Experts only A

franzkait · 29 January 2006, 06:35 AM

MG with this aircraft ?

FlyXwire · 29 January 2006, 08:29 AM

Franzkait,

Doesn't appear to be an MG......

......shows the Hythe Camera Gun.

Colin A Owers · 29 January 2006, 01:05 PM

Looks like a Hythe (spelling?) camera gun.

Colin A Owers

franzkait · 29 January 2006, 06:55 PM

the picture is taken in 1919 , and I do not know a lot about this kind of camera gun. can you guys give moore info about it ?

StephenLawson · 29 January 2006, 07:50 PM

The AEF. British and French used the Lewis (and the Hythe type) gun cameras for training. At Field Eight Issoudon 3rd A.I.C. they trained pilots about how to approach enemy aircraft. There were several Nieu. 27 types painted all over white, one was Red and etc. These "enemy aircraft" were the targets. Students were assigned Nieu. 24-27 types with camera guns and told to attck a specific aircraft. Usually they were given map locations / grids and the "enemy" was somewhere in the grid.

When the "enemy" was sighted the camera gun was triggered to record the "kill."

It was an advanced course usually attended after the Acrobatic course at Field Five.

FlyXwire · 30 January 2006, 02:29 AM

Here's a few pictures of a Nieuport trainer caught in the "sights" of a Hythe Camera Gun over Issoudon:

30 January 2006, 03:19 AM

Sounds like TOP GUN without the computers.

duedicoppe · 30 January 2006, 11:38 AM

The Hythe was used by the Italians, too.
This imagine shows a Macchi M.5 of Gruppo Idrocaccia in Venice, where the camera was used from the beginning of 1918.
Happy landings
Paolo

franzkait · 30 January 2006, 11:40 AM

did the germans use it ?

FlyXwire · 30 January 2006, 12:45 PM

Not unless they had captured one and then put them into wholesale production Franzkait (no evidence that occurred though).

The first British-built version (the Mk. I), was basically a Lewis Gun with a camera mounted alongside the muzzle, with the Mk.III version having the camera fully integrated (as the pictured above illustrates).