Aircraft Spead and the interecept...

[mdiehl]

A 30mm hispano hit cuts a Spit in half. So what? .50 cal cut plenty of Axis aircraft in half. The one-off example is apropos nothing other than the fact that any weapon has to hit something important to get a kill... unless you're using heavy caliber flak.

Same sort of comment applies to the cited quote. "Armor" "fairly effective." So what? Not in general effective enough. Equally apropos the observation that Allied amor was "fairly effective" against 20mm and even 30mm. (I've read several instances of P40s in the CBI area taking Japanese 30mm shell hits to the seat armor and bringing the pilot and plane back intact).

[Brady]

" 30mm hispano hit cuts a Spit in half. So what? .50 cal cut plenty of Axis aircraft in half. The one-off example is apropos nothing other than the fact that any weapon has to hit something important to get a kill... unless you're using heavy caliber flak. "

Shure several 50cals hits did not one, a concntrated bust of 50cals could schread a plane, and concentrated series of hits could from any gun package, even one a feable a a 202:

Whear we depart hear is that HEI shels did not realy nead to hit somthing solid to get a kill the simply had to shread the plane and this started to hapen when the hit the skin, the aerodynamic effects on the ruptured skin would enhance the efect helping to tear the plane apart and to render incapable of sustaining flight, or setting fuel cels on fire or killing the crew.

"Same sort of comment applies to the cited quote. "Armor" "fairly effective." So what? Not in general effective enough. Equally apropos the observation that Allied amor was "fairly effective" against 20mm and even 30mm. (I've read several instances of P40s in the CBI area taking Japanese 30mm shell hits to the seat armor and bringing the pilot and plane back intact). "

Allied armor being effective aganst HEI ammo is a mute point since the ammo dident nead to penatrate the armor to be efective as noted above. What Japanese planes in the CBI mounted a 30mm cannon? None were so equiped.

[mdiehl]

You are greatly overstimating the usefullness of damaging the skin on an aircaft. More to the point, if an Allied plane takes a detonating hit in the armor behind teh pilot's seat, flies home with the plane and pilot intact, that pretty much crushes the pretense that the mrer bursting charge is enough to down the plane.

That claim, that the bursting charge obviates the need to hit anything important, is wholly false.

[mdiehl]

This damage was done by a collision. Do you think a 30mm bursting charge is more damaging than a collision? This aircraft made it home in one piece.

[mdiehl]

This damage was done by 88mm flak burst inside the fuselage, yet the aircraft flew home.

[mdiehl]

This p47 took a bursting German 30mm hit in the wing yet flew home safely. The wing burst disabled the armament.

Oops it's copyrighted. See:

http://www.web-birds.com/9th/misc/js-damage-01.jpg

Anyhow, you get the point. Skin damage just isn't sufficient to do the job.

[Arnir]

Does anyone know why the Grumman F8F Bearcat was initially produced with only 4 .50 cal MGs? That seems light compared to other US planes. Later the Bearcat was given 4 20mm cannons.

Was the decision to go with only 4 .50s a decision connected to plane handling/weight or weapon effectiveness, or both, etc?

[Mr.Frag]

ORIGINAL: Arnir

Does anyone know why the Grumman F8F Bearcat was initially produced with only 4 .50 cal MGs? That seems light compared to other US planes. Later the Bearcat was given 4 20mm cannons.

Was the decision to go with only 4 .50s a decision connected to plane handling/weight or weapon effectiveness, or both, etc?

Funny that most people do not know the design goal of the F8F. It was aimed at the CVE's, not the CV's.

It was made to be a much lighter faster aircraft then the earlier USN fighters. It was the corvette of aircraft. It was *not* a big slugger, hence the fewer numbers of guns.

It was upgraded to the 20mm's with the addition of a more powerful engine and other changes required to stop it from ripping itself apart.

[Brady]

Nice picks, sometimes folks just get lucky.

"You are greatly overstimating the usefullness of damaging the skin on an aircaft. More to the point, if an Allied plane takes a detonating hit in the armor behind teh pilot's seat, flies home with the plane and pilot intact, that pretty much crushes the pretense that the mrer bursting charge is enough to down the plane. "

No it is not.

"That claim, that the bursting charge obviates the need to hit anything important, is wholly false. "

Again , No it is not.

