Cannon Balls??????

[David H]

I went to a local house clearance recently, the old guy who used to live there was a bit of a hoarder and had lots of things he'd collected over the years ranging from clocks to parking meters.... Anyway I came away with some artillery shell cases and a few other bits and bobs, but I also took a punt on these 'Cannon balls'. I don't know if they are cannon balls, they were so ridiculously cheap I couldn't leave them, though thinking about it I don't know what I will do with the bloody things..

Anyone know if they are cannon balls or are they just weights of some sort??
Any help appreciated.

David

[David H]

2

[David H]

this one looks like a fuze hole??

[David H]

..

[David H]

.. As you can see they are mainly different sizes and weights.

[bodes]

They might be "shot" or simply ball bearings....Can be difficult to distinguish the difference....Are they cast iron?....Civil war cannon balls were made of this...Hopefully somebody with more experience in this area will chime in....If not, there are some good sites that you could google which could help you out....Bodes

[Wilhelm]

Cool. Look too rough to be ball bearings to me.

[klarkon]

http://kanonen-kugeln.de/

[bodes]

Cool. Look too rough to be ball bearings to me.

Large ball bearings, cement truck tanks cleaning balls, roller mill balls, wrought iron ornamental fence balls, and shot puts are often confused for cannon balls...Any of these would also be in rough shape had they spent time under ground or in a scrap pile...This is why a person needs to know how they were constructed, and this can be a daunting task....They also need to know what bore sizes were typical for cannons of the day.......Bodes

[dave peifer]

difficult to tell without precise measurements but some could be large grape shot.............dave

[Bob Hritz]

If there was mining done in the area, they could be stamping plant balls. The ore is mixed with cast iron balls and rotated until the ore is broken down into smaller pieces which are placed in a stamper to be crushed to powder. From this powder, the ore is chemically extracted.

Or, they could be cannon balls.

Bob Hritz