Cannonball identification help, please.

[fireonethree]

Hi all,

First post here, and thanks for your help.

This ball was found under the stairs of a local church gymnasium (used to be a school). It looks to be around 4.5 inches across, and I have not weighed it or completed a circumference measurement on it. To be honest, once I looked at it, it was removed to a safe place away from the crowds until some advice could be sought out. Living in a remote community means we do not have any experts around to offer opinions, so I will offer this up for thoughts here.

Because of where it was found, everyone figured it was a shot put ball. The wood plug gave me some red flags and if it is just a shot put ball, I will feel better for being safe rather than sorry. There is a visible seam around the ball, which is close to the plug site (so, the plug is not 90 degrees to the seam). The plug site looks chiseled, but the seam looks like it was filed. The plug is wood. There is a section that looks like a casting flaw, and is not smooth. There are no markings visible (broad arrows, numbers, etc).

Historically: yes, it came from a church school gym that operated 10 years ago. The school was only operational from the 1980's to early 2000's. The community did have a Hudson Bay Company post within 15 miles away, and it did have a few cannons at the fort.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Cheers!

 

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[vpnavy]

I noticed this was your very first post fireonethree - so, Welcome Aboard! You didn't list your state (or country) in your profile. So, you might consider jumping over to Sub-Forums: Select Your Area.... and selecting location information (i.e., clubs, hunts, finds, legends, maps, etc.) directly related to your state (or country).

 

[fireonethree]

Thanks for the prompt (updated my profile) and welcome. So, I take it posted this in the wrong spot...and should move it to another section. Will try to figure that out.
Cheers,

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Responding to your request. You say the ball is "around" 4.5-inches in diameter. That is approximately the correct size for a Sports Shot Put ball and also a 12-Pounder caliber cannonball. You said you read my "cannonball -- or not?" article at:
SolidShotEssentialsMod

It's very important that the hole in this ball is not located "on" the mold-seam NOT 90-degrees "above" the moldseam. Those two locations are where the fuze-hole is always loated on a cannonball. So, I suspect this ball is not a cannonball. It could be a Shot-Put ball, or an Ornamental Ironwork ball. But, because we do need to make certain about its correct identification, at this point the next step is to weigh the ball on a PRECISION weighing-scale, such as a Postal Shipping scale. (Typical household bathroom weighing-scales are notoriously inaccurate.) If this ball is a Shot Put or an Ornamental Ironwork ball, its body is solid, not hollow. An iron/steel 4.5-inch SOLID ball weighs within a few ounces of 12.0 pounds. A hollow 4.5-inch iron cannonball will weigh somewhere between 7 pounds and 10 pounds. (That is why super-accurate weighing is needed... household scales are often "off" by several pounds.) So, please get the ball weighed on a Precision scale, and tell us the result.

By the way... you don't need to worry about dropping a cannonball, it won't explode from impact.

 

[fireonethree]

Thanks for the great information(and reassuring info). I have not been able to get it on an accurate scale, but I did get a tape on it. I will try to weight this up tomorrow, and get back to you with the result.
Cheers,

 

[fireonethree]

Was able to weigh this item up on an accurate scale, and it came in at exactly 12lbs 0oz. Thanks for the help on this post!
Cheers,

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

I did the math on your ball's Circumference measurement (aproximately 14.25-inches), which translates to 4.53-inches in diameter. That is within 1/100th-inch of the specified diameter for a civil war era 12-Pounder caliber cannonball. But a RevWar era one would be smaller, about 4.45-inch in diameter.

The fact that your 4.53-inch ball weighs exactly 12.0 pounds tells us two things. (1) It is definitely a solid (not hollow) cast-iron ball. (2) It could be a Sports Shot Put ball, because that sport's rules say the ball for the "12-pound class" of the sport must weigh EXACTLY 12.0 pounds. (That ensures fairness in the competition, ensuring that each team's ball weighs exactly the same.)

But I must mention that its kinda strange for this Solid (not hollow) ball to have a wood-plugged hole in it. The chisel marks around the hole suggest that it was once mounted on an iron stud somewhere, and got chiseled off. Or, perhaps there was a metal plug in the hole, and somebody chiseled the plug out. SInce the ball has no dollar-value, you might want to investigate a little further by digging the wood out of the hole, to see whether it is a threaded hole or not, and how deep the hole is.
By the way, in your photo with the tape-measure, the hole seems to be very close to 1/2-inch in diameter... which is a lot smaller than the fuzehole in any 12-pounder explosive cannonball. That is additional evidence that the ball is not a cannonball. (Of course, there would be no fuzehole in a Solid-Shot cannonball.)