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Subject: Mig-15 v. F-86
RockyMTNClimber    6/13/2010 10:40:31 AM
I think this is one of the more interesting historical aviation stories. At the conclusion of WWII the allies divied up the available German engineers and combined them with talent from their bench to create our first generation of jet powered combat aircraft. This happened just as Ole' Smokin Joe Stalin became frisky and decided he could take over the universe. The net Russian result was an airplane that was fastest in level flight, had the highest combat ceiling of any at the time, and could turn with anything the west had in a horizontal fight. Then, the Mig was produced in numbers that boggled the 1950 mind. When the whistle blew over Korea the US had very few assets in place to hold back the Red Tide. Initial combat fell on the F-80 and what WWII piston aircraft that were still stored in the region. The Mig quickly proved itself a vicious killer of B-29s and it could stay outside of any UN fighter pilot's weapons envelope he wanted to. In spite of this, the F-86 did finally arrive and with it some of the best pilots the world has ever seen. The Sabre Jet established itself as a heat shield against the communist "Faggot" (the NATO code name for the Mig-15) and ran up at least a six to one kill ratio. When we compare today's PAC-FX against western types it would be well that we consider we have not always had the pure performance advantages to keep our side safe. Sometimes we have actually had to settle for lower performance and other factors to prevail against our despotic enemies "inferior" equipment. I think the Mig-15 v. F-86 makes an interesting case study that remains relevant today. Check Six Rocky
 
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RockyMTNClimber    Wet diapers......   6/23/2010 3:44:27 PM
My first question is, how did the ground controllers know that the aircraft on their radar screens were F-104s?
 
The bad guys knew what aircraft arrived from the US. When and in what numbers. When birds were being sortied and what ordinance they were carrying. They even had dossiers on the individual pilots. The lowest ranks of them. All of this was provided by a cadre of well paid intellegence agents in South Vietnam, Thailand, Philipines and anywhere else the US forces were deployed.
 
Check Six
 
Rocky
 
 
 
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45-Shooter       6/23/2010 3:49:09 PM
That is my one criticism of the F-8. I would have preferred  Mausers or an Adens.in 27 mm. Also the Crusader I believe used Mark 12s.

If I'm not mistaken, the BK27 was nowhere near enough ready for F-8 armament: it didn't come about until the advent of the MRCA program which begat the Tornado (1970s).

Also seen it suggested as suitable armament for Jaguars and Alpha Jets (although a single centerline podded, rather than two internal, for that expensive, troublesome little trainer).

 As to ADENs, up until the AV-8B and BAe Hawk trainer programs, the ADENs were only in 30mm. It was these two aircraft that encouraged the development of an ADEN in 25mm,...which itself proved troublesome and expensive to fix, ending up yet another promising defense design (with the flaws fixed) that was sacrificed on the altar of saving money for something else.

 Funny point about the 27mm: initially under Project Vulcan, there were three calibers considered: 15.2mm(.60"-cal), 20mm, and 27mm.

It was 20mm that eventually won the day, and became the M61 family as we know it.

The .60-cal was at one point chosen as a follow-on to the 50-Browning late in WW2, when it was suggested 50-cal might not cut it anymore, but 20mm cannon were having reliability issues.

I remember seeing an artist's rendering of them installed in the nose of the Bell XP-83 back in a 1980s Airpower or Wings magazine.
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Hamilcar    Revolbert versus electric gatlings.   6/23/2010 4:07:46 PM
The original brief was the F-86. The Vulcan is an electricity hog and its not SMALL. Where would I put it on a Sabre when I wanted the Hughes E-1 radar, the auto-cue circuit and a cannon?? So I get a pair of gas operated revolver cannon. They are smaller lighter and they don't eat electricity I need for the radar. Now what revolver cannon do I use?
 
M-12?
M-39?
 
Are you kidding? 
 
That leaves some kind of DEFA or ADEN. The Israelis had all kinds of trouble with the DEFA because of bottlejams, duds and the fact that the excessive muzzle gas expelled was sucked into the Mirages they used and snuffed the crappy SNECMA engine and by extension the aircraft it was in as that  augured into the ground.  
 
That leaves the ADEN and in the Sabre it goes into the wing roots so that you can put the muzzle flash below and away from the pilot's LoS as well as the muzzle gas away from the AVON engine. 
 
Gatlings have their advantages but these are not the advantages that help me in a small  fighter into which I try to cram a radar, 4 SIDEWINDERS, and a target cuing system as well as the guns.  
 
