B-29 Bomber's WWII Tail Gun Radar Flop

The intent of this video is to discuss the combat effectiveness of the WWII deployed B-29 adopting of the APG-15 tail radar system.
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[@WWIIUSBombers]

B-29 Bomber Gunnery Video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rKixgX2dg6qsg7c B-29 Bomber Bombardier/Gunner Video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oqWzioSce5eCl8U B-29 5 Fascinating facts Video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/kKbVoIOOr9eIesk B-29 Bomber’s Tail Gunner Station Video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oqWzioSce5eCl8U B-17 vs. B-29 WWII Gunner Kill Ratios Video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oITac2SDrcaopMk

[@masterimbecile]

The intention of this comment is to add to this video’s audience engagement and therefore help the algorithm promote it to more viewers.

[@WBtimhawk]

Engaging audience engagement system.

[@jdiluigi]

Your content is WW2 history enthusiasts hidden gem. Not one ever fails to teach me at least something new let alone entire new topics.

[@Br1cht]

He´s so above other KZbin channels in depth of knowledge that it makes the other channels unwatchable(too me at least).

[@rickcentore2801]

You make very interesting and informative videos. Could you do one on the defensive armament of the A-26 Invader? It had two B-29 type remote turrets. They were controlled by a periscope with a bicycle seat for the gunner.

[@JK-rv9tp]

Great video! I was in the airline tech support engineering business for many years with an OEM. It took a tremendous amount of endurance and operational stress testing to introduce components and product improvements in fleet service and expect an acceptable level of reliability, or reliability improvement. Even there, no endurance test or environmental test can quite replicate in-service use, and things went off the rails in service quite a lot after millions invested in redesigns. In a wartime military operation, all that sort of thing is pared to the bare minimum and it's a miracle that those systems worked at all.

[@alanstevens1296]

Not ready for prime time in 1945. Such installations worked later on.

[@SanderAnderon]

after decades of WW2 aircraft docs, a guy thinks he knows a thing or two....then sees your vids to know he did not. Another well-done one here, fascinating

[@gavinhammond1778]

Here's hoping you cover liberators some day, otherwise keep doing your thing man, this is good stuff

[@jethrox827]

I've always been fascinated by the B29 capability, thanks for doing all these posts

[@moefuggerr2970]

Not to increase bomb bay doors cycle times. Reduce the cycle times.

[@elliotdryden7560]

I guess they had fully given up on this APG-15 system by the time the '29s went to work again over Korea, as all photos and illustrations I have seen on that effort shows B-29s without the radar "sphere" on the tail gun position.

[@bomberkid55]

The "Range" knob as you call it in the video is actually the "Target Size" control. The radar indicator display shows a "dot-and-wing" type presentation of a target, and will automatically "lock on" to the target, measuring its direction and range. The gunner then sets the target wingspan through the optical sight, and fires the guns. The system automatically tracks the target once “locked on” to it. The gunner does not have to adjust range or follow the target with the sight once the radar antenna has "locked" on the target. (That's what the TO says.)

[@paulchukc]

The problem with Hi-tech gadget is that sometimes it doesn't work.

[@raymondclark1785]

It didn't help that those old radars used tunes that didn't like vibration and hard landings

[@martijn9568]

And if it does work it can be awesome. Look at auto canons, radar or missiles on aircraft. All had issues in the beginning before becoming effective, but after teething issues were figured out they started to be irreplaceable.

[@TheSpoon369]

this is cool as hell, thanks for making this video

[@nikonmark37814]

I never knew the B29 had radar much less tail gun radar, that's amazing. We probably use something similar with the B52!

[@Eric-kn4yn]

Lancaster rear gunner had village inn late war r tail radar

[@briancooper2112]

Yes

[@alltat]

It had a tail gun radar, but the thing apparently didn't work at all, which is probably why you've never heard of it. Another case of a sound idea where the technology just wasn't quite there yet.

[@greggravitas5849]

Another example of your superlative research! Keep up the great work.

[@Paladin1873]

I presume you meant improve "bomb bay open-close cycle times", not increase them.

[@WWIIUSBombers]

Yes, I misspoke there

[@WilliamHarbert69]

Fantastic presentation. Thank you.

[@gregharbican7189]

“…the gunner would set the intercepter’s wingspan on the pedestal gun sight…” This will probably sound real stupid, but if the interceptor is attacking at night, how is the gunner supposed to be able to see the intercepter to ‘set the intercepter’s wingspan’ if the intercepter is far enough away from the B-29, that it would require the radar ( rather than the gunner ) to spot and track the intercepter?

[@donalddodson7365]

These early systems paved the way for more effective air-to-air electronic warfare in use today.

[@williambinkley8879]

I have thoroughly enjoyed your channel.

[@kevinf2618]

I learn so much from your channel!

[@MrLemonbaby]

Well done as usual, thank you.

