welty@lewis.crd.ge.com (richard welty) (07/20/89)
From: welty@lewis.crd.ge.com (richard welty) i recently got a chance to visit the museum on the grounds of the Watervliet Arsenal (in Watervliet, New York, a few miles north of Albany NY just off I-787.) For those who are unaware of it, the Arsenal has been making guns for the armed forces of the US since the early 1800s, and currently makes all the large guns for the US Army, as well as handling relining of the 16 inch gun barrels of the Iowa Class BBs (9 of the 16 inch Mk 7s were originally made at the Arsenal.) the Museum is located in an unusual early prefabricated building, the `cast iron' building (which is itself on the national registry of historic places. the arsenal grounds as a whole, and the `big gun' shop are also independently in the registry. the original erie canal passed through the arsenal grounds, although this section of it has long since been filled in.) lots of pieces have been squirreled away at the Arsenal over the years (the Arsenal also provides storage for many of the Army's guns), and the Museum staff has been actively collecting historic guns from other services and nations over the years. the collection includes pieces dating back several hundred years, and one member of the museum staff has been working on a large collection of various breech loaders in order to show the evolution of breech design. in addition, there are a number of experimental guns on display which, for various reasons, never reached production. there is an extensive display on recoiless rifles, and one of the pieces from the 50s designed to launch a nuclear shell. on display outside of the museum are three large naval guns -- a 8 inch gun of the type used on WWII-built heavy cruisers; a 12 inch of the type used on Alaska and Hawaii; and a 16 inch Mk. 6 (45 caliber) of the type used on the North Carolina and South Dakota Class BBs. the 12'' and 16'' guns were built at the Arsenal, and are in excellent condition; the 8'' gun was built by joe random steel corporation, and is pretty beat (Allison (my friend who works at the Arsenal) took great care to point this out to me when we looked at the barrels.) one interesting point i picked up was that very large numbers of 16 inch guns were built by the Arsenal for use by the Army in coast defense batteries; and that many 16 inch guns built originally for the Navy were transfered to the Army in WWII for shore defense use (this may well have included the 16 inch Mk 2s which were originally going to go on the Iowa class BBs, but which proved to have too great a diameter for the turret.) one question which the museum staff is interested in finding the answer to -- does anyone know if any of the 16'' shore defense batteries ever fired at a real enemy during WWII? they can find no evidence that the batteries ever saw such usage (Ft. Drum in the Phillipines may have been active, but my recollection is that Ft. Drum only had 12'' guns emplaced.) The Arsenal Museum is open from 10am to 3pm, monday through friday. technically, cameras are not permitted on the Arsenal grounds, but apparently they'll let you take them into the Museum (just don't blatently wave a camera around.) to get to the Arsenal from I-787: take the exit for NY 378 West. almost immediately, take the exit ramp to NY 32. at the bottom of the ramp, go right onto NY 32 north (Broadway.) continue north for a little bit, passing the Schyler bakery (named after General Philip Schyler, no doubt -- good donuts) (this stretch of road is heavily speed trapped, and has an artificially low speed limit, by the way), eventually reaching the South Gate of the Arsenal. if the South gate is closed, then continue on NY 32 to the Main Gate on the East side of the Arsenal grounds. In any case, tell the guards you are going to the Museum, and they'll give you a pink pass. richard -- richard welty welty@lewis.crd.ge.com 518-387-6346, GE R&D, K1-5C39, Niskayuna, New York Officer: Do you know how fast you were going? Driver: No. The speedometer only goes up to 85