Really bad weapons...

[dragoon500ly]

What can I say....my mind works faster than my fingers....

[Legbreaker]

I usually blame the keys. They have a habit of jumping about underneath my fingers!

[HorseSoldier]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

I checked with a NG tanker buddy of mine and tells me that the ole M-3A1 is still sitting in their arms room, two per M-1A1 and 2 per M-88. The damn thing just won't go away!!!!

They just are a really low readiness unit. The 'Guard armored cav unit I was in when I first started out back in the early 90s had a couple M3s for the '88 crew and that was it. The tankers had their one long gun* per track and pistols.

* Initially we were issued M16A1s that had been "upgraded" with A2 hand grips and maybe A2 buttstocks (can't recall on that part), later replaced with a mix of new production M16A2s and remanufactured M16A1s with the 'auto' option on the selector ground off and overstamped with 'burst'. In a Twilight War scenario I suspect they might have installed new 1-7 twist barrels and not even bothered with changing the fire control group, so a lot of NG units and the late war raised USAR divisions might have had a lot of what are essentially M16A3s. (And I'd guess those would be pretty popular with anyone else who could get their hands on them, compared to M16A2s.)

[Legbreaker]

I'd imagine that they'd be a bit worn out though so perhaps not as popular as one might first think.

[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by helbent4

Group,

I think the Little Big Horn deserves it's own thread, because I'm sure we still want to read about "really bad weapons", too.

Tony

Just wondering, but is there any intrest in a LBH thread?

[helbent4]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

Just wondering, but is there any intrest in a LBH thread?

Lee,

You never know until you try. Not everything we discuss has to relate specifically to T2K, does it?

Tony

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by HorseSoldier

* Initially we were issued M16A1s that had been "upgraded" with A2 hand grips and maybe A2 buttstocks (can't recall on that part),

We had a bunch of those in my training battalion during my second round of AIT, when I changed from 11C to 11B.

[dragoon500ly]

Yet another thread too good leave hanging in the past...

When Germany staged its rapid tour of Poland and its little incursion into France in 1939 and 1940, the US Army had several military observors who were shocked by the impact of massed tanks. The US Army realized that it had no real tank worthy of the name and those that were in service were thinly armored and vastly underarmed. In an effort to be ready for the expected entry into the war, in May of 1941, the Tank Destroyer branch was created. Its mission was to use heavy guns, mounted on mobile carriages and tank on the German panzers.

Here is what producing tank destroyers cost the US Army:

The M-3 Gun Motor Carriage, 75mm. This was the basic halftrack fitted with a field gun. Total production came to some 2,202.

The M-6 Gun Motor Carriage, 37mm. This was the standard 1.5-ton weapons carrier fitted with a 37mm antitank gun, some 5,400 were built.

The M-10/M-10A1 Gun Motor Carriage, 3-inch. The standard SPAT of WWII, total production was 5,000. The M10A1 had a redesigned rear grill, some 1,713 were built.

M36, M36B1 and M36 B2, Gun Motor Carriage, 90mm. Entered service in late 1943. Some 913 M36 were built. The M36B1 used the 90mm turret on a Sherman hull, 187 were built. The M36B2 had minor changes, 724 were built.

The M-18 Gun Motor Carriage, 76mm was the last of the tank destroyers, 2,507 were built.

Total production of the tracked vehicle came to 11,044

[dragoon500ly]

It seems that we've been picking on the ground services...time to spank the Navy!!

The USS Vesuvius was a "dynamite cruiser" armed with the awesome battery of three 15-inch pneumatic guns that were aimed by pointing the ship at the target. The guns fired a 980-pound shell of which some 500-pounds are dynamite.

So what made this awsome ship killer such a bad weapon you ask? The maximum effective range of the "air cannon" was less than a 1,000 yards.

[pmulcahy11b]

Wait till I put the 8-Gauge Woinchester Maganum shotgun I just made up on my site -- it's based on the Looney Toons cartoons where Porky Pig was (trying) to hunt Bugs Bunny or the Tasmanian Devil (the fictional one, not a real Tasmanian Devil). Now that's a bad weapon...

BTW, I did just put an update on my site a few days ago -- let me get to the "announcement" on the Site Update thread...

[dragoon500ly]

Picked up a Copy of World at War #24 and saw this article.....

The Unluckiest Ship: The USS Willian D. Porter, DD-597---by Mark Day.

