Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Funk]

if we are after autocannons for planes then 40mm way is too big, about 20 to 25mm is the type of thing we need.
a 25mm version of the 40mm gun with bigger magazine, mountd as a quad or twin linked plat form should be a great AA or anti tank weapon.
if we neck down the 25mm shell so it shoots a 20mm bullet we should get good velocity at the cost of fire power.

[Ukrainian Ranger]

I strongly dislike the idea to make a 14mm version of Patriotism.  While it's easier, result may be worse than designing new machine-gun from scratch. It will be employed in too many roles to not be the best possible. I want to appoint , many, many engineers for it. But later, now we have no great need for it and 8mm machine-gun fits the role. When we'll get enough LMG we may consider to create medium and heavy

One more thing I want to offer:

Dedicate one novice engineer to study captured Moravian rifles and any other firearms they may have

20-25mm guns is another "not now" thing. 8mm machineguns is a weapon of choice for fighters of that Era, let's not rush to midWW2 fighter armament standards , we have no airframes to support that

[RAM]

1) I mean design aircraft engine but - try to use it for other projects. Why not? By all means try putting it in other vehicles, I just want it to be the best aircraft engine it can be. I will second this proposal because I want an engine...
2) 8mm machineguns is a practical thing to be put on any biplane. 14mm-16mm machineguns will come next. 40mm gun is an overkill, and we need to design a proper monoplane full metal CAS first. Not gonna happen soonIt gives us an excuse to keep working on the 40mm, and I would love to get one really refined gun to inspire our other efforts. The 40mm should just barely work as a fighter weapon and if we can get it working now then it will make a marvellous ground attack weapon later-on. Although we will probably be sticking a couple of 8mm guns on too. My vision is of a twin-engined fighter with a massive gun underneath with about 48 rounds and the range and accuracy to destroy anything they get a clear shot at and a pair of 8mm guns in front of the pilot if they need to spray ammo.
3) 14 mm or 16mm, I see no much difference. First is somewhat lighter, second offers a bigger punch, both workI just deperately want to have our light guns follow the same 4/8/16 pattern that the larger guns do.
4) It's more for testing than actual combat useI agree to that
5) IMO, It's a waste to design a powerful engine for aircrafts and then not try to use it to make a  tank with better HP to weight ratio. If the engine works for that then +1, but I want the engineers focused on air-purposes. And I sort of doubt that the engine will be much good in the first draft. I expect to end up with something that a plane can be designed around while the engine is perfected.
6) They aren't torpedo boats, they are multipurpose, cheap to make boats that any navy needs. I imagine some spec ops operations using it. And while not ideal for ship to ship warfare , 2 or 3 of  such boats sunk a destroyer equal to our Popular Devotion while being much cheaper. Main problem is that they are too slow for their class and that needs to be fixed. And as we design petrol engine anyway....I think that we could use another destroyer and I really want to get the speed issue tended to while it is still a prototype. But I am willing to +1 either destroyer or PT boat construction. Can I get a second for the name Righteous?

[Ukrainian Ranger]

Agree with the above, except 40mm gun centered fighter

While that concept is somewhat plausible, 40mm for fighter to fighter will not work at all. It's too hard to hit other nimble target with a shell like that unless you fire from a point blank... and if you fire from point blank, 8mm is enough

Knocking out heavy bombers from a safe distance is another thing, strafing runs also possible, but such a heavy  armament will make the aircraft way to slow to be called a fighter.  Even the lightest 40mm  gun will weight something like 300kg. + 50 kg for ammo. Huge weight to carry for a fighter, Even WW2 fighter.

Besides I find it unpractical  to design one gun for all roles from AA to AT to Aircraft weapon  to infantry gun

Spoiler: real world stuff (click to show/hide)

40mm Bofors AA gun weights 2 tonnes without carriage , AT 37 mm gun weighted 330 with carriage. BK 37, automatic 37mm gun used for dive bombers weighted  300kg

[tryrar]

Also, instead of a trailer for the 80mm, use the Badger as a base for an SPG and give them to artillery regiments. They do have the benefit of being more mobile than trailers and as such being able to retreat faster in the event of an emergency.

[Funk]

The idea of building a  14mm version of Patriotism is only to have a stop gap weapon to shoot down morovian planes better than our 8m MG can.
If the round is good we can build it a new machine-gun from scratch later, if not then we can try 16mm

The 20-25 mm auto cannon is a weapon for later, for one are air frames are too weak to cary the loads need.
as an ground based weapon it can be used now.

edit: we can build a trailer for the 80mm now, building a badger based SPG will take time.

[RAM]

I would expect that we would want something with a higher velocity than the patriotism.

