Live Fire Ball Turret

[warbird1]

There are no hoops to jump thru to mount a machine gun on your plane, if you own the machine gun legally.The gun mounting is covered in the parts and maint manuals, and as such, are not major modifications to install. You do have to inform the BATF if you are taking the gun out of your home state. You can even fire the gun, as long as you meet FAR 91.15 which covers Dropping objects.
No pilot in command of a civil aircraft may allow any object to be dropped from that aircraft in flight that creates a hazard to persons or property. However, this section does not prohibit the dropping of any object if reasonable precautions are taken to avoid injury or damage to persons or property.

Is it really that easy as you seem to paint it? If it was, how come there hasn't been a single prop-driven warbird that has had live guns, much less blank firing guns installed on it, with the exception of the P-40 from Wanaka last year? You would think that of all of the warbird owners with huge resources, money and connections, that some history buff owner, fanatical about accuracy, would equip their plane with guns. Is there some part of the picture you are leaving out? Surely, it's got to be significantly more difficult if not impossible than you seem to indicate?

[mustangdriver]

There are no hoops to jump thru to mount a machine gun on your plane, if you own the machine gun legally.The gun mounting is covered in the parts and maint manuals, and as such, are not major modifications to install. You do have to inform the BATF if you are taking the gun out of your home state. You can even fire the gun, as long as you meet FAR 91.15 which covers Dropping objects.
No pilot in command of a civil aircraft may allow any object to be dropped from that aircraft in flight that creates a hazard to persons or property. However, this section does not prohibit the dropping of any object if reasonable precautions are taken to avoid injury or damage to persons or property.

Let me know how that goes. We still argue from time to time about the proper placards on aircraft because they don't like the color, I couldn't imagine telling the local FSDO that I installed a 50 cal. in my Piper.

[CAPFlyer]

Is it really that easy as you seem to paint it? If it was, how come there hasn't been a single prop-driven warbird that has had live guns, much less blank firing guns installed on it, with the exception of the P-40 from Wanaka last year? You would think that of all of the warbird owners with huge resources, money and connections, that some history buff owner, fanatical about accuracy, would equip their plane with guns. Is there some part of the picture you are leaving out? Surely, it's got to be significantly more difficult if not impossible than you seem to indicate?

Not really. It's that you aren't considering the considerations that make owners vote against it.

1) Liability (big one).
2) Weight (another big one).
3) Cost (it's about $1/round last time I checked for .50 blanks).
4) General Hassle (do I really want to deal with the paperwork, cleaning them, maintaining them, making sure I always have the paperwork with me in case I'm ramp checked?)
5) Sellability (will the airshows still invite me if they know I have live guns? What happens when they find out if they don't ask?)
6) Insurance (another big one - will my insurance company let me?)

[warbird1]

Not really. It's that you aren't considering the considerations that make owners vote against it.

1) Liability (big one).

This one makes absolute sense, and I can see how this would be a showstopper. The potential to have your ass sued off for an accidental discharge and lose everything would be a HUGE detriment to me! But with taking certain precautions, like keeping the aircraft on a "hot" ramp away from the public, perhaps on the other side of an airfield while not flying, would go a long way to preventing any accidents.

2) Weight (another big one).

I don't see this as that big of a deal. A lot of restorations now have lots of full military equipment, including fake non-firing guns, armor plating, gun chargers, etc. The latest restoration, "Happy Jack's Go-Buggy" has virtually all of the original weight on it. I don't see the addition of weight as that big of a deal. A few extra hundreds of pounds on a Mustang is not going to make that big of a difference when it is being offset by the deletion of the fuselage gas tank and armor plating, etc.

3) Cost (it's about $1/round last time I checked for .50 blanks).

I don't see this as a big deal whatsoever. Let's see. A typical fighter costs anywhere from 1.5 million to 4 to 5 million dollars. An engine overhaul can cost upwards of $100,000. Av gas can cost close to $ 7 to $8 dollars per gallon. Tell me again, why I would be worried about a measley $1 per round. That is chump change and not even worth worrying about! This argument does not hold water. If you have to worry about paying one dollar a round then you wouldn't have the warbird in the first place!

