Salute to the big guns.

The A10's were always a MVP for us in afg. You should see them flying so low that you can actually see the pilot and the rivets on the aircraft- all while slinging those countermeasure flares and firing that death ray of a cannon- when you are 200 meters away and in contact! I always accused the A10 jocks of wanting to be grunts because they were practically on the ground with us sometimes. I have even seen the flares hit the side of a building and start brushfires. Just having those things do a low flyover with no ordnance being fired would make the bad guys decide to leave us alone.

Pure2nd said:

Can anyone speak to the push a battleship must deal with when firing in volume with the 16s?

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From what I understand, even when firing a full salvo the sideways movement is imperceptible. Drachinifel may have had a bit on that.

The recoil from 9 16”/50 cal guns is enormous, but an Iowa class BB is enormouser.

Many moons ago I was visiting the Iowa in Bremerton and got to talking to one of the sailors. He had been talking to a group of tourists and mentioned that the ship could be reconditioned and put back in service (this was before the Reagan navy).

One of the ladies (+P+ sized) said "Nonsense, a boat moves when I step on board and this one didn’t even wiggle! You must have it on concrete pilings”

Pure2nd said:

Good replies and interesting stuff.

Can anyone speak to the push a battleship must deal with when firing in volume with the 16s?

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Yes. There is no push. The waves you see in pictures are a result of the muzzle creating ripples on the water. Naval cannons recoil in their mounts. If the ship moved in the water from the guns firing as much as the ripples show, everyone would be thrown against the bulkheads.

Again, simple laws of physics are in play just at a larger scale. Each 16 inch gun fires a projectile weighing around 2,000 pounds. Multiply that times 9 and you at a measly 18,000 pounds. An Iowa class BB weighs in at 45,000 TONS (that's 90,000 pounds). Just like the GAU-8 in the A-10 that isn't taking the recoil reduction into account.

As a real life example, go find pictures of battleships firing in support of various invasions, particularly WWII. In many of the pictures you can see the anchors set while they fire. If the ship moved appreciably while firing, eventually the anchors would drag or the chains would snap.

Again I have been beaten to the punch. She above for a far shorter response from @MoscowMike.

Pure2nd said:

speak to the push a battleship must deal with when firing in volume with the 16s?

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Using very round numbers, a full broadside is 9 x 2000# at 2600fps.

Now, that's on a ship that displaces around 53,000 tons of seawater ("weighs" is a rather arbitrary concept in ship buoyancy). The "hole in the water" a ship's hull is what the displacement "is." Sea water comes in at 65# per cubic foot. A ship "weighs" less than it displaces, or else it would sink. But, what it "weighs" varies. A fully loaded Iowa has about 300 tons of just 16" ammunition on board. And around 100 tons of power charges as well. Add in bunker fuel, and food, and other expendables, and the ship can ride near 10' higher out of the water after a full combat mission than before.

Havok7416 said:

n at 45,000 TONS (that's 90,000 pounds).

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Missed some decimal places, 45kt is 90 million pounds--easy to do with these sorts of numbers.

This despite having both learned and taught Queequeg's Coffin a time or two, Sigh.

12Bravo20 said:

A note on the A10, if they hold the trigger too long you can see the aircraft actually stop or move backwards while in flight.

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Definitely not the case that the plane will stop or come anywhere close to stopping or moving backwards (and if it could do so, it would be catastrophic), but the pilot can feel the plane slow down a bit when the cannon is firing. My Nephew is an A-10 pilot and has talked about this a bit. These are awesome aircraft that some in congress might want to mothball, but none of the troops on the ground want to see go away.

I6turbo said:

Definitely not the case that the plane will stop or come anywhere close to stopping or moving backwards (and if it could do so, it would be catastrophic), but the pilot can feel the plane slow down a bit when the cannon is firing. My Nephew is an A-10 pilot and has talked about this a bit. These are awesome aircraft that some in congress might want to mothball, but none of the troops on the ground want to see go away.

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Well what do I know just being a dumb glorified grunt with a shovel. It sure looks like they stop when firing long bursts when they are directly overhead of you on the battlefield.

A bud of mine was on an American Battleship when it fired a broadside. He was in the center tour section, I think being outside would have gotten a person killed. He said even though he was inside, it felt as though he had been punched in the stomach.

