Inclusion of unsolicited quotes in posts

Colin1 said:

The Luftwaffe shot them down in droves
what the Luftwaffe couldn't do was shoot them down in enough droves
There's only so much armour you can sling around an aircraft before it becomes a barge hauling scrap iron - with all of the inherent handling characteristics.
I don't know how the P-51 would have fared against the Il-2 but I'm pretty certain in a fighter vs Il-2 scenario the weight of fire of the cannon-armed German bird would have weighed heavily in its favour vs the P-51's chances against the same aircraft.

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renrich said:

I see we are back into the debate of which guns should a fighter be armed with. To me, it is not necessarily indicative of the performance in combat of gun armament to say cannon are better because a hit by a cannon shell is more destructive than a hit by a kintic energy round like the 50 BMG. A lot of other issues play a role such as the amount of rounds carried, the hit probability of six or four 50 BMGs taking into account the rate of fire, down range velocity, ballistic coefficient and resulting trajectory. This to be compared to the 20 MMs ( or 30 MMs) with the same factors. An extreme example would be in the Korean War, the Mig 15 carried two 20 MMs(23 MMs?) and one 30 MM. A hit by the 30 MM would probably be very destructive to an F86 but it is my understanding that the F86 seldom was hit by that 30 MM because of slow rate of fire, poor trajectory and not many rounds were carried. If a fighter with four 50 BMGs and 400 rounds per gun can expect to get hits more easily than a fighter with four 20 mms, because the 20 mms have a slower rate of fire or don't have as many rounds to expend, then I would hardly call the 20 MM armed fighter better armed. In WW1, most fighters could rather easily be shot down by 30 cal. MGs. In WW2 most fighters, particularly with a liquid cooled engine like the D9 and P51 had, could rather easily be shot down by a 50 cal. MG. Heavy bombers were another story. To me, it is kind of like elk hunting. There is no question that a 458 Win Mag will ruin a bull elk's day. But if I have a better chance of hitting him in a vital spot with a 270 Win, because he is on a ridge 350 yards away, I am better off with the lighter caliber. Some D9s were armed with four cannon and two MGs. Did that weapons load degrade it's performance any? I would be surprised if the D9 with that load performed as well as the one with two MGs and two cannon.

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DerAdlerIstGelandet said:

Hmm, so you did two separate posts, but it picked up both and put them into one? Sorry if I am not understanding you.

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