Machine Guns and Cannons (Ground, Vehicle, and Aircraft Mounted Weapons)

[jcf]

Re. downward-firing Schrage-musik, I seem to recall reading about a project (possibly Japanese?) where a big aircraft (a medium bomber or transport, I think) had a massive array of rifle-calibre machine guns fitted in the belly, firing downwards. The idea being to fly over eg. a beach landing, and shooting up the troops getting off the landing craft...?

Mukade (centipede) was the Japanese concept and used cannon, from page 1 of thread:
http://www.whatifmodelers.com/index.php/topic,19887.msg227211.html#msg227211

[pyro-manic]

Aha. It's the 400 x 7.7mm machine guns that I remembered! For "anti-ship" use...

[jcf]

Probably safe to assume 'anti landing ship'.

[rickshaw]

Talking about massed MGs/Cannons, there is the Spanish Naval Meroka CIWS, which uses 12 x 20mm cannon, which fire in salvo to destroy incoming missiles.



There is also a ground mount version:

[jcf]

... a self-loading Mitrailleuse, Napoleon III's dream come true. 

[rickshaw]

... a self-loading Mitrailleuse, Napoleon III's dream come true. 

Reminds me more of the Nordenfeldt...

I've seen a drawing of it's in turret configuration and it's feed mechanism and barrel configuration are quite interesting.  The barrels actually start out quite widely spaced and are then are clamped together, having gentle curves to bring the muzzles to close parallel.  The feed mechanism feeds 12 rounds at a time, one to each barrel, top and bottom layer.

[DarrenP]

The F1's bayonet was the same as the L1a1's.  I am unsure whom had the bolt grooves first but it may be that the F1 did copy them from the Sterling (IIRC the Patchett didn't have them).

The Patchett did have the grooves according to what I was reading last night.

The Sterling bayonet was the SLR bayonet with a wider diameter ring on it. Looking at the way the bayonet attaches on the F1, I think they probably made it use the standard SLR one.

Sterling used the same bayonet as the number 5 lee enfield did it not?

[DarrenP]

there is of course "Metal storm" a multi barrelled weapon firing electronically multiple rounds

[rickshaw]

there is of course "Metal storm" a multi barrelled weapon firing electronically multiple rounds

Still very much a solution looking for a problem IMHO. 

Metal Storm represents some interesting ideas BUT they come with some considerable complications.  The use of multiple rounds in a barrel effectively means you either have to change barrels if you encounter a different sort of target or discard the first barrel, which is ultimately wasteful in resources (and possibly dangerous, what is there to stop your foe picking up the discarded barrel, still with rounds inside it, for his own use later on?).  A good example is if you have a grenade launcher with HE rounds in it and suddenly an AFV appears.  You need AP but you're stuck with HE - either you swap barrels or you fire the HE rounds and reload, both take more time than a convention grenade launcher.

Another is the multiple barrel weapons with their incredible rates of fire.  They don't seem to have taken into account the recoil from firing the theoretical million rounds a minute they claim it can achieve, as all their test weapons don't have any recoil mechanism and are simply staked into the ground and only fire light calibre rounds.  If they are going to be used on a ship, the ship's decks will need considerable reinforcing if the calibre is anything greater than rifle calibre.  That means any weight savings claimed are actually transferred to the ship from the weapon mounting.

Finally, something Metal Storm doesn't seem to address is the differences in accuracy and velocity each round in the barrel experiences to it's ballistics.  The first round has a shorter barrel length and a lower velocity than the last, so it's trajectory will be different.  Does the mount compensate for that?  If so, how with these tremendous rates of fire which are claimed?

[zenrat]

Was Schrage Musik only used on night fighters ?...

I recall reading something similar (but obviously firing downwards) for anti tank use.
Vertically mounted rockets in the rear fuselage of (IIRC) an Hs-129 that were triggered automatically when the plane flew over a large metal object like a tank.

One of the systems was the SG113, shown on page 1 of the thread:
http://www.whatifmodelers.com/index.php/topic,19887.msg227217.html#msg227217

There were similar multi-barrel systems using 30mm MK108 rounds for air-to-air (forward or vertical firing)
and air-to-ground.

That's the one.  Thanks Jon.

[jcf]

Necro-thread.
About summa them Nazzie era aircraft MG and MK designations.

MG81 - 8mm caliber, first of type, MG "eight"-"one".
MG131 - 13mm caliber, first of type, MG "thirteen"-"one".
MG151 - 15mm caliber, first of type, MG "fifteen"-"one".
MG151/20 - caliber increased to 20mm, MG "fifteen"-"one"-"twenty".

Cannon, official policy as of May 1942:
MK1XX - Rheinmetall Borsig
MK2XX - Mauser
MK3XX - Krieghoff
MK4XX - Krupp
As to the assignment of the rest of the numerals in the designator, still trying to find how it
was done, a master list like RLM 8-? or ??

Then, of course, being German, you have the Mauser MG215, 15mm aircraft
machine gun. Ok 2 for Mauser, 15 for caliber, which sort of futzes with the
former pattern. MG215/20 is the MG215 increased to 20mm, which does track
with the MG151/20 and other cases of a change in caliber to an existing design.

[Mossie]

Worth re-igniting this thread. 

Here's one that didn't get mentioned before, Green Mace. Monster anti-aircraft gun developed in Britain. The prototype in the pictures had a 4in gun, production machines would have been even larger with a 5in gun. It was just about mobile at 28 tons. It had a rate of fire of 96 rounds per minute, with two magazines of 14 rounds which would take 18 seconds to empty. Rounds were fin stabilised.

Pretty awesome, but design problems were many and development was prolonged. It took heavy flak to its zenith as aircraft got faster and guided weapon development overtook it.

You cannot view this attachment.

You cannot view this attachment.

[PR19_Kit]

Good heavens, there was one of those parked on a plinth near one of the workshops when I was at Fort Halstead in the 80-90s. I always wondered what it was and no-one who worked there either knew or would tell me, they just called it 'The Gun', which was weird as the whole place was wall-to-wall guns!

I'm not sure that it had all its wheels though, I could only remember seeing four of them. Was there a smaller version too?

[PR19_Kit]

[Later] A bit of googling tells me there was a smaller, 4 wheel version, called a Fixed Mace, or similar.



That looks a bit more like the one I saw at FH.

[Mossie]

Yep, Fixed Mace was a proof of concept, it only moved in elevation, not traverse (hence 'fixed').