Effective Ranges of WW1 aircraft guns

[totalspoon]

Hi Guys,

I recently posted a thread on the SimHQ website stating that the 250-300 meters effective range of the guns in Rise of Flight was too long, only to be laughed down. I tried to illustrate my point by the following quotes

'Mick' Mannock 61+ claims

In his rules for air fighting
"Rule 1. Pilots must dive to attack with zest, and must hold their fire until they get within one hundred yards of their target."

Oswald Boelcke 40 Claims and the father of German fighter tactics

He advocated to his pilots to get within 100 meters before opening fire. In his rules for air fighting (Dicta Boelcke) he states,
"Rule 3. Only fire at close range, and then only when the opponent is properly in your sights"

Manfred von Richthofen 80 Claims and leading WW1 Ace

"I calmly let him shoot, for even the best sharpshooter's marksmanship could not help at a distance of 300 metres. One just does not hit."

(Admittedly, the baron was talking about the gunner (Lt Woodbridge) but he was also being engaged by the pilots (Cpt Cunnel) fixed lewis too.)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I've tried searching the archives but I can't find anything so I thought I'd as those of you with far greater knowledge to myself.

What was the effective and what was a typical engagement range in WW1 for fixed forward firing guns.

Thanks

Spoon

[bristol scout]

Originally Posted by totalspoon

Hi Guys,

I recently posted a thread on the SimHQ website stating that the 250-300 meters effective range of the guns in Rise of Flight was too long, only to be laughed down. I tried to illustrate my point by the following quotes

'Mick' Mannock 61+ claims

In his rules for air fighting
"Rule 1. Pilots must dive to attack with zest, and must hold their fire until they get within one hundred yards of their target."

Oswald Boelcke 40 Claims and the father of German fighter tactics

He advocated to his pilots to get within 100 meters before opening fire. In his rules for air fighting (Dicta Boelcke) he states,
"Rule 3. Only fire at close range, and then only when the opponent is properly in your sights"

Manfred von Richthofen 80 Claims and leading WW1 Ace

"I calmly let him shoot, for even the best sharpshooter's marksmanship could not help at a distance of 300 metres. One just does not hit."

(Admittedly, the baron was talking about the gunner (Lt Woodbridge) but he was also being engaged by the pilots (Cpt Cunnel) fixed lewis too.)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I've tried searching the archives but I can't find anything so I thought I'd as those of you with far greater knowledge to myself.

What was the effective and what was a typical engagement range in WW1 for fixed forward firing guns.

Thanks

Spoon

Hi Spoon,

I absolutely agree-----of course those guns were lethal out to far greater ranges than even 250-300--BUT I think the ranges you state are much more typical and effective---taking into account all the variables of vibration, watering can spray effects bullet drop etc..

Indeed I would say the important word here is 'within'----meaning I believe closer than 100 metres ----by far.


Just my thoughts,

Dave.

[Chock]

Let me preface this by stating that I have never flown a WW1 aeroplane. I am however a reasonably decent real-life aerobatic pilot who has flown a number of single and two seater aeroplanes, including a few biplanes not dissimilar to WW1 types in some respects, such as the DH82 Tiger Moth. I've also done a fair bit of shooting, including getting a marksman badge with the RAF using a Lee Enfield to fire .303 rounds at various ranges. None of that makes me a WW1 pilot or even remotely close to one, but does at least mean I know a small amount about the matter of shooting, and a bit about flying aeroplanes. I also happen to review software on AVSIM too, thus I know a fair bit about flight simulation as well. So...

Anyone who claims that Rise of Flight is especially accurate, is frankly talking out of their ass. It is certainly capable of producing a nice flight model, and it sure looks pretty, but it bears about as much relation to historically simulating WW1 air combat as a game of Scrabble. However, in fairness, that is part of its design mandate, in that it is supposed to be a fun dogfighting game, and not an historical documentary. If it was to be made historically accurate, you would have almost all the people who bought it claiming it was 'too hard'. Bad news if you are a hard core realist that may be, but that's the way it goes. I'd prefer it myself if it was that way, but I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for it to happen.

People who buy combat flight sims want a fantasy version of warfare which enables them to experience being an air combat ace in some small way, by and large, that is what such simulations aim to deliver as developers know that's what customers want. There is nothing wrong with that, indeed it can be good fun, but to imagine it is a realistic portrayal of air combat is to deny the commercial reality of flight sims catering such preferences. If it was as easy to shoot down a plane as it is in most WW1 flight sims, the Pour Le Merite would have no 'Merite' at all and you'd be able to pick up the DFC in a junk shop for a tenner, for the military awards commissions having to hand such decorations out by the truckload. Two weeks of playing about with pretty much any combat flight sim means you can easily get to a level of competence where two or three kills on every mission is not hard to pull off; that alone ought to tell anyone that combat flight sims are more about providing a thrilling experience than emulating grim reality.

