Talk:Ricochet firing

no citations!

no citations! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.206.212.40 (talk) 23:35, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Clarify, please

As a non-artillerist, I can’t quite visualise the trajectory described. How can a low-angle shot, skipping across the ground, clear the outer parapet? Could we start with an entry-level explanation of this tactic? Valetude (talk) 13:06, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

There are several distinct uses of ricochet fires, used for different purposes. (A summary:)

Against shipping, flat fire with high charges gives low apex heights, an initially straight path (perhaps deflecting if there is a cross ripple, especially at longer range when the shot is essentially rolling) - from a first graze at 300-600yds the ricochet can travel to some 2900 yds with sufficient force and low enough trajectory height to endanger ship's boats and other small vessels, but lacks the ability to penetrate ship sides beyond around 1200 yds - this is still rather more than 90% of the 'direct' penetration and requires far less precision in range finding and pointing to obtain good practice, only requiring a reasonably smooth sea. (extreme ranges, where the shot is barely rising are more effected by small ripples and low waves than the first few (and the most effective) grazes).

In the field, gun fire with flat trajectory or slight elevation allows the shot to rise and bound at or below the height of troops, giving a long danger space, rather than the relatively short space of direct fires at a higher elevation to similar ranges - it tends to extinguish shell fuses, but is used for case and grape, as well as for longer ranged fires with shot. A 1 degree elevation (typical of a gun's line of metal) is excellent for getting a useful roll-schuss. No meaningful penetration is required to give useful effect, and any 'touch' by shot is potentially incapacitating (with specific instructions to not attempt to stop slow rolling shot with feet, as the dense iron shot will amputate feet with deceptively low velocities).

In siege the fire is elevated, to somewhere between 3-8 degrees, and fired with reduced powder charges, seeking to bring the shot over the parapet with minimal excess height, falling steeply enough to strike the platform on which artillery was mounted as close behind the parapet as feasible and with an angle of fall less than 10 degrees, and bounding along the platform, striking crews and carriages/guns on the way with a reasonable probability. The battery for ricochet fire is set off to the 'flank' of the targeted wall, and the ricochet 'along' the wall can endanger any of the guns sited there. A similar use of the guns sited to fire en-battery for the breach (directly in front of the targeted wall) allows fires to be directed to the base of the intended breach, just passing over the terreplain (which covers the wall from high velocity direct fires). This type of ricochet fire requires a fairly high level of knowledge of the piece and it's trajectory - though this can be by adjustment of fire, as well as by calculation, and 'incorrect' calculations can be adjusted to bring the battery into effect - but the degree of accuracy obtainable by the Napoleonic period was ample for good practice. Fires tend to be made from around 600-700 yds, just sufficient to be outside the point en blanc range of defending guns, and from constructed batteries with embrasures - with ricochet fire, the additional elevation can allow fire from full defilade, protecting the ricochet battery from observation and fire. 2A00:23C7:9390:FF01:CC80:C95B:EEBF:F9 (talk) 21:00, 3 July 2022 (UTC)