The USS William D. Porter, was a brand Fletcher-class destroyer commissioned on 6 July 1943. Her first commanding officer was LCDR Wilfred A. Walter. After her trails and shakedown cruise she reported to Norfolk VA for her first mission. On 12 November she left Norfolk as escort for the new battleship Iowa, onboard Iowa was President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Secretary of State Cordell Hull, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Ernest J. King as well as many other top brass enroute for conferences in Cairo and Teheran.

While departing Norfolk, Porter's anchor fouled on a sister ship and tore off her railings and lifeboat mountings. This in itself was enough to cause the relief of a ship's captain, but the problems, they were only beginning!

The next day, a depth charge fell overboard, exploding and causing the Iowa and other ships to take evasive action, believing a German submarine was attacking. Next, a real tradegy struck when a man was washed overboard by a freak wave and died. Next, one of the ship's boilers lost power.

The next day, President Franklin requested to see the task force conduct an anti-aircraft drill. Target balloons were released and most were quickly destroyed by the Iowa's gunners. Several drifted toward the Porter, which shot them down.

Then the Porter and other escorting destroyers were ordered to perfrom a simulated torpedo attack against the battleship. During that exercise, the Porter accidentally launched a live torpedo towards the Iowa. According to eyewitness reports, the torpedo officer ordered the simulated firing and commanded "Fire One!" "Fire Two!" and finally "Fire Three!" There was no "Fire Four!", but the sequence was continued by the unmistable sound of a fourth (armed) torpedo launch). Panic instantly reigned on the bridge. Lt H. Lewis, who witnessed the entire even, asked the captain "Did you give permission to fire a torpedo?"

Captain Walter's stammered answer was "HELL NO, I, I, I---ahhh, I---WHAT!?"

The Porter them attempted to warn the Iowa, but the task force was operating under radio silence, the warning message was sent by blinker light. The first message told of the torpedo heading towards the battleship, but gave the wrong bearing. The next message confusingly signaled only that Porter had gone into reverse at full speed.

Finally, the destroyer broke radio silence to warn the flagship, only to be ordered by Iowa's radioman to identify themselves.. Finally, the crucial message was received in time and the Iowa was able to turn aside to avoid the torpedo.

When President Roosevelt was told of the approaching torpedo, he ordered his Secret Service bodyguard to move his wheelchair to the railing so that he could watch. His bodygaurds then drew their psitols, ready to shoot the torpedo as it approached. Porter's torpedo finally exploded some 3,000 yards astern, in Iowa's wake.

The Iowa then trained every gun that could be brought to bear on the Porter, as it was feared that the Porter was part of an assassination plot. When the battleship radioed for an explanation for the live torpedo, all CPT Walter replied with was a meek "We did it."

For the first and only time in US Navy history, an entire ship's company was arreasted. Porter was sent to Bermuda, when she docked, she was surrounded by armed Marines. Ship and crew were held there for several days while a closed-session Naval Court of Inquiry examined the case.

LCDR Walter's career was effectively over. He was reassigned to a shore billet, well inland as were most of his officers. For teh Rest of her career, the Porter was greeted with the sardonic message "DON'T SHOOT! WE'RE REPUBLICANS!" whenever she approached other ships.

Torpedoman L. Dawson eventually confessed to having accidently left a promer in the Number Three Torpedo Tube, causing the accidental launch. He threw the primer case overboard to try to conceal his mistake, but finally admitted what happened. He was sentenced to 14 years at hard labor, but President Roosevelt ordered his release.

The Porter was sent to the Aleutian islands off Alaska. Where she accidentally fired a 5-inch shell into the front yard of the base commandant. The unlucky destroyer was next ordered to the dangerous waters off Okinawa, where kamizaes were weaking ahvoc with the US fleet. There she partly redeemed herself by shooting down several attacking planes, but only partly, as she was also accused of shooting down three American planes with friendly fire.

Her bad luck continued when she accidentally fired on a sister ship, USS Luce DD-522, riddling her side and superstructure.

On 10 June 1945, Porter's luck finally ran out. But even her sinking was bizarre. At 0815, a Japanese bomber dove out of the clouds, without warning; and headed straight for the ship. The Porter was able to evade the diving plan, but the bomber crashed into the sea nearby, passing underneath the ship and exploding, breaking her back.

With her steam lines ruptured, power was lost and fires broke out. The crew fought to save their ship for over three hours, but their efforts were in vain. The order was given to abandon ship and twelve minutes later, the Porter rolled to starboard and sank by the crew. Miraculously, none of her crew was lost. Perhaps in that regard, she could at least be said to have finally found some good luck, even while sinking.

