A thread for weapons which have stellar reputations but which, in reality, weren't THAT good.>pic relatedThe Mustang was good but not that good, the latest marks of the FW-190 were more than a match for it. It managed to shine because it was fighting against a Luftwaffe which had had its guts ripped out on the Eastern Front for years. Due to lack of fuel, replacement Luftwaffe pilots only had a few dozen flying hours under their belt whereas rookie US pilots had sometimes a thousand hours flying time before their first mission.
retarded downsized ar10 (which is stupid in the first place), meant for Air Force gate guards. there are good reasons why no one uses charging handles like it or flimsy mags like it or the dogshit DI like it.
>>62120677The late war Fw190 (Dora) were unreliable and expensive POS.
>>62120677wehraboo cope
>>62120677>because it was fighting against a Luftwaffe which had had its guts ripped out on the Eastern Front for yearsthat's applicable to German land forces, not the Luftwaffe. 75% of Luftwaffe losses were in the West.
>>62120693The Tiger hasn't been over-rated for a decade and now it is almost to a point where it's becoming underrated.
>>62120677>guts ripped out on the Eastern Frontthe Luftwaffe lost the vast majority of its pilots on the Western Front, chudthe Eastern Front was only live fire training for the Luftwaffe
>>62120677>It's another Youreapeein "Americans didn't ACKSHUALLY do anything in WWII" cope thread
>>62120728>brings up Europe out of nowhereObsessed
>>62120677>because it was fighting against a Luftwaffe which had had its guts ripped out on the Eastern Front for yearsretard, the luftwaffe lost most of its pilots in the west
>>62120677>FW190Only the Dora and only in a narrow flight regime. The FW190 isn't a bad fighter, if anything it was better than the Messershit 109 by far and especially so in the role of having to fight American bombers.It was a bit over rated over the P-47 however but it got away with it for coming in late war and being lower cost:>P-47 had a 0.7% loss rate>P-51 had a 1.2% loss rate (against a crippled LW that was getting greener and greener)
>>62120701>that's applicable to German land forcesthe honours are even; the Germans lost roughly the same number of casualties to the Soviets that they did to the Westhowever, vatniks carefully cherrypick the KIA figure because whereas 20% of the Wehrmacht casualties in the West were KIA and 80% captured or surrendered, the ratios are flipped for the Eastern Front.
>>62120677Almost twice the range of FW-190
>>62120746the FW-190 didn't need range.
>>62120677This uncomfortable little fucker
>>62120757>the Bf-109 didn't need range>the Fw-190 didn't need range>the Me-262 didn't need range>the He-111 didn't need range>the Do-17 didn't need range>the Ju-88 didn't need range>the amerikan bomber didn't need range>the V-2 didn't need range>the 15 cm Kanone 16 didn't need range
>>62120677>the latest marks of the FW-190came over a year after Mustang's introduction
>>62120701Germans were losing more aircraft in Africa than in the east for the majority of the early war.
>>62120757They needed endurance. The Luftwaffe would pull fighters from airfields all over Germany in response to big bomber raids. They could burn through a good chunk of their gas just getting into formation at their assigned assembly area.
>>62120685>there are good reasons why no one uses charging handles like itanon are you retarded? the ar platform is one of the most prolific rifle patterns in the world. that means that all of those people ARE using charging handles. saying it's bad because other rifles don't use a similar design makes no sense. why would they do that when the AR exists
>>62120677Kind of. The '51 was an escort fighter first, whereas the 190 was either a JABO or interceptor. >>62120685You're half right. The AF wanted the AR-15 to replace the long outdated M1 and M2 carbines then in inventory. The rest of what you claim is pure unadulterated fuddlore.>>62120690Even then the D was still a VERY good fighter.>>62120741You be nice to the '109. It was magnificent in it's day.
