MOTOR ARTILLERY.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 1295, 10 September 1914, Page 4

MOTOR ARTILLERY.

Reference has been made in the war cablegrams to the use of the motor in warfare. An experiment carried out at Grimsby in the end of July established that by means of motor haulage for light field guns operations by a battery can be carried out in eight or nine hours which under ordinary conditions at present would occupy three days. The scheme of war supposed the threatened landing of a raiding force on the east coast, and the consequent necessity for speedy reinforcement of the available artillery by the arriving of battery from the gun-park at Wentworth Woodhouse, some 75 odd miles away from the point of attack. Ammunition was needed and had to be fetched from the ordnance depot at Selby, an additional distance of over 40 miles. The railways were impassable owing to the blowing up of bridges by spies. The battery of four guns and four ammunition waggons, each attached by an ingenious hauling bracket —the only special equipment used —to chasis driven by 30 h.p. six-cylinder motors, mobilised at Wentworth Woodhouse about 1 o’clock in the morning. Two hours later the ammunition column dashed off to Selby, and before six o’clock the guns had set out for Gainsborough to effect a junction with them. Here General Plumer and bis staff also joined the battery. From this point Grimsby was reached without a single hitch, in spite of some bad by-roads and general traffic hindrances. A good deal of telltale dust was raised, of course, and the passing of the column was not noiseless, but iu neither of these respects were the conditions so bad as they would have been with horsed artillery, and the additional speed would be a most valuable factor in counteracting both disadvantages. To Waltham, just outside Grimbsy, where the experiment virtually ended, an average speed of 21 miles an hour was maintained, with a maximum of 28, On several considerable bills a speed of 15 to 17 miles was attained and the petrol consumption in the case of the ammunition waggons was eight gallons for 99 miles. Roughly these wagons weigh 25cwt and the gun carriages and guns 33cwt. The greatest cause for anxiety was how the gun carriage wheels would behave under the strain of the extra speed. They came out of the test very well, but no doubt with specially-adapted tired wheels a greater speed would be possible.