[Webstral]

Poor CO. I've had periods off time that felt like that. Mishaps come in bunches.

[Adm.Lee]

That's even worse luck than the battleship South Dakota, she too had a reputation as a "hoodoo ship" in the Pacific War.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

If we're going to talk about terrible general purpose weapons, how about the M85. More complicated than the M2HB, and despite being the same caliber it had an entirely different link feed system, rendering cross-feeding M2 ammo into it or it's into an M2 impossible.

[HorseSoldier]

Yeah, the M85 was a dim idea at best. Early 90's the unit I was with had several days of planned gunnery training tanked because the ammo guy ordered the wrong DODIC and got big pile of ammo for M85's. I was luckily too junior to be anywhere near the meeting where he had to explain that to the commander and 1SG.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Originally Posted by HorseSoldier

Yeah, the M85 was a dim idea at best. Early 90's the unit I was with had several days of planned gunnery training tanked because the ammo guy ordered the wrong DODIC and got big pile of ammo for M85's. I was luckily too junior to be anywhere near the meeting where he had to explain that to the commander and 1SG.

Yeah, that turkey is a real pisser. What's worse is when the '85 rolled out it was going to be the greatest thing since sliced bread - and of course they were phased out PDQ - and something like 3 or 4 million rounds of ammo were produced for it. Because the linkage is completely wrong, it's completely useless ammo: it's cheaper to produce more properly linked M2 ammo from scratch than delink and relink the M85's rounds in M2 belts.

[dragoon500ly]

For the non-DATs, the M85 was the coupla mounted .50-caliber on the M-60 series MBTs. Of intrest was that it had two rates of fire, normal was about 500-60rpm, but when set to high, it was supposed to have a 800-900rpm. Great idea! when the Hinds started poping up over the treeline, the tank commander simply had to switch to high rate and blast commie whirley birds with a long burst.

There was just one, simple, little problem....

The M85 has this habit of, well, simply going all to pieces when you fired it on high rate. And since the TC was seated right behind it when it went...

It was a standing order in Germany in the ealy 1980s, to never, under any circumstances, set the M85 on high rate.

[dragoon500ly]

The Heinkel He 162 was designed to be a simple, inexpensive fighter suitable for quantity production from readily-available materials by semi-skilled and unskilled labor. It was to have simple controls to allow new pilots to easily fly it. It was conceived, designed, built and flown within 90 days!

It had a metal fuselage with a plywood nose cap, its wing was primarily of wood with plywood skin and detachable metal tips. Tailplanes, elevators, and rudders were of metal construction, but the fins were made of wood. The MBW 003 turbojet was attached directly over the top of the fuselage. The cocpit was fitted in front of the jet inlet and was provided with a jettison able canopy as well as a simple ejector seat. The fighter was intended to have an active service life of some 5-10 hours of combat flying.

Armament consisted of two 20mm cannons provided with 120 rounds per gun. At maximum thrust the He 162 had a maximum speed of 562mph at 19,690ft. Range was limited to about 300 miles and the service ceiling was 39,400ft.

One its first test flight, an undercarriage door broke away. On its second flight, before a large gathering of Luftwaffe and Party officials, the starboard wing leading edge ripped away during a low level, high speed run, causing the plan to start rolling and crashing.

During its short service life, no Allied pilot ever engaged a He 162, although some 170 were officially delivered to the Luftwaffe, with a further 100 more waiting on flight testing and another 800 in advanced stages of assembly at various plants.

Flight tests by the RAF after the war confirmed that the He 162 was no plane for a novice pilot, being unstable around its longitudinal axis as a result of its top mounted engine. It was an unforgiving machine that required careful handling by its pilots., in the words of one test pilot “no sudden or erratic movements and no tight maneuvers!” If experienced test pilots had problems with controlling this fighter, attempts by 16-year old pilots with only cursory gliding experience, would have been little short of suicidal.

Source is “Warplanes of the Third Reich”

[Webstral]

I've read some modestly favorable reviews for the Volksjaeger. It's an interesting idea. Of course, it takes a lot more than on-paper promise to get a combat worthy weapon into action. Still, if used as an interceptor, the Volksjaeger had potential. With a high top speed and a good offensive punch, the Volksjaeger might have been able to get around its other limitations. Short range doesn't matter so much for an interceptor. Radical maneuvers might not have been necessary if the fighter operated in a hit-and-run mode against Allied bombers. If the Volksjaeger had an average sortie length of 1 hour (just to pick a round figure) and killed an Allied bomber every other sortie, then a 5-10 hour combat life would yield 2.5 to 5 kills. Obviously, it's nothing like this simple. Still, it would have been interesting to see what might have come of getting the new plane into service in mid-1944.

