All-electric simulated machine gun?

[cluttonfred]

You think that's bad, how about the Hawker Hurricane IIC and other British planes that used the early Hispano 20mm cannon with 60 round drums? Some of the bigger aircraft like the Beaufighter had a second crewman who could load new drums, but not the single-seat fighters. At 600-850 rpm that meant that the Hurri only had 4-6 seconds of ammunition, 8-12 if only two cannon were used at a time. Later Spitfire, Tornado and Tempest fighters had belt-fed Hispanos with twice the ammunition capacity.

From my virtual experience in online flight simulators, however, I can say that it's not necessarily a problem. You learn to hold your fire until you get the shot, and when you do, it only takes a short burst of 4 x 20mm to finish the job.

To go serious for a moment, I'm always amazed at how LITTLE ammunition fighters carry. That 47 rounds equates to about 12 seconds of firing. Yes, you carry extra drums, but there's no way you're going to change them in combat. And the P-51D had six .50 cal machine guns, each loaded with 400 rounds, and each gun shooting at 800 rounds per minute. How'd you like to fly to Berlin and back in 1944 with only 30 seconds of firing time?

Ron Wanttaja