Blog - Vespers War

[Vespers War]

I'm working on a post about WW1 grenades, and there's some information I can't find, so hopefully I can crowd-source from the board.

British Grenades:
I know the No 2 used tonite, the No 3 used TNT, and the No 20 used ammonite. However, I can't find how much explosive was in any of these.

German Grenades:
I know the filler mass for the 1915 diskushandgranate, but not what the filler was.

Austrian Grenades:
Pretty much all I have are names - Rohr, Lakos, Schwere - but I don't have information on grenade mass, filler mass, or filler type.

Any help with any of these would be appreciated.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

While my interest has typically been the Cold War era, some of the early Jane's Infantry Weapons yearbooks still listed some of the equipment from previous decades (usually if it was still in general use when the yearbook was compiled).
I also have some Brassey's books that might cover the same weapons but I'm not so sure of those (I haven't checked them for some time!)
I can't say if any of them have the information you're looking for but I'll check through the yearbooks I have and report back if I find anything useful.

[Vespers War]

Originally Posted by StainlessSteelCynic

While my interest has typically been the Cold War era, some of the early Jane's Infantry Weapons yearbooks still listed some of the equipment from previous decades (usually if it was still in general use when the yearbook was compiled).
I also have some Brassey's books that might cover the same weapons but I'm not so sure of those (I haven't checked them for some time!)
I can't say if any of them have the information you're looking for but I'll check through the yearbooks I have and report back if I find anything useful.

Thank you. I have a copy of Anthony Saunders' Weapons of the Trench War 1914-1918 that's been helpful with a lot of information, but it's occasionally sketchy on technical detail, along with an online copy of Major Graham Ainslie's 1917 Hand Grenades, but for most of the British grenades he only lists the total weight and the type of filler, with no mention of filler weight. And, as a British publication during the war, he's aware of German grenades but doesn't have much information on them.

I did, however, find a 1909 Scientific American that refers to Hales' new grenade having 4 ounces of filler. Given the date, that would be the No 2, so that one's answered.

Unfortunately, I don't have Rick Landers' Grenade: British and Commonwealth Hand and Rifle Grenades, and it's apparently quite rare on this side of the pond. And as far as I can tell, English-language publications about grenades from non-English-speaking countries simply don't exist.

[Legbreaker]

You might be able to contact Brian at RUSI for the information you need. Looks like they've got plenty of publications on the subject.
https://www.thecollectingbug.com/rus...ia/view/horz?4
https://www.rusivic.org.au/library
May be a similar organisation closer to you that may even send you hard copies on loan.

[Vespers War]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

You might be able to contact Brian at RUSI for the information you need. Looks like they've got plenty of publications on the subject.
https://www.thecollectingbug.com/rus...ia/view/horz?4
https://www.rusivic.org.au/library
May be a similar organisation closer to you that may even send you hard copies on loan.

Either late this year or early next year I should be able to access the Library of Congress; right now it's not practical because of transportation issues (there are two Metro lines I can take in to DC; one is barely running due to construction and the other is completely closed for repairs). They have one of the three copies of Grenade that WorldCat shows as held by institutions in the US (the other two are at Harvard and the First Division Museum in Illinois).

[Legbreaker]

Worth contacting them now anyway. Brian at RUSI is happy to scan and email documents, perhaps the US libraries will do the same?
I'm not even in the same state as RUSI, and there's about 200 miles of water in the way as well. They've been REALLY HELPFUL with my research on the ANZAC sourcebook (one day I'll settle on a proper title for that...)

[StainlessSteelCynic]

No joy from my library. Jane's Infantry Weapons 1976 only has British 36M anti-personnel grenade and nothing earlier. I wasn't really expecting it to have the German or Austrian grenades but given the longevity of various British infantry weapons in far flung corners of the Empire I thought there may be some Commonwealth nation still using the older grenades.

My Brassey's Infantry Weapons of the Word 1975 also had the 36M but the same info as the Jane's.

(See EDIT below)
For what it's worth, maybe as a comparison because the 36M was specifically designed for Mesopotamia (I believe it was inter-war rather than WW2 but definitely not WW1), the 36M weighed 27 1/4 ounces in total and according to the cross-section image of the grenade, explosive used was: -
Baratol, 20/80, 2-oz. 7-dr.
I believe dr. is short-hand for dram which according to http://www.onlineconversion.com/weight_all.htm 7 drams is 12.402 916 367 grams (1 dram being equal to 1.771 845 195 3 gram)
... meaning the 36M had 69.101 962 617 grams of filler
I absolutely was tempted to round up/down those figures but I don't know how finicky/forgiving the formulae in WTH or even FFS are so, yeah, I included all the decimal places!

EDIT: Bah! I see from doing some checking for images that there's no comparison between the British No.2 & No.3 grenades to the 36M grenade