>>62120908The 109 was okay early to mid war but it was apparent that it was overloaded as a platform (even after the revisions that effectively kept the same aero but were a new airframe) towards mid war.The combination of late war models being flown by green pilots, built by slave labor in "cottage industry (underground, etc)" environments combined with the increase of engine power (torque roll) and the already super flawed landing gear (slightly less narrow of a track than a Spitfire with a small triangle) that had toe out and negative camber made it an attrition machine.>He sent me a long letter relating that I should be sure of the absolute vertical alignment of the tailwheel ais; he also wrote that its inherently weak brakes sould be in excellent condition because in WWII, the Luftwaffe lost 11,000 out of 33,000 Bf 109s to takeoff and landing accidents. Steinhoff directly attributed this terrible record to the bad geometry of the plane's very unstable, splayed-out, narrow landing-gear configuration. In his letter, he said twice that if a German mechanic who really knew the Bf 109 wasn't handy, I should not get into the cockpit.
>>62120869Yup. One of the biggest reasons why it seems like other guns don’t use “AR-like” features is because most of the ones that do just get grouped under the AR family label. You could argue a modern LMT MARS-L potentially has enough differences that it would have been seen as a different gun at the time of the AR-15’s introduction, but today, nope, it’s an AR-15. I’ll admit myself that the vanilla charging handle design is far from my favorite but I prefer the improved variants over any side charger.Also there are a bunch of non-AR15 rifles which still use AR pattern mags so I don’t know where he gets that idea.
>>62120677https://youtu.be/bIYd7RYoNsM?si=Fm8lXaDRjoR48IEh
>>62120908>DoraAlso the Dora's successor (given it was the "we need it now" version of the 152s) was sort of overrated (mythical beast and all) given how fucked it was in regards to being a late war LW fighter.
>>62120690>unreliablesauce?>expensiveno doubt, given the natural resource constraints Germany faced and the Allied bombing>>62120908>the D was still a VERY good fighter.just about a year late>It was magnificent in it's daythe airframe was dated by mid-war and by rights should not have been upgraded past the F variant
>>62121095Not arguing either point, but both aircraft are remembered more for their credits, than deficits.Both were overall, still very very good aircraft for the era.
>>62121095https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/db-605-x-db-603.7886/?post=693364#post-693364
>>62120998that looks so kino, very predatory.
>>62121112And its competing engine.https://www.enginehistory.org/Piston/Junkers/Jumo213/Jumo213.shtmlAll german late war engines were absurdly unreliable for reasons completely unrelated to fuel.
>>62121112>>62121129>german late war engines were absurdly unreliable for reasons completely unrelated to fuelso what were the reasons?the articles don't really make it clear
>>62121156>so what were the reasons?Lack of refractory metals and excessive boosting (not enough engineers to do revisions).>The DB 603 (Bf109) had its own problems related to ball bearings
>>62121156They were made in bombed-out factories by unskilled laborers from sub-par components and materials because nothing else was available.
>>62121156Likely metallurgical. I know they began to have issues making reliable sleeve bearings and had to go to pin/needle bearings in some of their engines, which is not as great an idea as it sounds.
>>62121185yeah the second page made references to metallurgical problems but didn't go into details in that area>>62121180>not enough engineers to do revisionsah right>>62121182in short, yesbut it pays to go down 1 or 2 more levels of detail
>>62121265Used to be well into the rarefied autism that was the AEHS, that was likely where I read it. Since I quit wrenching on leaky old roundy-rounds and other forms of engine driven windmillery I genrally lost interest but still retain more than modicum of the trivia.
>>62120677ok wehratard
>>62120677> it was fighting against a Luftwaffe which had had its guts ripped out on the Western Front for yearsFTFY. The East was where the Luftwaffe sent its green rookies to get experience, owing to the vast qualitative inferiority of soviet pilots and airplanes compared to the bongs and burgers.