4) General Hassle (do I really want to deal with the paperwork, cleaning them, maintaining them, making sure I always have the paperwork with me in case I'm ramp checked?)

Perhaps this is an issue, but I don't see it as that big of a deal. After all of the initial paperwork is done, you're set. You carry your pilot's license, airworthiness certificate, etc, with you in the airplane. What's the big deal about carrying a folder with a few more documents in it? If warbird owners are willing to go through the red tape to import warbirds from former Communist countries, with full armaments. (i.e. - L-29's, -39's, various Migs, etc.), why would a little more paperwork be that much more detrimental? As far as cleaning and maintaining them - you would probably have a dedicated mechanic to maintain the airplane anyways, so what's a little extra work? After all, you're a millionaire and you can afford such luxuries.

5) Sellability (will the airshows still invite me if they know I have live guns? What happens when they find out if they don't ask?)

Perhaps this is a factor, but I would think it would be a selling point. When I found out about the P-40 "live fire" event scheduled for Wanaka last year, I considered going half way around the world, just to see this event. Only due to the fact that I found out too late, was the only reason that I didn't go. I couldn't travel there on such short notice. That airplane did not even have fully functional guns, but was only capable of firing blanks. I would bet that if you promoted your warbird as one of the few that fired blanks at an airshow, it would be a huge draw. I know I would certainly go see it. It's a HUGE selling feature for me. I think the general public would think it pretty awesome to see working machine guns "fire" blanks at an airshow and would be a giant draw. What about current military hardware like F-16's, F-18's etc? They all have live machine guns, but it doesn't stop them from appearing at civilian airshows all over the place.

6) Insurance (another big one - will my insurance company let me?)

I could see where this might be a big issue for the less wealthy warbird owners. But when you are extremely wealthy, along the lines of the Paul Allen's, Kermit Weeks, Charles Nichols, Rod Lewis types, you would be able to afford to lose an aircraft with no hull insurance. The setback would probably not put much of a dent in your bottom line. This argument might have some merit, but surely there is a wealthy millionaire warbird owner out there who doesn't care about being covered by insurance.

Some good points, CAP Flyer, but I still don't understand why someone hasn't done it yet. Especially with doing something along the lines of the Wanaka P-40, where you modify the guns so they could only fire blanks. This would ensure a "safe" machine gun, that would not be too dangerous, and yet keep the public safe at airshows and keep liability down at a minimum. It would be the best compromise for ensuring the most authentic restoration and the least amount of risk for historical accuracy!

[CAPFlyer]

First, find me an owner who's imported Communist equipment with full armaments in working condition. I know the CWAM fleet will NEVER have working weaponry. Why? Because the BATFE said so. Mind you, the founders have all the required certifications and everything, but BATFE told them that the weapons have to be permanently de-milled to be imported - period. Heck, two of them are long time law enforcement and one of those two is a sitting Dallas County Constable. If anyone's going to be able to "finagle" the system, one would think that they would.

The list of allowable machine guns and "large caliber weapons" is very tightly controlled. If it's not on it or you're a special case (for example a defense contractor like Mike Dillon), you're going to find a lot of problems with BATFE getting a live weapon or even a blank firing weapon imported from outside the US, especially if it's a non-US designed weapon.

[JDK]

First, find me an owner who's imported Communist equipment with full armaments in working condition.

I know at least one. However it was by accident (everyone assumed the didn't work) and were deactivated as soon as they realised. No names, no pack drill.

However that's just a distraction. I agree with all of Warbird1s point - if cost and difficulties are an issue, what are you doing with a warbird anyway?

If it possible (leaving aside cost or difficulty) why has there never (AFAIK) been a .30 or .50 cal fitted warbird?

I'm genuinely just curious.