Effective Ranges of WW1 aircraft guns

[totalspoon]

Thank you Rexee.

Mr tttiger,

I used the military term 'Effective Range' which has the definition
"The maximum distance for a shooter at which he or she can confidently hit the target." (from google.)

In the Australian Army, the term is commanly used to indicate the range where you can start registering hits on targets with a reasonable use of ammunition.

An example for the use of this is during my 9mm Browning pistol course with the Australian Army, we were told that the maximum effective range was supposed to be 50 meters but if the target had taken cover and was returning fire, the real effective range was 6 to 8 meters.

This doesn't mean the 9mm round will have no lethality beyond 8 meters but that your chance of gaining a hit within a reasonable number of rounds is low.

I hope this clarifies things for you.

Spoon

[tttiger]

Rexee, you are being far more abusive than I was. I wasn't intending to demean Spoon, I just disagreed with his terminology. I tend to argue passionately but NEVER with malice. You are intending to be nasty....

****

Spoon, perhaps it is matter of Yank terms and Aussie terms. I think we are saying the same thing.

In US terms, maximum effective range usually means the range at which a bullet will be "effective" or cause serious injury or death. It assumes the bullet hits the target, of course, but not that it was an aimed shot.

Up until mid-WWI, as you probably know, Enfield rifles had "volley sights" that allowed a group of soldiers to fire very long distances at groups of enemy soldiers with the hope of hitting them with plunging fire. Even at long range beyond what we would consider "aimed fire" the .303 rounds were within their effective range in terms of causing wounds.

By contrast, the M1 and M2 US carbines had an effective range of not much more than 100 yards in Korea because the padded clothing of the Chinese soldier was sufficient to prevent any serious injury from the .30 carbine round even with "aimed fire."

I believe you are saying that it means "likely to hit where aimed," which is different. I think your definition of "effective range" include the liklihood of both hitting the target and causing intended injury.

But it appears, again, we are saying the same thing with different terms.

I would write it off to semantics.

And again, I apologize if my post (I don't have a copy of it or I would send it to you) appeared to be a personal attack That never was intended. Often the printed word can appear to have a harsh tone that the spoken word does not.

Again, sri for causing a dust-up over this.

Out here.

ttt

[totalspoon]

Originally Posted by tttiger

Rexee, you are being far more abusive than I was. I wasn't intending to demean Spoon, I just disagreed with his terminology. I tend to argue passionately but NEVER with malice. You are intending to be nasty....

tttiger, you called me Ignorant, Stupid and Worthless because you didn't agree with me on one technical issue.

However...

The US definition is the same as the Australian. Below is the official nato definition...

maximum effective range
Definition: (DOD, NATO) The maximum distance at which a weapon may be expected to be accurate and achieve the desired result.

Larf... Guess that makes me Ignorant, Stupid, Worthless and Right!

Spoon

[bristol scout]

Originally Posted by tttiger

Rexee, you are being far more abusive than I was. I wasn't intending to demean Spoon, I just disagreed with his terminology. I tend to argue passionately but NEVER with malice. You are intending to be nasty....

****

Spoon, perhaps it is matter of Yank terms and Aussie terms. I think we are saying the same thing.

In US terms, maximum effective range usually means the range at which a bullet will be "effective" or cause serious injury or death. It assumes the bullet hits the target, of course, but not that it was an aimed shot.

Up until mid-WWI, as you probably know, Enfield rifles had "volley sights" that allowed a group of soldiers to fire very long distances at groups of enemy soldiers with the hope of hitting them with plunging fire. Even at long range beyond what we would consider "aimed fire" the .303 rounds were within their effective range in terms of causing wounds.

By contrast, the M1 and M2 US carbines had an effective range of not much more than 100 yards in Korea because the padded clothing of the Chinese soldier was sufficient to prevent any serious injury from the .30 carbine round even with "aimed fire."

I believe you are saying that it means "likely to hit where aimed," which is different. I think your definition of "effective range" include the liklihood of both hitting the target and causing intended injury.

But it appears, again, we are saying the same thing with different terms.

I would write it off to semantics.