>>62120677>>62120908>'51 was an escort fighter firstIncorrect.the original P-51 was Allison engine powered.it was an excellent performing aircraft which went un-adopted by the USAAF (except as the dive-bombing A-36 variant) for two straight years, while the USAAF continued its procurement of vastly inferior-to-P-51 P-39s and P-40s.now, along came the year 1944 when the USAAF 8th Air Force needed fighter escorts to accompany the daylight Europe bomber raids. And the eventually-developed 2-stage supercharged Merlin power variant of the P-51, the B/C and then D models, came along but was by then almost a completely different airplane for a different role.(Remember that all of those P-39s and P-40s procured from 1941-44 could have been P-51s/P-51As; the Mustang could've had an entirely different career and reputation)
>>62120677>>62120825>latest marks of the FW-190>came over a year after Mustang's introductionthis>>62120908>the D was still a VERY good fighterand this.the Mustang was a great design from the outset >>62123329 but obviously the 2-stage supercharged Merlin D was its apotheosis and served on into the Korean War
>>62120782>This uncomfortable little fuckeryeah not sure why the Sigslurpers go gaga for dat thing
>>62123329I can't think of where P-51A worked that great, except when it comes to range of course. Like P-39, they lost the performance on usual bomber altitudes and that's where range advantage is at it's best. Undoubtedly better than P-40 and P-39, though at that point the former was more of filler. A-36 was doing well when they could slip in and out before opposition could gather up, but one could argue that was due to lack of other dive bombers. Lack of 2-stage supercharged Allison was a crime, even if it would have been only a prototype.
>>62123851>worked that great>undoubtedly better than the P-40 and P-39see some of the combat use of early Allison P-51s in the southwest Pacific, they served until end of the war. One of the best low-medium altitude single engine fighters in inventory at early part of the war, the USAAF was slow to adopt North American's design until the Merlin derivative came along and changed policy/intended mission on it.>dive bombersyes correct the A-36 was a makeshift stopgap adaptation of the early-mid war; several other land based dive bombers were used by the allies in this period until the P-47 and late-model P-51 variants took over as single engine fighter-bombers and the dive bomber doctrine was abandoned.>2-stage supercharged Allisonwould have been interesting. As seen with the turbosupercharged late J and L model P-38s the engine could be made to perform at altitude. Later Allisons were also used in the post-war P-82 Twin Mustang variants.
The P-51 is not overrated, the laminar wing and the radiator integration were better than anything else at the time.P-51s would fly from the UK, trash 109s and 190s over Germany and then fly home.
>>62123962The meredith effect radiator was rather common in mid-late war designs.The merit of the P-51 was the good aerodynamic, cheapness and taking advantage of all the minor improvements of prop aircraft, essentially a flaw-less aircraft.
>>62123962>P-51s would fly from the UK, trash 109s and 190s over Germany and then fly home.I dunno how that's an accomplishment, even Zeros were doing that over much larger distances in the Pacific theater. Like 8 hours transfer time
>>62123962>laminar wing and the radiator integration were better than anything else at the timeanother reason why I mentioned it ^^above as such an advancement over P-39/P-40 (which it continued procuring) in 1941-42 yet only the RAF adopted it as a fighter; USAAF held off until almost 1944 after the Merlin version for sustained high altitude use had been developed.
>>62123973If the P-51 had a flaw, it was that it was overbuilt like most American aircraft of the time.They managed to shave off a significant amount of weight on the H version.
>>62120998always thought the BV 155 would've been rather kino
>>62123978The difference is that Zeroes were hilariously fragile and underarmed
>>62123992>the H versionthis was probably the ultimate 'air superiority' version of it, though really was almost a different plane with near-new wings (that housed smaller main landing gear) and fuselage.It wouldn't have been as effective or robust a fighter-bomber as the D but ideal for interceptor and high altitude air combat.along came jets and that was the end of the P-51H
>>62120677>the latest marks of the FW-190 were more than a match for it.Germans lost to USAF in March 1944. First MW50 equiped FW-190D-9 arrived in November 1944, to late for anything and only several hundreds were produced.Also while FW-190D-9 could comptete in performance with P-51D it didn't have it's range. If USAF had FW-190D-9 instead of the Mustang they couldn't do what they did. Conquer air superiority over Germany flying from Britain Beauty of the P-51 was it could kick ass of any fighter having enormous range.
>>62120701Most eye opening is checking German aces bios>transfered to West - KIA by escort fighters >transfered to West - KIA by escort fighters >transfered to West - KIA by escort fighters
>>62123946>see some of the combat use of early Allison P-51s in the southwest PacificWhich squadrons operated allison P-51 on Southwest Pacific and how long? All I can remember are few recon variants.In CBI they served for long, but that front is a huge mess. Almost every larger engagment includes multiple Allied types andfor reasons both sides over there claimed ridiculous ratios. It was almost consitently over 5 times the actual losses, although many survivors must have been written off.Main opponent being Ki-43 doesn't make it that staggering either. It's rather a miracle how those weren't regularly stomped like it was Marianas.