One hit wounders from Uber cannon could and did kill enemy aircraft, no mater the size, heck even a rifel caliber size weapon could kill a plane if it got a luck hit. The point hear is that a good bust from a 50cal could kill and so could one from HEI based gun package, by schreading the plane enough to kill it, the 50cal could punch trhough and snap a spare with such a burst, or kill the crew, or the engine, while the HEI based weapon would rip the plane its self to schreads, it could also set it afire, and comprimise vitial systems in the process. In the end both types of weapons packages were efective, it is again just that the Big Bore cannons were more likely to kill with a single hit, espichaly aganst smaler planes, and the HEI based weapons systems were far laighter consumed less resources to make and fit better in the smaller planes used by the Axis poweres in general, even Russian Weapons systems followed this designe concept to a degree.

[Arnir]

That makes sense about fewer guns for a smaller aircraft, but does that mean the we can assume that the USN felt 4 .50s were adequate to take on Japanese aircraft effectively?

PS, I didn't realize that the Bearcat wasn't designed to be the next step in fleet carrier fighter design.

[Mr.Frag]

That makes sense about fewer guns for a smaller aircraft, but does that mean the we can assume that the USN felt 4 .50s were adequate to take on Japanese aircraft effectively?

Nope, they realized that it was not enough and replaced them with 4x 20mm really before getting into full speed production. Only two squadrons of -1's made it into the field if memory serves.

[Brady]

Bearcats never saw combat in the pacific in WW2.

[Mr.Frag]

ORIGINAL: Brady

Bearcats never saw combat in the pacific in WW2.

Yep, VF-19 was on the way aboard the Langley when the war ended. Didn't get there in time to see action.

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: Arnir

That makes sense about fewer guns for a smaller aircraft, but does that mean the we can assume that the USN felt 4 .50s were adequate to take on Japanese aircraft effectively?

PS, I didn't realize that the Bearcat wasn't designed to be the next step in fleet carrier fighter design.

My understanding was that it was designed to be the next generation carrier craft and Grumman was charged to mate the most powerful engine onto the smallest possible frame.

With the 4 x 20mm this little bugger was a heady candidant for best piston engine fighter ever produced. [:)]

i want a bearcat. Seattle traffic sucks

[mdiehl]

We're talking about what a weapon could reliably do in most hits. The 30mm and 20mm lacked sufficient bursting charge to regularly bring down a single-engined allied fighter with only one hit unless the hit smacked something vital. Moreover, your assertion that skin damage would be sufficient to drop an aircraft is utterly wrong.

The whole package is only "more efficient" if it gets more kills per round fired. You haven't come remotely close to demonstrating that such occurred.

[Brady]

"Seattle traffic sucks "

Ya it does, Had a GF in Seatle for a couple years and always got into some nasty traifc going their no mater what day of the week or time of day it seamed.

................

"We're talking about what a weapon could reliably do in most hits. The 30mm and 20mm lacked sufficient bursting charge to regularly bring down a single-engined allied fighter with only one hit unless the hit smacked something vital."

True, except in the case of the 30mm Mine rounds, it would be the exception that plane survived a hit rather thant he rule.


"Moreover, your assertion that skin damage would be sufficient to drop an aircraft is utterly wrong. "

No it is not.



"The whole package is only "more efficient" if it gets more kills per round fired. You haven't come remotely close to demonstrating that such occurred. "

"Effective" can be argued from many prespectives, given that the US planes would undoubtly of fired many more rounds to get a kill, simply by virtue of their larger gun packages and ammo loads which would of lent themslefs to sloper fire disapline it is a given that they wasted more ammo to get a single kill than the Japanese did.

[mdiehl]

No it is not.

Aluminum aircraft skin doesn't just peel away because you punch a few holes in it or even a few big holes. It's tough stuff. It's not foil. You have to approach supersonic speeds to get progressive deterioration in aircraft flight surfaces through superficial (surface) damage. Have you ever even touched an aircraft or seen one up close? Have you ever even LOOKED at a photograph of battle damaged WW2 aircraft?

Apart from that, there are real limits to how far damage to the surface can spread. Since the metal is applied in panels, the most you can lose is an entire panel. When you examine battle damage ww2 aircraft you often see that a detonating 20mm or 30mm hit has blown out a panel and peppered a few minor holes in the rest of the surface. None of these hits were sufficient to substantially degrade the lifting surface.

"Effective" can be argued from many prespectives, given that the US planes would undoubtly of fired many more rounds to get a kill, simply by virtue of their larger gun packages and ammo loads which would of lent themslefs to sloper fire disapline it is a given that they wasted more ammo to get a single kill than the Japanese did.

Emphasis added. "Sloppier fire discipline?" What... did that have a nice ring to it so you decided to pretend that there's anything to it? I have not once ever read a comment in any credible source that the US load out caused US pilots to have "sloppy fire discipline." That claim is, frankly, idiotic.

