vincent Brannigan wrote in message ...
Keith Willshaw wrote:


The napoleon was a smoothbore and its production involved
much less boring and turning than a rifle

The true comparison is between an iron
smoothbore and a napoleon. The columbiads
while admittedly larger than the napoleons
were also smoothbores

I agree that rifling adds to cost, but not that much. The cost of boring
(drill the main center tube) and turnign (trunnions) is the same. Bronz if
anything is cheaper to bore and turn than iron.

Rifling costs nothing. It's knowing the pitch of the
rifling that costs a fortune. Which is why
smoothbores still do what they've always done on
the battlefield. Which is die in numbers too large
to fit in New York City, or Gettysburg. So we
have are forced to open new cemetaries in Washington, D.C.





Vince