As you say, there are numerous flyers, not only aces, who relate quotes similar to the ones you included. It's certainly true that a bullet is effective at way beyond 300 yards, and considerably further for stuff of the type the Vickers and Spandau shot. In fact, later bullets such as the types modern armies use have actually been designed to get around such problems as the range of things like the .303 round, which was found to be greater than it needed to be, because it tended to blast through a target rather than transferring its energy to the thing it hits. It's that ballistic behaviour which led to things like the sub machine gun and later the assault rifle, and for aeroplanes, the cannon. The ballistic properties and extremely long range of WW1-era rounds is probably what they are thinking of. But...

Clearly few of them have ever flown an aeroplane and fewer still one in close proximity to another aircraft when having to deal with its propwash and turbulence from the wings whilst watching out for other aeroplanes. I've done that a fair bit and I can promise that most flight sims don't even get near to being as tricky as it is in reality to stay behind something if you are having to deal with any of that. As much fun as flight simulators are, five minutes in a (real) small aeroplane trying to line up another one whilst you both turn would be enough to convince any flight sim 'ace' that they would not find it quite so easy in real life if the other guy is trying to shake you off.

It's true the Vickers, the Spandau, the Lewis and the Parabellum could hit things a long way off, and indeed cause damage too. Hitting something at 2,000 yards is not beyond the realms of possibility with a .303 round for example, if you aim up a bit, and the Vickers was regularly used at ranges of 800 yards on the ground in WW1 and WW2. But there is a reason why when on the ground such guns were generally on tripods or bipods. Of course they don't need a bipod or tripod when bolted to an aeroplane, but that means the aircraft has to be right on the money aim-wise, especially with the fixed guns.

Compare this footage of a Maxim gun firing (which both the WW1 Vickers and the Spandau were variants of):

YouTube- Shooting the Russian Maxim 1910
Then look at this footage of a WW2 era MG-42 firing:

YouTube- Shooting the WWII German MG42
If you want an example of how much machine guns can kick with recoil and muzzle blast, check this video:

YouTube- Shooting the Type 98 Machine gun
Finally, here is footage of a Lewis gun. As you can see, it could be very accurate and place tight groups on a target at a fair range, but it is limited to short bursts if it is not to jam and in any case has a fairly small magazine:

YouTube- Shooting the Lewis Gun
You can see from the comparison that the Vickers-type had a much slower rate of fire than more modern stuff like the MG-42, and would occasionally have been slower still on an aeroplane because of the interrupter gear affecting the rate of fire.

With any of those bits of footage, imagine using such a weapon and shooting at an aeroplane at 300 yards, and you can further imagine that it would be extremely difficult to hit it. If you were tail chasing an aircraft, the wings would be edge-on to you, and if you were one tenth of a degree off target as you fired, you'd miss by a very wide margin. Conversely, most sim objects have an 'hit bubble', which registers your hits. Generally speaking, it's done to reduce the processing your PC has to do, usually with some sort of 'dice roll'.

Add in the fact that the guy in the other plane is maneuvering, you are maneuvering, you are watching behind you for enemies, watching your comrades to make sure they are okay, bouncing around in the slipstream of other aircraft, being blasted by a 100 mph wind, avoiding other aircraft. Then add the fact that you are probably scared sh*tless and freezing your ass off too, not to mention being pumped with adrenaline like crazy.

You can see why guys like Mannock, McCudden and Richthofen would fly right up the ass of the enemy before opening fire. Unlike a lot of aces, Mannock was fairly open on occasion about how scared he was of the need to do that; he was pretty hard on himself and regarded it as a personal defect that he was scared to close on the enemy. He worked hard to overcome that fear, because he knew that he would have to if he was to get victories. Richthofen's combat reports regularly relate him being right up the ass of the enemy, often as close as a mere plane's length away, and if a guy who shot down 80 aircraft had to do that sort of thing, then it is enough to convince me that 300 yards is not where you're going to find it easy to hit stuff. McCudden is on record as saying that air combat had seriously depleted his sporting instincts, and from that statement it is not hard to imagine what he was talking about. If you read one or two aces autobiographies, you'll note that some of them even got enemy flyer's blood on their aeroplanes because they were so close to the enemy when they opened fire. You can find an example of exactly that in McCudden's autobiography. Even in WW2, where ranges were typically a little longer than in WW1, there was a night fighter Hurricane pilot whose aircraft got blood spattered all over it when he shot down an German bomber. He was at the time so traumatised by the death of his wife and child in a bombing raid, that when the mechanics tried to clean it off his aircraft he rounded on them and demanded they leave it on there.

It's a cruel fact that experienced WW1 German pilots would deliberately fly along at about 300 yards range in formation with British Independent Force bombers so that any inexperienced gunners on the bombers would fire at them and waste ammo, and then they would close in, thus facing less enemy fire. Many aces could tell when they were up against a veteran or not based on when the guy fired, and would be fairly certain it was a newcomer if they were firing at long range, so then they'd go for that guy. Lots of people slag off Richthofen for doing that sort of thing, but he is merely the most famous for it, and pretty much every other ace did the same sort of thing.

