Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Wishlist => Topic started by: thomace on February 03, 2011, 12:53:48 PM
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I'm a B-24 that been jumped several times and although I've been a good gunner and used short bursts...the sheer number of attacks has left a gun low on ammo or even out with several grids to still go and the odds of attack fairly high...could there be a way to transfer some ammo from 1 station to another???
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+1 if historically accurate.
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Not all that accurate... Sometimes crews stocked MORE ammo than default, and that "extra" ammo (which HTC won't model in, because it's not the standard), can be moved around.
However, all the other installations have bolted on ammo boxes, belt feeds, etc... You could not easily unload the ammo, unfeed it, unbelt so many rounds, move it to the tail guns, remove their ammo, unfeed it, connect the belts, re feed it, reload it, etc...
That said, the extra ammo canisters often would NOT be something easily reloaded in the tail, because of the guns' placements etc (i.e. you cannot load the chin guns on a B-17G while in flight, tail guns are often cramped as well and powered turrets have compact belting with tight angles....)
P.S. Just get a friend to escort you. That or don't fly HQ runs by yourself. If you run out of tail gun ammo you can do a few things... angle it so other guns can hit the target, or fire shorter bursts... Fire only that position's guns (not "FIRE ALL") and so forth to save ammo.
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Not all that accurate... Sometimes crews stocked MORE ammo than default, and that "extra" ammo (which HTC won't model in, because it's not the standard), can be moved around.
However, all the other installations have bolted on ammo boxes, belt feeds, etc... You could not easily unload the ammo, unfeed it, unbelt so many rounds, move it to the tail guns, remove their ammo, unfeed it, connect the belts, re feed it, reload it, etc...
That said, the extra ammo canisters often would NOT be something easily reloaded in the tail, because of the guns' placements etc (i.e. you cannot load the chin guns on a B-17G while in flight, tail guns are often cramped as well and powered turrets have compact belting with tight angles....)
P.S. Just get a friend to escort you. That or don't fly HQ runs by yourself. If you run out of tail gun ammo you can do a few things... angle it so other guns can hit the target, or fire shorter bursts... Fire only that position's guns (not "FIRE ALL") and so forth to save ammo.
What about the waist gunners, top and ball turrets?
Since thous are next to each other it can't be that hard to move the ammo, right?
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dunno...coming from an Axis... :neener: it's cool...I'll save some ammo for you... :aok
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What about the waist gunners, top and ball turrets?
Since thous are next to each other it can't be that hard to move the ammo, right?
You ever look at the ammo storage bins? They're bolted to the walls and closed, even for those waist guns. They have feed belts going to the guns.
In the event that these guns run out of ammo, it's much easier to re-load them with surplus ammo, IF you bring that ammo along. For the flex-mount guns, that is. Top turrets are fairly closed in deals, with no free space. The ball turret's ammo wasn't even in the ball! It was on the frame the ball hung from. Taking it from OTHER guns is probably not going to happen.
HTC won't add "extra ammo" because that's not the standard loadout.
Heck, there was one B-17 I read about where the crew took so much extra ammo (thousands of roudns) they could barely take off. The entire plane was so destabilized they had to ballast it with bricks in the nose, then drop the bricks after takeoff to lighten the load. It's not a standard load.
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You ever look at the ammo storage bins? They're bolted to the walls and closed, even for those waist guns. They have feed belts going to the guns.
In the event that these guns run out of ammo, it's much easier to re-load them with surplus ammo, IF you bring that ammo along. For the flex-mount guns, that is. Top turrets are fairly closed in deals, with no free space. The ball turret's ammo wasn't even in the ball! It was on the frame the ball hung from. Taking it from OTHER guns is probably not going to happen.
Got it.
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sorry I asked man...it's cool... :rock
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sorry I asked man...it's cool... :rock
Don't mind Krusty, he's just a crusty old goat who wishes he had a hot young sheep for a girlfriend.
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I love it when i run out of ammo while bombing :). you get to sit at your computer yelling "GET SOME, GET SOME" till the gf wakes up and tells you to shut up. it sucks to run out of ammo, but hey look at the bright side you at least got a couple of kills :rock. been wondering about transferring ammo myself and i searched that also it wasn't easily done in rl.
semp
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You ever look at the ammo storage bins? They're bolted to the walls and closed, even for those waist guns. They have feed belts going to the guns.
In the event that these guns run out of ammo, it's much easier to re-load them with surplus ammo, IF you bring that ammo along. For the flex-mount guns, that is. Top turrets are fairly closed in deals, with no free space. The ball turret's ammo wasn't even in the ball! It was on the frame the ball hung from. Taking it from OTHER guns is probably not going to happen.