>>62124027>D but ideal for interceptor and high altitude air combat.>only high altitude combatP-51H also had record speed and climb at sea level.
>>62120728hat pic hilariously ironic lol
>>62120677Armor is made of strong, but...>Socially shared lack of vision.>mobility of Tiger II>reliability of two Tiger IIs
I don't need to elaborate.
>>62124102KV tanks are overrated only because of WoT and probably WT.
>>62120677FW-190s were dogshit airframes. If not for the practical reasons of:>Not having enough fuel to stay in the fight>Claustrophobic cockpit which makes it an absolute nightmare to pilot>Bailout procedure which makes B-17 ball turret bailout look preferable>New variants had various parts which were not interchangeable and made an already FUBAR situation for German logistics even worse>Several parts were reliant on handfitting/filing at the airfield and this usually caused issues because slave labor meant a lot of sabotaged or not-to-spec parts.This is something that can be said for most Axis aircraft btw. Allied airframes had some of their own issues, but the saving grace for allied airframes was standardization of tooling and machining. Lot of shit could be cannibalized and placed onto birds of the same type, and it wasn't an astronomical pain in the ass to do so.
>>62124167All soviet tanks are overrated because of those tanks. Because they look at the data sheet and see a passable tank.But factors like crew comfort, production quality and reliability are hard to simulate.
>>62120757Yeah that's what happens when you're stuck on the back foot for most of the war.
piece of shit
>>62123329You're conflating the A36 and early offering to the Brits, versus what it became and was known for.While the airframes are similar, they are not the same aircraft.
>>62120693everybody and their grandma has made the point that the tiger was an overengineered mess, anon
>nicknamed Ronson/Zippo/TommycookerAh yes, the best tank of WWII.
Ki43 mogs the A6M
>>62124604early 43 were crap.
>>62124044>Get jumped by 20 American fighters immediately>The pilots in them aren't chumps like the Soviets>Mauled repeatedly in encounters, wingman usually getting killed too if ever present>Fighter strafed on ground anyways for any late war transfers who survive getting back homeYeah.
>>62124599>burned negligibly more than a pz 4, and far less than it with wet storagememe
>>62124194>factors like crew comfort, production quality and reliability are hard to simulatein practice they all translate to slow response times and missing / broken components so it's not actually hard to simulate, just a PITA to game>spawn four T-34s>two crews are drunk>two tanks have underpowered engines because they're 500 miles past their maintenance date>three are missing their optics (were never installed)>the one with the optic is the political commissar's and he's staying at the back to shoot the other three if they flee, also he'll second guess every order you give them all until he dies>they all have half the basic ammo load
>>62125479There was that one wargame where Hitler would interfere with your shit (Decisive Campaigns I think?)IIRC it was like "Hitler is being a fucking retard again and decided to prioritize another front, you get half the fuel you were supposed to this turn"
>>62125479>two tanks have underpowered engines because they're 500 miles past their maintenance dateT-34s rarely survived to that sort of point.
LOL, no. The P-51 was a game changer because it could do a mission that no other plane could do in the escort role. Not only was it the only plane that could ensure the safety of strategic bombing efforts that were essential to winning the war, it was also responsible for the forward combat air patrol missions that actually gained air superiority. >Muh P-47 was better P-51 was far more significant and there's a reason why the vast majority of pilots preferred it, because it was also a superior design in just about every way except for in the CAS role, which in WWII was actually vastly overrated. The P-47 was not only a mediocre dogfighter it also cost THREE TIMES as much to build. You can cope that the Mustang fought easier opponents, and that might have been true in like 1945, but when P-51s were starting to be deployed there were still battle-hardened luftwaffe aces coming back from the Eastern front and plenty of skilled German pilots remaining, and Combat Air Patrol meant the P-51 had to fly into flak screens to fight the enemy over their own territory. Having to struggle with mediocre planes before getting better ones doesn't mean that those planes should be celebrated. Imagine you as an allied war planner have to choose between the P-51 and a fighter that costs three times as much, can't do the mission you need, and is also inferior in air-to-air performance. >The Fw-190 was betterThis is a retarded premise to state that the P-51 was "overrated" when it's an Apples to oranges comparison, since each plane should be evaluated by its impact on its own side of the war to determine its significance. Depending on the variant they were close to each other performance-wise, but Fw-190s got demonstrably raped by P-51s in practice. You can cope that it was because they were optimized for fighting bombers or because it was untrained pilots but allied tactics were superior and the P-51 was overall a more balanced, advanced design with more growth potential.