I have a WW2 book by a sailor who was firing the 40mm's and his gun was below the five inchers on his light cruiser.



the sailor complained about chronic headaches from the blast of the 5 inch guns.

turn of the century coastal artillery









I toured Fort Morgan in Mobile Bay. The magazines were a good distance from the fort, a rail line had been built so munitions could be brought in. I was able to follow the rail lines, hoists, and lift areas. As you can see in the picture, final delivery was with some cart. It is obvious, that by the 1890's, 1900, Fort Designers were highly concerned that modern artillery could penetrate the earth and masonry of the Fort and put the shells and powder bags far enough away that a direct hit on the magazine would not take out the Fort.

I cannot image the blast from those 12 inch guns to the ground crews.

When I was stationed at Ft. Campbell, KY in the mid 80's I had the opportunity to watch an anti-tank training exercise with the infantry using the Dragon anti-tank missile and the A10 doing strafing runs on target tanks. The A10s were passing directly overhead at a very low altitude and when they fired off a burst it was quite impressive the amount of hurt it put on the target tanks.

CapnMac said:

Using very round numbers, a full broadside is 9 x 2000# at 2600fps.

Now, that's on a ship that displaces around 53,000 tons of seawater ("weighs" is a rather arbitrary concept in ship buoyancy). The "hole in the water" a ship's hull is what the displacement "is." Sea water comes in at 65# per cubic foot. A ship "weighs" less than it displaces, or else it would sink. But, what it "weighs" varies. A fully loaded Iowa has about 300 tons of just 16" ammunition on board. And around 100 tons of power charges as well. Add in bunker fuel, and food, and other expendables, and the ship can ride near 10' higher out of the water after a full combat mission than before.


Missed some decimal places, 45kt is 90 million pounds--easy to do with these sorts of numbers.

This despite having both learned and taught Queequeg's Coffin a time or two, Sigh.

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Yeah I sure did.

The 14" guns of the first Fort Drum, "The Concrete Battleship", in Manila Bay, Phillipines, circa 1925-


A fascinating and now little-known edifice to American Imperialism, for better or worse.
Recommended reading-
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Drum_(Philippines)

Largest muzzleloading cannon ever made.

The Armstrong 100 tonne.

Slamfire said:

Saw this while visiting the Pima AFB Musuem.

View attachment 1069652

Looked like the A10's were doing touch and go.

I was very impressed with the B47. Might be the biggest bomber we ever built

View attachment 1069653

The B1B is still in service. Smooth airplane.

View attachment 1069654

If you tour the fighter aircraft at Pima, or Wright Patterson, notice that the late 40's jets had guns, and then the guns disappear. The guns were replaced by missiles. The problem was, those single barrel machine guns, or machine cannons, could not put enough lead on target to destroy a jet. There are plenty of accounts of American fighters in Korea just pumping bullets into and at MIGs before the MIG finally went down. If you look at Chinn's Machine Gun Series, https://www.milsurps.com/content.php?r=347-The-Machine-Gun-(by-George-M.-Chinn)


You see that what machine cannon development that is going on post WW2, is focused on multi barrel machine gun cannons. And those were extremely heavy, took a lot of power to operate, and so, it took time for the guns to come back.

This is the Guns a Go Go. Virtually there was a machine gun sticking out of every hole.

View attachment 1069661

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Your second pic is a B36. Not a B47.

I6turbo said:

Definitely not the case that the plane will stop or come anywhere close to stopping or moving backwards (and if it could do so, it would be catastrophic),

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Can't change physics. Wings must have airflow or they're useless and the A10 becomes a 25,000 lb anvil.
I have stopped and gone backwards... in an aerobatic biplane, but the backwards part was a straight line back to earth.

Jeff olson said:

Your second pic is a B36. Not a B47.

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Opps! You are right.

One B47 coming up



I worked next to a guy who was an navigator/bombardier in one of these, US 8th Army Air Force. (8 AAF)



he said, half of his flight school class never made it back. I gave him a book on the British experience, he got 20 pages into it, before getting too upset to continue. Too many good buddies still over there.

12Bravo20 said:

A note on the A10, if they hold the trigger too long you can see the aircraft actually stop or move backwards while in flight.

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Sorry, no.

The recoil force of a GAU-8 is in the neighborhood of 10,000 pounds. The rate of fire is 3,900 rpm and the maximum ammunition capacity is 1350 rounds, or 21 seconds.

