www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15652440
Spitfire redux: The WWII guns firing after 70 years buried in peat
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browning .303....you have to admire american engineering
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>>american engineering <
The article says 500,000 were built by B.S.A, so thats British Engineering surely?
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And they had assembled a weapon that would fire out of the best parts of six.
If they had been Kalashnikovs they would all have worked after a brisk hose-down...
฿:o}
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It wasn't really a crashed plane, they stumbled upon an IRA arms dump.
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the bren gun is by far a superior weapon... czech by design but classed as a british armement
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but my favourite has to be the BAR .. takes a stout fellow to operate a BAR
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>> but my favourite has to be the BAR .. takes a stout fellow to operate
>> a BAR
>>
>>
Takes a great big sod to carry one as well, zoo!
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Shame that BSA couldn't translate this hi-tech precision mass-production to their post war bikes, which were badly designed and made rubbish.
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>> By CZ of Brno I presume?
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No, by Browning of America. I think you're possibly confusing the Browning Automatic Rifle with the Bren light machine gun. As you probably know, Bren is a portmanteau of Br(no) and En(field), the latter being where it was first made for the British Army.
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>> Br(no) and En(field), the latter being where it was first made for the British Army.
Very accurate over a good range, as good as a Lee-Enfield .303 or better, and an effective weapon in the right hands, used in very short aimed bursts. But could jam and would overheat in intensive use, hence the invariable presence of a spare barrel, quickly and easily changed. Many a WW2 (and later) soldier got burns on his fingers from Bren barrels. The standard magazine was a bit small too, 20 rounds I think, but you could stuff quite a few more in by straining the spring a bit. Kalashnikov users, who are a bit like average drivers but worse, usually do the same thing.
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>> The standard magazine was a bit small too, 20 rounds I think,
>> but you could stuff quite a few more in by straining the spring a bit.
>> Kalashnikov users, who are a bit like average drivers but worse, usually do the same
>> thing.
>>
20 or 30 round mags. Normally loaded to 28.
The joy of the Bren was its stability on a bipod, from prone.
The kalash works with a variety of magazines - but best with a 30 - the amount of rounds in a 40 or 70 (could be 75?) mag meant the barrel overheated when the thing was on 'squirt', and ended up cooking off rounds.
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>> the bren gun is by far a superior weapon... czech by design but classed as
>> a british armement
>>
Horses for courses. The Bren is an excellent piece of kit, but useless in an air-to-air role, its very accuracy being its weak point. With only a thirty-round magazine it wouod also be useless as a defensive gun, hence the adoption of the Browning for this role too.
With a fixed group of machine guns as fitted to a Spitfire, the object of the exercise was to get a spray-pattern of bullets, rather like the rose on a watering-can. It follows that the more accurate the gun is, the more precise your firing pattern, which is detrimental to the idea of saturating the target area with bullets to bring it down.
The Germans of course had no such problems; the Messerschmitt 109E was fitted with a brace of 20mm cannon which fired an explosive shell and were accurate at a greater range. One of those cannon shells in the right place would do more damage than several solid .303 rounds.
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>> the Messerschmitt 109E was fitted with a
>> brace of 20mm cannon which fired an explosive shell
Hope this isn't a daft question but presumably a lot of those shells missed - was there a risk of damage to stuff on the ground?
But I suppose a solid .303 round dropped from height wouldn't do you much good if it landed on you. IIRC there was a feature on the BBC news site recently (possibly referenced on c4p) about the number of people killed every year by bullets coming to earth after being fired into the air during celebrations.
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>> presumably a lot of those shells missed - was there a risk of damage to stuff on the ground?
There obviously was, and it must have happened. But it is in the nature of things that most projectiles fired by automatic weapons miss, and are then harmlessly lost. That's one reason why war is such terrific business, as good as prostitution really but with satisfyingly huge cashflows. .50 calibre costs a dollar a round these days, and it gets used incredibly fast. With artillery and even small missiles the cost goes up geometrically. How I wish I were really wicked and competent...
I was on the roof terrace of the only posh restaurant in a small African capital once interviewing a French Jesuit who knew a thing or two over dinner, when news came through on the radio in a language I didn't know (but the Jesuit did) that the president's men had taken a remote desert town from Libyan-backed opposition forces, something like that. All hell broke loose and skeins of tracer climbed into the night sky all around us from people's back yards, the OAU 'peacekeeping' troops, etc. The Jesuit and I sat back enjoying the show, but one guy got terribly worried about 'balles perdues' and fled downstairs, his lady companion berating him loudly for his wimpishness all the way.
Heh heh... memories...
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>> >> the Messerschmitt 109E was fitted with a
>> >> brace of 20mm cannon which fired an explosive shell
>>
>> Hope this isn't a daft question but presumably a lot of those shells missed -
>> was there a risk of damage to stuff on the ground?
yeah there sure was, My grandfather, on firewatching duty during the blitz, was shot through the chin by a ricochet off the pavement. He was left with a chin cleavage!
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>> Hope this isn't a daft question but presumably a lot of those shells missed -
>> was there a risk of damage to stuff on the ground?
Explosive cannon shells have a fuse, which works on centrifugal force, so once it is outside its effective range, it becomes relatively safe - inasmuch as it will still hit the ground with a thump. but won't explode.
Obviously this is to ensure that any 'friendlies' underneath the dogfights aren't in too much danger.
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I was told the main reason for getting inside a shelter during an air raid was to avoid the shrapnel from our own anti-aircraft guns.
We, allegedly, threw more metal up than they ever dropped down.
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>> Explosive cannon shells have a fuse, which works on centrifugal force, so once it is
>> outside its effective range, it becomes relatively safe
Presumably you're talking about the spin imparted by the rifling in the barrel on the shells? Thanks for that - it did seem odd that you might get mini-bombs falling all around.
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>> Presumably you're talking about the spin imparted by the rifling in the barrel on the
>> shells? Thanks for that - it did seem odd that you might get mini-bombs falling
>> all around.
>>
yep. rifling spin, and obviously this slows down along with the velocity of the projectile in question.
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spitfire gun - zookeeper
