the best gun

[Furball]

According to Tony Williams, the Browning was only a mediocre aircraft weapon because of its weight, making it score poorly in the "efficiency" category.

The Hispano V gets my vote.

Here you go, from the above link:

The American Browning .50 M2 is an undistinguished performer, particularly when compared with its closest competitor, the 12.7 mm Berezin. The relatively small incendiary content in the .50 API (0.9 g instead of 2 g) gives the Soviet round a flying start, which it adds to by its usefully higher rate of fire, then finishes off in style by being lighter as well, and thereby almost twice as efficient overall. The Browning also makes an interesting comparison with the Japanese Ho-5, which was basically the M2 slightly scaled up to take 20 mm cartridges.

It may appear that this low score of the .50 M2 is in disagreement with the satisfactory experience the USAAF had with this weapon. The answer to this apparent contradiction is that the .50 M2 proved very effective against fighters and (not too sturdy) bombers, if installed in sufficient numbers. Six or eight guns were specified as standard armament, resulting in a destructive power total of 360 or 480, at the cost of a rather high installed weight. Most American fighters were sufficiently powerful to have a high performance despite this weight penalty. Incidentally, the mediocre efficiency score of the .50 M2 is not only an effect of the low chemical content of its projectiles. Even if only the kinetic energy were considered, the efficiency of this gun would remain inferior to that of the UBS, B-20, ShVAK or Hispano, although better than that of the MK 108 or MG-FFM. To sum up, the preferred US armament fit was effective for its purpose, but not very efficient by comparison with cannon.

A further validation of the calculations is provided by the outcome of tests by the USN, which stated that the 20 mm Hispano was about three times as destructive as the .50 M2. In the above table, the ratio between their scores is 3.3.

The outstanding performer is clearly the German 30 mm MK 108, which achieves ten times the destructiveness of the .50 M2 for only twice the weight.

To return to the obviously controversial question of the relatively poor performance of the .50 Browning: as has already been stated in this study, "the preferred US armament fit [of six or eight .50 HMGs] was effective for its purpose, but not very efficient by comparison with cannon". It is worth pointing out that for as long as the battery of .50s proved adequate against the targets usually encountered, there were strong arguments in favour of retaining the weapon, as the standardisation of production, supply, maintenance and training provided great logistic benefits by comparison with the plethora of different weapons fielded by the Germans and Japanese in particular. Of course, the USA did make some use of the 20mm Hispano cannon, but this was severely limited by production problems: that is another story, told elsewhere on this website!

[titanic3]

K-98 Mauser
'03 Springfield (w/ a scope of course)
Moisin Nagant (I'm pretty sure I spelled it wrong)

.50 Cal
Mg42

[Furball]

MP44?

[uptown]

[Spikes]

I dunno if it's the best, but BAR.

And the Sten is sweet, pretty weird lookin though

[ColKLink]

.50 CAL is still in service today for very good reason, from personal experience w/ a crew served .50 cal,...they are wonderful when spiting lead down range, but ours seemed to jam much more than I care to admit. Unjamming a .50 cal round, is a bit dangerous. I hated that part of it.

[BoSoxFan]

I wouldnt say mg42 because the high rate of fire heated the barrel too quickly,which reduced reliability.
The stg44 was a good gun but wasnt available to many.

Good posts so far keep 'em comin.

Yes the barrel did heat up when the trigger was just held down but with short bursts is didn't as much. Even when it did the squad had extra barrels that could be changed out in a matter of seconds.

[Anaxogoras]

Thanks for the expansion furball.  Funny that we both voted Hispano V after reading that article and data.

[lowZX14]

.50 CAL is still in service today for very good reason, from personal experience w/ a crew served .50 cal,...they are wonderful when spiting lead down range, but ours seemed to jam much more than I care to admit. Unjamming a .50 cal round, is a bit dangerous. I hated that part of it.

Head down while opening cover, round must be extracted within 5 seconds after a 5 second waiting period for cook off, if it cannot be extracted within 10 seconds, wait 5 minutes   
At least that's what I was taught.

[PFactorDave]

Moisin Nagant (I'm pretty sure I spelled it wrong)

Mosin Nagant

I picked up one at a gun show for about $50 a few years ago.  It was in good shape, smeared with cosmolene.  I cleaned it up and shoot it once in awhile.  Very accurate rifle, kicks like a mule though.  It has a steel butt plate on the stock.  When I bought mine it had a regular round headed screw holding the butt plate on the stock, instead of an inset screw.  Until I replaced the screw with one that sits flush with the metal plate, every time I fired the rifle it would leave a small round slotted screw shaped bruise on my shoulder.  Much more comfortable to shoot now that that old screw is gone. 

[BigPlay]

mg42

(Image removed from quote.)

without question !

[Furball]

Thanks for the expansion furball.  Funny that we both voted Hispano V after reading that article and data.

Yup!  I would have said Mk108 if it wasn't for the muzzle velocity.  I have had a close look at a 108 before and it is an absolutely genius bit of engineering.  So small for something so powerful - really impressive.

[RumbleB]

Yup!  I would have said Mk108 if it wasn't for the muzzle velocity.  I have had a close look at a 108 before and it is an absolutely genius bit of engineering.  So small for something so powerful - really impressive.

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if I ever lose an arm that would be quite the replacement

[999000]

I thought Rachel Ward had great guns!...................
<S>999000

[MachNum]

Any "what's the best" thread is always amusing