Best armed fighter

Beau-FIGHTER? Designed as an interim replacement until the Whirlwind could be fully developed, and classified as a "heavy fighter". Started it's career as a night fighter, then fighter/bomber, and eventually went on to be used in the anti-shipping role.

The four 20mm Hispano cannons on the Beau were in the nose, the six .303s were in the wings, four on one side, two on the other (outboard of the engines). The Mosquito MkII had four 20mm plus four .303, all mounted in the nose, giving it an even tighter concentration of fire, albeit with two less machine guns.

The Mk21 Beaufighter had four x 20mm (nose) and four x .50 Brownings (in the wings). That's pretty hard to beat.

Hi Renrich,

>Considering the enemy likely to be encountered what was the best armed piston fighter that served in WW2.

Well, here is a comparison of raw firepower (in terms of firepower at the muzzle, international decimal separator):

Me 262: 20,1 MW
Fw 190A-8/R2: 13 MW
Ta 152H: 7,6 MW
Fw 190A-8: 5,5 MW
Me 109K-4: 5,5 MW
Beaufighter Mk 21: 5,3 MW
Tempest: 4,9 MW
Fw 190A-4: 4,3 MW
Typhoon: 4,2 MW
Spitfire IXE: 2,7 MW
Spitfire VC: 2,5 MW
P-47D: 2,3 MW
P-38: 2,2 MW
Me 109G-6: 1,8 MW
Me 109E-4: 1,7 MW
P-51D: 1,7 MW
Me 109G-2: 1,4 MW
P-51C: 1,1 MW
Hurricane IIA: 1,1 MW
Spitfire II: 0,7 MW
Me 109F-2: 0,6 MW
Me 109E-1: 0,3 MW

Rate-of-fire losses through synchronization are not included, but with an electrical system as used by the Luftwaffe should be around 5 % - 10 % depending on type of gun and current flight parameters.

(The MG 151/20 installed have been considered to be using standard ammunition, not the more powerful late-war MX ammunition.)

With regard to wing armament, below a diagram showing the impact of off-centre gun placement and higher dispersion in the P-38 vs. P-47 comparison for their 12.7 mm MGs only (P-38 cannon not considered) for a "zero allowance" shot (placing the aiming dot right on centre of the fighter sized target). As can be seen from the graph, the four guns of the P-38 really give superior hit power for most ranges except the convergence distance of the P-47's eight-gun battery.

My pick for the best-armed piston fighter of WW2 is the Ta 152H as it combines high firepower with centreline weapon placement.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Although it didn't reach production the Martin Baker MB3 would have been formidable with 6 x 20mm.

HoHun said:

Well, here is a comparison of raw firepower (in terms of firepower at the muzzle, international decimal separator):

Me 262: 20,1 MW

Click to expand...

So, we have the winner here?

Most interesting data being furnished here. Many thanks to all. As those of us who hunt know and, especially, those who handload, ballistics at the muzzle are not as important as ballistics downrange where the projectile has to do it's job. I am not up to figuring out what the ballistics at a range of 300 yards would be. Can you, Henning, furnish those. Obviously, another factor plays a big role. In Lundstrom's books he mentions often that the 30 cal bullets from an A6M would usually be defeated by self sealing tanks. However, the 20 MM cannon round would usually puncture and tear up the SS tanks. However, the early war Zekes only carried 60 rds of 20 mm and since they had a low MV, they were somewhat difficult to hit with. Does anyone know if the 50BMG would defeat a SS tank? One candidate for a well armed fighter against bombers might be the P61. Four 20 MM cannon and four 50BMGs firing at 800 RPM all on the center line.

But when you're outside of convergence point, all of those projectiles are going to be less and less effective.

Hennning, why does the MK 108's hitting power dip downafter 200 m but then jump back up at 500 m?

Hi Koolkitty,

>Hennning, why does the MK 108's hitting power dip downafter 200 m but then jump back up at 500 m?

