GU-11 ammo/magazines/clips

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Has there ever been any lineart showing external clips or magazines for the GU-11.

Were they even mentioned in any canon source?

Or is the GU-11 only reloadable back at base?

[hellohikaru]

I think they can only be reloaded by trained ground crew.

[maxjenius81]

yeah the GU-11 uses a large internal magazine as opposed to the external magazine used on later gunpods like the GU-15 meaning it isnt able to reload in the field and must be reloaded back at base. Its worth nothing that the later gunpods with external magazines use smaller caliber (30mm vs 55mm) rounds.

Edited March 4, 2004 by maxjenius81

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Ouch, if true then the valks sure have serious tactical drawbacks. IIRC, they had like 200/300? rounds only? Thats like 20 secs of firing?

With all that OT I guess they should have used beam weapons like on the Regaults. Its not as if the beams on the Regaults were weak too. In the show we see VFs getting blown apart from a single blast from the zentran pods.

[maxjenius81]

It fires at 200 rounds per minute which gives the Valkyrie approx. ten seconds of continious firing.

For a modern day comparison the 20mm M61 Vulcan cannon in its most widely used version (940 rounds) has approx. the same firing time.

All in all ten seconds of continious firing while not sounding like a lot, it is a good amount. Im sure the GU-11's ROF in one second is enough to ensure that a quick one second burst has a high enough shot density to ensure a kill.

[F-ZeroOne]

If you can't stop what you're firing at with half-a-dozen 55mm rounds to a vital area, you've got more to worry about than just running out of ammuntion...

Edit:

Some comparisons.

Supermarine Spitfire, Mk. I or II: 8 .303 Browning machine guns. 333 rounds per gun for approx. 13 seconds continious firing.

Messerschmitt Bf109E: 2 7.62 mm machine guns, 1000 rounds per gun, and two 20mm cannon, 60 rounds per gun - approx 6 seconds firing. This is why at least one historian has argued that asides from making 109 pilots feel a bit more comfortable and being able to penetrate a bit deeper into England, increasing their fuel load wouldn't actually have had much effect on the Battle of Britain, as they would still run out of bullets - and have much further to fly back home after doing so, through the best organised air defence system of the era...

MiG 29: 30 mm cannon with 150 rounds. Fitted with a laser rangefinder, the designers claim that the cannon jam after only three of four rounds, but that the laser made it so accuarate that a target was nearly always destroyed anyway.

Edited March 4, 2004 by F-ZeroOne

[Stamen0083]

It fires at 200 rounds per minute which gives the Valkyrie approx. ten seconds of continious firing.

That's some screwy math... 200 rounds per minute rate of fire empties a 200 round clip in 10 seconds?

Temporal anomaly?

[GRAND CANNON]

MACROSS COMPENDIUM states the following:

Standard external 55 mm Howard GU-11 three-barrel gatling gun pod mounted under central fuselage in Fighter mode or in manipulator or stored on arm hard point in GERWALK and Battroid modes with 200 rds fired at 1200 rds per minute.

[Skull Leader]

It pays to remember that regault pods had paper-thin armor, thus it took very little ordinance to breech the interior. When you take into consideration the size of the pilot and the size of the cockpit, virtually ANY torso hit on a regault more likely than not proved fatal, or at least dehabilitating.

Knowing that, a good valkyrie pilot could count on a little going a long way (unless you pull a hikaru-episode#2 and completely unload the thing). Those things are pushing some pretty high-caliber ammunition.

[Prime]

All in all it just means that you have to have good aim and be selective with what you shoot at

[maxjenius81]

damn typos i meant 1200....

[Raptor]

This is why I love the VF-11 and the VF-19's gunpods.

Mag changes are sexy

[maxjenius81]

Speaking of magazines, whats the deal with the VF-11's mag. Its curved and very long. How do you suppose it actually stores the rounds and moves them to the firing chamber?

[azrael]

Perhaps one should consider that the SV-51 also uses a 55mm gunpod with only 120 rounds.

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Speaking of magazines, whats the deal with the VF-11's mag. Its curved and very long. How do you suppose it actually stores the rounds and moves them to the firing chamber?

It probably uses a helical magazine (like in the real life FN90) or the ammo is belted and the belt cramped into that area.

As for the 10 sec firing time being enough and the comparisions to WW2 fighters.

Well this is a valk, its gonna be outnumbered 10 to 1 at the least.

Anyway, a simple beam weapon would have sorted it out. But running out of ammo is a nice plot device to have anyway.

[maxjenius81]

There must be some sort of weakness to the beam weapon concept. We still have ammo based gubpods over 30 years later in Macross Plus and Macross 7 and the newest fighters, VF-19s still use ammo-based gun pods. There are those that say the VF-17 and VF-22 are armed with energy based gunpods, but that isnt canon.

[VF-19]

Well, I could assume that beam weapons may not be as reliable as a traditional gun in the Macross Universe. However, considering that there are lasers mounted into the head of most VFs, I think it may be a cost issue as well. Guns are cheap. Lasers aren't (at least in our world).

