This is an odd ad!

[Rob Fast]

Nice find Rob.

[Bob Phillips]

In the photo of the limbers spares box there is a small brass grease gun with what appears to be a hose. What fitting is on the end? (button head fitting?)
I have a small supply of similar grease guns but they have a metal pipe end with a couple of flexible knuckles on it, ending in a small button head fitting.
Is this a correct grease gun fora 25 pounder or other (17 pounder ) guns? Will attach a picture if I can get it to work....BP

greasegun.jpg

[rob love]

Your gun looks correct, but I cannot say I have seen that hose before.

Here is the standard 25 pdr grease gun courtesy of the Irish Army.

[Bob Phillips]

Thanks Rob, my gun says Tecalemit London, cast in the body and appear to have a button head fitting that is smaller than the standard UC fitting. Does your have a rubber or woven metal hose?? BP

[rob love]

It is woven metal over rubber. We actually have about 25 of them at the museum. The majority are like this, then there is the odd variation with rubber hose.

[rob love]

So it has been just over a year since recovery of the 2 guns, and I have been meaning to post a bit of an update. I selected one of the guns to begin restoration and have pretty much dis-asssembled it as far as I am going and begun repairing the caisson.

Disassembly was not too bad, with the exception of course of the breech. After oiling and heating, I finally just removed the tube and breech, and ran them over to the press for disassembly. Much quicker and no damages that hammering would have caused. Much thanks goes to Rob Nixon who advised me through the process. I did have a bit of a hiccup on the muzzle brake though. I warmed it up a bit, and managed to get half a turn before it stopped. I asked Rob if it was left hand thread and he responded that it turns clockwise, so I thought that meant right hand thread. I had about 8 feet of bar through the brake, with the wife standing on the end and me whacking the bar with a sledge....almost no movement. So I reversed the direction of the pipe, put the tractor bucket against the pipe and with a single whack of the handle, the brake just spun off. Looking back at Rob's advice, I guess clockwise is subjective to which way you are standing.

Photos will tell it better than I can.

[rob love]

So the next step was to deal with some of the damages aquired by rough handling of the gun over the years. The bracket that stored the tool box was of concern, as was the hole punched through the top near the hitch, and the bent "wings". I used a porta-power C-clamp to straighten the wings, and it moved them like hot butter.