Back to the original reason for your post: I suspect you have been shouted down for pointing out that the guns are overly accurate in RoF, because to do so dents the fantasy of those who like to believe they would be a brilliant ace in real life, by virtue of the fact that they are a brilliant ace in a flight sim. That's understandable in some ways, as it is a bit mean to challenge somebody's relatively harmless preferred fantasy, even if you are in fact correct. You may not be bothered that it is mean, but you can save yourself a bit of time, since it is probably also fruitless too, for they may indeed know that, but it will not be what they'll want to hear. Zapping planes at 300 yards range with a deflection shot in a turning fight is entertaining, and that's why you can do it in a flight sim.

Al

[dglewwe]

Thanks, Al, for the post. I'd venture to guess that the flying aspect of many (most?) flightsims is in accord with the gunnery one, and is perhaps seen by aficionados as accurate/representative of the piloting experience? Like you said: It wasn't an easy task - especially when one considers both the training level and mechanical quality/consistency of the machines of the time (not to mention the overall aeronautical knowledge available to the pilots).

I agree: the game's for fun, and being a "superace" is what it allows people to be --and considering the generally poor reception I've had to my game (minis/dice) that denies players that and creates a mood more of peril and uncertainty (...that "fill your pants" kind of feeling you mentioned...), it's what the market wants.


As to the OP: While I can't vouch for its accuracy, the book "Gunning for the Red Baron" (Bennett) is worth a look to gain a view from the "it was really hard to shoot" perspective.

[bristol scout]

Indeed extreme range lethality first became embarrassing with the introduction of the best rifle---the excellent Enfield 1853---which when taken on the range in it's first (regimental) trials amazed it's users with it's accurracy (of course) but also it's lethal range--killing cow's in far away --hitherto safe--fields.

And the overkill power of the S.L.R. caused problems in Northern Ireland in those not so far gone dark day's.

Dave.

['14-'18aviationcollector]

Originally Posted by bristol scout

I absolutely agree-----of course those guns were lethal out to far greater ranges than even 250-300--BUT I think the ranges you state are much more typical and effective---taking into account all the variables of vibration, watering can spray effects bullet drop etc..

Indeed I would say the important word here is 'within'----meaning I believe closer than 100 metres ----by far.


Just my thoughts,

Dave.

Hi Dave,

I agree. By the time vibration of the guns and the airframe, buffeting by the wind and slip stream, bullet drop, and the savage slip stream are taken into account, the bullets would have spread out, as you said Dave like a watering can and slowed down very quickly. Try poking your head out into the slipstream of even a Tiger Moth, and see how savage the slipstream is! I was talking to the owner of a Tiger Moth and he said they are fairly slow - probably a lot slower than some (but not all of course) First World War aeroplanes. As the bullet leaves the barrel, surely it be travelling at terminal velocity and would experience exponential drag during the process of slowing down to the same speed - constantly decreasing - minus the effects of the slip stream. It's like firing a bullet into a 100 MPH plus head wind - it would slow down very quickly.

I would also say closer than 100 metres by far, and would suggest up to a range where you have to fly with skill to avoid colliding with the target aeroplane.

Regards,

David.

[Epee]

I was shocked to learn that the British iron sight; a rectangular thing; was scaled to approximate a wingspan at 200m. Of course that was informational only, determined by "theorists" flying a desk and may have been intended as a spot to open fire on a rapidly closing target.

I have heard (on the History Channel so the source is suspect) that the guns of a Sopwith Camel grouped in a thirty foot circle at 100 meters! That might be good enough for making a novice turn or maybe getting a lucky pilot hit during a long stern chase but to bring down a plane with any reasonable hope of success you need concentrated fire and that means in close.

Likewise early war monoplanes like the Morane Bullet and the Fokker Eindekker were not stable gun platforms. I supect this was true to some degree with all rotory engined planes.

MvR, after almost losing a couple of kills due to opponents regaining control or feigning disability, began the practice of firing until the enemy aircraft caught fire or broke apart sometimes firing as many as 400 rounds into planes from close range; 50 feet or less.

[Chock]

That's a bit harsh, especially for a first post, he was only asking a question, which by definition means he might not be sure of terminology.

Al

[dglewwe]

I agree: harsh. Isn't that what these public forums are for, to learn? If I only posted what I knew I'd never post at all!

Civility and tolerance aside, there're also the terms of the site:

"You agree, through your use of The Aerodrome Forum, that you will not post any material which is false, defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing..."

I'd say tttiger came close to at least a couple of those...

[bristol scout]

I agree----words like "Ignorant" "Worthless" and that last line are quite inexcusable and elitist sounding---with that kind of attitude you do yourself no favours.

Dave.edit--I will be quite open and say that i have reported that as abusive----