How Effective was the WWII B-29 Tail Gunner?
Vložit
- čas přidán 25. 09. 2022
- The intent of this video is to describe the WWII B-29’s tail gunner’s station external features, walk through the interior station, and discuss the stations combat effectiveness.
Takeaways from the video:
- Tail Gunner in Pressurized heated compartment
- Armored gun station
- Twin Browning M2 Machine guns
- 100% Armor Piercing Incendiaries
- No Tracers in ammo mix
- Optical illuminated Reticle Gun sight
- Computer accounted for ballistics
- Japanese attacked bombers tail during Night
- Japanese attacked bombers nose during Day
- Ratio of enemy losses to bomber losses was 70:1 for tail attacks - Věda a technologie
The actor Charles Bronson was a veteran B-29 tail gunner.
father-in-law sgt. Archie Hamrik was a tail gunner on the Ramp Queen, a B-29 from Saipan. loved his 20 mm cannon and kept it operational throughout the war. won the distinguished flying cross. pinned on by gen. Curtis Lemay. JDR
You can say what you want about Gen. Curtis Lemay, but as with George S. Patton, when you are at war you want to have leaders like that.
@@RubyBandUSA 🤦♂️
@@RubyBandUSA But you need to get rid of him real quick afterwards.
As an engineer I love the level of detail in this video. Well done.
Your videos are well presented with no pointless fluff. A large amount of these types of videos are just a long list of numbers and meaningless statistics to fill air time. 👍👍👍
Agreed
I agree. Too many of these WW2 warplane videos play the same clips that everybody else does. If I see the B24 pilot putting on a helmet one more time I will go crazy.
@@RMJTOOLS Or low flying B-24's on the Ploesti Raid with stacked wheat stalks and later billowing black smoke behind them in the distance as they make their egress back to Africa.
@@debbiestimac5175 Yes I agree in that. Cool anecdote, in the early ‘80’s as a young aircraft mechanic I had the pleasure of knowing a terrific mobile tool guy who came to the airport. Our mutual interest was aircraft and he told me about his father who was a bombardier on a B24. His first mission was Ploesti. Obviously he survived to have his son who was the guy I got to be friends with.
@@RMJTOOLS Nice, to have that kind of connection to history, it was such a horrendous loss of life, that raid. When I see modern warfare in that region today, Ukraine, with Germany being starved of oil and natural gas due to the conflict it drives home how green energy is never going to be enough, fossil fuels will be with us until they run out. And when they do, we are done as a civilization. No oil = no lubricants = no machinery.
What is amazing is how B-52 tail gunners were able to down MiG's in Vietnam with their 4 50 calibers!
Very well supported report. Thank you. I have witnessed ground-to-ground quad-50 caliber M-2 fire, so I can imagine the swarm of armor piercing rounds flung at an attacking aircraft by the twin 50's. A sign of the times: complete with ash tray.
Yes right across from a canister of walk around oxygen
"Dammit, is that a Zero?" (Stubs out his Lucky Strike unfiltered) "Time to go to work"
"complete with ash tray." If you ever come across a discussion about the Soviet Clone of the B-29 - the Tu-4 - among other fantasies - such as Boeing spelled backwards on the brake pedals due to them being castings of the original pedals (how sparse in knowledge about casting techniques can one be ???) - is the absolute doozy that the gunner's compartment was fitted with field modified Baked Beans cans to serve as ashtrays for the gunners. Kremlin control over the project was so strict that these Baked Beans cans were incorporated into the Tu-4 design. Da ohhh !!
Ashtray just cracks me up. They thought of everything!
Who else misses AWESOME shows like Wings on the History Channel, that were in-depth and informative, back when they used to focus on you know, history haha! 😉 😂
The all important ash tray with 20 camels (or your preferred brand). Essential for the nerves at a few thousand feet with the Japanese airforce intent on bringing you down at all costs. Reminds me of Galland fixing an ashtray in his Messerschmit.
He had lighter too.
Thanks for this. My dad was a B-29 tail gunner. I still have his oxygen mask. When I was stationed at Ft Knox, I gave dad a tour of our tank, conduct of fire trainer. The gun controls were made by Cadillac Gauge and not unfamiliar to Dad’s hands. He was nailing targets out to 3,000 meters.
This answers questions I've had about bombers and gunners for decades. Even as I was building the models as a kid.
There is an abundance of detailed information that makes it all seem so logical as to how these planes were built and flown. The 12 plane formations and gun coverage graphics at 7:10 are fascinating.
Your videos are fantastic! Thank you for all the hard work.
Thanks for another great video. These videos are very well done with well thought out verbal descriptions, visuals and documentation. Very informative w/o hype and over the top excesses.