[Ukrainian Ranger]

Problem with Patriotism  -  it is water cooled,something not very suited for aircrafts as those are much heavier than air cooled. And 400 rpm is a bit too low for that role

On other hand, 8mm is a perfectly good caliber for fighters, I can't understand why you guys think otherwise. We will need to design a proper light and rapid firing machine-gun for our future fighters. Going straight to arming them with larger machineguns (14 or 16 mm) is also an option as we don't have to follow history closely. Still larger machine-guns = fewer of them = less chances to hit

As for 20mm guns, I don't think that we need them for use for our ground forces. Can't think of role it can fill in the current war

[Funk]

Hence the bigger 14mm rounds, in RL there basicy the biggist bullet come then there is a jump to 20mm+ (ok so the nazis did make a 15mm autocannon but they swapped it for 20mm not long after the war started.) 

edit: 8mm is a crap caliber for fighters all it does is punch small holes, the spitfire struggled to hurt bombers with 8 machine-guns.
we have one that give use an 1/8 of that number , we should give up on the idea of a dog fighter with sub 10mm unless we can get a total rpm of 2000+


Have two engineers work on building a faster air cooled gun based on the Patriotism MG

[Morrigi]

It would be impractical to mount anything heavier than the current 8mm machine guns on any aircraft we can design in the near future. In order to mount heavy autocannons we would need a metal, monoplane airframe and a much more powerful engine, neither of which we have. In addition, we need some kind of competent AA ability, whether it be ground or air based.

Also, this is the 1920's. 8mm is adequate as a fighter weapon for the time and similar calibers were used extensively in fighters of the time period.

[RAM]

I am thinking of 40mm for ground to air and anti-tank, I want it to be capable of functioning as an air to ground weapon too. It should be fine against the armour we are facing at the moment and if we get the 40mm done right then it should have a long future as an air to ground and ground to air weapon as we move into heavier anti-tank weapons and get dedicated air to air weapons.

As for the 40mm as an air to air weapon, I think that it would rule in head-on encounters or against bombers and be effective against ground targets but otherwise be pretty feeble, but 40mm is where our expertise lies and it seems that we hae an opportunity to make a really good 40mm gun that can be put in our tanks, possibly our aircraft(and the specifications for being in an aircraft should make it a very expensive, but otherwise excellent ground weapon) and used as an anti-aircraft and support weapon.

[Ukrainian Ranger]

I am thinking of 40mm for ground to air and anti-tank, I want it to be capable of functioning as an air to ground weapon too

It will be capable only for ground attack, it's nearly useless in air to air as it will turn a fighter into a turtle. Ok you can hit heavy bomber with it, but fighter with 300 additional kg (at the very least) will be a sweet target for enemy fighters.

but 40mm is where our expertise lies

Said who? We just have one 40mm gun, nothing more

  to make a really good 40mm gun that can be put in our tanks, possibly our aircraft  and used as an anti-aircraft and support weapon.

One gun to rule them all? As I said earlier, AA 40mm, AT 40mm, infantry 40mm, tank 40mm,  40mm aircraft gun are different guns IRL, there are many-many reasons for this. I 

[Morrigi]

The Bofors 40mm gun was and is used as an anti-aircraft, naval, and light armor gun.

[RAM]

The high-velocity thing has a number of uses, and aerial specifications should make for a very reliable, if also very expensive, ground weapon. My proposal basically comes down to "keep working on the 40mm". And the 40mm is where our expertise lies because we have already worked on it and the 4-round magazine sounds like an excellent thing to pursue, and would tie in well with aerial use where a quick burst would be ideal, even if it ended up requiring the pilot to pull a crank between every burst. Of course there is a good chance that we will ot be able to mount it on a plane, or that it would be impractical to use, but given that we haven't actually seen any aircraft designs, it seems like something that we could chalk up to experience and still have an excellent gun that could be refined into more specialised roles.

[Ukrainian Ranger]

Bofors is an excellent gun, it's true. Bad guns don't stay in service for 80 years

It had a nice AT ability with a right shell and SPAA vehicles based on it were useful in close support role (note that it became obsolete in both auxiliary roles and still used as fixed AA gun, because it is fixed AA gun, not gun for everything)

Short-barreled 75mm is much better in a role of infantry gun, 82mm mortar is way better for light indirect fire role. 37mm Pak36 and 50mm pak38 are better AT guns (not because of better penetration, but because they are smaller and lighter, important feature for AT gun, not so important for AA) and, as far as I know, no  tank ever had Bofors in it's turret (because bofors 40mm is a very heavy gun, with a very long barrel for it's caliber)

Edit: some modern IFV do use modified bofors 40mm as main guns