"12lb Napoleon barrels" Topic

I've just purchased a battery of 12lb Napoleons. Do I paint the barrels black or bronze ?

Bronze.

Bronze

And they should shine. Artillery pieces were the army's pride and joy, and were polished even on campaign

What about other gun types? Like a parrot gun? What color for them?

Speaking of which, I saw a demo of a scale modeler using a brass acrylic paint for his tank ammo that could be buffed to a very high shine. Looked perfect for cannon. I believe it had wax in it? Anyone used anything like this?

What about other gun types? Like a parrot gun? What color for them?

The Parrott rifle barrel was cast iron with a wrought iron reinforcing band on the breech.

Bronze it is. thanks for the info.

The Parrotts and the 3" Ordinance Rifle would have black painted iron barrels. The Napoleons and the various 6, 12, and 24-lb guns and howitzers would have bronze barrels. Not sure about the "esoteric" Whitworths, etc.

Jim

I saw a 6 pound smooth bore at Fort Jay recently, tended by reenactors. It was highly polished bronze.

I paint mine gold, rather than bronze. Model bronze paints look way too coppery.

I paint mine shiney gold, like scomac's and others. Unlike scomac's, mine is 28mm.

Thanks all. I think I will see what I painted wrong and correct it. That picture is great.

I would agree bronze.

However, from 1863 Tredager Foundry in Richmond cast 12pdr Napolens in iron, so for late Confederate War in the east an occasional black Napoleon would be an option. I'm not sure how many were produced but I have seen two examples in recent visits. One at Tredager and one in the Petersburg National Park.

Smoothbore field guns were bronze (lighter than iron) and left unpainted. You see them on battlefield parks all oxidized to a light green, similar to the background of this page, but when kept clean and polished, they were a light golden color.

Most rifled field guns were iron (held the rifling better than bronze) and were painted black to prevent rust. The only bronze rifle that I know of was the 12-pounder James, which was just the 6-pounder smoothbore gun that had been rifled. It wasn't popular because the rifling in the bronze barrel soon wore smooth.

So the basic rule is: Rifles black, smoothbores bronze.

The Confederates cast 6pdrs and 12pdrs in iron. due to shortage of bronze..often iron guns had banded breaches.

I use brass paint.

I too use gold for bronze. I apply a super thin black wash to provide shading.

For the sake of quick identification on my wargame tabletop, I paint all smoothbore cannon barrels bronze, and all rifled cannon barrels black. It helps the game flow.

Whilst I accept that iron/steel artillery was painted black every winter to prevent rusting. It seems unlikely that any 19th century bituminous or oil based paint would last very long when exposed to the heat of being fired.

Similarly the black painted carriage fittings would be subject to heavy wear in use.

I reckon lots of bare metal appeared in each campaign season.

Paint was part of the battery wagon's load. They painted them far more than just once a year.

Bronze gun tubes were polished to maintain them. Iron gun tubes were painted black to avoid rust and deterioration.

I paint my artillery pieces with bronze barrels gold as it shows up better.

Rifled guns are black and smoothbore guns, like the 12lb Napoleon are painted bronze or brass.

The 'color' of the gun tube was based on the metal used to construct them, not what type they were.