[JsARCLIGHT]

Laser or Beam based weapons may also just be too darn fragile to be used as a main battle rifle by a huge robot. Think of how they use the GU-11 in Macross TV... they use it like a foot soldier would his rifle. They hit things with it, they toss it around a lot... heck they even light enormous zentran cigarettes with them. The lasers on the head of a valk are on there along with all the sensative cameras and other fragile equipment so perhaps they are not at risk as much as they would be on a rifle.

Let's also not forget that the rifle is a standalone entity... in order for it to be a laser or beam weapon you would have to connect it to the valk's power supply somehow. The only logic most anime has for this to work is that the hands have some sort of power coupling to transfer energy from the unit's reactor to the beam weapon... meaning every shot you take is effecting the power drain on your fighter. Make the beam too weak and you might as well be throwing rocks, make it too strong and your headlights dim every time you take a shot.

Conventional powder ammunition has always been very reliable, strong and cheap to produce thus it will always be around in some capacity.

As for the magazines inside the gunpods I would assume they are not spring driven like human sized small arms. Almost every large scale mechanical automatic weapon is motor drive ammo feeding, the ammo is not under any "spring pressure" it is pulled along by a motor system that basically drags the belt of ammo through the weapon. Miniguns and Vulcan cannons (like what the GU-11 is designed after) would not use loose ammo housed in spring magazines but rather a motorized belt fed system. When it comes to belt ammo as long as it does not bind or kink at a weird angle you can snake that stuff all over like a serpentine belt on a car engine.

[bsu legato]

It probably uses a helical magazine (like in the real life FN90)

Are you refering to the FN P90? Because it doesn't use a "helical" mag. AFAIK, the only small arm produced so far that used a helical mag was the Calico smg family.

AS for the VF-11 gunpod, it could be that only the magazine body is curved, to better fair it into the gunpod body during flight.

[Southcross]

It probably uses a helical magazine (like in the real life FN90)

Are you refering to the FN P90? Because it doesn't use a "helical" mag. AFAIK, the only small arm produced so far that used a helical mag was the Calico smg family.

AS for the VF-11 gunpod, it could be that only the magazine body is curved, to better fair it into the gunpod body during flight.

I agree. I have only seen the Calico using a helical magazine. The Calico system is definatly very "interesting". Generally the design is too unreliable for contemporary military use, but does allow for a "massively" higher capacity for a less "critical" consumer market.

[Vifam7]

I'm wondering how many rounds the GU-11 holds...

If pilots need at least 10 seconds worth of ammo (assuming they fire 1 sec bursts) then about 200 rounds are needed if the firing rate of the GU-11 is 1200 rds per min. I hope I have my math correct (I was never good with math)...

I don't see the GU-11 gunpod holding too many rounds though. I mean 55mm rounds should be pretty big.

-------

Vifam7

[JELEINEN]

I'm wondering how many rounds the GU-11 holds...

If pilots need at least 10 seconds worth of ammo (assuming they fire 1 sec bursts) then about 200 rounds are needed if the firing rate of the GU-11 is 1200 rds per min. I hope I have my math correct (I was never good with math)...

I don't see the GU-11 gunpod holding too many rounds though. I mean 55mm rounds should be pretty big.

-------

Vifam7

It holds 200 rounds.

[Smiley424]

In regards to the VF-17 having beam weaponry, it does kinda. I remember in Mac7 Gamlin would pop out this attachment for his VF-17's gunpod which would shoot this large powerful beam and take out a bunch of enemies. Seemed like a one shot deal though. Well, it looked like a beam weapon to me.

Also, I believe the VF-4 had beam weapons and missiles, no gunpod, but I don't know how canon that is. And after that fighter, I think all valks have had gunpods since.

[wolfx]

10 seconds worth of ammo, and they use it to shoot down missles.....10 seconds doesn't feel very realistic.

As a matter of fact, 200 rounds seems abit little. How much does a modern fighter jet's Vulcan cannon have anyway? I'm not a military freak, so I wouldn't know.

I don't see the GU-11 gunpod holding too many rounds though. I mean 55mm rounds should be pretty big.

The 3 barrels on the GU-11's muzzle are pretty small relatively to the whole gunpod, just as a relative size of the bullet to the Gunpod. Not sure how the rounds are fed into the chambers to roughly estimate how much the gunpod can hold though. Most probably its fed through chains like a gattling gun.

[Stamen0083]

As a matter of fact, 200 rounds seems abit little. How much does a modern fighter jet's Vulcan cannon have anyway? I'm not a military freak, so I wouldn't know.

400 rounds, if I recall.

The 3 barrels on the GU-11's muzzle are pretty small relatively to the whole gunpod, just as a relative size of the bullet to the Gunpod.

The size of the muzzle is not indicative of the size of the shell being fired. The part that exits the muzzle is a small part of the bullet. Most of it is powder and casing, which is ejected.