HTC won't add "extra ammo" because that's not the standard loadout.
Heck, there was one B-17 I read about where the crew took so much extra ammo (thousands of roudns) they could barely take off. The entire plane was so destabilized they had to ballast it with bricks in the nose, then drop the bricks after takeoff to lighten the load. It's not a standard load.
IIRC,
The Ju-88 Had TONS of extra ammo mags placed all over the aircraft, since their guns DID NOT have ammo belts. In fact, historically speaking, the Ju-88 gunners should be reloading after ~50 rounds to grab a new magazine.
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True, but he wasn't talking about Ju88s... The only time this request comes up (and boooy does it come up all the time!) is for US bombers with 12+ .50cals on them.
P.S. Thomace, don't be sorry ya asked. That's what this forum is here for.
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Krusty you say it with such authority, that I hate to call you on it.
Quoting Bernie Lay's well known narrative of his flight with the 351st BS, 100th BG B17F Picadilly Lilly on the Regensburg mission. This isn't from Twelve O'Clock High btw, but his actual narrative of his combat experience that day.
"After we had been under constant attack for a solid hour it appeared certain that our group was faced with annihilation. Seven had been shot down, the sky was still mottled with rising fighters and target time was still 35 minutes away. I doubt that any man in the group visualized the possibility of our getting much further without 100 percent loss. I know that I had long since mentally accepted the fact of death and that it was simply a question of the next second or the next minute. I learned first hand that a man can resign himself to the certainty of death without becoming panicky. Our group firepower was reduced to 35 percent. and ammunition was running low. our tail guns had to be replenished from another gun station. gunners were becoming exhausted and nerve tortured from the prolonged strain and there was an awareness on everyone's part that something must have gone wrong."
I've seen other similar accounts. the gunners installed their guns and loaded them up. No doubt they had the ability to transfer ammo if the situation demanded it.
I
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No worries Guppy. I would be very interested to know by what process this was done... If the guns are still loaded with enough ammo to go through the belt feeds and into the ammo box, I can see clipping extra ammo to the end of a chain. However trying to feed it once ammo is totally expended seems darned near impossible while in-flight (to me). Getting access to the guns themselves, getting the ammo through the feed belts, to the gun bolt, etc...
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yea their ammo cans are no different from ones we have today I see no reason why any postion cept the Ball would give you a bunch of trouble to get ammo to em.
Might be time consuming but hey what else do you have to do. :D
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Not quite... Maybe you're thinking of the ammo tins on vehicle-mounted 50cals we have today. If so they are not the same.
These are for the cheek guns on a B-17G:
http://media.photobucket.com/image/b17%20walkaround/Spodeley/Planes/B17_Bombardier.jpg
Here's an example of the box mount for a waist gun:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_zu-DKjmLnoA/Simh3wMcI0I/AAAAAAAAEeI/GLbdN8LotGo/s400/b+17+waist+gun.jpg
Time consuming, definitely. On a 10-hour flight you have lots of time though. How practical is it, though? You cannot get to the B17G chin turret ammo boxes. The tail gun boxes have several long feet of ammo feed belts (and if you use up the ammo past that point, good luck feeding it back!)
The best candidates were the ones with room around them to work -- hypothetically you could plop down an ammo box, disconnect the belt feed and just operate the gun off the new source.
In the dorsal turret it is mightily cramped. Same for ball and tail.
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I love it when i run out of ammo while bombing :). you get to sit at your computer yelling "GET SOME, GET SOME" till the gf wakes up and tells you to shut up.
:rofl :rofl
Been there.
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Some turret positions cannot be entered from the fuselage, so regardless of whether the ammo can be moved.............. :old:
What about the waist gunners, top and ball turrets?
Since thous are next to each other it can't be that hard to move the ammo, right?
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If it was me Id knock those feed lines off the gun Im sure they come off and feed the ammo like normal you'd have more loadin time then shootin but youd still be shootin.
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Personally, it was either possible or not possible. Simple as that, I am sure there is a source that says yes or no. I read above an account of somebody replenishing the tail gun. So, make it like the reload pad. ".xferammo 200 5 4" (Transfer 200 rounds from position 5 to position 4) or whatever ammount was contained in a box. If the source position had fewer rounds than a set ammount then it could not be done. Also, when I said make it like the reload pad, make the gunners unavailable for like 1 minute or whatever. So that way, yes you get ammo, but you gonna pay for it if you get bounced.