>>62125707>when P-51s were starting to be deployed there were still battle-hardened luftwaffe aces coming back from the Eastern front and plenty of skilled German pilots remainingnice evasive action, but you can't disguise the fact that the P-51 was playing mop-up only after the P-47, the Spitfire and the Typhoon went through the meat of the Luftwaffe
>>62120693People have overcorrected so hard on the Tiger that it's heavily underrated in 2k24
>>62124685>>Get jumped by 20 American fighters immediatelyErich Hartmann wasn't afraid to fight 20 soviet fighters repeatedly. Because he always could push gas and his 109 outrun soviet flying furniture.But in the first air combat with Americans in Romania he figured out he can't run away from Mustangs...
>>62120677It was the best fighter of the war, and still one of the fastest prop planes ever made.>>62120685Became the world's most ubiquitous rifle and is STILL gaining share, especially among developed nations. Essentially solved small arms.>>62120782Most compact 9mm available, making it the best CC without resorting to 380. It's not a replacement for a full size or even a normal 'compact' pistol.>>62124238Actually overrated. The war it was built for never happened and PGMs advanced very fast. Still, excellent survivability.
>>62125724>but you can't disguise the fact that the P-51 was playing mop-up only after the P-47, the Spitfire and the Typhoon went through the meat of the LuftwaffeNah. Decisive Battle for Germany happened in the February-March 1944. Previously USAF took time out after disastrous losses, Germans figured out how to deal with daylight mass bombers (improved fighters armament and massing fighters, Germans starting amassing like 100 fighters fro simultaneous attacks against bombers formation, that negated bombers defensive fires).in early 1944 USAF restarted bombers raids with new tactics and weapons.First of all P51D arrived. It had enough range to reliably cover all bombers mission. Mot only first partSecond. Tactics. Now most fighters squadrons got orders of free hunt. Instead of covering bombers from attacks they got orders sweep ahead, find and kill enemy fighters. Pursuing and killing enemy fighters was the main goal. Not disrupt their attacks against bombers. But kill fighters (and as byproduct kill their pilots).February-March 1944 was bloody blitz air offesnvie similar to the Battle of Britain. Both sides had terrible casualties but USAF bench was deeper and they came on top. In March 1944 Luftwaffe lost so much pilots they couldn't effectively act again escort fighters anymore and it was over since. P-51D fighters sweeps buck broke Luftwaffe in 2 months.
>>62126203>making it the best CC without resorting to 380Yeah but its size makes it less shootable/requires even more training and personally it just never fit in my hand comfortably/doesn't point naturally
>>62125479>>62125619>>two tanks have underpowered engines because they're 500 miles past their maintenance date500 miles was entire service life of the T-34. Not counting combat casualties. After 500 miles T-34 engine and running gear were completely worn off. In the second part of the WWII soviets installed high achievement goal for industry of 1000 km (600 miles) of T-34 service life. And it was high achievement because most T-34 production batches couldn't meet it.
>>62120677>rookie US pilots had sometimes a thousand hours flying time before their first missionIt was revealed to me in a dream.
>>62124730A lot of those early conflagrations were due to crews ignoring standards and stuffing munitions in every spare nook and cranny til the tank was packed as full a christmas goose, then hanging even more on the outside.
>>62126257P-51's arrived in late 43 and escorted bombers all the way to Berlin for a full bombing run.
>>62120685Anyone who complains about the Ar's charging handle is a nogunz.
>>62126270Yeah I mean it's entirely optimized around being a minimalist conceal carry. It is going to be less comfortable to shoot and require more training by it's nature. I still use an LCP instead, but if you wanted 9mm ballistics that's what it's for.
>>62126622I'm very much hasgunz and I think it would be a lot better as a side charger
>>62126861Well the good news is you can get side charging uppers - they never took off because they don't offer meaningful advantages for most.
