Tanks firing machine guns at other tanks

[PantherCub]

Originally Posted by Steves308

It's also useful to assist with the primitive range finders and fire control systems to improve the hit percentage. I will fire the first shot or two with just the machine gun (to save main gun ammo), and when I do finally use the main gun, I can often get a hit the first time I use it. I once did some testing with firing the main gun and machine guns, and just firing the main gun, to see if the machine guns firing helped with getting a better hit percentage as opposed to just using the main gun, but I was never really sure if they helped or not.

Steve

I cannot tell from your comment if this refers to reality or the game?

There are/have been some guns that used dedicated coaxial rifle calibre weapons for ranging, but that presupposes that the ranging gun has more or less the same ballistics as the main gun. And for tank guns firing high velocity AT rounds this is not the case. So any ranging shots with a regular MG will just be wasted and possibly alert the enemy.

Besides, what I was referring to was the routine in game firing of MGs by tanks on tanks AFTER the main gun has been fired.

[Steves308]

I was referring to the game.

An interesting test is to take a tank with a hull gun, like the M3 Grant, and then fire at a target with all the weapons, and then have a 2nd M3 Grant fire with just the hull gun (usually in the last weapons slot). In the case of the Grant, having first the 37mm, then the coax machinegun, fire seems to help the hull mounted 75mm gain a higher percentage than by just firing the 75mm gun (this testing was based on just the initial round of firing, not multiple rounds).

I don't have any mathematical proof, it just seemed the hit percentages were higher with firing multiple weapons than just a single weapon. So maybe firing the multiple machine guns in addition to the main gun would help increase accuracy for the following rounds?

I guess for a real test I need to create some test vehicle with 4 of the same weapon, then note if the 4th weapon has a higher hit percentage than the 1st weapon...though I think the fire control and range finder may only apply to the primary weapon, and maybe the coax/2nd slot weapon.

Steve