I learn so much from this channel. Great content!
A susual, a very thorough and well-done report on the B-29 Tail Gunner's position. I always enjoy your videos.
Great video! My maternal grandfather was a Waist Gunner on the B29 with the 20th Air Force. I have manuals, classified at the time, that were used for reference on the computers, gun systems, etc. Pretty neat stuff
Very well presented, good pacing, fascinating information, great photography! Thanks for the video!
Glad you enjoyed it!
I get so excited when you have a new upload.. I love this stuff.
Excellent vid! Really appreciate the insights, narrative, and statistics. Wonderful and thank you!
Love your content! Extremely useful and informative stuff. Keep up the great work 🤙
QUALITY CONTENT. 👍
I love the content as well, but hope never to have to use it😂
@@theonlymadmac4771 I was wondering that myself !
Great video. Thanks for answering questions I always had about the B 29.
I didn't know I wanted to know this - Thanks for a very well made analysis.
Thank you for the time and effort you put into your video, thumbs up.
Thanks, like how you display all the primary sources also.
This is the content I look for. You’ve got my subscription.
I watched the documentary on the Kee Bird.
The outcome was devastating. So close.
The main mechanic on that project was quite a character. It was sad to learn he passed away from illness shortly after.
One of my late uncle (on dad's side) was a tail gunner of a B-29 during the Pacific Theater.
Excellent & informative as always.
Cheers
Incredible technology for that period! Thanks!
This was an amazing video! Thank you! And you did it all within 10 minutes! It points up what I think Mark Twain said something like this: "Sorry for the long speech. I wanted to do a 3-minute speech but only had time for the 20-minute one."
Once again, great video! I love this topic!
Very informative, your presentation flows well is logical and every element you include is very detailed. It is if you could get in and go on a mission as a tail gunner. Thanks
Very concise. Nicely done!
Outstanding breakdown!
Thank you for this great video
Wow, this is very enlightening. Definitely subscribing.
My father was a volunteer tail gunner with the 462nd bomb group. He only shot down one fighter a Zero.
Enjoyed this information on the B29
Excellent insight. Thank you.
VERY nicely done video
well done. great report
Informative and well explained.
Another fantastic video
At night they could also fly low hidden in the dark and follow the planes silhouetted against the sky, and if it's a moonless or cloudy night track the Flames from the exhaust. Coming up from the depths and taking a swipe which would illuminate their position, then diving back down into the darkness.
They let you flick all those switches and sit in the seat, that is a Great Museum.
I think the Japanese twin engine heavy and night fighters had slanting upward firing cannon before the similar installations used by the Luftwaffe.
I'm thinking of the Ki45 and the Gekko- not sure of it's designation.
100% relevant material. Clear and concise, while integrating loads of cool stats and only relevant material.
Well detailed, thank you.
Your videos are awesome thanks for your work you deserve 1 million subscribers 👍🇭🇲
It’s actually fascinating how quickly the tail gunner goes from eyeballing and crude sights to take out enemy fighters to upgrading quickly to computer aided, projected crosshairs to easily take out hostile craft. All with a complimentary ash tray in your gunners seat, thank you for a very interesting and informative video, I hope there’s more videos with their same informative standard for the rest of the B-29 and other craft.
I giggled at the ash tray right across from his walk-around oxygen supply 😂
Brilliant video- most realistic feel- as if you were there. !! . Thanks
Very informative video. Thankyou for sharing. My father was a B-29 pilot-in-command in July 1945 with his own assigned B-29 crew. He and his crew missed the war in the Pacific by only two weeks because the war with Japan had ended. He later joined the newly formed USAF in 1947 where he flew WB-29's for the Air Weather Service. He would hunt hurricanes and track their position. He would also fly through clouds to check for radiation to see if the Soviets had detonated any atomic weapons. The gunnery system in the B-29 Superfortress was very unique. Its central fire control system eliminated recoil and its computer system calculated wind speed and allowed for bullet drop. The only other aircraft to have a similar gunnery system was the Northrop P-61 Black Widow night fighter in which the top gun turret was controlled by the gunner and by the radar officer in the tail of the fuselage. The top gun turret on the Black Widow was later removed because the muzzle flashes from the guns had a tendancy to blind the pilot. They were later reintroduced on the P-61C models when flash arrestors were installed on the guns.
And here I was the entire time thinking that the tail gunner on the B-29 was remote controlled. I’m more of a tank guy and only know the basics of WW2 aircraft and probably have two aircraft confused. That being said, the B-29 is absolutely beautiful and amazing for when it was built. There is a B-29 on the bottom of Lake Mead in immaculate condition with talk of recovering it….it would be awesome to see this aircraft in person.
Immaculate ...... is perhaps not the best word to discribe it's condition.
