no self respecting home owner should be without one ... :D

another example of poor design was the F-4 Phantom, not the plane itself, which was used by USAF and USN and featured a great design, but the fact that it was designed with no internal gun since designers were convinced that air-to-air missiles had rendered guns obsolete.

That sounded great until Vietnam came along and it turned out the AIM-7 and AIM-9 missiles the F-4 carried had been designed to track big, slow moving bombers and were almost useless against fast turning north vietnamese fighters..:damn:

needless to say, every US fighter since then carries an internal gun.

of course, it was'nt just the US, the Russians and the French made the same mistake. It was just the Israelis who insisted on having a gun and had the french instal a 30mm cannon in the Mirages they bought. They were put to good use in the six-day war...:yep:

Interestingly the F-8 Crusader (AKA the "Last of the Gunfighters") only scored three kills (some say four) with cannons. The F-8 had the best kill ratio of the Vietnam war (19 to 3)

BTW the F-35B and F-35C will not have an internal gun. ;)

The Erdnagel could possibly take its place up there...but it's hard to tell whether it was more the public perception over the aircraft as opposed to the actual design. :hmmm:

It was a carry over from the Bristol fighters from the First World War...yeah, we did a lot of carry overs from the First World War, some worked and some didn't. The Defiant did work initially, she had a reasonable kill ratio in the Battle of France, knocking down six 109s for three Defiants in one battle and then some nineteen Stukas, nine 110s, eight 109s and a Ju-88 over two sortees with the loss of one Defiant gunner after he bailed out but the aircraft itself made it back to base.
However, then the Luftwaffe recognised the Defiants weaknesses and stopped engaging it from the rear, and the new Defiant pilots refused to follow the strategy adapted by 264 Squadron of flying a tight Lufberry circle (like the 110s did when they were attacked by our fighters) they would sacrifice speed and height but gain a 360 degree coverage on the turret guns, thus combining the firepower of the aircraft in the Lufberry to bring down an aircraft which tried to approach from behind or got into the arc of fire.
Of course, ultimately she wasn't right for the job, like the Ju-87 and Me-110 as the Luftwaffe would find out during the course of the battle, and she was transferred to Night fighter duties and used as an experimental aircraft for ECMs and jamming against the German radar network until the Beaufighters took over the role in '43, and she did quite a good job as a night fighter but technology overtook her and that was that.
I wouldn't have said the Defiant was dumb...just tactically outdated, like a great deal of British equipment at the beginning of World War Two.

that is surprising. One of the reasons pilots like guns on their planes, now that missiles are more reliable, is to be able to protect a downed pilot on the ground from enemy forces while waiting for rescue. Can't do that with AAM missiles.

Erdnagle? Is that the Starfighter Obie?

Won't have to worry about pilots very long...

They can still carry a gun in an external pod but I heard they are thinking about sticking a laser in the space normally reserved for the lift fan- unneeded on the USAF and USN JSFs. Speaking of lasers if they put more funds in to the ABM laser on the 747 I could see that dooming the manned fighter quite quick- think AWACS with a thousand mile ranged death ray...

The tent peg, aye. :yep:

Like all aircraft though, I guess it was a case of knowing how to handle it, and some are more forgiving than others...the Tent peg was not very forgiving... :doh:

This was done with specific fighter groups - known as the "Boar" groups. There were two sets - the "Tame Boars" who answered to ground controllers for vectoring, and a smaller "Wild Boar" group that was given free range.

The weapon was known in English as "Jazz Music" - though properly translated was actually "Slanted Music". If memory serves me - it was a 37mm cannon - but it may have been a 20mm instead.

I am curious TLAM - where did you hear of this? I have only seen it in one source - The Air War in Europe (Time Life Books).

zRead about it in a book I have called "The Encyclopedia of 20th Century Air Warfare. According to the book the Junkers Ju 88G-6b had "Schrage Musik" upwards 20mm MG151 cannons. They mention this one guy: Maj. Heinz-Wolfgang Schnauffer shot down seven Lancasters in 17 minutes with a Schrage Musik equipped Heinkel He 219.

With this being a subsim board, I am suprised that nobody has made a comment of the effective range of a Subroc vs the Lethal radius of said weapon.

Nothing like a 2 for 1 weapon.

