weighing loads in 18th century?

[BrownBear]

Or, it might have been a brain fart. :redface:

Those things have a bad habit of sneaking out just when you don't suspect it. :shocked2:

You must be lots younger than me. There comes a time when it's more the usual than the unusual!

Just wait! :rotf:

 

[Dean2]

No worries, like all farts, much easier to spot others than your own.

Old Guy goes to the doctor and says, Doc I have terrible gas, the only good thing is when I fart they don't make any sound nor do they stink. Doctor gives him some pills says come back in a few days. Comes back and says, man, I still have the gas but now they stink like hell. Doc says good, we have your nose working again, now we can work on your hearing. :grin:

 

[coloradoclyde]

I love Canadian humor.... :haha:

 

[RAEDWALD]

Just a warning to be careful interpreting old references to drams/drachms, ounces and so forth.

Gun powder used to often be weighed with apothecary units and not the avoirdupois system. 12 ounces to the pound is a major difference to 16.

Weighing used to be centred on the commonly available examples of coins which were of consistent weights and it was common commercial and personal practice to carry and use beam scales to weigh coins to check their authenticity so accurate weighing was a common practice as old as metal coinage. Arrow weights were still being quoted in silver UK coinage until the 1950's. Thus a 1 ounce (avoirdupois) arrow weighed 4/8d (four shillings and eight pence) in British new minted silver coin. Obviously different countries could express this in their own currency.

British Ordnance would refer to powder in pounds and the number of cartridges that units were expected to form from them. Thus '42 of a pound' or similar and pound etc. weighing was everyday for a grocer etc. To end as I began. Just beware what pound; to quote:'there being 7000 grains in the avoirdupois pound and 5760 grains in the apothecary pound and in the troy pound'.

For your homework; express a charge of 120 grains of powder in pennyweights, in droits and also in scruples.

 

[coloradoclyde]

I love the French too.... :haha:

 

[George]

Just a warning to be careful interpreting old references to drams/drachms, ounces and so forth.

Gun powder used to often be weighed with apothecary units and not the avoirdupois system.

A good example of that problem shows up in Cleator, An Essay on Shooting, 1789. He says, “For a fowling piece of a common caliber, which is from twenty-four [58 cal.] to thirty [54 cal.] balls to the pound weight; a dram and a quarter, or, at most, a dram and a half, of good powder; and an ounce, or an ounce and a quarter, of shot, is sufficient.”

Both the avoirdupois and apothecaries system were in use at that time, so there are two possibilities for his recommendation. In the avoirdupois system a dram is 27.34 grains, so it would be 34.2 or 41 grains. In the apothecary system a dram is 60 grains, so he would be recommending 75 or 90 grains. In our modern world the apothecary system is essentially no longer in use, the avoirdupois system is the main one, and the dram there is 27.34 grains. That's why we are familiar with 2 1/2 - 4 drams equivalent powder in our shot shells.

Spence

 

[Dean2]

That is an excellent point, and in addition weights varied from country to country. Given the differences in guns, weighing systems and powder quality I can't imagine anyone today trying to use old recorded loadings of any type but probably doesn't hurt to provide the warning.