>>62126966I do wish they were somewhat more available in my corner of YuropLike I can get a BRN-180 upper or some 9mm upper and that's it
>>62126861Dude you literally touch the charging handle twice during a normal day. Once to initially load the rifle and once at the end of the day. Rest of the time you are just hitting the bolt release.
>>62127005That's a shame, there are quite a few options available in the US. Not sure what your import restrictions are, you really only need the upper receiver and bolt carrier to convert for the most basic versions.BRN-180 is solid too, but a bit different beast.
>>62126257The battle that broke the Luftwaffe began in 1943. From 1943 onwards the Luftwaffe constantly lost more aircraft in the West (meaning both West and Mediterranean) than in the East. While there was a significant spike beginning in the first half of 1944, the second half of 1943 saw nearly as ferocious fighting with casualties inflicted on the Luftwaffe equal to about 50% of the casualties in the first half of 1944.in early 1944 the P-51 wasn't available in large numbers yet, and P-38s and P-47s were still very much in use. for example, the USAAF 4th Fighter Group (the Eagle Squadrons) only began flying Mustangs operationally in late February 1944. by the end of 1944, the USAAF fighter groups in Europe still had not fully converted to P-51s yet.the RAF also only began flying the Mustang Mk III in Feb 1944, and only one squadron. A second squadron began conversion in March 44.>In March 1944 Luftwaffe lost so much pilots they couldn't effectively act again escort fighters anymore and it was over since. P-51D fighters sweeps buck broke Luftwaffe in 2 months.in the first quarter of 1944, the Luftwaffe saw twice as many casualties (about 2,000) as in the last quarter of 1943 (about 1,000). while significant, also, 1944 was when the Luftwaffe was hastily grown from roughly 4,600 aircraft to roughly 5,200 aircraft. this rapid expansion in the face of higher loss rates can only mean that more and more rookie pilots were being put into action.the P-51 massacred a lot of green pilots, in other words.thus, in the six months from September 1943 to March 1944 the Luftwaffe lost 3,000 aircraft in the West, but the majority of these would have been inflicted by other fighter types, as the Mustang was only operational in one month out of six (March 1944).the significance of the Spitfire, Typhoon, P-38 and P-47 in destroying the Luftwaffe fighter corps is significantly and unfairly overshadowed by the P-51.
>>62125707>The P-47 was not only a mediocre dogfighterRead Nazi pilots autobiographies. They feared the P-47 more than anything else due to it's firepower, can tank hits and can disenage at will due to unrivalled dive speed.
>>62127334>in 1943Late '42 actually, since that's when regular bomber raids started arriving with US direct involvement into the European war.>From 1943 onwards the Luftwaffe constantly lost more aircraft in the West It's not even a comparison. Germans were losing more aircraft in the west than the east during the whole war, even before US entry into the theatre, with the possible exception of the early soviet invasion after they lost the battle of Britain.North Africa caused about the same aircraft losses as the entire eastern front, that's how garbage soviets were. And they never faced more than a quarter of the Luftwaffe forces, less than a fifth excluding the short period during the initial soviet invaion.
>>62127555>feared the P-47they also feared the P-38 'Der Gabelschwanz Teufel' and its buzzsaw nose-concentrated firepower but yeah I get what you're sayingthe P-47 was a devastating adversary and weapon
>>62120677>It managed to shine because it was fighting against a Luftwaffe which had had its guts ripped out on the Eastern Front for yearsNo. The Luftwaffe unquestionably got its dick ripped off by the USAAF, thousands of aircraft were diverted from the Mediterranean and Eastern Front because Americans were the far more pressing issue
>>62124300>conflatingNo.look up the word 'conflate' in dictionary>not the same aircraftthe Allison-engined P-51s are essentially the same aircraft. Subvariants like the A-36 had different modifications, armament (cannon vs. MGs) and equipment (dive brakes) for slightly different roles.the later Merlin engined B/C/D Mustangs were substantially different from the Allison P-51s>what it became known forDid (You) read the post of mine replied to and OP?read both again. Read them 50 times until they sink into your deformed skull
>>62124058>sea levelmaybeI didn't use the word "only"that was (You).
