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Interesting 1917 Tripod info

3K views 9 replies 5 participants last post by  Gatekeeper 
#1 ·
In looking through a friends TM and FM library I found reference to a base that attaches to the feet of the 1917 tripod. Has anyone ever heard of these? What about seeing a actual one if so?

In the future I will provide some more details since I did not have the time to collect the info on them but I did find the drawing numbers for the bases.
 
#2 ·
are you referring to the stabilizing leg that clamps to one of the legs
 
#4 ·
he is referring to what I call spoons for the feet. It was something developed for the 1919 tank guns tripod when they were developing the 1919a2 cavalry gun. In the case of the cav gun they rivetted the dish shaped feet to the tank gun tripod feet to get a bigger more stable foot print. These apparrantly were intended as attach as necessary for stability but the interesting thing is the cradle appears to be the 1917 commercial/28 Argentine, but pod appears to be a 1917a1 (traverse adjust was eliminated from the head,in the drawings. Its a really cool accessory havent heard of before, may have been something experimented with and discarded. I cannot get a good enough look at what Ali sent me to tell if pod is actually a 1917 commercial pod. Its an exciting drawing because it may have some more clues to devlopment of the 17a1 pod.

EDIT: IIRC thought I saw a reference to 1933 somewhere on this so ordnance may have been experimenting on better designs, tThese eventually will influence the feet design of the M2 tripod feet
 
#5 ·
I've never actually seen one in the flesh but they did exist as an item of issue for Cavalry. They were intended to help the M1917 tripod in soft soil.

The best reference I've seen on this part is a January, 1937 Rock Island pub titled "Notes on the Pack Equipment Cal. .30 and Cal. .50". My copy came from a scrounging and xeroxing session in the basement of the RIA Museum about 20 years ago so Gatekeeper should be able to come up with more details from it. The only scan readily at hand is this one:

Text Diagram Technical drawing Design Font


The drawing is dated 1931. Another in the book shows the plates chained to the feet of an M1917 tripod with this note: "Plates, base, tripod, M1917 are accessories to the M1917 tripod. They are carried seperately from the tripod and are used only when conditions of terrain make such use necessary. (Authority: Memo, Tech. Staff, April 22, 1933)"

A little further digging produced drawing C60879, dated April 10, 1935 for "Case, steam condensing device and tripod base plates". This canvas case had the vertical snap hooks like early versions of the normal round-bottom steam condensing device case, but was more of squared, boxy design.

At least two sets of feet exist somewhere as Bob Landies had them about 15-20 years ago when he sold the collection of Larry "Smitty" Smith. Smitty had two new-in-the-crate M1917A1 tripods dated 1938 or 1939, and these feet/plates were included in the crates. IIRC, they came from a Navy or USMC surplus source originally. No idea where they wound up, unfortunately.
 
#7 ·
I for one would like to see the other sub drawings on this. I suspect that the top view is the rear foot and the side view of the front foot plate. The subassembly drawings will give clues to the rest of it. These can be frustrating because they tend to be visual representations of what ordnance wanted them to look like but they are commonly not scaled uniformly.I suspect from the pin being shown on top of the one plate that the plate is dished upwards into those two torpedo shapes. Be curious if they put tank gun tripod style spikes on them (how they finished the bottom
 
#9 · (Edited)
Early Steam Condensing Device Case Drawing

Here is a drawing I already have digitized for a steam condensing device case but it isn't the C60879 drawing. This drawing was then converted to C59762. I may have both C drawings. Just haven't found them yet.




This drawing is for a steam condensing device for the M1917 BMG.



When I get the time, I will look for the other C drawings mentioned above.
 
#10 ·
Steam Condensing Device Case and tripod Base Plates

I found C60879 which is titled "Case, Steam Condensing Device and Tripod Base Plates" and is dated April 8, 1935 ( I think, the date is hard to read). The drawing pertains to the "Pack Outfit for BMG Cal. .30 M1917".



The other drawing, C59762 is just a later version of what I previously posted and pertains to a Pack Outfit for Auto Machine Gun, M1919. This drawing is dated June 1, 1934.



Not sure if this is helpful or not but I said I'd look for the drawings so here they are.

Gatekeeper
 
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