Very cool 81MM Mortar trenchart!!

[FightenIrish35]

This is a really neat 81 MM mortar I got off epay. What I like about it is It fills a spot in the collection. Also I guess I really wasnt paying close attention to what the bottom piece is made of while the auction was going as i thought is was a sturdy piece of metal that was for an ash tray...but it looks to be the bottom piece of a huge naval shell...it has plenty of markings including anchor....i was wondering if anyone can decifer what the stamping means on the bottom and to what size gun would have fired a shell this wide...it is 6 and a half inches wide and weighs 8 pounds!!!! The mortar shell itself is in pretty nice shape....paint is in very nice condition....i was wondering the same thing with the mortar about the stampings...if anyone could tell me what the stampings mean on the side of it? Also what does the kanji in the white mean....I thought that this was way to cool to let slip by...it sure is a nice trench art piece
Thank you very much guys and hope all is well!

[FightenIrish35]

more images...

[FightenIrish35]

and more

[blinky]

Neat piece and a sneaky way to sell a mortar shell on ebay

The white kanji is gibberish. It looks like it's trying to copy the markings applied in white that indicate if the shell is within a certain weight, overweight or underweight, so that the gunner can adjust for the difference. Also on these shells is stenciled in white the nomenclature (Type 100 etc.).

[FightenIrish35]

hehe ohhhh yeah lol....kind of suprised it didnt get pulld his title was something like "Japanese Rocket" lol

[mcmike]

The perforated tube that is attached to the "ashtray" base: is that part of the barrel of a U.S. air-cooled MG?

[blinky]

It's the primer assembly from the artillery shell.

I wonder if the guy who made this originally made it as a lamp/ashtray?

[FightenIrish35]

blinky,i didnt see that you gav einfo on the kanji...are you sayin it i gibberish meaning its not original...or that its nothing important?? You say that it is a copy??

[blinky]

The white painted kanji isn't original. The shell had been repainted, the stripes are not correct either. It was probably a well-worn round that the vet "dressed" up a bit to look how he remembered it. The nose should be red (as it is) with a yellow stripe around the the circumference just above the four grooves near the top.

eric

[FightenIrish35]

Thanks Eric...thats good info....kind of is a downer that its not original paint...but it is really old paint you can tell its nothing new so I would think a Veteran did it as well.....can you tell me anything about the base of this trenchart...Does anyone know what kind of gun would have fired a round this huge..im guesing naval ship

[blinky]

I'm having a bit of a brain fart but I think that's about 155mm diameter? I think most of the ship-borne guns of this size and bigger used bag charges rather than casings. I think there was an older 155mm gun that used a semi-fixed casing, most likely for shore defense. I should know this but I'm drawing a blank right now. Hopefully someone else will chime in if I'm too far off. It's a great casing though, the walls are massive compard to the 75mm guns!