It makes noisy death metal fly through the air. If the tool worked back then, it can work now. I hope Ukraine will get better support, though. They’re currently all that stands between Europe and the rabid dog in Moscow.
Man, you have a lot of barrels if you run out of water and piss first.
What you’re talking about is effectively finished gun barrels as a coolant, and guys scrabling to change them as cooling system. That’s a little jankier than a small pump or gravity feed and the most common fluid on Earth.
All joking aside the barrel weighs less than the cooling system and running out of water was a very real concern. You’d run out of water before bullets.
So it’s easier to carry and stock barrels than it is to carry the heavy ass water cooled gun. There IS a reason the air cooled gun was chosen over water cooled.
Well obviously, you should cool it with the other bullets, then. Maybe you could even collect the spent ones for that. /s
If directly using air is fast enough, sure, that’s a better option. I mean, in a water cooled gun, the water/steam itself gets cooled in the air, or on surrounding surfaces. It’s just an intermediary to increase effective surface area.
Not actually knowing much about the history of this, just the science, it seems likely that a barrel replacement was expected to be a rare event, because the rate of fire and heat per shot was low enough for whatever other engineering features to handle it, at least most of the time.
Roughly speaking you’d need to change the barrel every ~1000 rounds, and WW1 MGs shoot at ~200 rounds per minute, so you’d need to swap the barrel once every 5 minutes of continuous shooting. It could be half of that tho, depending on the barrel and the gun.
They are just too heavy for front line use these days (damn weak kids). Lucky for us water cooled enjoyers the drone defense warfare is almost a perfect environment for the old almost one half zentner guns.
It makes noisy death metal fly through the air. If the tool worked back then, it can work now. I hope Ukraine will get better support, though. They’re currently all that stands between Europe and the rabid dog in Moscow.
Watercooled Maxims and its derivatives are the most reliable machine guns ever made after all.
Indeed
Ma Deuce in shambles rn
Ma Deuce has to change barrels after getting too hot, these Maxims can fire forever if you keep them topped up with water and/or piss.
Ma Deuce gets to hot swap barrels to keep it firing well beyond when everyone’s out of water and piss.
Most notable accolade for Ma:
In service:
1933-presentMan, you have a lot of barrels if you run out of water and piss first.
What you’re talking about is effectively finished gun barrels as a coolant, and guys scrabling to change them as cooling system. That’s a little jankier than a small pump or gravity feed and the most common fluid on Earth.
All joking aside the barrel weighs less than the cooling system and running out of water was a very real concern. You’d run out of water before bullets.
So it’s easier to carry and stock barrels than it is to carry the heavy ass water cooled gun. There IS a reason the air cooled gun was chosen over water cooled.
Well obviously, you should cool it with the other bullets, then. Maybe you could even collect the spent ones for that. /s
If directly using air is fast enough, sure, that’s a better option. I mean, in a water cooled gun, the water/steam itself gets cooled in the air, or on surrounding surfaces. It’s just an intermediary to increase effective surface area.
Not actually knowing much about the history of this, just the science, it seems likely that a barrel replacement was expected to be a rare event, because the rate of fire and heat per shot was low enough for whatever other engineering features to handle it, at least most of the time.
Roughly speaking you’d need to change the barrel every ~1000 rounds, and WW1 MGs shoot at ~200 rounds per minute, so you’d need to swap the barrel once every 5 minutes of continuous shooting. It could be half of that tho, depending on the barrel and the gun.
Counterpoint:
Water cooled Maxims,
In service 1886-present.
Yeah, but we’re talking recovered hardware being pressed back into service, which is astounding.
There were some k98s being used also.
But they’re not actually in production for front line use.
The M2 is still manufactured and is the heavy MG for NATO forces to this day.
Maxim created an air cooled machine gun because of the success of brownings air cooled machine gun.
ALSO … water cooled maxims require modern water, there is no water left from back then so like … are they really even that old?
They are just too heavy for front line use these days (damn weak kids). Lucky for us water cooled enjoyers the drone defense warfare is almost a perfect environment for the old almost one half zentner guns.
Death metal?