   

 
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45-Shooter    Corect data & Apologies!   6/23/2010 4:13:48 PM

Air forces found a different reason for seeking high velocity from aircraft guns; to minimise the time of flight of the projectile and therefore improve the chances of hitting a fast-manoeuvering target. The USAAF was using the .50" heavy machine gun, which achieved a velocity of 2,900 fps with the 710 grain M2 AP bullet. It was estimated that a 50 percent increase in muzzle velocity would triple the hit probability, so two development paths were followed; lighter bullets, and larger cases. This led to the development of the 495 grain M23 incendiary loading, @ 3,500 fps in the standard .50 Browning case, and was adopted for service. The second path was more complicated.

The USA had two suitable large-capacity cases available; the 20mm Hispano (the RAF?s standard weapon, also adopted by the USA) and the .60" MG, which began as an anti-tank rifle cartridge but was then used in a variety of experimental machine guns. They also built two new cases for other reasons of gun compatability. Experiments with the 20mm necked down to .50" started in 1942 and achieved over 4,000 fps. The .60" MG round propelled a 1,150 grain bullet at over 3,500 fps. They also produced 750 grain loadings achieving 4,100 fps. The next step was to neck down the .60 cartridge to form the .60/.50, which achieved 4,000 fps with a 660 grain bullet and an heroic 4,400 fps with a 500 grain API projectile. After all this, the US did choose the .60 MG case as the basis for its next aircraft gun - but necked out to 20mm to achieve 3,380 fps!

 
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45-Shooter    Corect data & Apologies!   6/23/2010 4:21:02 PM

The original brief was the F-86. The Vulcan is an electricity hog and its not SMALL. Where would I put it on a Sabre when I wanted the Hughes E-1 radar, the auto-cue circuit and a cannon?? So I get a pair of gas operated revolver cannon. They are smaller lighter and they don't eat electricity I need for the radar. Now what revolver cannon do I use?


 

M-12?

M-39?

 

Are you kidding? 


 

That leaves some kind of DEFA or ADEN. The Israelis had all kinds of trouble with the DEFA because of bottlejams, duds and the fact that the excessive muzzle gas expelled was sucked into the Mirages they used and snuffed the crappy SNECMA engine and by extension the aircraft it was in as that  augured into the ground.  

 

That leaves the ADEN and in the Sabre it goes into the wing roots so that you can put the muzzle flash below and away from the pilot's LoS as well as the muzzle gas away from the AVON engine. 

 

Gatlings have their advantages but these are not the advantages that help me in a small  fighter into which I try to cram a radar, 4 SIDEWINDERS, and a target cuing system as well as the guns.  


 


   






The entire problem is that you are thinking of modifying an existing plane to change the gun(s). In clean sheet of paper designs it is easy to put the M-61 into a small plane because it weighs less than the four M-39s or two Aden's, think Fiat? or the much smaller F-104! PS. It also comes in hydraulic drive.

 
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doggtag       6/23/2010 4:31:45 PM

The original brief was the F-86. The Vulcan is an electricity hog and its not SMALL. Where would I put it on a Sabre when I wanted the Hughes E-1 radar, the auto-cue circuit and a cannon?? So I get a pair of gas operated revolver cannon. They are smaller lighter and they don't eat electricity I need for the radar. Now what revolver cannon do I use?


You could go really hog-wild if you wanted to: the Viggen was being developed thru the 1960s, to begin fielding in the early 1970s.
The 30mm Oerlikon KCA gun was nothing less than a brute, developed something from a Hispano design, IIRC.
 
Where would you put it?
A single, under the fuselage, just like in the Viggen, to one side or the other of the nose gear, and forward of the main gear bays. Might have to slightly bulge it a bit on the underside, for the actual barrel port (don't really want that muzzle blast right against the fuselage).
 
With the radome-equipped Sabre "Dog" variant, the gun's ammo and other trinkets could've installed where the retractable 24round Mighty Mouse pod was, there behind the nose gear.
 
That gun might've been a brute to the airframe (or not), but its higher-powered ammo (30x173mm, same as the GAU-8 in the A-10) was an even bigger beast versus enemy aircraft, and more than a match for anything you choose to shoot at on the ground (and had very good range and accuracy from its shells, AIUI).
 
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Hamilcar       6/23/2010 4:33:01 PM
The entire problem is that you are thinking of modifying an existing plane to change the gun(s). In clean sheet of paper designs it is easy to put the M-61 into a small plane because it weighs less than the four M-39s or two Aden's, think Fiat? or the much smaller F-104! PS. It also comes in hydraulic drive.
 
