ME262 wrong guns?

[Starmyth]

Because the high velocity cannons were designed for air to air combat?

[Mobhack]

no - the low velocity cannons were designed for anti-bomber use, the shells were called "mines" as they had a relatively high HE content despite (relatively) low velocity.

But the shrage musak installation would require to be high velocity for firing up into a bomber's belly, (roughly vertical to the velocity vector of the firer).

Cheers

[Starmyth]

Thanks I'm not a weapons person so I learn from the different war games that I play and/or own and the people I meet in the forums.

[chuckfourth]

Hi Andy
I had a look at some other aircraft weapons and here is what I turned up, hope it is of interest to you.

These links mention that 20mm MG-FF 167 and 20mm MG-151 166 Have AP Ammo.
http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/mgffm.html
http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/mg151.html

These weapons get a penetration value of 2 shouldn't this be 4 like say the hispano 20mm?
carried by,
Fw 190A-8 121
Fw 190F-8 237
Fw 190F-3 242
Me 210a 901
Me 410B-1903
Bf 109G-2/R1 122
Bf 110D-2 123
Hs 129 B-1 128
Hs 129 B-3/Wa
Hs 129B-2 240
Fw 190 D-12 243
Fw 190F-1 236
Fw 190 D-12 243
Ju 87D-8 Stuka 487
Bf 110C 894
Bf 109E 906
Bf 109E-7 907
Bf 109F 908
Bf 109F-2 909
Fw 190A-4/U-3 913
Fw 190R-6 914
Fw 190F-8/R-1 915
Fw 190F-9/Pb1 916
Fw 190F-9/Pb2 917
Bf 110C-4/B 895
Bf 110C-7 896
Bf 110E-2 897
Bf 110NF 898
Hs 129 B-2/R-4 900
Quotes from
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/tankbusters.htm
30mm MK-101/103
"Various AP rounds were used, but the most effective was the Hartkernmunition, which had a penetrating core of tungsten carbide sheathed in a light-alloy shell with a sharply-pointed profile. This could penetrate 75-90 mm / 300 m / 90 degrees (depending on the type of armour)"
Previous Version 6 of the game had the penetration of 9 now 4 in Winspww2.
Carried by
Hs 129 B-1 128
For interest you may want to substitute some of the 30mm MK-108 168 carried by these for 30mm MK-101 169
Fw 190F-8 237
Bf 109G-2/R1 122
Fw 190 D-12 243
Bf 110NF 898

3.7cm BKannon 207
"It also remained clip-fed, with a maximum capacity of just 12 rounds. It mainly fired Hartkernmunition ammo, capable of penetrating up to 140 mm / 100 m / 90 degrees"
Previous version 6 of the game had penetration 14 now 5 in WinSPWW2, shouldnt it be 14?
Carried by
Ju 87G-1 Stuka 120
Ju 88P-2 234

5cm Bord Kannon 208
Previous version 6 of the game had penetration 16 now 7 in WinSPWW2, Should be at least 9 as same ammo as pak 50. If firing tungsten shot should be 15.
Carried by
Me 410A-1/U-4 902
Ju 88P-4 235

7.5cm BKannon 209
"The fully-automatic BK 7,5 with a 12-round rotary magazine. This could penetrate 132 mm / 500 m / 90 degrees"
Previous version 6 of the game had penetration 18 now 12 in WinSPWW2,should have penetration of 13 not current 12 as same ammo fired as the PAK 40. If firing tungsten shot should be 17.
Carried by
Ju 88P-1 233,4,5 209
Hs 129 B-2/R-4
Hs 129 B-3/Wa 129
? Hs 129 B-2/R-4 900

Although the game uses 30mm MK-101 maybe this should be substituted with 30mm MK-103 which had better ROF.
See
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm
http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/mk103.html
Best regards Chuck

[DRG]

We'll look into this when time permits

Don

[scJazz]

The penetration value of the guns carried on the following planes/guns should not be adjusted from 2 to 4 to reflect parity with the 20mm Hispano. The plane/gun combos mentioned carried HE shells designed for breaking up Allied Bombers. These rounds were incredibly low velocity by comparison with very limited amounts of explosive designed for fragmentation and causing fires. They were notoriously poor at penetrating armor. By comparison the 20mm Hispano round had incredible muzzle velocity (on a par with .50 M1 & M2) and basically no HE component (mostly just phosphorous tracer type Incediary). Also keep in mind that even though AP ammo was available for some of these weapons it was used in very limited roles when aircraft were being used exclusively for Air-to-Mud missions. Lastly aircraft weapons had no round select option. The magazine or belt fed weapons had a homogeneous not heterogeneous mix of ammo. Therefore a plane shouldn't have a magazine of 35 HE rounds and 5 AP rounds. One or the other, basically for all intents and purposes never AP rounds except in the case of unique tank buster planes or tank buster weapon loadouts. As a final note I would point out that pilots despised flying with their guns configured with AP ammo as that meant that engaging with other planes was going to be dangerously stupid and engaging other planes is what a plane does.

