Have read quite a few references that state that the supply and quality of German munition and the end of the war was quite desperate. I like to illustrate this with a photograph I took from a German cartridge, most likely 1918 production.
The cartridge is made out of pressed iron, German had hardly any Copper left. Only the igniter is still set into Copper.( due to the shortage of Copper the even k98 gun cartridges were iron electroplated with a thin layer of copper....) I do not know if they used this plating for artillery cartridge.During WW2 this was common practice and even an elastic paint was used)If you fire a gun, the high pressure presses the cartridge to the wall of the chamber and you need a type of elasticity in the cartridge material to be able to remove the cartridge afterwards.
Source image unkown ,internet?
Clearly the 1918 mark can be seen. Full iron cartridge with just a small piece of Copper
If you analyse the production of "powder" there is a dramatic difference between Germany and their opposites.
As you can see that the charge consists of two different chopped Rohren Pulver, Kz RP109 (chopped filaments), one is a sandy colour while the other is black. ( black due to added graphite which makes it easier to blend and as such the batch becomes more homogeneous) Most likely the reason to use two types next to each other, reducing the quality and reproducibility of the lot, is born out of shortage. Germany is using all the resources left and introducing batches from other products in their own production. Everything they can use even from foreign producers of which they got a hold f.i.
Harry
-- Edited by Haverba on Sunday 27th of October 2019 10:19:54 AM
%20of%202019-10-27_08-50-36.jpg)