The F-86 is not clean sheet. I have room for fuel and two guns in the wings, not four. I don't trust hydraulics used for linear or rotary cyclic machinery at all except as a transmission. I barely trust it for primary push and power boost applications as we use it in aircraft now. I wish we had better ways to do the work. There is a lot to be said for pneumatic first trigger cycle and then let either mechanical recoil or gas operation continue to cycle a gun.
 
H.   
 
 
 
 
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45-Shooter    I like this idea!!!   6/23/2010 9:13:16 PM



The original brief was the F-86. The Vulcan is an electricity hog and its not SMALL. Where would I put it on a Sabre when I wanted the Hughes E-1 radar, the auto-cue circuit and a cannon?? So I get a pair of gas operated revolver cannon. They are smaller lighter and they don't eat electricity I need for the radar. Now what revolver cannon do I use?






You could go really hog-wild if you wanted to: the Viggen was being developed thru the 1960s, to begin fielding in the early 1970s.

The 30mm Oerlikon KCA gun was nothing less than a brute, developed something from a Hispano design, IIRC.

 

Where would you put it?

A single, under the fuselage, just like in the Viggen, to one side or the other of the nose gear, and forward of the main gear bays. Might have to slightly bulge it a bit on the underside, for the actual barrel port (don't really want that muzzle blast right against the fuselage).

 

With the radome-equipped Sabre "Dog" variant, the gun's ammo and other trinkets could've installed where the retractable 24round Mighty Mouse pod was, there behind the nose gear.

 

That gun might've been a brute to the airframe (or not), but its higher-powered ammo (30x173mm, same as the GAU-8 in the A-10) was an even bigger beast versus enemy aircraft, and more than a match for anything you choose to shoot at on the ground (and had very good range and accuracy from its shells, AIUI).

This is my kind of idea! If you look up the picture of the "Stripped" F-86H at the USAF Museum in Daton Ohio, you can see that there is more than enough room under the skin to do things like this, IF it is done in the design stage!

 
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45-Shooter    I like this idea!!!   6/23/2010 9:22:22 PM

The entire problem is that you are thinking of modifying an existing plane to change the gun(s). In clean sheet of paper designs it is easy to put the M-61 into a small plane because it weighs less than the four M-39s or two Aden's, think Fiat? or the much smaller F-104! PS. It also comes in hydraulic drive.

 

The F-86 is not clean sheet. I have room for fuel and two guns in the wings, not four. I don't trust hydraulics used for linear or rotary cyclic machinery at all except as a transmission. I barely trust it for primary push and power boost applications as we use it in aircraft now. I wish we had better ways to do the work. There is a lot to be said for pneumatic first trigger cycle and then let either mechanical recoil or gas operation continue to cycle a gun.

 

H.   


 

 

 
There are fuel tanks and landing gear struts in the wings that would preclude mounting guns in them. But there is more than enough room to mount four revolver guns in place of the six fifties. I like the idea of a semi-submerged belly pack full of guns. It would be easy to cut and weld/rivit into place and the ammo chutes could go threw large radius bends and snake foreward to the place of the same ammo boxes?

 
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Hamilcar       6/23/2010 10:04:29 PM




The entire problem is that you are thinking of modifying an existing plane to change the gun(s). In clean sheet of paper designs it is easy to put the M-61 into a small plane because it weighs less than the four M-39s or two Aden's, think Fiat? or the much smaller F-104! PS. It also comes in hydraulic drive.



 



The F-86 is not clean sheet. I have room for fuel and two guns in the wings, not four. I don't trust hydraulics used for linear or rotary cyclic machinery at all except as a transmission. I barely trust it for primary push and power boost applications as we use it in aircraft now. I wish we had better ways to do the work. There is a lot to be said for pneumatic first trigger cycle and then let either mechanical recoil or gas operation continue to cycle a gun.



 



H.   






 



 



 


There are fuel tanks and landing gear struts in the wings that would preclude mounting guns in them. But there is more than no enough room to mount four revolver guns in place of the six fifties. I like the idea of a semi-submerged belly pack full of guns. It would be easy to cut and weld/rivit into place and the ammo chutes could go threw large radius bends and snake foreward to the place of the same ammo boxes?



Its clear that you need this:
 
http://www.flightglobal.com/airspace/media/galleries/images/14171/500x400/north-american-f-86e-sabre-cutaway.jpg" /> 
 
 
 
 
I have the room I need for the TWO cannon I specified. Never  use long  articulated ammunition feeds when short direct feeds are possible and quit suggesting I put guns in places where their vibration will screw up the radar!.
 
 H.
 
 
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