That's the result of putting the aim point directly on the centre of the target. The projectile takes a curved trajectory that takes it above the aim line, and in conjunction with the dispersion that causes some shots to go above the centre of the pattern and some below, some of the high shots miss above the target at 300 and 400 m.

At 500 m, the trajectory curves back down so that it's right on target again. However, the trajectory is curved so much that at 600 m and beyond, all shots will miss below the target.

(This is all valid only for a "boresight aim", no compensation approach.)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Hi Renrich,

>I am not up to figuring out what the ballistics at a range of 300 yards would be. Can you, Henning, furnish those.

Difficult, but I had a look into it a while back. There is not much good data, but two general rules are evident:

- If you go downrange, shells with a high chemical content keep their energy much better than those without.
- High velocity projectiles lose energy quicker than low velocity projectiles.

As rough estimates from the incomplete data, I figured that the MK 108 mine shell would still have 96 % of its total energy at 500 m, while the 12.7 mm Browning armour-piercing incendiary would be down to 64 % of its muzzle energy.

(These losses are not taken into account in my above Me 109K/P-38/P-47 comparison graph.)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Real interesting stuff here fellas.... Surprised Drgondog aint in this...

If we can guys, lets keep this in the boundry of single engined fighters, and those utilized for air to air combat...

What was the different armaments of the 190 D's then?

If we keep this single engined fighter, it certainly simplifies but excludes P38 and Me110 and perhaps others that were always intended for air to air combat. The P61 was purpose built as a night fighter or all weather fighter and I believe that Beaufighter was designed as a long range fighter. If one takes into account the factor that adding heavy armament to an existing design like the BF109 or Hurricane, etc,. can degrade performance, that can complicate the choice of best armed fighter. In other words, if adding a lot of weapons degrades performance significantly, then maybe that fighter drops out of consideration. In comparing down range ballistics, there are several considerations. I would assume that, in the case of an explosive shell that does not depend on kinetic energy to damage the target, there is no difference in the damage the target suffers at any range as long as the fuse causes the shell to explode. However, perhaps penetration is necessary before the fuse reacts to achieve major damage. But another factor is ballistic coefficient. If a 30 cal bullet starts out at 2800 fps and a 50BMG starts at 2800 FPS the 50BMG soon outpaces the 30 because of it's much better BC and thus reaches the target sooner and has a flatter trajectory which makes range estimation easier and, to boot, the 50BMG is a much bigger bullet so has more kinetic energy and penetrates better because of better sectional density. I don't know what the ballistic coefficient is of the various explosive shells in the 15, 20 or 30 MM projectiles was but I do know that some of the 20 MM shells in the early examples did not have very flat trajectories. An example of a single engined fighter which could carry a heavy and potent armament without much effect on performance would be the models of the Hellcat with two 20MM cannon and four 50 cals.

If a cannon shell has a more arcing trajectory compared to a MG with a flatter trajectory, then I would say the MG would be more usefull in an air-to-air battle simply because there's a higher probability of the MG projectile to hit its target.

Mg's just dont pack the punch of cannon fire tho.... Longer time on target to get the same desired effect as cannon...

Hi Renrich,

>In comparing down range ballistics, there are several considerations. I would assume that, in the case of an explosive shell that does not depend on kinetic energy to damage the target, there is no difference in the damage the target suffers at any range as long as the fuse causes the shell to explode. However, perhaps penetration is necessary before the fuse reacts to achieve major damage.

The exact mechanism of translating the energy from the projectile into damage of the target differs with the projectile type. There are cases for all projectile types in which the energy fails to be translated into meaningful damage - for example, bullets that punch a clean hole into aluminium skin, or slugs that are stopped by armour plate.

If you wish to be more accurate, the first thing would be a consideration of what type of structure the bullets hit with which probability.

German WW2 experience was that the largest part of the target area was metal-skinned structure, which is easy to penetrate but difficult to damage badly enough to force down the aircraft. This lead to the development of high-capacity explosive ("mine") shells, which would blow big holes in the skin to destroy the load-bearing capability of the structure.

