The FReeper Foxhole Revisits our Study of Flamethrowers - February 4th, 2005

see educational sources

[snippy_about_it]

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How Flamethrowers Work


Although other nations deployed flame throwers in WWI the US only began in WWII. The M2-2 and close variants, shown in this photo, were also used in the Korean War.

The napalm-gasoline fuel was propelled by a gas system of pressurized nitrogen, flow rate controlled by the rear hand grip. Leaving the nozzle the fuel was spark-lit by a battery-powered pyrotechnic ignition system controlled by the trigger in the front hand grip.


Radio Hill, Wolmi-Do, 9/15/50 Marine burns out North Korean weapons emplacement

By World War II, forces on both sides used a range of flamethrower weapons on the battlefield. The most impressive innovation was the handheld flamethrower. This long, gun-type weapon has an attached fuel tank that soldiers can carry on their back.

The backpack contains three cylinder tanks. The two outside tanks hold a flammable, oil-based liquid fuel, similar to the material used to make Greek fire. The tanks have screw-on caps, so they can be refilled easily. The middle tank holds a flammable, compressed gas (such as butane). This tank feeds gas through a pressure regulator to two connected tubes.

Link to diagram of flamethrower
Be sure to follow mouse click instructions at the bottom of the graphic to make the flamethrower work!

One tube leads to the ignition system in the gun. The other tube leads to the two side fuel tanks, letting the compressed gas into the open area above the flammable liquid. The compressed gas applies a great deal of downward pressure on the fuel, driving it out of the tanks, through a connected hose, into a reservoir in the gun.

The gun housing has a long rod running through it, with a valve plug on the end. A spring at the back of the gun pushes the rod forward, pressing the plug into a valve seat. This keeps the fuel from flowing out through the gun nozzle when the trigger lever is released.

When the operator squeezes the trigger lever, it pulls the rod (and the attached plug) backward. With the valve open, the pressurized fuel can flow through the nozzle. Some flamethrowers can shoot a fuel stream as far as 50 yards (46 meters).

As it exits the nozzle, the fuel flows past the ignition system. Over the years, there have been a variety of ignition systems used in flamethrowers. One of the simpler systems was a coil of high-resistance wire. When electrical current passed through these wires, they released a lot of heat, warming the fuel to the combustion point.

When the ignition valve is open, compressed flammable gas from the middle cylinder tank on the backpack flows through a long length of hose to the end of the gun. Here it is mixed with air and released through several small holes into the chamber in front of the nozzle.

The gun also has two spark plugs positioned in front of the nozzle, which are powered by a portable battery. To prepare the gun, the operator opens the ignition valve and presses a button that activates the spark plug. This creates a small flame in front of the nozzle, which ignites the flowing fuel, creating the fire stream.

In World Wars I and II, as well as in the Vietnam war, similar flamethrower designs were mounted on tanks.


German Panzer

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Today's Educational Sources and suggestions for further reading:

www.diggerhistory.info/
www.stormpages.com/ The FReeper Foxhole Studies Flamethrowers - November 28th, 2003

[snippy_about_it]

............

To the Marines on the ground during the battle for Iwo Jima in February 1945, the Sherman M4A3 medium tank equipped with the Navy Mark I flamethrower was the best thing going. The Marines had come a long way in the tactical use of fire in the 15 months since Tarawa, when only a handful of backpack flamethrowers were available to combat the island's hundreds of fortifications.

The Iwo Jima landing force still relied on portable flamethrowers, but many Marines saw the value of going one step further and marrying the technology with armored vehicles.



In the Mariana Islands in 1944, the Marines modified M3A1 light tanks with the Canadian Ronson flame system to good effect; the problems came instead from the vulnerability of the small vehicles. At Peleliu, the 1st Marine Division mounted the improvised Mark I system on a thin-skinned LVT-4; again, vehicle vulnerability limited the system's effectiveness. The solution seemed to lie in mounting the flamethrower on a medium tank.



The first modification to Sherman tanks involved the installation of the small E4-5 mechanized flamethrower in place of the bow machine gun. This was only a marginal improvement; the system's short range, modest fuel supply and awkward aiming process hardly offset the loss of the machine gun. Even so, each of the three battalions employed E-4-5-equipped Shermans during the battle for Iwo Jima. The best solution came from an unlikely joint task force of Navy Seabees, Army chemical-warfare service technicians and Marine tankers in Hawaii.

According to Lt. Col. William R. Collins, commander of the 5th Tank Battalion, this inspired group modified the Mark I flame thrower to operate from within the Sherman's turret, replacing the 75mm main gun with a look-alike launch tube. The modified system could then be trained and pointed like a conventional turret gun. Unfortunately, the ad hoc modification team had only sufficient time and components to modify eight M4A3 tanks with the Mark I flame system; four each went to the 4th and 5th Tank Battalions. The 3rd Tank Battalion, then in Guam, received neither the M4A3 Shermans nor the field modifications in time for Iwo Jima, although a number of their A2 tanks had the bow-mounted E4-5 system.



The eight modified Sherman flame tanks proved ideal against Iwo Jima's rugged caves and concrete fortifications. The Japanese feared this weapon greatly; time and time again suicide squads of "human bullets" would assail the flamethrowing tanks directly, only to be shot down by Marine riflemen or scorched by the main weapon.



Enemy fire and the rough terrain took their toll on the eight flame tanks, but maintenance crews worked around the clock to keep them running. In the words of Capt. Frank C. Caldwell, a company commander with the 26th Marines: "In my view, it was the flame tank more than any other supporting arm that won this battle." Demands for the flame tanks never diminished.