And again, I apologize if my post (I don't have a copy of it or I would send it to you) appeared to be a personal attack That never was intended. Often the printed word can appear to have a harsh tone that the spoken word does not.

Again, sri for causing a dust-up over this.

Out here.

ttt

I am sorry but as I was (at least one of if not the first) person to report that post I must defend Rexee and spoon.

I found your post (regardless of your counter claim regarding Rexees subsequent as being ' far more abusive....') to be most vicious for no reason whatsoever---and your apology to be disingenuous as you 'altered' the logic of what you said.

It is not abusive for Rexee to say you were 'blabbing on' It was without doubt YOU who was "intending to be nasty".

You, for whatever reason, exploded onto the scene with enough invective to get a rise out of a saint----this is not the way to go about having your opinions valued.

Dave.

[Zif]

I am not an aviator either, though having a long sim experience with Red Baron I & II and 3d with Western Front patches This means I absolutely don't have a clue on how to to fly a WWI plane and how to effectively shot.

Well, you can find some help from real pilots autobiographies and letters, and I rememebr I never have heard anyone bringing down planes from a long distances, apart lucky shots, like the one which bring down Richtofen in 1917.

You easily find reports of MVR around, where he talk of distances like 30-40m, I got some from Francesco Baracca which talks of such close distances too, maybe closer too when he used to fly a Nieuport 11 and shot "under the belly" of Austro-Hungarian recon planes.

To fire from more than 100 m to an enemy target would be a waste of ammo, in my opionion Anyway, while I used to PLAY :P I had the better way from 0-60 m. But that was a game.

[Kirk]

Something that hasn't been touched on but which may have been a factor is the fact machine guns at that time simply weren't very reliable. Like the airplane they were a fairly recent arrival on the battlefield. Put them up in a frozen environment with ammunition that didn't have the best quality control, and you have a recipe for jams. I'm no pilot but I'd think risking a jammed gun or guns and wasting ammunition at 300m distance just wouldn't make sense, regardless of all the miriad of other reasons everyone has already pointed out.

[Chock]

That is a good point. Of course you're no less likely to have a jam at 10 yards than at 300, but at 10 yards you are certainly less likely to have to 'walk' your tracers onto the target with a long hosing burst, so you probably would be statistically less likely to suffer a jam at close range simply by virtue of the smaller number of rounds you were putting through the gun, unless you were unlucky enough to have your first shot jam.

Which brings up another point, for the Brits, Frenchies and Yanks, that being the small magazine capacity of the Lewis, which probably meant walking your fire onto a target at range would needlessly waste a large proportion of the available shots one had, since you'd almost certainly not be able to change drums on the Lewis in the middle of a dogfight.

Al

[bristol scout]

Originally Posted by Chock

That is a good point. Of course you're no less likely to have a jam at 10 yards than at 300, but at 10 yards you are certainly less likely to have to 'walk' your tracers onto the target with a long hosing burst, so you probably would be statistically less likely to suffer a jam at close range simply by virtue of the smaller number of rounds you were putting through the gun, unless you were unlucky enough to have your first shot jam.

Which brings up another point, for the Brits, Frenchies and Yanks, that being the small magazine capacity of the Lewis, which probably meant walking your fire onto a target at range would needlessly waste a large proportion of the available shots one had, since you'd almost certainly not be able to change drums on the Lewis in the middle of a dogfight.

Al

And of course tracer itself is most innaccurate and only a pointer to where your rounds are going.

Dave.

[rexee]

Originally Posted by bristol scout

I am sorry but as I was (at least one of if not the first) person to report that post I must defend Rexee and spoon.

I found your post (regardless of your counter claim regarding Rexees subsequent as being ' far more abusive....') to be most vicious for no reason whatsoever---and your apology to be disingenuous as you 'altered' the logic of what you said.

It is not abusive for Rexee to say you were 'blabbing on' It was without doubt YOU who was "intending to be nasty".

You, for whatever reason, exploded onto the scene with enough invective to get a rise out of a saint----this is not the way to go about having your opinions valued.

Dave.

I,ve been called worse

Rexee

[bristol scout]

And me!

Dave.