THE ROYAL ARTILLERY INSTITUTION. 
103 
with No. 4 gun, it was deemed prudent to discontinue the experiment, on 
account of the erosion of the bore, “ due to the mechanical action of the 
gas ” and the Committee express their opinion that the service of muzzle¬ 
loading steel rifled guns of large calibre “ cannot be rated higher than 250 
rounds without danger ;” 1 2 this conclusion having been arrived at, be it 
observed, with an extremely mild powder. By this time half the experi¬ 
mental blocks had been expended, with results which it was impossible to 
regard as satisfactory. At this point, it appears to have struck the Committee 
that the endurance of the guns could be more conveniently established if 
they were smooth-bored merely. Blocks Nos. 5 and 6 were therefore bored 
out to 8£ and 11 ins. The first fired 1025 rounds of 27^ lb. charges 
and 80 lb. round shot, the second fired 790 rounds with 44 lb. charges 
and 1981b. shot. This test the Committee chose to accept as establishing 
the “ great resistance " of Krupp's steel guns. Two blocks remained ; 
No. 7 was tried as an 8^-inch muzzle-loading rifled gun, with a Parrott cup 
to stop windage. After 50 rounds the practice was stopped, the results having 
been unsatisfactory. No. 8 block was tried as an 8^-inch breech-loading 
gun. After, as has been stated, 400 rounds of 27^ lbs. powder and 200 lb. 
shot, and 25 rounds of 22 lb. charges, the Committee reported that guns of 
this description were “ perfectly suitable for the armament of coast batteries 
they decided upon the immediate introduction of this class and calibre of 
gun, and upon converting all the 84-inch guns already made, and all those 
which remained to be delivered, into breech-loaders. 
This is how the Krupp guns came to be introduced into Eussia. Upon 
this evidence the reputation of that class of ordnance may be said really to 
rest. How far the foundation is equal to the support of the superstructure 
■which has been imposed upon it, we leave to competent judges to determine. 
It might be supposed that Captain von Doppelmair would be embarrassed 
by the circumstance that the Eussian trials, upon which the whole fabric of 
the reputation of Krupp's heavy ordnance rests, were conducted with solid 
steel guns—a construction which is now abandoned as admittedly unreliable. 
It might also be supposed that the circumstance of one or two of these solid 
guns having in the first instance given' results which were deemed satis¬ 
factory, while subsequent trials have so far contradicted the earlier experience 
as to show the necessity for abandoning that construction, scarcely dovetails 
into the theory that “from the trial of one specimen (of steel guns), a 
judgment can be formed as to all guns of the same description." But 
Captain von Doppelmair does not for a moment allow difficulties of this sort 
to obstruct his progress. Nay, he even boldly takes credit for the perform¬ 
ances of these solid guns, 3 and he trusts here, as he has trusted elsewhere, 
to the carelessness of his readers to overlook this inconsistency, and to 
overlook also the disastrous failure of a solid 8-inch Krupp gun at Tegel, 
when he is pressing upon them his theory that from the behaviour of one 
specimen the behaviour of all steel guns of the same sort may be safely 
inferred. Captain von Doppelmair conducts his arguments on the turret 
system of warfare. It is no inconvenience to him to swing round and fire 
1 “ De crainte que si l’on continuait le tir, les projectiles ne produissent une obturation dans 
l’ame du canon.”—Proceedings of the Royal Artillery Institution, Vol. Y. p. 67. 
2 Doppelmair, pp. 72-74. 