[@timengineman2nd714]

I imagine part of the Stern Attack was due to the Japanese hoping that the intercepting pilot would see the B-29's engines' exhaust flames... I have seen pictures of the exhaust discharge "pipe", but I've never seen a picture that showed any flame dampeners on a B-29! Also considering that the B-29 originally mounted a pair of Fifties and a 20mm, the weight of the 3rd Fifty and the Radar would basically equal out the removal of the 20mm.

[@alanstevens1296]

I wonder if they considered installing a pair of 20 mm cannon to replace the original configuration.

[@timengineman2nd714]

@@alanstevens1296 Yes, the weight of the Three Fifties (~252 pounds) plus whatever the weight of the radar probably was close to the weight of a Twin 20 Oerlikons (~300 pounds). However you're also talking about reduced ammo storage (the B-29 tail-gunner had no access to his guns, so was unable to reload them). The Hispano-Suiza 404 were lighter and could be belt-feed, but like the Oerlikon it had reliability issues..... (Don't get me started on the issue of the people who made the barrels of these two machine-cannon not understanding the use of a "Go/No Go" gauge for the Chamber!!!)

[@dukecraig2402]

You won't see any exhaust flames from a B29 operating at altitude for the same reason you won't see it coming from a B17, B24, P47, P38 or some other USAAF aircraft of WW2, because at altitude the wastegate dumps are closed routing exhaust through the turbos, a fact I'm sure the Japanese were well aware of.

[@alanstevens1296]

@@timengineman2nd714 I wasn't aware that any B-29 turret could be reloaded in-flight. What would be your estimate as to the number of rounds for each? Three 50s would quickly consume ammo.

[@timengineman2nd714]

@@alanstevens1296 You are correct, I mentioned that because most people know that the gunners on B-17s and B-24s (and their variants) could reload their guns. Due to the design of the 5 turrets the B-29 and a variant of it called the B-50 could not be reloaded. Not sure of the ammo load, I've heard it mentioned on a few videos but can't remember it right now..... But if I remember correctly the Fifties were set to fire at 600 rounds per minute (RPM) and had somewhere about 40 or 45 seconds of fire, but as I've indicated, I could very easily be wrong about it being a B-29 and the amount of ammo could be for another airplane, perhaps even an airplane of another country! Also this is would be for the twin fifties, some B-29s had a 4 gun upper turret forward!

[@SkyCharter]

0:50 Why would they want to increase the cycle times of the bomb-bay doors? Do you mean cycle rates?

[@MarkSmith-js2pu]

Costing more than the Manhattan Project, and they used cloth control surfaces? Did they ever make them metal?

[@randomnickify]

It has nothing to do with money, its all about mass. Control surfaces have to be balanced around their rotation pivot. Balancing already heavy metal surfaces would add way to much mass to plane that already stretched limits of the piston engines. Metal control surfaces become a thing in the jet planes. Even today small piston planes are using fiberglass controls (technically - cloth in resin).

[@lafeeshmeister]

Top notch, as always.

[@347Jimmy]

Seems like they were a fantastic unit on paper, and in the testing lab

[@reubensandwich9249]

I enjoy your content and the actual show and tell you give us. I did like seeing the sea mine mission on the page for Operation Sarvation.

[@WWIIUSBombers]

I'm planning a whole series regarding the bombing phases. The impact of the mining phase is underappreciated.

[@reubensandwich9249]

@@WWIIUSBombers Thank you in advance. That'll be interesting because what's out there already is just there for clicks while you actually dive deep into the technical side. There's too much underappreciated material from navigation, technology, intel, and maintenence.

[@alanstevens1296]

I wonder if they ever considered installing a pair of 20 mm cannon to replace the original configuration. The mix of 50 BMG and 20 mm caused obvious dissimilarities in trajectory.

[@WBtimhawk]

My understanding is that the 20mm produced in the US during WW2 kept suffering from malfunctions. On the P38 for example, the pilot had a special mechanical lever to re-cock the cannon. Not sure how they got around this issue on the P61 tho. In the end, the US Air Force was still very much anti 20mm/pro .50cal way into the Korean war. I doubt they ever considered it seriously.

[@alanstevens1296]

@@WBtimhawk Multiple 50s could destroy any Axis and Korean aircraft with ease. I can't think of a single one that really needed a 20mm to destroy. A turret of two 50s could throw a lot of big slugs. A P-51 with six or a P-47 with eight, even more so! If the US really needed the 20mm then surely they could have solved the problems or developed a new one.

[@Eric-kn4yn]

Radar fails could tail gunner sight manually

[@lafeeshmeister]

Not in the dark, I'd expect!

[@347Jimmy]

From the looks of it, not even in daylight Given that aiming is completely under mechanical control (and they didn't expect the units to crap out), there probably isn't a manual mode

[@WBtimhawk]

@@347Jimmy removing the manual mode on a non-proven automatic system would be grade A level idiocy. I'd be curious to get confirmation on that

[@347Jimmy]

@@WBtimhawk agreed, both that it would be stupid and that I'd love to see some confirmation one way or the other

[@Eric-kn4yn]

@@347Jimmy crape out they were highly unreliable watch.video again plez from australia 🇦🇺

[@darrellborland119]

An interesting video...apparently all that technology failed in use...great idea, tho. Thanks.

