only had one mortar which was a 81mm which used a doughnut shaped charge bag I can only assume that maybe the Japanese navy used Japanese Army mortars as well, of which there was a good variety to select from. If that was the case then they would've used up to six of these charge bags per mortar.

I wounder if my supposition is correct as it certainly looks like a charge bag for a mortar.

Many thanks,
Cheers,
BOUGAINVILLE :tinysmile_grin_t:

 

[BOUGAINVILLE]

Japanese navy charge bag

Hi all :tinysmile_grin_t:
Have just been informed that the right column does infact read "24 grams contents".

The jury is still out though as to what munitions this charge bag was used with.

Cheers,
BOUGAINVILLE :tinysmile_grin_t:

 

[US-Subs]

Did they make silk bags for 20mm/25mm? I'm not much of a case person and never really paid attention. I've got larger, around 30cm long, that, as I recall, came from a 47mm.

 

[ogreve]

Hi,

Somehow I have completely missed this post; that's a most interesting item!
Yes, it does by all means look like a charge bag of some sorts, but I too have problems properly interpreting it. Summarised, here's what you already knew:
Right column, read from top to bottom: "Kure arsenal 24 grams".
Left column, read from top to bottom: "Sasebo arsenal 16 grams".

I have done some further checking in the document we have on Japanese ordnance markings. I can confirm the '16 grams' to be a possible correct reading. Another reading would be '16 gallons' which doesn't make sense, so indeed the 16 grams is most likely the correct reading, and that does make sense on a charge bag. Especially actual filler markings (as opposed to 'issue markings', which are normally printed separately on Japanese charge bags!) tend to have information of the actual charge weight. Now, often markings were read from right to left, and struck through text means that something is no longer applicable (most often due to later modifications of formerly issued items; you also find this e.g. on several 20x142 storage tubes). Hence, my interpretation would be that this bag was first issued by the Kure arsenal for something that required a charge weight of 24 grams (BTW: I could not find the two Kanji that the two of you managed to get translated as 'grams' too, but I'll take your word on it). These seem to be issue markings to me, but I'm not 100% sure, I find IJA markings are easier in this respect.
I think that the bag was then never used for that purpose, and at a later time was re-issued by the Sasebo arsenal for a charge weight of 16 grams. At least, I'd doubt that it was first filled with a 24 grams charge at Kure, and then emptied out and re-filled with a 16 grams charge at Sasebo....

Now, where does all of this leave us? I'm a bit clueless. Typically Japanese charge bags (both IJA as well as IJN) feature the type of weapon the bag is used for in the issue markings. I see no such indications on this bag. I have seen only one donut shaped mortar charge bag, and that was yellow and had a clear 'mortar' Kanji marking on it.
I checked the TM on medium calibre IJN fillings; I can find no evidence of the usage of charge bags in 25x163 ammo (a thing I can pretty much corroborate from what I've seen in factual specimens, where the charge was located directly in the casing). The bag would be too tall for the 20mm and 30mm IJN (!) calibres, and next up is the 40x158R calibre, for which the bag seems to be too narrow.

IMO this bag was not for an artillery round, nor for a mortar round.
Where that does leave us, is uncertain to me.
Possibly it's a sub-charge for something, maybe some gaines were filled with charges in bags, or maybe something entirely different. There's even a small chance that it's not a charge bag, but something else, however, it does completely look like a charge bag... I think the 'gaine theory' is a good one to further investigate; as gaines could be used in many calibres, and the overall dimensions seem proper for it, it's a possibility and it would explain why there is no specific weapon (nor calibre) printed on the bag.

The above is about as much as I can say about it. It shall be interesting to see what this turns out to be exactly!

Cheers,
Olafo