Detonator?

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Aaron Brooks Wolters

Aaron Brooks Wolters

Brigadier General
16,554
2,428
Jul 28, 2007
Abingdon, VA.
Ok, I work in a auto restoration shop located on a farm. The land owner was mowing hay Friday and ran over this before he saw it. To me, it looks like a detonator, but as to what type of ordinance it attaches to, I have absolutely no clue. And I may be wrong about the detonator bit to. I would like to know what it is and what it goes on. It still had the plastic plug in the open end and you could see eight electrical pins with letters and numbers beside them up inside the piece. And it is about 10" in height and 2.5" in diameter. So, with out further delay, here are some photos. Oh, and Homeland security now has the piece in question.
 

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Just had a quick look at it after getting back from the sewing class ... ok, the pub. But it doesn't look like explosive ordnance. More like a plastic, or ceramic, cap to a shell, with the 'barrel' and associated screw threads being the part which fits into the round itself. The green coloured cap indicates practice round and, even if a 'live' round, should be inert - the bit which goes noisy would be at the opposite end.
 
All the inert or practice fuzes i've seen has inert stamped on them.

That can on the bottom is the booster charge. Enough explosive in there to blow up a room. That sets off the main charge. When They're inert, they have holes in them, and I don't see any holes, but there's only 2 pictures.
 
Seems to be a small hole of sorts in that top pic Tom (must be a different size though or you would have recognised it i guess)

Great find Aaron, hope the HS people give it back if she's a dud!
 
All the inert ordinance i've seen is well marked as inert, several places, holes drilled through the explosive parts, etc.
I've seen dummy fuzes, just obvious solid inert pieces of metal, but still marked with nose to tail, dummy markings all around the circumfrence.

Except for what might have been a hole in the booster, i'm not so sure that fuze was inert.

Practice rounds won't have a charge in the main body of the shell, but they will have a charge of some sort, so you can easily see where the shot lands.
 
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It's empty guys. You can look in the bottom of it if you take the plastic plug out and see eight electrical pins on the bottom of the green cone. Each with a number or letter beside them. I was thinking more of an altitude arming device to arm the bomb once off the deck be it airstrip or flight deck, but here again, I am just guessing. I know absolutely nothing about these things. And Joe, we had the boss in the back room of the shop trying to break it open in the twenty ton press.:lol:
 
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