[@mandolinic]

It would have been cheaper to paint three broom handles black, and remove the guns completely.

[@paulredinger5830]

Would of been a extremely stupid idea. Just like taking the guns from the fighter jets, and only thinking missiles would suffice for air to air combat.

[@Eric-kn4yn]

The 20mm cannon in tail gun was bad idea how did it get approved

[@lordkreigs1978]

The M2 50 caliber machine gun throws a lot at the target but all they are capable of doing is punching a half inch hole. The 20 mm Canon rate of fire was much lower but it had the wonderful effect of having an exploding around that would it made contact it would detonate pretty much like a hand grenade. Often one or two strikes was sufficient to take down an enemy fighter. Everything is a trade-off.

[@williamromine5715]

@@lordkreigs1978 Of course, a half inch hole in an engine, fuel tank, controls and pilot are pretty devistating. That's how most of American "kills" were made, and there were a lot of them. Also, seeing all those tracer rounds coming at you might be quite a deterent. Your point is well taken, though. It's just that the Americans fell in love with that big Browning( so much so that we are still using it 80 years later).

[@dukecraig2402]

@@lordkreigs1978 The rounds that were fired from the AN/M2 .50 cal defensive guns of USAAF bombers by that point in the war were armor piercing tracer/incendiary, the tracer effect alone was very capable of lightning fuel and oil on fire as can be seen in plenty of gun camera footage from early in the war when they used just the armor piercing/tracer rounds, Japanese aircraft burst into flames with just one good squirt from .50 cal guns, in Europe where German fighter's had some armor on them the results were very similar. Everyone always thinks that "bigger is better" and assumes that the US military keeping .50 cal guns on its aircraft in WW2 was flawed thinking, while it's cute that people fancy themselves more of an authority on the subject than the people in the military during the war that studied the subject by pouring through countless pages of reports and analyzing figures, data and even gun camera footage to make their determinations the fact is the record of the aircraft, fighter's and the defensive guns on bombers, and the number of enemy aircraft they downed is proof they were right, between the fact that the ranges that enemy aircraft were engaged at due to the relatively primitive gun sights of the era (compared to later radar augmented gun sights on aircraft, fighter and bomber) being well inside the effective range of .50 cal guns along with the fact that inside of 300 yards they could punch through the defensive armor plate of any WW2 aircraft including the IL2 Sturmovik the .50 cal gun was very effective, that's why it was retained on US aircraft, because the people who were running the show knew what they were doing, even as late as the early days of jets in aerial combat they were still effective as was proven by the F86 Sabre in Korea. The firing rate of the AN/M2 .50 cal was higher than the regular M2HB .50 cal gun used by land forces, the M2HB had a firing rate of 550 to 650 rounds per minute but the AN/M2 variant had a firing rate of 750 to 850 rounds per minute during WW2 with it being raised to 1,150 to 1,250 rounds per minute for use in the early jets. Also not realized by all the self appointed experts is the much greater firing time that .50 cal guns have as compared to cannons, typically about twice the firing time, the Wildcat started out with 4 .50 cal guns and when a later variant was fielded with 6 .50 cal guns the pilots requested that they be converted over to the 4 gun arrangement because they considered it's increased firing time more of a benefit, along with fact that explosive cannon shell's don't have any armor penetration, they simply explode on the outside of armor plates, wherein the .50 cal rounds were armor piercing are all advantages over cannons that people never take into account, they just oogle over anything that's bigger and automatically assume it would have been better, the record of US aircraft armed with .50 cal guns speaks for itself, they were very effective and didn't need to be replaced with cannons.

[@lordkreigs1978]

@@dukecraig2402 Right, everything you said there was true and correct and completely accurate. I was simply trying to answer the question that the person posed why the 20 mm versus the 50 caliber. I was a Marine in the 1970s and the Ma Duce was my favorite thing to go to the range and fire. Occasionally we would get an ammo can of rounds manufactured during World War II making them somewhere around 25 years old and they all fired just perfectly. We would fire belts intermingled with standard ball round, tracer, armor piercing and incendiaries like you described. It was a lot of fun shooting up targets normally vehicles that had been surveyed out and we’re no longer useful for anything other than being a target. Most of the time they were so shot up that you really could not discern any damage of what you had just created compared to what formally existed. But every now and then we would get a new undamaged vehicle and we could actually see what we were doing damage wise. That was outstanding. But the vehicles had been drained of all fluids so we never got to see anything burst into flames which would’ve been extra cool.

[@Eric-kn4yn]

​@@lordkreigs1978ballistic trajectory were different ok. B36 etc had all 20mm

[@candice4088]

bro sounds like this emoji🤓

[@chamonix4658]

12th January 2024