1880.] Sequel to the ' Thunderer ' Gun Explosion. 321 



us would cause tho loadiug to differ from that which was effected by 

 the hydraulic apparatus. 



The loading being complete, those present at the experiment 

 retired about two hundred yards. The gun was then fired. The 

 report was not very remarkable ; but it must be borne in mind that the 

 gun was so thoroughly enveloped in the cell that the sound was, of 

 necessity, much deadened. There was a very large volume of smoke, 

 obviously more than would have occurred from an ordinary charge. 

 Some planks which were laid across the space between the two 

 cells were blown into the air, and those were all the indications 

 exterior to the chamber, that were given. 



On entering the cell it was at once seen that the gun was 

 utterly destroyed, the breech part with the trunnion alone being left 

 in position. The rest, with the jirojectiles, had either penetrated the 

 sand in front, or was lying in fragments about the cell, tho sides of 

 which were scored. 



The gun, or rather the remains of it, had recoiled the full distance 

 of about 4 feet, and the carriage was hard up against the wooden 

 blocks which had been put there as a final stop, and these blocks had 

 their ends indented into the transverse timbers, showing that the 

 pressure had been very large. Moreover, it was clear from the condi- 

 tion of the rear end of the cell that the pressure on the hydraulic 

 apparatus had been such as to burst the cylinder which, unlike the 

 cylinder on board the ' Thunderer,' was not provided with safety 

 valves, and to drive the fluid (the oil) out of the cylinder, the inside 

 of the cell at this part being literally anointed with the contents of 

 the cylinder. Subsequent examination has shown that the end of the 

 hydraulic cylinder had given way and had been opened out around 

 more than half of its circumference. 



I now propose to show you on the screen photographs of certain 

 of the principal portions of the recently exploded gun and of its 

 shells. 



I will, however, first ask your attention to a photograph, Diagram 

 (11), of the companion gun (the one that burst on board tho 

 ' Thunderer ') as it appears now when put together in the Arsenal at 

 Woolwich. 



The first of the photographs, Diagram (12), of the gun recently 

 burst, represents a front view of the remainder of the hinder part of 

 the gun. You will see that the whole in advance of the breech piece 

 has disappeared ; that the steel tube is broken off in a jagged manner 

 at about this point ; that the front end of the C coil has been torn 

 away, and that this coil itself is split from end to end on that which 

 is the right-hand side of the gun when viewed from the muzzle end. 



The front part of the steel tube is eximnded, as the other tube was, 

 from 12 inches diameter to about 12 J inches, this expansion, as 

 before, being due almost entirely to stretching in the grooves, and the 

 front of the breech piece has again been bell-mouthed by that 

 expansion. The rear end of the steel tube is unchanged in dimension, 



Vol. IX. (No. 72.) z 