The SUBROC had a range of 30 miles, the effect of the 5 kt warhead would only be dangrous out to about a mile from ground zero. The 11 kt warhead of the ASTOR torpedo (8 mile range) would be dangerous about a mile and a half from the blast. The ASTOR would shake the launching sub up a bit but not sink her, plus she could clear datum and get away from the blast.

JAS 39 Gripen
 

http://imgur.com/DAxRY.jpg

JAS 39 Gripen aircraft (two seater) Length: 14.1 m (14.8 m) Height: 4.5 m Span: 8.4 m Wheelbase: 5.2 m (5.9 m) Track width: 2.4 m Empty weight : 6500 kg (7000 kg) Starting weight: ~ 8700 kg (8500 kg) Max takeoff weight: ~ 12 500 kg (12 800 kg) Engine: RM 12 Thrust: 54 kN thrust with EBK: 81 kN (equiv. ~ 40 000 hp) Engine: Volvo Aero RM 12 (a development of the F404-400 from General Electric) Max speed: Mach 2 (about 2 500km / h) Armament: Rb74, Rb99, Rb75, Rb15, Bomb Capsule 90 and 27 mm Akan (only Version A and C) Range:> 3 000 km off distance: 400 m Landing distance: 500 m Number of FM: 204st (of which 28 pc two seater) in service since: June 9, 1996 Acceleration: Mach 0.5 to 1.15 in 30's . Turn Force: Up to 9G Radar: Ericsson PS-05 / A. Detects fighter at 120 km distance.
Manufacturer: Industrial Group JAS

What's so bad about the Gripen?:06:


And on the topic of subs, I'm pretty sure the dumbest submarine designs yet were those which attempted to use the subs as a big gun platform, including the British M class and the French Surcouf. Had the Germans actually built the Type XI cruisers, I'm pretty sure they would've ended up in the same category. Not to be bloodthirsty, but I kind of wish one of those subs had actually participated in actual combat - it would've shown exactly what a terrible idea the whole concept was (by inevitably failing horribly and being sunk), and would end for good all the myths and misconceptions about surface-gunning supersubs.

Nothing just a simple post
 

It is a good plan for sure :DL

Oh, and another batch of candidates for this would definitely have to be the three "battlecruisers" built for Jackie Fisher's Baltic project (Glorious, Furious, Corageous). Had they actually been used as intended, they would've not only failed spectacularly, but the plan involving them would probably be a massive fiasco as well. And not to mention they were structurally unfit to even use their main weapons without damaging themselves. Forget about being able to survive any sort of battle damage. Luckily they were quickly converted into carriers...

Baltic Project..had not heard of it
 

during WWI, so the ships,carrier was clearly a lift :yep:

Thank you.. I forgot about the ASTOR. Yet ANOTHER great design in the use of atomic weapontry. You had to hold position, maintain positive control of the weapon, and had to signal detonate the warhead. Like the other guy was not going to shoot at you in the meantime. The only thing I liked about it was that it was electric so it was not quite as noisy.

About the lethal radius, in a typical air burst you are correct, however, in a subsurface burst, the shock wave would have resulted in an overpressure wave that would have crushed a submarine. That was one of the design criteria of the thing. You did not have to land on the bad guy, you only had to get close. You get it in the general area, detonate it deep, and let the water hammer do the rest for you.

I remember reading about the SUBROC on the boat. They said that a 688 MIGHT be able to survive a max range attack if they did a 180, STOOD on the power and had a minimal cross section while at the same time going shallow rapidly just prior to detonation. Going shallow was to minimize the effect of the shock wave by decreasing the intial pressure on the hull. The variables involved were many and they did not give more than a 50/50 chance.

The older sailors who served on the 594/637 class boats said that they knew it was a suicide shot. They KNEW they could not go fast enough to get out of the danger zone. But, they were willing to take it if it would prevent the other guy from launching his missles.

Interesting factoid:

The USS Dentuda SS-335 survived a ~20 kt subsurface nuclear blast while dived at a range of about 1250 yards. This is Test Baker during Operation Crossroads.

Following the test she was returned to service for a while before being scrapped.

this should probably merit a new thread, but found this cool powerpoint on the new F-35. Canada is planning to buy 60 or so to replace our 30-35 years old CF-18s.

http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2010armamen...ougHayward.pdf

all variants of the F-35 will/can carry a 25 mm gatling gun. The conventional take off and landing AC has an internal one, while the carrier and the STOL versions can have one added as a pod as the mission requires.