"Kevin Brooks" wrote in message
om...
"Paul J. Adam" wrote in message
...
In message ,
writes
What would be more effective for strafing -- An F-51 with it's six
50-calibers or an A-1 with its four 20 mm cannon?

20mm, definitely.

The .50 was a fine anti-fighter weapon for most of the war, blessed with
a good rate of fire, excellent ballistics, and reasonable lethality.
Against bombers it would have struggled, but the US rarely faced large,
armoured bombers. The RAF started with .303, rapidly found it wanting
and moved to the Hispano; the USAF had the .50 which was a good
all-rounder, even if with hindsight a change to 20mm for many roles
would have been better.

Not necessarily. The .50 cal was generally more reliable than most of
the 20mm cannon then available, and carried more ammo per weapon.
Unless you can show that 20mm armed fighters were demonstrably
superior strafers (and given the records attained by the P-47 and P-51
in both the European and Pacific theaters that is going to be hard to
do), it is kind of hard to say "20mm definitely", IMO. Remember, the
question regards strafing, not the downing of large, reasonably
armored bombers.


And the Hawker Typhoon and Hurricane armed with cannon did a lot
of strafing, the comparison could have been and was done.


The USN switched to 20mm. the USAF didn't. Difference between Pacific
and Europe, perhaps?

When did the USN switch to the 20mm during WWII, or for that matter
during the Korean War? AFAIK, the standard remained the .50 cal in
both services until after the Korean conflict, when both began
shifting to the 20mm at roughly the same time (in the same general
timeframe that the A-1 was coming into major service with its 20mm,
the later F-86 variants were also gaining the heavier weapons, IIRC,
as was the new F-100).

Brooks

The USN jets produced in the immediate post war period
were cannon armed. The Grumman F9F for example reached
the fleet in 1949 and had 4 20mm cannon as did the F2H
Banshee

Later variants of the last generation of piston engined fighters
were also fitted with cannon including the F8F Bearcat
in the 1B variant.

The F7F Tigercat had 4 20 mm cannon in the wing roots and
4x0.50 MG in the nose.

Keith