What are UB

[CB77Don246]

On some Russian planes the ammo is UB what is UB and how do I fire it ?  

[AndyJWest]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berezin_UB

[CrazyDuck]

It's a russian airborne heavy machinegun (name stands for "Universal (gun) from Beresin"). When synchronized to fire through propeller, it carries designation UBS (S for Synchronized), when in a turret, it's an UBT (Turret). A rare wing mounted version was called UBK ("Krilo" = wing in Russian). It's the most powerful aircraft mounted heavy machinegun of WW2, approximately two times more powerful than MG131, and still some 20% more powerful than the M2. You fire it with your secondary trigger (when primary is used for cannon).

 

Yak-1B and Lagg-3 each carry one in the cowling, above and to the side from propeller. Yak-7B carries two (with different ammocounts!), and MiG-3 carries one i basic armament version. Both IL-2 1943 and Pe-2 carry these guns for rear defence.

Edited May 11, 2019 by CrazyDuck

[=FSB=Man-Yac]

I think it always nice to visualize the ammo, you can see how smaller the cartridge is for the german 131 compared with america and soviet 50.cal ( I think there is a mistake and the japanese type 94 is actually soviet shvak -> your standard cannon on soviet planes) 

[danielprates]

The picture above makes you think that all national .50s are identical in terms of caliber, but the russian round has more propellant, given the longer case. Is there data on the "russian point fifty" being more effective or destructive than other nation's rounds?

Edited May 12, 2019 by danielprates

[ShamrockOneFive]

1 hour ago, danielprates said:

The picture above makes you think that all national .50s are identical in terms of caliber, but the russian round has more propellant, given the longer case. Is there data on the "russian point fifty" being more effective or destructive than other nation's rounds?

 

By many factors the Berezin UB may be the best heavy machine gun mounted on aircraft of the war. http://users.skynet.be/Emmanuel.Gustin/fgun/fgun-pe.html

 

At least from a raw performance value it does well on everything from fire rate to ballistics to muzzle velocity.

[danielprates]

9 minutes ago, ShamrockOneFive said:

 

By many factors the Berezin UB may be the best heavy machine gun mounted on aircraft of the war. http://users.skynet.be/Emmanuel.Gustin/fgun/fgun-pe.html

 

At least from a raw performance value it does well on everything from fire rate to ballistics to muzzle velocity.

 

I thought as much!

 

Edit: wow, thats a great text right there. Concise but complete, and it shows that the writer knows what he is talking about.

Edited May 12, 2019 by danielprates

[CB77Don246]

Thank you for that guys.

Edited May 12, 2019 by CB77Don246

[Sublime]

Ya thanks ! I had zero ixea that a German .50 was smallee than a US .50 and Soviet .50s were bigger.

Thus is eye opening and also lessings the sting when I thonk of the 1 mg on a yak1b with the cannon. This exolains why in yak7bs in deflection shots I very very often set german planes aflame quickly..

Any info on Soviet cannons? I love their high rof and mv compared to every other nations cannons

[Eisenfaustus]

setting the enemy aflame has less to do with muzzle velocity or kinetic energy - a little with rate of fire but mostly with the kind of rounds that are fired. Most heavy machine guns in WWII aircraft had specially designed incendiary ammo available. But how much they were used depended on standing orders, production capacity and logistic possibilities.

[Bremspropeller]

Chose UB 40 if you like some red red wine.

[=FSB=Man-Yac]

9 hours ago, Sublime said:

Ya thanks ! I had zero ixea that a German .50 was smallee than a US .50 and Soviet .50s were bigger.

Thus is eye opening and also lessings the sting when I thonk of the 1 mg on a yak1b with the cannon. This exolains why in yak7bs in deflection shots I very very often set german planes aflame quickly..

Any info on Soviet cannons? I love their high rof and mv compared to every other nations cannons

Soviet canon is shvak it's the round that was mistaken as the japanese type 94 on picture above

[Sublime]

I know its a shvak. I didnt know it was mistaken for a type 94 though interesting ty

[=FSB=Man-Yac]

19 hours ago, Sublime said:

I know its a shvak. I didnt know it was mistaken for a type 94 though interesting ty

Maybe read the comment I posted with the picture ?

[Sublime]

1 hour ago, =FSB=Man-Yac said:

Maybe read the comment I posted with the picture ?

I dont understand what youre getting at? I understand totally you said the shell labelled as type 94 japanese is the russian Shvak.  Thats cool.  Great.  It wasnt a question it was saying I didnt know that thank you.

My original question was about info on the cannon...

[sevenless]

On 5/12/2019 at 2:17 AM, =FSB=Man-Yac said:

I think it always nice to visualize the ammo, you can see how smaller the cartridge is for the german 131 compared with america and soviet 50.cal ( I think there is a mistake and the japanese type 94 is actually soviet shvak -> your standard cannon on soviet planes) 

 

Thanks for that Picture. I wasn´t aware that the german 13mm had that less propellant compared to the 12,7 of us or russian origin. However they had their 20mm and 30mm HE shells which were hugely devastating on airframes to make up for that limitation.

[=FSB=Man-Yac]

1 hour ago, Sublime said:

I dont understand what youre getting at? I understand totally you said the shell labelled as type 94 japanese is the russian Shvak.  Thats cool.  Great.  It wasnt a question it was saying I didnt know that thank you.

My original question was about info on the cannon...

Okay I thought you were asking for the ammo since it is not indicated in the picture. Here is some information about Shvak 20 mm canon

 

20-mm ShVAK cannon was identical as the 12.7-mm machine gun. Distinction was only in a bore of trunk. They were issued in different versions: wing, turret and a motor - gun. Lenght varried for these models for wing version 1679 of mm, for turret - 1726 mm, for a motor - gun - 2122 mm. Weight of guns around 40 kg and 44,5 kg.  Rate of fire was 700-800 shots/minutes.

