Editing Carronade (section)

===Theory of design===

[[File:T3- d423 - Fig. 300. — Caronade de 30 de l’artillerie de la marine française.png|thumb|right|A cross-section diagram of a carronade, from a 1869 French book]]The advantages for merchant ships are described in an advertising pamphlet of 1779.<ref name="description1">. An Attempt to improve the Method of Arming Trading Vessels. With a description of the carronade, and some hints concerning shot. The third edition Falkirk, 1779.</ref> Production of both shot and gun by the same firm immediately allowed a reduction in the windage, the gap between the bore of the gun and the diameter of the ball. The smaller gunpowder charge reduced the barrel heating in action, and reduced the recoil. The mounting, attached to the side of the ship on a pivot, took the recoil on a slider, without altering the alignment of the gun. The pamphlet advocated the use of woollen cartridges, which eliminated the need for [[wadding]] and [[Worm (artillery)|worm]]ing, although they were more expensive.{{Citation needed|date=March 2021}}

Simplifying gunnery for comparatively untrained merchant seamen in both aiming and reloading was part of the rationale for the gun. The replacement of [[trunnion]]s by a bolt underneath, to connect the gun to the mounting, reduced the width of the carriage enhancing the wide angle of fire. A merchant ship would almost always be running away from an enemy, so a wide angle of fire was much more important than on a warship. A carronade weighed a quarter as much and used a quarter to a third of the gunpowder charge as a long gun firing the same cannonball.<ref>p 84 J. Guillmartin "Ballistics in the Black Powder era" p 73-98 in ROYAL ARMOURIES CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS.; British naval armament 1600–1900; London, 1987; Nov, 1989,</ref>

The reduced charge allowed carronades to have a shorter length and much lighter weight than long guns. Increasing the size of the bore and ball reduces the required length of barrel. The force acting on the ball is proportional to the square of the diameter, while the mass of the ball rises by the cube, so acceleration is slower; thus, the barrel can be shorter and therefore lighter. Long guns were also much heavier than carronades because they were over-specified to be capable of being double-shotted, whereas it was dangerous to do this in a carronade. A ship could carry more carronades, or carronades of a larger caliber, than long guns, and carronades could be mounted on the upper decks, where heavy long guns could cause the ship to be top-heavy and unstable. Carronades also required a smaller gun crew, which was very important for merchant ships, and they were faster to reload.{{Citation needed|date=March 2021}}