Bulgarian minethrower ?

[MCP]

I read that Bulgaria invented a 70mm minethrower before Balkan War.
AFIK it was not produced due to some technical faults, but the list of Bulgarian weapons at the beginning of WW1 shows 30 бомбохвъргачки, that may be these minethrowers.

Has anybody further informations about this weapons, its technical datas, its use and if possible, a picture of it?

Thanks

[Dinain]

By "minethrower", do you mean "mortar"? I believe there's a slight difference between the concept of the two.
If you do, it's very possible that "бомбохвъргачки" in your data refers to them.
By the way, I've heard that the bulgarian infantry in WWI (and perhaps others too) practiced a granade(or bomb)-throwing method, consisting of some kind of improvised slingshot. However, such devices probably would not be mentioned in an archive.

[dibo]

Yes, I also often wondered what are those Бомбохвъргачки. Once I thought these are Rifle Grenade Launchers, but nowadays I'm not sure.

[Dinain]

Could they be some kind of "regular" artillery, like heavy siege cannons or something of that kind?

[MCP]

By "minethrower", do you mean "mortar"? I believe there's a slight difference between the concept of the two.
If you do, it's very possible that "бомбохвъргачки" in your data refers to them.

Excuse me for the inaccurancy, but usually I read a text in Bulgarian, I think about it in Italian and I express my opinion in English, passing sometimes by German). So I'm often a bit confused. :o

According with the usual use of the terms in Bulgaria sources I can read, I think that :
минохвъргачка = Minenwerfer = Mortar = Mortaio
гранохвъргачка = Granatwerfer = grenade launcher = Lanciamine
бомбохвъргачка = Bombenwerfer = mine thrower or mine launcher = Lanciabombe

I'm not sure of the effective difference between the two English terms, but usually both Lanciamine/Granatwerfer and Lanciabombe/Bombenwerfer mean light infantry weapons usually with barrel not rifled and sometimes improvised by the soldiers themselves.

I think the Bulgarian бомбохвъргачка is a sort of Granatwerfer. It was designed also гранохвъргачка and мортирка.

The data I have are:
Calibre : 70mm
Lenght of the barrel : 75cm
Range : 150/460m
The barrel was in sheet (ламаринена). It fired spherical bombs called бомбит, that I think were the "Macedonia" hand granades, but I'm not sure.
The barrel used the breechblock of the Berdan rifle.

[Dinain]

So it's clear now. It was just a suggestion and it's obviously not slingshot, but a weapon with a barrel

[MCP]

According with A.RICCHETTI, La guerra nella penisola balcanica, Torino 1915, page 122 during the siege of Odrin in March 1913 "many men from infantry units had handgrenades that they threw with their hands at a distance of 25 metres or with a little mine thrower built with component of Berdan rifle at a distance of 300 metres".

On the basis of this description, it seems that the "Bulgarian minethrower" built after the Balkan War was used during the war against Turkey.

[Гост]

.... or with a little mine thrower built with component of Berdan rifle at a distance of 300 metres".

...........

[MCP]

Really many thanks for the picture.

[nag]

An old picture...a decade later

[nag]

And the manual of the " ръчната бомбова мортирка " ....