 

The canon was considered weak for its caliber of 20 mm.

Nevertheless, within war mass production of ShVAK cannon were manifactured. In 1942: 34601 gun, in 1943: 26499 guns, in 1944: 25633, in 1945:13433. In 1946 production of the gun stopped.

 

Synchronous and wing 20-mm ShVAK cannon were used on I-153P, I-16, Yak-1, Yak-7B, LaGG-3, La - 5, Pe-3 fighters, they were also added to lend leased Hurricanes replacing the Browning 7.7mm. Two fixed cannons were put on  Tu-2 bomber and on a part of Pe-2 bombers. Defensive turret with 20-mm ShVAK cannon have been established on Pe-8 and Er-2 bombers.

[Sublime]

11 hours ago, =FSB=Man-Yac said:

Okay I thought you were asking for the ammo since it is not indicated in the picture. Here is some information about Shvak 20 mm canon

 

20-mm ShVAK cannon was identical as the 12.7-mm machine gun. Distinction was only in a bore of trunk. They were issued in different versions: wing, turret and a motor - gun. Lenght varried for these models for wing version 1679 of mm, for turret - 1726 mm, for a motor - gun - 2122 mm. Weight of guns around 40 kg and 44,5 kg.  Rate of fire was 700-800 shots/minutes.

 

The canon was considered weak for its caliber of 20 mm.

Nevertheless, within war mass production of ShVAK cannon were manifactured. In 1942: 34601 gun, in 1943: 26499 guns, in 1944: 25633, in 1945:13433. In 1946 production of the gun stopped.

 

Synchronous and wing 20-mm ShVAK cannon were used on I-153P, I-16, Yak-1, Yak-7B, LaGG-3, La - 5, Pe-3 fighters, they were also added to lend leased Hurricanes replacing the Browning 7.7mm. Two fixed cannons were put on  Tu-2 bomber and on a part of Pe-2 bombers. Defensive turret with 20-mm ShVAK cannon have been established on Pe-8 and Er-2 bombers.

Thanks

I was reading some about sov guns yesterday.

 

I forget the name but what was the deal with the super fast firing MGs they put in some 1-16s (I believe they were 12.7) but they fired so fast they iammed up

Edited May 14, 2019 by Sublime

[CrazyDuck]

10 hours ago, Sublime said:

I forget the name but what was the deal with the super fast firing MGs they put in some 1-16s (I believe they were 12.7) but they fired so fast they iammed up

 

That was probably the so called "Ultra ShKAS" (7,62 mm). Standard ShKAS already had an impressive rate of fire of 1800 rounds per minute (appropriately lower for synchronized versions).

However, Russians didn't stop there. They modified the weapon to the physical limits so it could fire an insane 3000 rounds per minute (50 per second!!). However, this took too much of a toll on reliability, so these saw only limited use.

[Sublime]

Yes thats exavrly what i meant! How did it fire so fast did it have a motor like the A10s gun or something? They must have sawed planes in half when they worked. Wiki said they were used in Finland..

[welther]

Yes. Basic info is missing when selecting modifications.

[Jaws2002]

On 5/11/2019 at 8:17 PM, =FSB=Man-Yac said:

I think it always nice to visualize the ammo

Yes it's good to see the ammo, but you also have to know the actual specs, to know how they compare.

 If you look in that photo, the12.7x108 is a lot bigger than the us .50BMG, but what you don't see is that US counterpart runs at higher pressure, and shoots a lighter bullet, at higher velocity. In practice, they are pretty close in performance. 

On 5/11/2019 at 7:49 PM, CrazyDuck said:

 It's the most powerful aircraft mounted heavy machinegun of WW2,

 

Actually the 13.2x99mm Belgian FN made Browning, is right up there with UBS. Lighter than the US version, much higher rate of fire (up to 1500 rpm), heavier bullet (as heavy as the Russian gun) and the Belgians made a nice HE shell for it.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitrailleuse_d'Avion_Browning_-_F.N._Calibre_13,2_mm

Edited January 16, 2022 by Jaws2002

[RyanR]

I had the same question about what the UB was.... the Wikipedia page was helpful, but it wasn't until Google led me to a Russian language page that I learned about the different rounds. What we see in game is the AP and HE rounds, making the gun effectively a cannon.

 

It's a pretty potent weapon. My first flight in the Great Battles series was in a MiG-3 with underwing UBK's. When they just started shredding Bf-110's, I started researching the weapons. It's pretty neat. Soviet armament was pretty interesting, and I think more effective than the Luftwaffe "equivalents".

 

-Ryan

 

 

On 5/14/2019 at 9:02 PM, Sublime said:

Yes thats exavrly what i meant! How did it fire so fast did it have a motor like the A10s gun or something? They must have sawed planes in half when they worked. Wiki said they were used in Finland..

 

 

There's a neat illustration on Wikipedia. The rounds did spiral around barrel like with an M134 mini-gun, but it was all recoil driven.

 

-Ryan

 

 

 

[the_emperor]

On 5/14/2019 at 2:20 AM, =FSB=Man-Yac said:

 

The canon was considered weak for its caliber of 20 mm.

 

in terms of size the Soviet 20mm does indeed throw a smaller slug

 

here are some further information about the soviet aircraft ammunition from a german perspectiv. One can see that the cartride of the 12.7x108mm and 20x99mm to have the same length of 146.5mm. The 12.7mm AP/API/API-T are very simmilar in composition as the US .50. But of course not implemented in the game.