![war of rights artillery war of rights artillery](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/war-of-rights/images/5/52/War_of_Rights_weapons_(1).gif)
All British fuzes were prepared by cutting to length or boring into the bottom from below. At this time fuzes were used with shrapnel, common shell (filled with explosive) and grenades. However, in 1829 metal fuzes were adopted by the Royal Navy instead of wooden ones. For example, seven different fuses were used with spherical cased shot until 1850. There was little standardisation, well into the 19th century, in British service, virtually every calibre had its own time fuze. A British naval percussion fuze made of metal did not appear until 1861. The match was ignited by propellant flash and the shear wire broke on impact. It was a wooden fuze some 6 inches long and used shear wire to hold blocks between the fuze magazine and a burning match. However, in 1846 the design by Quartermaster Freeburn of the Royal Artillery was adopted by the army. The concept of percussion fuzes was adopted by Britain in 1842, many designs were jointly examined by the army and navy, but were unsatisfactory, probably because of the safety and arming features. Progress was not possible until the discovery of mercury fulminate in 1800, leading to priming mixtures for small arms patented by the Rev Alexander Forsyth, and the copper percussion cap in 1818. The problem was finding a suitably stable ‘percussion powder’. The term ‘blind’ for an unexploded shell resulted. The problem was that the shell had to fall a particular way and with spherical shells this could not be guaranteed. The first account of a percussion fuze appears in 1650, using a flint to create sparks to ignite the powder. In 1779 the British adopted pre-cut fuze lengths giving 4, 4.5 and 5 seconds. Experience taught that there was a minimum safe length. At this time fuzes were made of beech wood, bored out and filled with powder and cut to the required length. This led, in 1747, to ‘single-fire’ and eliminated the need to light the fuze before loading the shell. It was not until around the middle of the following century that it was realised that the windage between ball and barrel allowed the flash from the propelling charge to pass around the shell. Before this the proofmaster often tested the burning time of powder by reciting the Apostles' Creed for time measurement. The problem was that precise burning times required precise time measurement and recording, which did not appear until 1672. These early time fuzes used a combustible material that burnt for a time before igniting the shell filling ( slow match). In 1596 Sebastian Halle proposed both igniting the bursting charge by percussion and regulating the burning time of fuzes, this was considered visionary and nothing much happened until 1682. Early reports of shells include Venetian use at Jadra in 1376 and shells with fuzes at the 1421 siege of St Boniface in Corsica. Solid cannonballs (“shot”) did not need a fuze, but hollow balls (“shells”) filled with something, such as gunpowder to fragment the ball hopefully on the target needed a time fuze. Therefore, the terms ‘percussion’ and ‘airburst’ are generally used here unless ‘time’ fuzes are being explicitly described. However, by the 18th century time fuzes were aimed to function in the air and in the 1940s proximity fuzes were introduced to achieve more precisely positioned airburst.
![war of rights artillery war of rights artillery](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/war-of-rights/images/f/fd/War_of_Rights_Colt_Army.jpg)
Munitions fuzes are also used with rockets, aircraft bombs, guided missiles, grenades and mines, and some direct fire cannon munitions (small calibre and tank guns).īroadly, fuzes function on impact (percussion fuzes) or at a pre-determined time period after firing (time fuzes).