[dragoon500ly]

I've seen the same reviews but that these were written by test pilots, not the intended 16 year that were supposed to climb into the "People's Fighter" and do their bit for the Fatherland. And almost all of these reviews do agree that the, with its known fighters, the 162 would have taken a high toll...of its pilots.

[HorseSoldier]

I'm guessing the 5-10 hour lifespan was due to the jet engines of the era primarily.

[Webstral]

Originally Posted by HorseSoldier

I'm guessing the 5-10 hour lifespan was due to the jet engines of the era primarily.

That matches what I have read.

[Webstral]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

I've seen the same reviews but that these were written by test pilots, not the intended 16 year that were supposed to climb into the "People's Fighter" and do their bit for the Fatherland. And almost all of these reviews do agree that the, with its known fighters, the 162 would have taken a high toll...of its pilots.

There's no way around pilot quality. The Big Week was so hard on the Luftwaffe because they lost 400 pilots. The airframes could be replaced. Aircraft production increased virtually to the end of the war. Without fuel, though, the new pilots couldn't get into the air to learn their new profession. Hitting fuel production was a shrewd move on the part of the Allies. The Komet, with its unique fuel requirements and stupendous performance, might have accomplished something significant if they had overcome the hazards of using said fuel and had been able to get a significant number of them operational.

[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by Webstral

There's no way around pilot quality. The Big Week was so hard on the Luftwaffe because they lost 400 pilots. The airframes could be replaced. Aircraft production increased virtually to the end of the war. Without fuel, though, the new pilots couldn't get into the air to learn their new profession. Hitting fuel production was a shrewd move on the part of the Allies. The Komet, with its unique fuel requirements and stupendous performance, might have accomplished something significant if they had overcome the hazards of using said fuel and had been able to get a significant number of them operational.

True! The F2A Buffalo was roundly damned by the RAF, RAAF, Navy and Marine pilots as combat ineffective...yet the Finns loved the aircraft and actually had several aces who perferred to fly that aircraft.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

True! The F2A Buffalo was roundly damned by the RAF, RAAF, Navy and Marine pilots as combat ineffective...yet the Finns loved the aircraft and actually had several aces who perferred to fly that aircraft.

Kind of like the USAAF's experiences with the P39 Airacobra - didn't do well at altitude in the Pacific theater so they lend-leased as many as possible to the Soviets...who promptly used it at 0-15k/ft and proceeded to blast the crap out of the Nazis with it. They loved the Airacobra!

[raketenjagdpanzer]

More really bad weapons, let's talk (more) really bad aircraft (production only). The F-4K. The British (like us) have occasionally a case of "not built here" myopia so with their F4 purchase they insisted on the higher-performing Rolls-Royce Spey engines rather than the ol' smoky J79s. Better engines! Higher performing!

...except the Spey engines had to be modified to such an extent to fit in the Phantom that any design advantages were lost, and as a result they were only as good as (some say inferior) to the Phantom's...

Or how about the Gutless Cutlass? The F7-U was a terrible aircraft that served for a tiny, tiny amount of time - despite 300+ being built. Let's see...horrible roll characteristics, such anemic engines that it's takeoff AOA required a huge front wheel strut that was apparently made from balsa wood: rough landings (you know, the kind every landing on a carrier deck is) would smash the oleos into their own telescoping length...on the Cutlass this would and did typically break the entire assy.

Still, it was the first guided-missile armed Navy plane, and responsible for several kills (...of its own pilots...)

The A-5 Vigilante. Okay, this one is a 50/50. The RA5 Viggie was a decent dedicated recon platform. Problem was when everything on a carrier comes at a premium (fuel, replacement parts, berthing for pilots, space to park the A/C either on deck or beneath) the idea of a dedicated recon-only bird becomes problematic. But once converted to Recon duty the Viggie wasn't that bad. Where it sucked was its original role as a dash nuclear strike fighter (hence the "A") - shockwaves would form behind the aircraft when it would drop its ordinance in a high-altitude vertical drop-and-dash laydown attack that would (and in tests, did!) bring the bomb along behind the plane. That's right - the test articles would just sort of bob along behind the airplane for a distressingly long amount of time. On occasion, some bobbed into the actual aircraft, damaging it.

