Logistically Viable Weapons Part 2: Electric Boogaloo Bullets (AtE)

[Minuteman37]

Originally Posted by swordtart

I would have thought that the logistics tail of loose BP and ball would be far more onerous than say .357 magnum cartridges loaded with BP. This does away with the spoiling of BP through damp and the chance of numpties mis-loading and bursting their barrels. Flinters need more skill to operate reliably than cartridge guns, not less. If you reload metallic cartridges with lead and BP you move the risk to the manufactory where you can exert more control.

Don't give your plebs fast shooting lever guns or they will deplete their ammunition far too quickly. Single shot rifles (or smooth bores - including worn rifling) would preserve your tier hierarchy but retain your commonality of ammunition. These could be bolt action, falling block (or even lever guns with the magazine capped). It will encourage marksmanship rather than spray and pray. Or you could give them single shot pistols instead and force them to get close.

You could even give them lighter powder loads than normal (maybe in .38 special cases) so that should they rebel your higher tier forces have an operational advantage. If the tier 1 guns could only handle the lighter loading you have the ideal situation, higher tier troops can use tier 1 ammunition in extremis, but if tier 1 troops try to use higher tier ammunition they risk burst barrels. It also allows you to gain some trade space in your manufacture/procurement. Barrels not good enough for magnum loads can still find a use. There are more .38 plus .375 weapons available than .357 alone.

If you get them used to flintlocks and BP they may well find someone who can supply them independently in an ATE world. This increases their opportunity to defect or rebel. Make them dependent on a manufactured cartridge and they will find it harder. Manufacturing and supplying BP plus flints plus ball has got to be harder than supplying made up metal cartridges. Many BP shooters cast their own ball, very few knap their own flints

You can reserve your smokeless powder for your better troops.

When your troops find guns, reward any troops who turn them in to the armourers and punish any who you discover have kept them. This will ensure you retain control of the logistics. If you find a broken .357 long arm you can cut the barrel down to make several single shot pistols (or a couple of smgs). A worn barrel can be used as a poor smooth bore.

You make a convincing argument Sword. I'm going to have to concede to giving the conscrips breech-loading rifles.

[swordtart]

Originally Posted by Minuteman37

I've actually got around to doing some more work with doug's spreadsheet. How do you find the projectile length? That doesn't seem to be a commonly available metric.

In particular I'm looking at .303 british becouse of it's black powder history.

Lots of good gen here (including primary source schematics)

https://sites.google.com/site/britmi...rk-vi-to-viiiz

The bullet length depends on the mark number but the one shown for the 160 grain mark VII bullet was 1.269" long. With the actual bullet diameter of between .310" and .312" that gives a length of almost exactly 4 calibres.

[mlangsdorf]

Originally Posted by Minuteman37

I've actually got around to doing some more work with doug's spreadsheet. How do you find the projectile length? That doesn't seem to be a commonly available metric.

Projectile length, projectile density, and aspect ratio can be frustratingly hard to find. You can derive any of them if you know two of the others, but you usually have projectile mass and diameter and that's not enough.

I usually estimate density at 10 g/cm^3 for jacketed lead bullets, aspect ratio at around 2 for pistols and 3.5 for rifles, and then curve fit to see if I get numbers that make sense. Or do more research: there's a picture of .30-06 projectiles in the wikipedia article, for instance, so I can measure the length in units of width (which is aspect ratio) and then calculate density and length.

[Ed the Coastie]

I wrestled with firearm logistics for quite a while when working on my own AtE game. What I eventually wound up using was a "cottage industry" single-shot 12-gauge shotgun with a bayonet mount for the primary infantry weapon and replica Colt SAA revolvers for handguns. Mortars were used as support weapons, and there were a trio of technicals (well, a technical and a couple of panel vans with gun ports cut into the sides) available as well.