Question..electriclly tested Arty Ammo????

[motto]

One of the contributors to the Australian Shooters Journal was an ammunition tester during WW2 and has referred to some of his activities in his articles for the magazine. He worked in South Australia and for one of the tests they used a huge flat area in which they fired vertically so as to recover the projectiles with as little damage as possible. I think it was on the coast somewhere. Perhaps they were doing something similar at Ajax
As regards electrical firing. In this instance it probably refers to remote firing of the weapon as most artillery and probably all was percussion ignition. Electrically ignited munitions have been around since the late 1800s but were to my knowledge confined to shipboard or fixed shore installations.
David

[Dean (Ajax)]

Thank you....wish I could find photos of them doing this.

Thank you again
Dean

[Marc Montgomery]

Dean, are you sure about it being the biggest? Camp Bouchard in Blainville (about 20 min from my house) was several km sq in area. Its now a major equestrian area, lots of housing (of course) and the site of an automaker test track (closed to public) which you can easily see on google earth. When I was there several years ago, you could still find in the wooded areas remnants of foundations and some of the small calibre filling stations.. These were rows of three sided concrete cubicles..so that if one blew..it would up and back through the wood roof and rear but not forward into the building or beside into the other cubicles. (a blast wall would be outside building-see photo) I have somewhere in my collection “then and now” photos..but these are not available to me at present (were they in a Convoy Mag??)

In walking the still wooded areas (again several years ago) you would come across other vestiges of the past including for example fire hydrants in the middle of the woods..

There was daily train service for the thousands of workers to and from..and of course other train tracks into the plant itslef to transport the vast amount of munitions…train evidence all gone now. And the plant even had its own bus service.

The other major plant was Cherrier, now Le Gardeur..also about 20 min from my house in the other direction, but I’ve never been there. Its now all new boring soulless suburb. I doubt anyone there knows anything at all about the plant/war effort there. Probably any evidence of its existence is long gone.

Quite some time ago I somehow came across medical reports (online somewhere) about worker health.. Seems after awhile, it was discovered that many workers began to suffer from TNT poisoning in spite of precautions of mandatory showers, washing of work clothes etc.. (this was also the case in WWI) I seem to recall that they began to limit the time workers spent directly with the explosives to a period of several months before switching to other functions

**(veterans affairs website) ***= For example, Quebec, one of the main suppliers of arms to the Allied forces, alone provided up to one third of the country's civilian workforce, earning it the name of Canada's Arsenal! Quebec had the country's two tank factories, five main shipyards, two of the four largest gun manufacturing plants, practically all the plants producing small calibre ammunition, ten plants manufacturing shells, the only plant producing air bombs, almost half the explosives and chemical factories, and three out of eight aircraft plants. The armament plants were literally industrial cities. The largest, Defence Industries Limited's Cherrier plant, located in Saint-Paul-L'Ermite (today known as Le Gardeur, just outside of Montréal), alone had 450 buildings spread over 15 square kilometres! ****


Also in one of the old Convoy Magazines, there is a big story on the Angus Yards tank plant in Montreal. Lots of then and now photos. Mostly housing development now. Part of the main plant is now a big supermarket, another part is converted into office space


Bouchard and Cherrier photos
1- Blast wall outside a shell filling building
2- Inspection window into one of the filling cubicles ( I have a fragment of the triple layer armoured glass window)

3- Filling a torpedo warhead
4- One of the filling cubicles mentioned
5- Stencilling 25pdr shells

[Marc Montgomery]

PS- there seems to have been a great deal of quality control too..

testing of explosive charge weight, exact dimensions, effort to separate shell from cartridge, defects etc etc etc

[Dean (Ajax)]

THANK YOU!!! I have found over 300 photos of the D I L Plant in Ajax..but yours are the only photos I have seen shown the blast walls.

I have found many photos of the entire process for filling, painting the shells and projectiles..and the many inspections also..even a copy of a workers photo album

One thing you mentioned also explains a photo I have seen reproducted many times..listed as being DIL Ajax, but I knew it could not be from that plant....The famous photo of the 500 LBS air dropped Bombs.
I will pass this info on.

Thank you aain
Dean

[Marc Montgomery]

Hi Dean all these photos are available online from archives Canada
I have others not so readily available but alas are difficult for me to access


1- bouchard or cherrier filling 20mm shells

2- pull test..(effort to separate projectile from casing

3- bundling cordite

4 weighing cordite

5 cherrier plant- working on 500lb aerial bomb

[Dean (Ajax)]

Sorry, I found over 600 photos..check out this link http://www.pada.ca/search/results/?txt_a=DIL

Also there are many more not on this site....A bunch were found of DIL Ajax in Shilo early this year or Late last year...I have seen them..but they are not on that website yet.....the archives here have a lot of DIL items..but the archives are being redone..so it is quite a mess right now..

DIL Ajax, was the largest shell filling plant in the Commonwealth..and perhaps the world..less Russia at the time....not bad for a place that was just farm land in 1938!!!

However..there are still many unanswered question...about the little things.
The 3 Shifts ( the women) wore Red for morning shift, white for afternoon shift and blue for late or night shift ( their headbands)
Just a neat bit of info.

Thank you again

Dean