What happened to the .303 Browning machine guns used in RAF fighters/bombers after WW2?
I was thinking they could have replaced the Vickers/bren guns and be converted to GPMG’s like the M1919A6.
Suppose they could have been converted to the 7.62 NATO Calibre.
Apart from that, Does anyone have images of them?
If it is the same weapon as the .30 Browning, they were used by the British Army for many years after the war. An example would be the Saracen APC, which had Browning mounted in the turret, as did the ferret scout car.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browning_Model_1919_machine_gun
Why would they want/need to do this?
If you are referring to the re-boring of the weapon to take 7.62mm ammo? Then, the simple answer is that they did it to standardise ammunition. Better and simpler to produce one calibre of ammunition to fit all weapons, than to have to supply many different calibres.
The way that I read the original question was “were the aircraft guns re-used after they had been removed from aircraft that had been decommissioned?”. Possibly in a ground role?
I’d be interested in that too - especially wing guns. Or were they scrapped alonf with the rest of the plane?
No, my q was really why would the army convert A/C MGs into inferior ground wpns post-war during a time of surplus BRENs/MMGs ?
Parts/training/infrastructure/support must be borne in mind
Did wing mounted MG’s of the same calibre have the same:
as infantry ones?
Were the mounting points for internal wing mounting compatible with simple conversion to stocks?
Were they the same weapons in other respects?
I’d assume that there would be a lot of fiddly work in converting them to infantry weapons.
As Man of Stoat says, why bother when there was no shortage of other infantry
MG’s already available?
I read somewhere (and now can’t remember where) about partisans using machineguns “rescued” from a downed aircraft. I’m sure it was a fighter, because the use of bomber MGs wouldn’t have been a problem (and hence I wouldn’t have thought it so strange).
As to postwar - yes, I agree that there was already a glut of standard guns. But one wonders whether the idea was ever considered, and as RS asks above, what would the technical difficulties have been.
They couldn’t replace the BREN in the same manner due to weight, feed, role, etc., nor are they are suitable for SF.
The German MG15 was e.g. originally an aircraft MG, which, after it got replaced by machine cannons, was often converted into an infantry MG mainly used by rear area troops during a shortage of real GPMGs. Since it was not designed to be used with a bipod and to be carried, it was very bulky and arkward.
Jan
I have never heard any suggestion of using the .303 Browning in the ground role. It would have required various accessories, as already mentioned, and probably also a special supply of belted .303 ammo (the Vickers used a different belt).
Finally, it would have faced limitations on its use because of its high RoF of 1,200 rpm, which did not meet the British Army’s philosophy and would have required frequent breaks for cooling down. I don’t think the gun had the kind of quick-change barrel that the MG 34 and 42 had.
The .30 Brownings used in British AFVs were the same as the US ones, in .30-06 calibre, and fired at the normal rate of c.500 rpm.
Tony !
Stop bringing facts and common sense into these MG discussions !
LOL Good one
The browning tripod was issued to all units late 70s for bore sighting the SLR. School of Infantry Brecon used the .30 with tripod for many years as an enemy weapon. I never saw it used in the live role only blank. I saw it post Falklands so may have been captured but probably dismounted armoured car guns as ferret and Saracen were still using them at this time. If you could see a CES for the .30 browning issued to armoured vehicles you would probably find it comes with a tripod same as the L37 CES had a but, bipods and light barrel.
You cannot have such a high rate of fire in an air cooled ground machine gun with no quick change barrel facility. It would overheat too quickly. As an emergency expedient, fine, better than nothing. The idea of such an official conversion is, frankly, laughable, which is why only the sage “cutaway” is considering it…
Just to demonstrate my ignorance, was there an allowance in aircraft MG for faster cooling in the cooler air at higher altitudes and the faster flow of air over barrels (but presumably not so much the rest of the barrels and the breeches in enclosed wings)?
^^^
To some extent, but mainly because you’re not doing sustained fire, and your ammunition supply is severely limited.
with most of the remaining WW2 generation fighters and bombers either cannon-armed or quickly discarded after 1945 there was little role for the a/c Brownings and they were probably scrapped. The .30 AFV guns continued in service for many years (most converted to cease fire with bolt open) until they were finally withdrawn in 1998. They gave very little trouble and there were still plenty of spares in the supply system, most still in their WW2 packaging.
the other thing was that the main weopon being the 7.92 or 303 caliber for over eighty years, the main change was due to the newly introduced NATO rounds, which the 7.62 or the 308 calibers allowed for a more universal production of both the rounds and the barrels, but this also follows the stupidity of the americans to drop the 30-06’s, and the M1 Garands during the vietnamese war and to take up the more popular 20 caliber machine guns, so it comes down to a new round pushed by both popularity, NATO rulings, and ease of production.
Just thinking bout it, why did the B-15 flying fortresses and like, have the half inch or .50 caliber machine guns, on the nose and tale gunners along with the 303 caliber browning machine guns? and if these were effective, as they were, this poses the question, were the newly adapted weopons and calibers also improve fire rates and/or round effectiveness?