>>62124054>In CBIyeah I was mainly thinking of (not sw pacific but) 1st Air Commando Group and 23rd FGstill was an effective escort fighter and fighter bomber for the theater
>>62124599I heard that the U.S. Ordnance Department was aware of the Sherman being a 'Tommy Cooker', and attempted to implement various measures to address this issue. The design team was led by Sheldon Rosenstein, a convicted child-beater, arsonist, and avid necrophiliac. Sheldon was reportedly pen-pals with Shiro Ishii, and Oskar Dirlewanger. When questioned about these letters outgoing to hostile countries, Sheldon replied that he was merely exchanging 'tips and tricks'. Sheldon's team designed a mechanism that would lock the crew hatches shut, thus trapping the crew, when smoke was detected inside the sherman after being penetrated and set alight. Not only that, but apparently there was also a following feature that was a re-take on the Brazen Bull. When the crew was burning to death, their screams would be amplified by speakers that projected outside the tank. The U.S. Ordnance Department justified these features by proclaiming that the Germans would be frightened by the hellish screams of the sherman crews being incinerated, and allied soldiers would be more motivated to fight hard, lest the same fate befall them. Sheldon also later devised a system that had a 1 in 59 chance of setting off an explosive charge in the ammunition storage every time the Sherman's engine was turned on. Supposedly, this was to 'test the crew's luck before battle'. This innovation was well-received by the U.S. Army, but was rejected for budgetary reasons. Upon receiving news of the Army's rejection, Sheldon bludgeoned his manservant to death with a fire iron in a fit of unstoppable rage. Years after the war, Sheldon tragically died in a fire, which he had started in a New York orphanage.
>>62126861Come on, I know you wanna talk about your thoughts on the forward assist too
>>62131035Zased
>>62131035kek
>>62131133I don't really have any on the forward assistI think if you have to use it in non-adverse conditions there's something wrong with your rifle, but I have had some use of it shooting in harsh winter weather
>>62127005180s are fine give one a shot
>>62129585>read both again. Read them 50 times until they sink into your deformed skullPhysician, heal thyself.
>>62133774
>>62124120Has anyone ever claimed the BMP-2 was all that great? It was introduced almost at the same time as the Bradley
>>62120693If you were in one you had a comfy, roomy tank with good survivability. Crews loved them, despite the horrible maintenance requirements.
>>62126316Somehow, the Brit’s are responsible for this.>there seems to be something wrong with our bloody tanks today
>>62124019>The difference is that Zeroes were hilariously fragileYes.>and underarmedU wot?
>>62138129Two light machine guns and two problematic cannon is underarmed for 1941 onwards
>>62138561>2 mgsthe gladiator had more wtf
>>62139387yet another of the ways the Hawker Hurricane is underrated is that people don't get how big a deal EIGHT MOTHERFUCKING MACHINE GUNS is in 1938
>>62139427>8x .30 caliberYeah.
>>62139616>1938>Messerschmitt Bf109E: four 7.92mm>Morane Saulnier MS.406: two 7.5mm, one 20mm>Nakajima Ki-27: two 7.7mm>Macchi C.200: two 12.7mm>Curtiss P-36: three 0.30cal, one 0.50 cal>Grumman F3F: one 0.30cal, one 0.50 cal>Hawker Hurricane: eight 0.303 calYeah.
>>62139427The 12 gunned Hurricane is exceptional.>Eat your fucking golden BB
>>62120677Comparing the Mustang to the Fw 190 is nonsense, they had completely different design goals.
>>62139803>golden BBit's not even about golden BBs, that volume of firepower IS going to cause structural damage to anything flyingmachine guns only really fell out of favour when armour plate and metal bodies came in
>>62139834I count the structural spars being shredded by .303 AP as being a mouth full of golden BBs, just like having radiators shot out or cylinders losing compression.
>>62134093Kek. Saved for future use.
>>62138028Seems the U.S. was doing it as well, at least in North Africa. I forget which memoir it was but it was something along the lines of- "Tank Crews were packing every shell they could into every space in their M3's, as if they would never see another ; Crewmembers were often seen festooned with belts of .30 cal. looking like Mexican banditos".