Late in the battle for Iwo Jima, as the 5th Marine Division cornered the last Japanese defenders,the 5th Tank Battalion expended 10,000 gallons of napalm-thickened fuel per day. The division's final action report stated that the flame tank was "the one weapon that caused the [Japanese] to leave their caves and rock crevices and run."

Fuel hose stretches up hill

Tanks advance up hill

Flame hits hill

Burned out Japanese survivor

Enemy position burned out

[snippy_about_it]

...........


A U.S. Navy "Zippo" flamethrower

The unreliability of electronic ignition systems meant that operators sometimes had to use a Zippo lighter to ignite the fuel as it left the nozzle.


Vietnam

[snippy_about_it]

"FALL IN" to the FReeper Foxhole!



It's Friday. Good Morning Everyone.

If you want to be added to our ping list, let us know.

If you'd like to drop us a note you can write to:

The Foxhole
19093 S. Beavercreek Rd. #188
Oregon City, OR 97045

[Iris7]

Ah, Snippy, you are a woman after my own heart.

I think there is a place for a well armored flamethrower tank in modern urban combat. Combined with a 10" squash head projectile from a low pressure gun, perhaps on another vehicle, able to deal with thick concrete out to three hundred yards or so. Say, a three hundred pound projectile. A bit like a 10" mortar on a gun carriage.

[Aeronaut]

Good morning Snippy.

[Grzegorz 246]

Germans in Stalingrad.

[Grzegorz 246]

"I think there is a place for a well armored flamethrower tank in modern urban combat."

I agree, generally urban combat became very important. Israelis built some strange vehicles well prepared for urban combat using captured T-54's and T-55's. Russians did something similar and built BTR-T, also new German IFV will be good in urban battles. they should be equipped in flamethrowers, 40 mm grenade launchers etc.

[E.G.C.]

Good morning, snippy and everyone at the Foxhole.

[SAMWolf]

Good Morning Snippy.

[SAMWolf]

Not much around that's be better for clearing out a nest of terrorists. They worked pretty well at clearing out Japanese troops hiding in caves in WWII.

[SAMWolf]

Morning Aeronaut.

[SAMWolf]

Morning Grzegorz 246

[SAMWolf]

Morning E.G.C.

We had a fast temperature drop last night. Caught a lot of people not ready for it. (Well, ok, it was probably just me, teach me not to have a coat handy this time of year.)

[The Mayor]

February 4, 2005

The Obedience Factor

Read:
Matthew 3:13-17

Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. -Matthew 3:15

Bible In One Year: Exodus 25-27

Dewey VanderVelde refused to be baptized. He steadfastly resisted, even when his wife and daughters were baptized one Sunday afternoon.

Years later, his pastor preached on the baptism of Jesus. He pointed out that John the Baptist initially refused to baptize Jesus, but Jesus said, "It is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness" (Matthew 3:15). The pastor then added this comment: "If Jesus obeyed the will of the Father, so should we."

After the message, Dewey asked to be baptized. He said that he should have obeyed the Lord's command much sooner, and he regretted having been so stubborn.

The issue, of course, was more than just baptism; it was obedience. The same may be true for us. We may be stubbornly disobeying the Lord in a certain area of our life-lying, cheating, stealing at work, not giving to the Lord.

Here's what we must face: Jesus obeyed the Father in everything. His submission took Him from the height of popularity to abandonment. It took Him from public adoration to solitary suffering. It took Him to Pilate's judgment hall, the terrible road to Calvary, the cross, and the tomb.

Let it be today that we willingly decide to obey the Lord in everything. -Dave Egner

O give us strength to quench the urge
To do things our own way;
And help us, Lord, to heed Your Word,
Its precepts to obey. -Sper

True faith will obey without delay.

FOR FURTHER STUDY
What Does It Take To Follow Christ?

[SAMWolf]

Think for a moment about the concept of the flamethrower.

Okay? The flamethrower. Because we have them.

Well, *we* don't have them, the army has them. That's right. We don't have any flamethrowers.

I'd say we're screwed if we have to go up against the army, wouldn't you?

But we have flamethrowers. And what this indicates to me, it means that at some point, some person said to himself, "Gee, I sure would like to set those people on fire over there. But I'm way to far away to get the job done. If only I had something that would throw flame on them."

Well, it might have ended right there, but he mentioned it to his friend.

His friend who was good with tools.

And about a month later, he was back. "Hey, quite a concept!" WHHOOOOOOOOSSHHH!

And of course the army heard about it, and they came around. "We'd like to buy about five hundred-thousand of them please. We have some people we'd like to throw flame on. Give us five hundred thousand and paint them dark brown.

We don't want anyone to see them."

George Carlin

[SAMWolf]

Morning Mayor.

[The Mayor]

Morning Sam, not getting much sleep lately are you..

Flame throwers have always amazed me.
I have a roofing torch that is like a miniature one.
I pick off bees flying around me in the summer.
I melted my sneaker this summer, I jumped around with a real hot foot.

[E.G.C.]

Good morning, folks.

Folks, I want to let you know that Microsoft is planning to release, get this, NINE critical updates for Windows on Tuesday. This many be a lgenthy download so you might want to prepare for that.

Weather's been nice yesterday. forecast high lower 50's. rain in the forecast for tommorow.

How's it going, Snippy?

[GailA]

Good morning. Coffee's on