The A-10 is equipped with two TF-34-100, each rated at 9,000 pound of thrust at sea level, for a total of 18,000 pounds of thrust. If the gun is fired and firing is maintained until all the ammo is expended, while the aircraft is in level flight at a speed of 310 knots, the total recoil will reduce the airspeed 75 knots, assuming the pilot does not increase thrust. However, shooting has to be done in a shallow dive, even if the throttle id not moved the speed will not be reduced an appreciable amount.

According to A-10 pilots I have talked to is that the recoil from the guns wasn't noticeable. However, the exhaust generated by the spent shell casings (smoke, particulate) tended to get into the engines and cause issues. Hence the relatively short bursts followed by periods of non-firing to let the engines clear.

Incidentally, gun gas ingestion and its effects on engine performance is typical with most aircraft with the gun muzzles near the intakes, such as the A-4, F-11, and F-4E.

So I was proven wrong several times already. I am not beyond admitting when I am wrong which I was. No need to beat a dead horse here.


Like I said, in the heat of combat and the A10 is directly overhead and firing its cannon, it sure looks like it stops for a split second. And Yes I have had them flying and firing directly above me in combat on several occasions.

That is the BBRRRRRTTTTTTT gun.

You know it’s hot today when 70 30 mike mikers come screaming overhead at Mach 2.8.

lysanderxiii said:

...However, the exhaust generated by the spent shell casings (smoke, particulate) tended to get into the engines and cause issues. Hence the relatively short bursts followed by periods of non-firing to let the engines clear...

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Someone got it before I had to. This is the why and was a much more serious issue on the early tests. Really serious. Lots of muzzle device and nose shape variants, etc. They also upgraded the starter system for MANY more operating cycles than the usual, and it automatically triggers the startup system when firing, so if it does flame out from oxygen deprivation, the engine should restart within a few seconds.

Finally got the powder tweaked and got the burst procedure down and these systems, and it works. But a lot of gun. There were worries they wouldn't get it worked out early in the test flight program.


Also... 30mm is small arms? Naw. Once you get to to say 14.5mm (there are opinions where the cutoff is) it's a "cannon." Somewhere around 50-70 mm it becomes artillery, or a gun.

12Bravo20 said:

So I was proven wrong several times already. I am not beyond admitting when I am wrong which I was. No need to beat a dead horse here.


Like I said, in the heat of combat and the A10 is directly overhead and firing its cannon, it sure looks like it stops for a split second. And Yes I have had them flying and firing directly above me in combat on several occasions.

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Adrenaline has a funny way of impacting our time/space perspective. Either things speed up or slow down for many people. I've had more than a few such instances myself.

shoobe01 said:

Someone got it before I had to. This is the why and was a much more serious issue on the early tests. Really serious. Lots of muzzle device and nose shape variants, etc. They also upgraded the starter system for MANY more operating cycles than the usual, and it automatically triggers the startup system when firing, so if it does flame out from oxygen deprivation, the engine should restart within a few seconds.

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Okay I knew I wasn't going crazy watching them look like they stall when firing long bursts from the 30mm. And I can definitely see the engine getting starved for oxygen.

A10s fly over my house very frequently. Selfridge ANG base is a couple hundred miles south of me, and they seem to use the lake as a focal point in their day to day ops. Common sight for all the time I've been up here. Sometimes they fly right down the highway, that's especially wild, as you'll hear only a bit of a rumble, then that roar as it passes over you.

12Bravo20 said:

Okay I knew I wasn't going crazy watching them look like they stall when firing long bursts from the 30mm. And I can definitely see the engine getting starved for oxygen.

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In order for an aircraft to stall it needs to lose lift over the wing. In a descent (which you have to be to aim at the ground) you continue to push air across the wing, meaning a stall is exceedingly unlikely. This applies even if the engines aren't running.

I talked to a A10 pilot one time asking him questions about the effect of firing the gun. He stated that when the gun fired the gasses from the firing choked off the engines and it felt like you were stomping on the brakes of a car. Pretty much a quote there!

Well it seems that I was only party wrong on my earlier statement. No it won't go backwards or completely stop mid air. But firing the gun DOES effect the aircraft and its flight performance. Again things look different on the ground when they are directly over head. And yes I do understand the requirements for flight. Though I am more familiar with rotary wing versus fixed wing.