Gentlemen:
When I skimmed through the "machine gun" section of the 1887 Treatise on Ammunition last night, I obviously "misinformed myself" as it were, resulting in my post (#18) above .....
Firstly, I see that the .45 machine-gun cartridge diagram does, indeed, have a bottleneck ..... although it is much less pronounced than the dramatic diameter reduction of the .577/.450 neck .... (Mind you, in my own defence, I did modify my comment in that regard by saying "or nearly straight-walled" - which would seem to be a fairly apt description of the cartridge profile illustrated in the Treatise ....) i.e. the "Cartridge, Machine-gun, .45-inch (Mark III), Ball, Gardner, Gatling and Nordenfelt, except Martini-Henry chambered guns" as described starting at the bottom of page 303 (see below) and illustrated on page 304.
Secondly, my mind definitely wasn't in full gear when I also said the Treatise seemed to refer to a Martini-Henry-chambered (i.e. .577/.450) Gatling gun - in fact, any such reference in the Treatise actually uses the general term "machine gun", and it now appears to me on a closer reading that it was some Gardner guns which were Martini-Henry chambered ..... see the last two lines of the third paragraph on the first (partial) page of text below (i.e. under the heading "Machine Gun Ammunition".)
I note that the first sentence of that same paragraph says: "The .45-inch Gatling formerly took its own cartridge, but can be set to take the Gardner-Gatling which is now issued for it." I first wondered if this could be the Boxer (coiled brass) round that some of the quoted references mentioned, but note from that page 303 clearly specifies that its case was solid drawn brass. From everything stated in the Treatise, it would indeed seem that only the .65 Gatling cartridge was of Boxer construction (as others have already pointed out) and it must have been those that suffered from the reported problems.
For the heck of it, and assuming some of you may not have access to the 1887 Treatise on Ammunition - which certainly should qualify as a "primary reference" for this discussion - I have scanned the pages which seem relevant and now link to them here - i.e. the entire "Machine Gun Ammunition" section of Chapter XXI and the first few pages of Chapter XXII ..... Definitely no "copyright issues" with material this old!
When I skimmed through the "machine gun" section of the 1887 Treatise on Ammunition last night, I obviously "misinformed myself" as it were, resulting in my post (#18) above .....
Firstly, I see that the .45 machine-gun cartridge diagram does, indeed, have a bottleneck ..... although it is much less pronounced than the dramatic diameter reduction of the .577/.450 neck .... (Mind you, in my own defence, I did modify my comment in that regard by saying "or nearly straight-walled" - which would seem to be a fairly apt description of the cartridge profile illustrated in the Treatise ....) i.e. the "Cartridge, Machine-gun, .45-inch (Mark III), Ball, Gardner, Gatling and Nordenfelt, except Martini-Henry chambered guns" as described starting at the bottom of page 303 (see below) and illustrated on page 304.
Secondly, my mind definitely wasn't in full gear when I also said the Treatise seemed to refer to a Martini-Henry-chambered (i.e. .577/.450) Gatling gun - in fact, any such reference in the Treatise actually uses the general term "machine gun", and it now appears to me on a closer reading that it was some Gardner guns which were Martini-Henry chambered ..... see the last two lines of the third paragraph on the first (partial) page of text below (i.e. under the heading "Machine Gun Ammunition".)
I note that the first sentence of that same paragraph says: "The .45-inch Gatling formerly took its own cartridge, but can be set to take the Gardner-Gatling which is now issued for it." I first wondered if this could be the Boxer (coiled brass) round that some of the quoted references mentioned, but note from that page 303 clearly specifies that its case was solid drawn brass. From everything stated in the Treatise, it would indeed seem that only the .65 Gatling cartridge was of Boxer construction (as others have already pointed out) and it must have been those that suffered from the reported problems.
For the heck of it, and assuming some of you may not have access to the 1887 Treatise on Ammunition - which certainly should qualify as a "primary reference" for this discussion - I have scanned the pages which seem relevant and now link to them here - i.e. the entire "Machine Gun Ammunition" section of Chapter XXI and the first few pages of Chapter XXII ..... Definitely no "copyright issues" with material this old!