chuckfourth said:
<SNIP>
These weapons get a penetration value of 2 shouldn't this be 4 like say the hispano 20mm?
carried by,
Fw 190A-8 121
Fw 190F-8 237
Fw 190F-3 242
Me 210a 901
Me 410B-1903
Bf 109G-2/R1 122
Bf 110D-2 123
Hs 129 B-1 128
Hs 129 B-3/Wa
Hs 129B-2 240
Fw 190 D-12 243
Fw 190F-1 236
Fw 190 D-12 243
Ju 87D-8 Stuka 487
Bf 110C 894
Bf 109E 906
Bf 109E-7 907
Bf 109F 908
Bf 109F-2 909
Fw 190A-4/U-3 913
Fw 190R-6 914
Fw 190F-8/R-1 915
Fw 190F-9/Pb1 916
Fw 190F-9/Pb2 917
Bf 110C-4/B 895
Bf 110C-7 896
Bf 110E-2 897
Bf 110NF 898
Hs 129 B-2/R-4 900
Quotes from
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/tankbusters.htm
30mm MK-101/103
"Various AP rounds were used, but the most effective was the Hartkernmunition, which had a penetrating core of tungsten carbide sheathed in a light-alloy shell with a sharply-pointed profile. This could penetrate 75-90 mm / 300 m / 90 degrees (depending on the type of armour)"
<SNIP>

[Marek_Tucan]

From what I've found on plane loadouts the ordinary one was about 1:4 or 1:3 API/T to HE for general purpose.

[chuckfourth]

Hi scJazz
Thanks for your interest, What you say is true for the 30mm MK108 but less applicable to the early German 20mm cannon and not really relevant to the later war German 20m Cannon.
If you have a look at the tables in the reference I supplied above, here it is again for easy reference,
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm
We can see in the first two tables that the hispano fired the 20x110 round with a muzzle velocity (MV) of 860/830 m/sec the MG 151/20 cannon fired the 20x82 round with a MV of 720/800 m/sec
However the German MG-FF and MG-FF/M fired the 20x80RB round with MV of 585/585/700 m/sec.
This site
http://www.bf109.com/armament.html
Gives the MG-FF(early war licence built oerliken see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MG_FF_cannon ) a MV of 600 as fired from the ME-109. MG-FF was replaced by the MG-FF/M beginning summer 1940 (Bf 109E-4 onward) firing the same round but with a better MV of 700 m/sec
Mind you the 257 gm weight of the Hispano round compares well with the german rounds 182 gm and 205 gm.
I dont know how the SPCAMO determines AP pen but the German guns and the Hispanos performaces dont look that dissimilar to me. Certainly all the numbers required are readily available in the references I mentioned.

It is correct that the thin walled Minengeschoss shells had poor AP performance but a very much larger payload of HE. See %HE content in
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm
ie the Hispano is 8 % HE and the Minengeschoss is 22% ie the German shell has nearly three times the HE content of the Hispano shell.
This could be seem as justification for giving the german guns a higher HE kill than the Hispano.
Also from
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/CannonMGs.htm
"The German cannon were not exclusively loaded with Minengeschoss, but used them mixed with older-type HEI-T shells (retained because, unlike the M-Geschoss, they could carry a tracer) and later some API rounds as well, in varying proportions." No doubt plenty AP if on a ground attack mission.
Also see this site which gives detailed descriptions of the various recommended mixes used by the germans in there ammunition belts ie mixed HE and AP
http://www.geocities.com/capecanaver...n/fgun-am.html
So Marek_Tucan would seem to be correct here.
Best Regards Chuck.

[scJazz]

Ya my comment on homogeneous ammo mixes was a mix up. I was remembering something totally different for that part. I'm going to review the info in those sites and consider this some more but I still say that the AP qualities of the german 'tater-tosser shells (what we referred to these weapons as in Aces High II and Warbirds) is still far inferior to the 20mm Hispano/M2. More later...

[scJazz]

I thought those links looked familiar. Admittedly I haven't placed Aces High or Warbirds in awhile but the Nildram site is used as a references in AH and I'm fairly certain that the designer plays.

If I remember correctly the arguement for better AP performance for the 20mm Hispano is that it has a better muzzle velocity and better ballistic properties so that it retains its velocity. While the muzzle velocity of the german 20mm and 30mm are not incredibly bad their ballistic properties are and they suffered fairly steep velocity drop off.

In Aces High II where all the planes you mentioned are modeled you don't go firing the 20/30mm guns at a target beyond 400m unless you have zero deflection while pulling zero Gs on a totally unsuspecting target and even then you have to go so nose high that you can't see the target.

On the other hand shooting stuff up with a Typhoon or even better... the F4U-1C (4 x 20mm M2s with huge pile of ammo) is rediculously easy out to 700m and not so tuff out to 1000m.