The "critical areas" of a target would only make up the smaller part of the target area and usually be armoured or otherwise protected. The Luftwaffe also had armour-piercing projectiles capable of attacking these areas, but front-line experience showed that this approach yielded inferior results to the mine-shell approach, and thus the Luftwaffe standard anti-fighter belting became 3 mine shells, 1 incendiary, 1 armour-piercing incendiary for the MG 151/20.

Unlike other air forces that did not have mine-shell type cannon ammunition for a front-line comparison, the Luftwaffe had combat experience both with mine shells and conventional ammunition and could make a combat-result based evaluation. (On a broad basis, I figure - Steinhoff commented on the tactical value of the detailed combat reports which listed the exact ammunition consumption by number and type for each kill.)

Though it's sometimes claimed that the mine shells were designed as anti-bomber ammunition, that couldn't be farther from the truth. They were introduced right in time for the Battle of Britain when RAF Fighter Command was the immediate enemy, and in fact the belting suggested against bombers by the Schießfibel had only 1/3 mine shells instead of 3/5 as "against all other aircraft".

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Hi Lesofprimus,

>Mg's just dont pack the punch of cannon fire tho.... Longer time on target to get the same desired effect as cannon...

Absolutely right ... as I'm sure everyone here is aware the Luftwaffe had two variants of the MG 151 in service, the 15 mm high-velocity variant and the 20 mm variant with the well-known mine-shell capability.

The 15 mm variant was a very potent machine gun, and as Tony pointed out on his website, the USAAF did in fact consider production of a copy of the Mauser cannon as a replacement for the 12.7 mm Browning machine gun. (It was referred to as 0.60" HMG in US documents, I believe.)

However, the Luftwaffe switched from the 15 mm to the 20 mm variant almost immediately when the latter became available, and although the weapon could easily be converted from one calibre to another, I'm not aware of any Luftwaffe fighter pilot ever having 15 mm cannon exchanged for his 20 mm guns, or even just mentioned that he'd like to have had them exchanged but wasn't allowed to. Not that they didn't appreciate the high muzzle-velocity - you'll find the 15 mm variant praised for that, too. Yet, no-one ever considered the trade-off against the higher hitting power of the 20 mm variant so important to have his aircraft converted.

Here is a comparison of firepower, muzzle velocity and projectile mass data:

MG 151/20: 0,97 MW, 720 - 800 m/s, 162 - 182 g
MG 151: 0,28 MW, 850 - 960 m/s, 151 - 166 g
.50 Browning M2: 0,18 MW, 860 - 900 m/s, ca. 112 g

(Obviously, the USAAF considered the MG 151 superior to the 12.7 mm Browning M2, or they wouldn't have considered it as their next fighter weapon. In my opinion, it's not really a quantum leap, and I suspect this is the reason it never entered series production in the US.)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Maybe I have missed it but what about the ballistic coeffecient of the various cannon rds.? I have read of, in the Korean War, Sabres making kills at high altitudes of 700 yards on Migs. A Marine exchange pilot, a WW2 veteran, witnessing this as a wingman had it explained thusly. At very high altitudes, much higher than where WW2 was fought the 50BMG had a longer effective range because of the thin air and less friction. Not saying the 50BMG is more of a killer than 20MMs or such but trying to find a comparison of relative ease of making hits because of rate of fire, velocity and trajectory. An extreme example is that the RN favored CLs over CAs partly because they believed the high rate of fire of the 6 inch offset the heavier projectile of the 8 inch.

My vote would have to go for the Tempest assuming we are sticking to single engined fighters together with the 190 with the extra 2 13mm.
In brute firepower the Tempest would have it but the better positioning of the 190 weapons would make the difference up.
If someone wants to put one in front of the other I wouldn't complain, but personally consider it to close to call.

If we include the Jets, then the 262 has it by some margin followed by the Meteor.

What was the armament of the Tempest?

It had 4 20mm Hispanos in the wings, 2 on each side, this became the standard RAF armament, even Spitfires had it.