Warbird Information Exchange

I was watching a Thunderbolt snippet over on Youtube and noticed something I'd never seen before. What the heck is on the ends of the gun barrels?

I believe it is tape. They taped over the ends of the barrels to keep dirt out.

I wondered about that possibility. Looks like you would have to use an entire roll to get it as thick as it appears on the longest barrel.

Looks like a flash suppressor on the end of the 2 inboard barrels. The inboard one it looks like you can see through to the other side through the aft slits
The other 2 it could be tape remnants that were wrapped on the suppressor sides or some method of securing a cut down suppressor to the cooling jacket..

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I have never seen flash suppressors used on P-47 gun barrels. I have done some research on the P-47 gun barrels in the past and my best guess is that what you see is tape that was used to seal the ends of the barrels. The guns may have been fired and the wind is blowing the tape back, giving it the appearance that you see. Later in the war, circular carboard disks were produced which were inserted in the barrels to keep the dirt out.

Speaking of gun barrels, I have often wondered why the P-47 and P-38 used blast tubes over the .50 cal gun barrels. It was suggested by some that the blast tubes protected the barrels and also reduced drag somewhat by covering the perforated .50 cal gun barrels. The P-47 and the P-38 were pretty much the only WWII fighters that had the gun barrels sticking out significantly from the wing or nose section (P-38). Both suggestions make sense.

Any information or suggestions would be welcome.

Ron

they are 50 caliber foreskins!!

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Yea, that's not the greatest thought or image.......

All kidding aside, according the P-38 Erection and Maintenance manual, the barrel sleeves were fitted to the guns to keep air from blowing into the nose compartment. I presume they were fitted to the guns on the P-47 for the same reason.

Ron

The inboard gun, at least, looks like it has a muzzle brake similar to those fitted to the cheek guns on a B-25, albeit turned 90 degrees. Why they are fitted - aside from the armorer thinking they look cool- is a mystery.

The blast tubes on a P-47, and P-38 (and P-35 FTM) are to keep the guns warm - or at least from 'overcooling' in the slipstream - so they are less apt to freeze up and jam. It's the same reason that muzzles are taped, or patched over, and wing mounted guns are often fitted with electric heaters , or ducted hot air.

That also one reason why cowl mounted guns remained as common as they did. The rate of fire of a synchronized gun may be lower, but the reliability is higher due to a constant operating temperature (and room for a bigger ammo box doesn't hurt either)

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Thanks Shrike.

The manual that I quoted the information from was for the P-38L, a later version of the Lightning. Earlier P-38s did not have the sleeves or blast tubes covering the .50 cal barrels. I guess the cold air was a problem and the sleeves were developed as a solution to the problem.

It seems like the blast tubes were used on P-47s right from the start.

Ron

The P-47 was also a turbocharged high altitude fighter, maybe that's why? Same goes for the P-38.

Along with that I thought or read somewhere that the tape was used to see if the gun fired when they came back to base?

The pilot would be pretty sure to mention it, even if there weren't great filthy powder stains on the wing. In any case, time allowing, the guns would be removed, cleaned and oiled between missions anyway.

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.

The tape was used after cleaning to seal the barrels to keep the guns clean, free of moisture and also to prevent the blast air from cooling the guns too quickly. High altitude fighters and escort aircraft had electric heaters attached to the receiver or main body of the guns to keep them from freezing at altitude. As mentioed earlier some aircraft had ducted heat or even small gas fired heaters to apply heat to the guns.

Here is a shot of a waist gun with a heater attached to the receiver which is just to the right of the feed chute.



As also mentioned earlier the tape was an indicator as to whether the guns had been fired. If the the guns were not fired and the tape was still in place the guns didn't have to be cleaned or serviced the same as if had they been fired. If one of the guns tape was not blasted through when theothers were then it could also be an indication of a malfunction.

The complete guns were not removed after each flight simply for cleaning but typically the internal parts were. The parts removed consisted of the barrel, barrel extension, buffer group, bolt and return spring. There parts could slide out the back of the gun when the back plate was removed. You can see this in many shots of the gunners or ground crew cleaning the weapons and the receiver and cooling jacket would still be in the wings or turrets. In a lot of installations if the receiver was removed then the gun would have to be bore sighted again which is additional work and could be pretty involved. Later war aircraft were going to quick detachable mounts which made it easier to remove the complete guns for maintenance.

There were a lot of concerns with proper maintenance of the 50 cal guns especially at altitude. I have a can of oil that is WWII vintage called AIRCRAFT INSTRUMENT AND MACHINE GUN OIL. The Browning 50 and 30 cal ANM2 guns were pretty precice machines just like the instruments in front of the pilot. These close tollerance machines, as well as the rest of the aircraft, had to function from 50 below zero to 150 above zero at crazy airspeeds and in all kinds of extreem conditions. From the instruments to the bomb sights to the radios, engines and their support systems not to mention the air crew and what they had to do to survive.

Pretty amazing to think about really.

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