Let's take minigun with number of barrels and machinegun with single barrel. They both have high firing rate but why minigun has multiple barrels? Are they there just to keep the friction of bullets down so the barrels won't heat up and melt down thus increasing the friction of barrels and reducing the firing rate? Is there any other purpose for having multiple barrels than just that? Like maybe preventing bullets to collide to each other inside a barrel if the firing rate is so excessive there are multiple bullets inside the same barrel and the pressure change could cause them to collide each other? Though I think that's not even possible actually. But anyway, is there any other reason than just to keep friction down and thus keep heating up of the barrels down too.
The idea sprung up during the creation of the handcranked Gatling gun, where you had to manually turn the barrels using a crank. Nowadays it's mainly for weapons that can only stay on target for a few seconds or just to look badass I suppose
Well you aren't supposed to fire light machineguns in bursts higher than 6 shots or it gets real hot and you wear out to barrel quickly. For a rate of fire as high as a minigun you need multiple barrels. I'm sure there are other uses.
The main reason is that it allows the next shot to fire before the last used barrel cools down, so overall it does allow the firing rate to increase. A net-friend from NY told me a few years back that, according to his uncle (a gun maker), using the same barrel twice in a row with the firing rate of a minigun would cause the bullet casing to detonate in the barrel.
Yeah, but there's high and there's high. Check out this. Particularly from 30s on. Difference between a machine gun and a fucking terrifying bullet hose miningun should be apparent. Speaking of terrifying, a Canadian Iraq vet was telling me about the time he was within 50feet of being strafed by an A-10 when in a light tank. Crazy story. The Americans knew full well how close they were to the target. He expressed his opinions on his American comrades lack of concern for the safety of himself and his crew by firing a few bursts of 50cal around the American command vehicle which had called in the airstrike. They asked him to leave the Army. :D
and thus, the term spray and pray was born. meh, as long as there wasn't any Rock/metal/foliage/water for the bullets to richochet off of, you don't have much to worry about. Ground and clay/mudbrick walls do a pretty damn good job absorbing bullets rather than bouncing them.
lol at youtube comments "arn't tracers illigal?" x2 and "what tracer bullets do is they expload on impact" now does anyone remember that old computer generated cartoon, with the animals that had jetpacks and weapons? there was like a cheeter, and on the bad side there was a spider. and the lion had a chaingun with a circular saw attatched to it so when it spun up he could cut stuff? anyone remember what that was called?
this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKAjvrmBego&NR=1 this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWAaZnALTYc&feature=related and this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVEV_x-DsmY this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddDs67bbF3E&feature=related and thiiiis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zxeSXdgT9U&feature=related
