Introduction

General Purpose bombs are heavy-cased bombs ranging in weight from 40 lb. to 4,000 lb. The smaller bombs are used mainly as anti-personnel bombs, while the larger ones are used for general bombardment purposes.

The earlier marks of these bombs are fitted with central tubes to take the explodering components, but later marks are fitted with exploder containers at the nose end, or at the nose and tail ends. Bombs with central tubes or with exploder containers at each end may be fuzed at both ends, or at either end, depending on the operational requirements. Bombs fuzed at the nose only are fitted with instantaneous detonators, while bombs fu-zed at the tail are usually fitted with delay detonators. If bombs are fuzed at both the nose and the tail with instantaneous detonators, the nose assembly will function first, on account of the direct action of the nose pistol. The general practice is to ship G.P. bombs with a tail pistol in place, but without detonators, altering the fuzing as may be desired prior to loading the bombs on the plane.

G.P. bombs are generally streamlined in shape, cast in one piece, and have a male base plate. To facilitate handling in storage and shipment, the bombs have a transit base of the same diameter as the maximum diameter of the bomb. Before using, bombs under 1,000 lb. are equipped with a tail unit that clips in place. Bombs of 1,000 lb. and over employ a tail unit which is secured by wing bolts.

TNT, Amatol, and RDX/TNT are the explosives commonly employed as main fillings to give a charge/weight ratio of approximately thirty per cent.

G.P. bombs are painted dark green over-all and have a ½-in. red band at the nose, and a 1-in. light green band on which the type of filling is stencilled.