It is kinda remote controlled. The gunner points the sight, and without human touch the guns follow via synchros or servos or resolvers or whatever electrical means.
Excellent video.
Nice... great information.
Love the channel for its a StarWars engineer's handbook feeling!
Much of you see in Star Wars was inspired by WWII via George Lucas wanting it to be like a kids serial at the movies he enjoyed as a youngster. The Millennium Falcon's greenhouse style canopy like the B-29's, the Star Destroyers like the Battleships of the end of the war like Yamato and Mushashi, that and Darth Vader's helmet and suit fashioned after the revival of Shogun style militarism in Japan at the time, that led to them attacking Pearl Harbor. The Sith always attack first, just like Japan did.
Very nice. Thanks!
I knew the man who Sold the "new" WWII surplus radials to the 95 tragedy crew! He gave and my kids a tour and showed us a few more treasures as he wept tears of responsibility, RIP old man Oxman's Surplus lived to be over 100. then his son inherited his museum and Surplus treasures and sold a New "surplus" Ball Turit, then he passed. 100% plug and Go! and it is now gunned up and mounted in a trailer last I saw.
Very cool!
this is pretty awesome, didnt know how sophisticated the system was
Love the ash tray, best feature
Very informative video great work!!!
Very specific, but very interesting! Y thanks.
That was super interesting !
A well laid out and informative video. The only thing ,imho, missing is a count of actual number of enemy fighters destroyed vs bomber losses. thank you for the video.
See the channel’s B-29 gunnery video on the Bomber’s kill ratio
As a retired soldier , I worked with a 'Secret Spy Base in England, a colleague, female had been an an RAF photographer, making a record of damage on bombers returning
she said of the rear gunner area, we often had to wash out that area before we could take photographs.
In that way a colleague had been tail gunner, he would occasionally go for treatment, to help him recover for his experience
I love that the tail gunner’s station had an ashtray 😅 I guess it can’t have been pressurised with pure oxygen then??
No. You pressurise aircraft with ambient air, which is compressed by the aircraft as you go. Pressurisation of a whole aeroplane or cabin with pure oxygen would be both impracticable for a long range aeroplane and exceptionally dangerous, as the Apollo 1 disaster demonstrated. The use of oxygen is just to feed the face masks when pressurisation is not applied, and/or when the aircraft is pressurised but flying so high that the pressurisation can no longer maintain a sensible cabin altitude. In those cases the oxygen from the bottles is blended with ambient air in varying proportions into the mask according to the conditions at the time
@@harryspeakup8452 Ah I didn’t know they were pressurised with ambient air. Very interesting - thanks Harry!
another great one, thanks....re: ashtray, did I hear that right? Never heard/knew they could smoke, wow.
Great video I look forward to seeing the notification of your new videos. I also wonder how many people get hit on the head from spent shells in Europe. That's a crap load of brass falling from the sky 😂.
Keep up the great work don't be afraid to do an hour long video 👍peace.
I love this channel
Eye-opening--thanks! I was a bit surprised about no tracers; they could cause an enemy to break off an attack and given the B-29's altitude and speed, the enemy might not be able to catch up for another pass.
I think that after flying through a .50 cal lead hailstorm the enemy plane was in no condition to do another pass.
Excellent 👍
Great video...👍
Very interesting information I never heard before. That was pretty Advanced for 1945.
Great content
In the corporate turboprop aircraft that I fly, the cabin pressurization system is set for differential pressure, not a specific cabin altitude. The cabin altitude will vary depending on the altitude of the aircraft, since the differential pressure remains constant. Typically, the operational ceiling of the aircraft is determined by a maximum cabin altitude of less than 10,000 feet to comply with Federal Aviation Regulation (FAR) requirements. As an example, a BE-B200 King Air has a maximum differential pressure of 6.6 psi, giving an approximate cabin altitude of slightly less than 10,000 feet at a service ceiling of FL350 (35,000 feet).
Interestingly the 'Kee Bird' featured in the 'Nova' episode was forced down not only to being unable to navigate over the Arctic Circle, but higher than usual fuel consumption because of the drag created by the tail skid that failed to retract after take-off. As duly noted it lacked any manual crank just for such an event. The 'putt-putt' engine helped save the crew by providing power to broadcast a distress signal that rescuers were able to triangulate and finally locate them in the sometimes -50 F environment after a couple of days.
This is a subject I have always wondered about. You hear and see a lot about early B-17 defensive gunnery, but rarely ever anything related to the B-29. I think it would be fascinating as not only were they well protected with advanced systems, they also went up against some very advanced Japanese fighters, again something we don't really see or hear about much. Zero had range needs. But in homeland defense climb rates and fire density were the needs
Zero had no armour and no self sealing tanks.
