Gun Trucks

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by copeab

The Germans did some work on 35cm and 54cm recoilless (countershot) weapons to be carried under aircraft.

Some WWI British aircraft were equipped with a Davis Gun, which was a counter-shot weapon (explosive shell goes forward, frangible counterweight of equal mass goes harmlessly <?> out the back).

One of the SPAD models had a 37mm cannon firing through the hollow propeller shaft.

In WW2:
The Me109 (some versions, too lazy to track down which) had a 30mm cannon "nestled between the cylinder heads" of the aircraft's engine, firing through the propeller boss.

Back to gun trucks:
I think the penultimate gun trucks were the SAS jeeps used in the "Jeep Raids" on German airstrips in North Africa. Like the eventual evolution of the PT boats from torpedo to gunboats, these Jeeps had more armament per pound of vehicle weight than just about any other weapons system in their class.