Re: Re: [DL] bursts per action [MUNCHKINS]

["Daniel Gwyn" <dgwyn@colba.net>]

Hi,
    I would like to point a couple of problems with your comparison.  First
of all, the actual Gatling hand-cranked machine guns had rates of fire that
were at most about 1200 rounds a minute in the later models.  This is only
about twice the rate of modern machine guns which typically fire something
like 500-600 rounds a minute and is much lower than the 6000 rounds a minute
that modern electrically driven multi-barrelled machine guns (or miniguns)
can pump out.  If we compare the Gatling machine guns with their modern
counterparts, it can be seen that the slightly higher (and it depended on
how fast you cranked) rate of fire is off-set in recoil terms by the extra
barrels and therefore extra weight.  Gatling guns had 6 to ten barrels and
were usually mounted on field carriages.  Hence, Gatlings were HEAVY.
Historically, they were generally treated as light artillery rather than an
infantry weapon.  That alone will absorb the extra recoil when compared to
modern single barrelled machine guns.
    Secondly, the early Gatlings of Deadlands use gunpowder as propellant
which is much less powerful than nitrocellulose or cordite  which came into
use as propellants in the late 19th century.  In simple terms, each shot of
the Gatling does not generate as much recoil as a modern machine gun.
          Daniel Gwyn
"Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all."
     Hamlet, Act III, scene i.

-----Message d'origine-----
De : Frempath2@netscape.net <Frempath2@netscape.net>
À : deadlands@gamerz.net <deadlands@gamerz.net>
Date : March 17, 2002 2:28 AM
Objet : RE: Re: [DL] bursts per action [MUNCHKINS]


>Actually not, a machine gun has only a fraction of the recoil of a
comprable gatling weapon.  For comparison the WWII corsair had 6 .50 machine
guns which were later replaced with 4 M-3 20MM cannon so assume that 2 20mm
are equal to 3 .50 cal.  The M-3 had a rof of 700 rounds per minute.  So an
M-3 is equivilant in energy to say 1050 .50 rounds.  The gatling version of
an M-3 is the vulcan, which had varients between 1,500 and 6,000 rounds per
minute.  This equates to a recoil energy equal to 2,750 to 9,000 rounds per
minute of .50 caliber fire. The M-2 with a cyclic rof of 550 rounds per
minute does not compare, even after calculating out the extra mass of the
gatling.  I don't know that I would call the 44 pound tripod for the M-2
flimsy either though.
>
>From personal exerience though, machine guns and gatlings feel different,
though both are a hoot to fire.  Machine guns are a LOT easier to clean
though.
>
>g'day
>kevin jameson
>
>
>"Lord Jobe" <lordjobe@bigfoot.com> wrote:
><snio>
>>Something as "flimsy" as a tripod holds up an M-2 Browning .50 cal machine
gun very well, and I think it
>>would have a lot more recoil than a steam gatling.
>>
>>---
>>"You can observe a lot by watching."
>> -Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra
>>
>>Lord Jobe, God of Psiberspace (The Landscape of My Mind)
>>"Universes Exist in My Mind."
>>ICQ# 17774785
>>
>>
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>>
>--
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