How effective was Schrage Musik?

[he219research]

Originally Posted by Denniss

He 219 weapons manual does neither mention weight or CoG issues for removal of the center bay guns. Judging from the manual Section IIB the MK 108 uses the attachment points of the center bay guns.

For weight calculation one needs to add 2x compressed air bottles required for the MK 108.

Excellent clarification, Denniss! I stand corrected (and I also totally missed the attachment point issue).

[Stephan Wilkinson]

In engineering terms, the installation of long guns vertically into a shallow fuselage, whilst ensuring feed mechanisms and low drag, doesn't seem achievable.

I don't think that's true. I'm looking at a photo of the 30mm Schrage Musik unit out of an He-219 Uhu, including two guns and ammunition containers and feed mechanisms, and though I'm guesstimating measurements, the breech block/receiver units seem to be about 2.5 feet long with two-foot-long barrels. From the bottom end of the receivers to the floor of the aircraft seems to be about 1.5 feet, so inclining the guns from 65 to 90 degrees would still allow plenty of clearance at the bottom and probably extend the barrels several inches out into the slipstream at the top. Or move the entire gun down several inches, get the guns entirely out of the slipstream and still have plenty of clearance at the bottom.

These were pretty short "long guns."