@@paulc2130 Not by this point of the war. early war stuff yeah but they learned. Also need to remember why that was the theme; zeros were designed for long range as its primary function. These later war planes had to climb fast and hard, and then made steep fast passes from blind spots, so frontal armor was considered more important. That does change toward the end of the war but the B-29 was bombing in may of 44
A very nice description. I only wish you had provided a link to that report for those of us that would like to read it ourselves.
Great presentation! Can you produce a similar video of the B-17g chin turret... Thanks!
This appears to be video of the B29 at the Seattle Museum of Flight Pavilion, the 787 nose visible, the tail of the Concorde SST and the engine wing of a B47 !!!
Use of primary research material - exceptional in a YT video.
my grandfather was the gunner of b29's in the korean war.
Interesting. Thanks.
I like how the ashtray was considered a essential piece of equipment.
Quality of the build, wow.. Espcially those flush rivets & that mirror-like shine.
Add an ashtray, so you can smoke either tobacco or (?)
Related B-29 Videos from WWII US Bombers Channel:
B-29 Bomber Gunnery Video: czcams.com/video/vwNPJgNEyMU/video.html
B-29 Bomber Bombardier/Gunner Video: czcams.com/video/ltPYQfF2Oac/video.html
B-29 vs. B-17 WWII Gunner Kill Ratios Video: czcams.com/video/jSwB1Mxaung/video.html
B-29 Tail Gunner’s Radar Video: czcams.com/video/l-39wbSe_0k/video.html
B-29 5 Fascinating facts Video: czcams.com/video/ZuroPXzrUDg/video.html
Imagine being on the ground while the bombers are making their runs and they dumping 50 shells from a mile high on to what ever down bellow! And glad they didn't forget the ash tray. Can't light up bad guys without a smoke!
1:05 lol bro is that you? I’ve seen several of your videos now, enjoyed them; but that is the first funny thing I’ve seen. Gj
That is not me, Just a stock image scaled to represent the size of the gunner.
Would love to see a follow video detailing combat effectiveness of B29 against Migs in Korean War.
They weren't, the MiG-15 decimated them. It is why they had to switch to nighttime bombing like the Brits in WWII. The MiG had no radar, they could not find targets at night.
I d love to see that as well. I think the consensus is that it was outgunned by the mig15. Fwiw there is also an interview out there of a mig 15 pilot saying that the 29 was a very dangerous target to attack.
Great engineering feat! Don`t know if the problem with engine overheating was ever fully resolved.
My dad talked about (B-29, B-50) how a tail skid strike from take off or landing meant that the POC at the event owed a case of beer to the crew.
Absolutely fascinating!
I'll tell a story from my father's family history. My Dad started in the '30's as an aerial gunner in the old B-10. This was during the Great Depression (when an Army job was a big win)From he went on to an instructor in aerial gunnery (this was all before Pearl Harbor). He was so good at it they sent him to bombardier training, That was the introduction of the 'Heavy bombers like the B-17, b-24 and the B-29. Since he was an (old man) in his thirties they never would allow him to transfer to the 8th air force in the ETO. They said, since he was a good instructor, they couldn't let him go. That was for the twenty year olds. He was too valuable...so they kept promoting him (even into officer ranks). The NORDEN bomb-sight was becoming the big bet they were placing and they needed highly experienced men to understand it and train on it. So, that's what he did for the rest of the war. I know that he contributed a big effort to the USAAF. But I think that training so many men were killed weighed on him. so, suffering isn't limited to those that get shot out.
My father was a radio operator on a B-29 in WWII. Please do a video on the radio operator's station.
Nice! My grandfather was as well! He was assigned to B-17s before that in Europe. 🇺🇲👍🏻😎👍🏻🇺🇲
I think that it is fair to say that the tail gunners were so effective and necessary that the position was kept in the B-52 until ~1991.
I’d like to see a video on the B-52 tail gun/gunner.
Awesome content. Feeding the algo.
Thanks
very good video. They had an ashtray in the compartment! That means they were allowed to smoke?
my grandpa was a tail gunner in the b-29 bomber, tried to get more files on his military career tc but my uncle found out that a storage area that had my grandpa files in illinois had burned down and lost the files so my uncle only has a few papers about my grandpa. which is a bummer cause i wanted to learn bout my grandpa because i never got to meet him. he had a heart attack while bringing in groceries,i think my dad was 14 or 16 yrs old when that happened.
A story goes around that Lancaster tail gunners had no parachute because of space constraints. There's one in Perth WA aviation museum that you can tour and they contradicted this and pointed to a bracket that held the pack. Any similar story about B29s?
Thanks!
Thanks Matt. I appreciate the support.