Tim, I am posting this in case others may be interested. Dr Jager has finished his latest book "Panzers at War" and has passed on this information re your enquiry about the use of the 10.5 cm gun as a Flak gun on a railway car. He says in his letter (he isn't on email) that " As for the questions Tim Rigby has about the German 10,5 cm Eisenbahn-Flak of WW1 What little information I have is to be found in the book Otto Wilhelm von Renz "Deutsche Flugabwehr im 20 Jahrhundert"". It was published by Verlag Mittler & Sohn, Frankfurt/Main in 1960 (No ISBN)
The other day I found in the September catalogue of my Italian book seller another book on this topic: E.B. Westermann "Flak- German Anti- Aircraft Defenses 1914 -1945". It is offered for 29.50 Euro by Tutto Storia; Casella Postale 395; I-43100 Parma; Italy.
Not owning this book I cannot say to what detail it covers the 10,5 cm Eisenbahn-Flak. This is all I can do for Mr Rigby, sorry. Maybe the German AA school can help him: Flugabwehrschule des Heeres; Schleswiger Chaussee 91; D-24768 Rendsburg.
Also thanks to either you or Peter for up dating the link to the restoration work we have almost completed on the WW1 10.5cm LFH . I am to finish painting it this morning ready to be retruned to its new home in the country at Moonta Sth Australia. Photo attached.
It would be great to see if it could fire, however despite all our efforts on making nearly all of the moving parts free and working we decided not to touch the recuperator without a special tool to remove the springs. There is also a very large spring under the recuperator which we believe assists with the elevation of the barrel. When I dismantled this it exploded due to rust holding all the bits compressed until I cut open the container housing it all. I figured the same might apply to the recuperator springs but with a lot more energy stored up so I chickened out.
I managed to make up a mechanism to work the breech block but the firing pin bits are missing and we also gave up on dismantling the breech block.
I think if we had made the gun operable the authorities might have had a fit and demanded that it be made inoperable.
I have just returned from giving the gun its first coat, minus the wheels. Whilst I like the color of the red undercoat and the wooden wheels to make it a bit more authentic we are painting it as to field grey as we can, wheels and all.
