discussion Scratchbuilt French 400 mm railgun

[bazers]

Hi guys finished latest scratchbuilt railgun , Saint Chamond built eight of these very large calibre 400 mm howitzers fielded in the summer of 1916 they were very effective.
The model is in 1 72 scale, 12 inches long hand painted in the usual French patterned camouflage figs are from W D models.

 

[scottie3158]

Barry,
Another masterpiece to add to the collection. You must be well happy with that.

 

[Tim Marlow]

Looks excellent to me. Really fine work. Great job on a complex Cam job as well.
Personally, I’ve seen lots of pictures of these guns but am not actually sure how they operated. I assume they were moved from site to site by heavy freight engine, but what about the firing regime? There must have been recoil on firing, but did they have a dedicated shunting train engine travelling with them to push them back in position or was it simply the local shunter that did the job? There must have been a substantial support “train” (sorry about that) with these big boys.

 

[spanner570]

Barry.
On a par with your other excellent builds you have shown us on here.

Top work for sure.....

Ron

 

[BattleshipBob]

Stunning Barry

 

[adt70hk]

Out of this world.

ATB.

Andrew

 

[outrunner]

Really, really great work.

Andy.

 

[Mini Me]

One to be proud of Barry....any chance of a "Group" photo with all your Rail Guns or would that be too large an undertaking. I'm just imagining how impressive they would look all together in one photo.
Rick H.

 

[papa 695]

Fantastic work Barry

 

[Gern]

Beautiful

 

[minitnkr]

Some very impressive scratchwork. I'm thinking nine like these in a battleship broadside. Quite the throw weight.

 

[bazers]

Looks excellent to me. Really fine work. Great job on a complex Cam job as well.
Personally, I’ve seen lots of pictures of these guns but am not actually sure how they operated. I assume they were moved from site to site by heavy freight engine, but what about the firing regime? There must have been recoil on firing, but did they have a dedicated shunting train engine travelling with them to push them back in position or was it simply the local shunter that did the job? There must have been a substantial support “train” (sorry about that) with these big boys.

Thanks Tim there were various ways to counteract recoil some were fixed to the ground with a framework with gun sliding up a slight ramp and gravity bringing it back to position ,others had wedges that lowered on to extra wide rails and friction slowed complete gun assembly
Others gust rolled back and were winched back.

 

[bazers]

One to be proud of Barry....any chance of a "Group" photo with all your Rail Guns or would that be too large an undertaking. I'm just imagining how impressive they would look all together in one photo.
Rick H.

Thanks Rick there are photos somewhere on this site if you can find them

 

[Tim Marlow]

Ah, never thought about winches and gravity….the simplest ideas are often the best….

 

[bazers]

Thanks for all comments guys.