Another B-29 wish....

[Beefcake]

But field mods do exsist in AH...check out the 51B.

And the B25C Strafer.

[Chalenge]

The guns were removed under order of LeMay who felt the escorts could deal with intercepting fighters and that speed was more important than defensive fire power. Obviously the cannon trajectory differed from the .50 calibers and so the three .50s were favored by the crews.

[Krusty]

Sorry, you're wrong.  The Spit Vc to Vb had nothing to do with the Vc being rare,

Jumping the gun there, mate. I never said it was. I said it was more representative... It was one of the examples of how they are moving to a more representative planeset, and since the only major SpitV matchup of EPIC proportions is against the Bf109F over the English Channel, it made sense to pair those 2 planes up properly.

I'm saying they're trying to do something other than just throw in random rarely-used guns, guns that never saw the light of day, or test kits, etc. I'm saying they're doing the responsible thing. With that in mind, the responsible thing IMO ought to be "remove the 20mm from the B-29 tail."

Ack Ack, I thought there was also a large component of the guns being unreliable, jamming, or just not being desired by the crews.

Beef, 5pointoh, "field mods" are different from general changes made at the depot level per orders from above. I think they make a difference for HTC. Those 2 changes weren't just some renegade ground crew sticking guns on planes at random.

Also, Beef: The 20mm is Hispano. It's about as close to 50cal trajectory as you can get, especially when firing rearward at 350+mph...

[AWwrgwy]

I believe the USAAF after some studies learned that 3x .50 calibers were just as effective with the radar guidance system than 2x .50s and single 20mm cannon.

ack-ack

I believe I've read somewhere that it was a difference in convergence/trajectory of the mixed armament.


wrongway

[beau32]

Not so much, we don't... Outside of a few exceptions I think most of the planeset is fairly representative.

There's an effort lately to revisit these armament options as planes are updated with newer 3D models. See the SpitVc reduced to SpitVb. See the 109F4 removed of gondolas. See the early 1943 109G6 with no 30mm option.

The emphasis is moving towards more representative loadouts. It's a clear trend in HTC's decisions over the past several years. I hope they stick with it.

Give us the Bf-110 G-2 with 4 MG17's instead of the 2 30mm, or at least make it a option to change them, as the 30mm was a option to the MG17's.

[Squire]

Also, Beef: The 20mm is Hispano. It's about as close to 50cal trajectory as you can get

Why is it a beef when they have almost the same muzzle velocities and therefore very similar trajectories?

20mm Hispano Mk II (AH Spits and Typhoons): @880 m/s dependant on exact ammo.

12.7mm M2 Browning: @890 m/s dependant on exact ammo (ball ammo here).

The Hispano Mk II was not a low velocity cannon. You can argue the various merits of the two guns (as has been done to death and im not getting into it) but the trajectories were not very different.  

The Tempests Hispano Mk V: 840 m/s thats the only other version in AH and has a somewhat greater drop at range compared to a 12.7mm Browning.

If your looking for "bam" "plop" that would be the 37mm M4 on the P-39 at 610 m/s.

Interestingly enough the MiG-15s N-37 37mm cannon did 690 m/s and you had to get to @ 200 yards to hit anything with it. Of course thats vs F-86s and they didnt have gyro sights either. Reminded me of the P-39s cannon anyways. Of course if you hit its game over for the poor sod you nailed.

Was going to add re the B-29s guns. Make the 37mm optional. That way we can model early and late versions.




 

[EskimoJoe]

if someon is going to take 30 mins to get to altitude to do one bombing run - then kudos to them. 

30 mins? If I had enough perks for a Bee-twenteh-naaaaan, I'd spend an hour and a half
after upping from the opposite end of the map! 

[Krusty]

Why is it a beef when they have almost the same muzzle velocities and therefore very similar trajectories?

No no no... That was directed at Beef... aka Beefcake! It was responding to his comment about differing trajectories.

[Squire]

Righto. A guy can ge into trouble with all them callsigns.

[Ack-Ack]

Ack Ack, I thought there was also a large component of the guns being unreliable, jamming, or just not being desired by the crews.

While reliability may have been a factor, the main reason was as stated by wrongway.  The trajectory from the 20mm shells was completely different than the trajectory of the .50 caliber bullets that it made aiming in combat conditions difficult.  As a result the 20mms were removed from the B-29 production block 55, Bell-Atlanta block 25 and Martin-Omaha block 25 and on the B-29A, the 20mm cannon was removed from production block 20 onwards.  In the case of the B-29A, when they removed the 20mm cannon, Boeing added 2 additional .50 caliber machine guns to the top turret to increase forward defensive firepower to provide additional protection against frontal attacks.

ack-ack

[Krusty]

Well our in-game model has 4 guns on the upper nose so that means it ought not have the 20 in the tail, right?

What kind of numbers are we talking that actually had it and kept it?

[fullmetalbullet]

well if its nikkis your gonna be dealing with forget the fiftys a staple gun would do the job easily. i mean the last time i took a nikki up and landed it when the tail dropped when i was slowing down, it broke in two.

[Chalenge]

I believe I've read somewhere that it was a difference in convergence/trajectory of the mixed armament.

Yes... you did... right here:

http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,306720.msg3953558.html#msg3953558

[Babalonian]

The guns were removed under order of LeMay who felt the escorts could deal with intercepting fighters and that speed was more important than defensive fire power. Obviously the cannon trajectory differed from the .50 calibers and so the three .50s were favored by the crews.

Also take into account what they were defending themselves against, japanese aircraft were not that durable and in many/most cases a .50cal was just as lethal to them as a 20mm.  With this same logic, looking ahead to the release of the B-29 in AH, I'm not thinking that a vast majority of intercepting aircraft will be of Japanesse nationality but rather of all varieties, thus we can speculate in this situation had historical B-29 crews had to of faced tougher attacking aircraft and had the choice of removing or keeping the 20mm they would of likely opted to keep the 20mm for taking down an aircraft signifigantly more resilient than a GI Zero.  Also, bombers in AH are not as dependent on friendly fighters offering them protection as they are on their own defencive armaments, also leading us to conclude that had B-29s been in a situation requiring more independent defence for themselves, then they would likely pack as much defencive firepower along as they could.

[HighTone]

well if its nikkis your gonna be dealing with forget the fiftys a staple gun would do the job easily. i mean the last time i took a nikki up and landed it when the tail dropped when i was slowing down, it broke in two.

Above 20K and without warning it would be pretty tough in a N1K2 to stop the B-29.

I would much rather have the J2M3a or...for some reason we get it....I would love to have the J2M5.

That and the Ki44, esp if anyone wanted to use a B-29 for and FSO or scenario