The manufacture of carriages for the 75's produced concrete results, as our factories here were turning them out for us at the rate of 393 per month when the fighting ceased, and our contract plants in France were making 171 per month. In all we received from American factories 1,221 carriages. At the rate of increase we would have been building 800 carriages per month by February, 1919.
It may be said we were thoroughly impressed with the difficulties attached to the transplanting to this country of the manufacture of French 75-millimeter recuperators. It was a question whether this device could possibly be built by any except the French mechanics trained by long years in its production. At first it seemed that we could secure no manufacturer at all who would be willing to assume such a burden. Not until February, 1918, were complete drawings and specifications of the recuperator received from France. At length the Singer Manufacturing Co., builders of sewing machines, consented to take up this new work, and on March 29 the company contracted to produce 2,500 recoil systems for the 75-millimeter gun carriages. In April, 1918, the Rock Island Arsenal was instructed to turn out 1,000 of these recuperators.
TWO VIEWS OF THE FRENCH 75-MILLIMETER GUN.
This type of gun has been used by the French Army since 1897, and was the gun most used by the Allies in the Great War. This gun throws a shell weighing 12.3 pounds a distance of 8,400 meters or shrapnel weighing 16 pounds a distance of 9,000 meters. The weight of the gun and carriage is 2,657 pounds. The service muzzle velocity of the shell is 1,805 feet per second, while for shrapnel it is 1,755 feet per second.
THE 75-MILLIMETER FIELD GUN, MODEL 1917 (BRITISH).
This gun throws a shell weighing 12.3 pounds a distance of 8,300 meters, and 16 pounds of shrapnel a distance of 8,900 meters. The weight of the gun and carriage is 2,887 pounds. Its muzzle velocity for shell is 1,750 feet a second and for shrapnel 1,680 feet a second.