While in the event of a nuclear war there'd be all kinds of horrible things to worry about, finding out the nuke you just dropped out of your aircraft was floating along behind you would really take the starch out of your shorts...

The F5! Now...let's be fair, in terms of "MiG-21, only better" the F5 actually is a decent aircraft. But poor Northrop can never, ever catch a break, ever when it comes to building military a/c. A descendent of the T38 Talon, and cousin of the F18 family, the F5(a/b/c/d/e/g) was an anemic, day-only, Mk. 1 eyeballs only aircraft. A Honda Civic DX when the USAF was in to buying Cadillac El Dorados. Northrop shopped it around and found some customers - Iran, Pakistan, Kenya, S. Vietnam (which meant that shortly thereafter, North Vietnam became a operator, although not for long as they quickly ran out of parts)...Then came the F20 (in reality, the "F5-II"). They put it up against the F16. The USAF wasn't buying. And because the USAF wasn't buying...nobody was buying.

But hey lest anyone think I'm picking solely on the US side, and to go back to the skies, how about the Yak-38? Whoa Nellie, that was a shitty aircraft. In the Soviet's defense it...well, no, there is no defense for putting that thing in the air. Seriously, that's what happens when you don't have a free press and governmental oversight of projects. Couldn't fly in hot air. Couldn't carry more than a couple hundred pounds of bombs. So unstable it had to have an automatic ejection system for the crews when it got past a certain AOA since there was no way in hell a pilot could regain control once that happened...what a horrible waste of everything that bird was.

The MiG-25. V. Belenko's defection taught us that all is not gold that glitters. The Foxbat turned out to be a paper (well, stainless steel) tiger. It did have some innovations, like an all-digital integrated hands-off weapon system - but this was because Soviet aviation treated aircraft like flying SAM platforms rather than like, y'know, aircraft with pilots. Designed to intercept and destroy the (X)B70 Valkyrie, it found itself without a job once the Valk was cancelled. However the Soviets never let that stand in the way of producing something anyhow! The engines had the lifespan of a mayfly. The whole bird had a turning radius of about Rhode Island at speed. Still, it gave us the F15 and that is a truly awesome weapons system!

I've been scouring my resources but I cannot find the entry for the Soviet cold-war era bomber that literally barely had the range to hit targets in Western Europe. It was pathetic, I wanna say it was the M50 but that never got produced. There was a whole "Wings of the Red Star" episode about it...

[Adm.Lee]

In defense of the F-5, the USAF was never the target market for that. It was supposed to be an export fighter, I am told, for folks like the Saudis, South Vietnamese, all of South America, maybe even the Israelis. It was a cheap fighter for those who didn't have to worry about facing a high-quality air force, but needed to replace whatever WW2 cast-offs they were still operating in the 1970s. If your opponents are flying day-only MiG17s, or French Mirages, then you shouldn't need two-seat Phantoms or other all-weather interceptors.

Trouble was, as you say, if the USAF and USN weren't buying it, no one wanted it.

[Webstral]

I've read that the latest F-5 upgrades are quite serviceable, provided you can get around the small combat radius. The advantages of relative simplicity and cheapness of operation have to count for something to somebody.

Maybe the F-5 counts as "too much of a good thing". When we look at the USAF, we see a number of truly stellar performers. However, we also see very good but much cheaper airframes like the F-16 (compared to the F-15). That should mean that there is a place for an aircraft like the F-5. As Adm. Lee points out, perhaps the quality of the F-5 that prevented it from becoming a success was the fact that the US didn't use it extensively.

[TrailerParkJawa]

I always liked the F-5 even if it was just base on looks.

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by TrailerParkJawa

I always liked the F-5 even if it was just base on looks.

When it was modified to its F-20 Tigershark (originally F-5G), it was a match for virtually any light fighter out there (at the time it was being marketed). And Northrop was willing to produce different builds (as the guts of the F-20 were modular to a large degree). The buyer could choose from sets of electronics, radar, air-to-ground capability, AAM carriage capability, even the amount of rounds for the aircraft's cannon. The Tigershark, despite seeing much interest around the world in the design, lost in the sales department by the US Government. Northrop was for most of its time as an independent company looked down upon by the USG, and they cajoled, persuaded, undercut deals, and even threatened the procurement agencies of other countries into buying either surplus USAF/Navy aircraft or more expensive aircraft like the F-16 series.