3 
Good results may also be expected from the Mannesmann process 1 which accord¬ 
ing to General Wille has been tried in a 4‘8" gun. 
But a field gun cannot be lengthened with a view to an increase of the muzzle 
velocity, you are at once met by the impossibility of increasing the weight, unless 
the material used admits of a lighter construction. 
Again reduction of calibre may give some slight assistance in this direction. 
But General Wille claims each of these elements and goes to the very extreme 
limit of what is possible in each, and even beyond it. 
Of the different field guns in Europe the mean length is about 7 feet 6 inches. 
General Wille’s proposal is 9 feet 2 inches. But even that unmanageable length 
would not realise the ballistic conditions required. Krupp’s 3’36-inch gun of 40 
calibres should indeed serve rather as a warning than an encouragement. It 
developed a muzzle energy of 648 foot tons. Now, to attain that result with a 
gun of smaller calibre we must lengthen it in inverse proportion to the two 
calibres. General Wille demands an energy 37 foot tons in excess of the above, 
so he would be saddled with a gun rather over 13 feet in length or 59 calibres. 
Captain Moch gives a careful analysis of the relations subsisting between calibre, 
length, and mean and maximum pressure, by which he arrives at the above result. 
The question of length brings us to that of determining the calibre. If we are 
again to compare the 3*36-inch Krupp with the 2*756 Wille gun we must note 
that their lengths will not merely be in inverse proportion to their calibres, but 
that that proportion will only apply to the path of the projectile, to which must 
be added the length of the powder chamber. The latter will of course be 
relatively larger in the Wille gun and even absolutely so (the charges being res¬ 
pectively, Wille 3 lb. 5 oz. Krupp 3 lb. 8 oz.). Indeed all weights too must be 
roughly proportional to the cubes of the calibres. The 3’36-inch gun weighs 20f 
cwt., the 2*756-inch should weigh 12 cwt., whereas the General only allows 7f- 
cwt. The projectile which is 15^- lbs. in the one, should be 10 lbs. in the other, 
the General increases it to 15 lbs. A recent Krupp 3-inch gun of 40 calibres is 
relatively superior to the gun chosen for comparison, but is still far from reaching 
the ideal results of the Gun of the Future. 
As regards the metal to be chosen for guns General Wille expresses a prefer¬ 
ence for crucible steel forged under pressure, and hopes in the near future to get 
something better from the Mannesmann process and from chrome and nickel steel. 
Captain Moch on the other hand agreeing with the Deutsche Heeres-Zeitung looks 
to the Martin steel process as the most likely one for achieving progress. 
General Wille treats lightly the inconvenience of his long gun on service, and 
contents himself by saying that it must always travel at the maximum elevation 
and travel over obstacles obliquely. 
He is in favour of the breech closing apparatus with vertical wedge which the 
Gruson factory have applied to their quick-firing howitzer of 4*75-inch calibre. 
Captain Moch contends that no system at present is equal to the interrupted 
screw, which has been copied from the French both by the British and the 
United States Governments. 
1 An account of Mannesmann’s invention was given in the Revue d’Artillerie , November, 1890. 