There's not ALOT of information on accuracy or the relative merits of US or Japanese gunnery training. FWIW, US pilots were much better trained in deflection shooting (at least, if you believe US pilots -- this was the substance of Thach's remarks on the A6M vs F4F to Halsey in September 1942 and also the recollection of US fighter pilots for example in the AVG and also at Guadalcanal see Lundstrom's closing remarks in "The First Team at Gudalacanal.") Otherwise it basically came down to moving in close to get the kill. That, in turn, was US doctrine. It was also, as far as I can recall, just about EVERYBODY's doctrine.

If you can name one example of a WW2 aircraft being brought down solely by damage to the aircraft skin, let's hear it. If you can name one source that empirically proves that US pilots were relatively worse shots let's hear it.

[Svar]

ORIGINAL:
One hit wounders from Uber cannon could and did kill enemy aircraft, no mater the size, heck even a rifel caliber size weapon could kill a plane if it got a luck hit.

A case in point was a UH-1 in Viet Nam was brought down with a cross bow bolt when it hit the fuel filter and the engine quit.

[Mr.Frag]

A case in point was a UH-1 in Viet Nam was brought down with a cross bow bolt when it hit the fuel filter and the engine quit.

Basic law of probabilities. throw enough stuff up in the air and sooner or later you will hit something [:D]

Ever wonder how many bird strikes have killed planes?

[Brady]

p. 40 Flying Guns:

"The Luftwaffe discovered that AP amunation was not ushually as effective as HE, partialy because the armored parts of an aircraft were small and not often hit, partly because of eratic of the eratic preformance of AP described in the nexct section. It was discovered that to be more productive to maximise the HEI content to inflict balst damage on the aircrafts structure......Starting in the late 1930's Germany developed the minegeschloss."

" The German aproach represented a compleatly different philosophy from that of the USAAF. Instead of using the kinetic engery of large numbers of high velocity AP Bullets to destroy the target, the luftwaffe relied on blast effect of large quantities of HE detonating withen the structure. Both aproaches seemed to work well"

" The 30mm HEI M-Geschoss, fired from a MK 108, was tested on a Spitfire fusalage, of 10 rounds fired 3 resulted in a score of imeadately lethal, seven probably lethal"

Sounds like one hit kills to me.....

"Eleven rounds fired at a Blenhim resulted in the same results, plus one doubtfull"

I am seing a patern hear...

" The Germans discovered that a wing hit on a B-17 resulted in a whole 100 x 175 cm. It was noted that the ammunation did not have much effect on heavy bomber fuslages (presumably becuase of the larger volume for the explosion to disapate into), but inflicted serious aerodynamic damage to the wings by blowing off the surfaces, and that the incendary content was very effective in starting fires."

"German tests reflected these results, and also reveiled signafagant diferances in the efect of mine shels on depending on the construction of the aircraft. Stresedskin aloy monocore structures were the most vulnerable to being blow apart. Steal structures clad with thin aluminium were less affected as the cladding quickly split, relessing preshure before it had much time to damage the structure, and fabric covered structures, such as the wellington bomber, were damaged least of all. It was not only the blast which inflicted the damage; after the war the Americans test fired a MK 108 shel into the tail of a B-24 at a typical angle, caracteristic of a tail interception by a 262. The Spray patern of very heigh velocity, very small fraements, cut most most if not all of the controle cables and many longerons. It was assesed that the tail would have seperated if the plane had been in flight."

Another one hit kill...

" Japanese cannon projectiles varried between the heavy (IJN 20mm Type 99 projectiles weighed around 128 g, the IJA's Ho-1 and Ho-3 up to around 127-136 g) to the very light (IJA 20mm Ho-5 as little as 79 g). AP Projectiles were cannon type ( i.e. solid steal) rather than using subcaliber cores. HE shels generaly had a modest filling ratio, although the little 79 g Ma 202 HEI used in the Ho-5 managed an impresive- for a non M-Geschoss- fifteen percent charge weight ratio."

"The actual preformance of AP projectiles in battle can vary considerably from that acheaved on test. In particular, passing through the thin aluminum aircraft skin can induce yaw, i.e. disturb the streight flight of the projectile away from traveling point to first, so that it fails to hit the armor head on, theryby significantly reducing it's penetrative abailitys. In fact the degrees of obstruction caused by aircraft structures is such that armor much thiner than therory indicated nescessary was often found to give satasifactory results."

......................

Sloper fire disipine, was ment to infer that given their larger ammo loads that the US planes would tend to make more use of the ammo they had thuse the higher number of rounds fired thant ehir Japanese counter parst who typicaly had smaller ammo loads. My main point was it was a silly point to begine with and and i exagerated it to make that point.