Case in point, the A-10's 30 mm rounds are actually the size of a milk bottle before firing, which is, what, 60 mm?

[azrael]

In regards to the VF-17 having beam weaponry, it does kinda. I remember in Mac7 Gamlin would pop out this attachment for his VF-17's gunpod which would shoot this large powerful beam and take out a bunch of enemies. Seemed like a one shot deal though. Well, it looked like a beam weapon to me.

Also, I believe the VF-4 had beam weapons and missiles, no gunpod, but I don't know how canon that is. And after that fighter, I think all valks have had gunpods since.

In regards to the VF-17's gunpod attachment:

http://www.anime.net/macross/mecha/united_...vf17/index.html

one spare gun pod magazine or one gunpod beam adaptor stored in lower main fuselage in Fighter mode or in opposite lower leg section in Battroid mode

In regards to the VF-4's armaments:

http://www.anime.net/macross/mecha/united_.../vf4/index.html

[Southcross]

As a matter of fact, 200 rounds seems abit little. How much does a modern fighter jet's Vulcan cannon have anyway? I'm not a military freak, so I wouldn't know.

400 rounds, if I recall.

The 3 barrels on the GU-11's muzzle are pretty small relatively to the whole gunpod, just as a relative size of the bullet to the Gunpod.

The size of the muzzle is not indicative of the size of the shell being fired. The part that exits the muzzle is a small part of the bullet. Most of it is powder and casing, which is ejected.

Case in point, the A-10's 30 mm rounds are actually the size of a milk bottle before firing, which is, what, 60 mm?

according the the images I have seen of the 55mm round, its "case" is not much bigger than the projectile. I looked and I can't find the site I saw the image. The best way I could describe the "shell" that was depicted... "looked like a beercan with the tip of the projectile poking out of the end". Its quite possible the image I saw might of been "fan-art"

Now the gun pod on the YF-19 looked like a typical "bottleneck cartridge" round, there was a scene in the OVAs where they were loading the gunpod.

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

As a matter of fact, 200 rounds seems abit little. How much does a modern fighter jet's Vulcan cannon have anyway? I'm not a military freak, so I wouldn't know.

400 rounds, if I recall.

The 3 barrels on the GU-11's muzzle are pretty small relatively to the whole gunpod, just as a relative size of the bullet to the Gunpod.

The size of the muzzle is not indicative of the size of the shell being fired. The part that exits the muzzle is a small part of the bullet. Most of it is powder and casing, which is ejected.

Case in point, the A-10's 30 mm rounds are actually the size of a milk bottle before firing, which is, what, 60 mm?

Its indicative of the diameter of the shell being fired, just not indicative of the size of the cartridge.

The vulcans have a drum holding about 475 -575 rounds. Good for about 4-5 secs

[maxjenius81]

As a matter of fact, 200 rounds seems abit little. How much does a modern fighter jet's Vulcan cannon have anyway? I'm not a military freak, so I wouldn't know

Depends on the aircraft.

F-16, F-15E = 500 rounds

F-14 = 676 rounds

F/A-18 = 578 rounds

F-15A-D = 940 rounds

As for the size of casing of an A-10's 30mm round its not that much larger around than the actual bullet.

[Stamen0083]

As for the size of casing of an A-10's 30mm round its not that much larger around than the actual bullet.

I stand corrected.

Roughly 40 mm it is, then.

Edited March 5, 2004 by Stamen0083

[maxjenius81]

Another question about gunpods, any one got any good guesses as to the size of the ammo used by the YF-19's GU-15 gunpod. I found a scene in Mac Plus which confirms it as a five barrel gunpod so its probably smaller than 55mm, but i could really find much advantage to it being 30mm (same size as the VF-11) which has six barrels unless you wanted to slow the rate of fire to give the pilot additional firing time.

Here are some reference pics to help anyone:

Also, after watching mac plus again ive estimated the size of the magazine to be approx 200 rounds after determinnig number of seconds spent firing (approx 6-7 one second bursts are fired by Isamu before the first magazine change) and working off the estmate of 2400 rounds per minute for the VF-11s gun on the assumption that the VF-19 is also a 30mm.

Edited March 5, 2004 by maxjenius81

[Mellow Yellow]

It probably uses a helical magazine (like in the real life FN90)

Are you refering to the FN P90? Because it doesn't use a "helical" mag. AFAIK, the only small arm produced so far that used a helical mag was the Calico smg family.

AS for the VF-11 gunpod, it could be that only the magazine body is curved, to better fair it into the gunpod body during flight.

I agree. I have only seen the Calico using a helical magazine. The Calico system is definatly very "interesting". Generally the design is too unreliable for contemporary military use, but does allow for a "massively" higher capacity for a less "critical" consumer market.

Actually, the PP-19 Bizon also uses a helical magazine. http://world.guns.ru/smg/smg08-e.htm

I know about this gun only cuz I play the Firearms HL mod

[Southcross]

It probably uses a helical magazine (like in the real life FN90)

Are you refering to the FN P90? Because it doesn't use a "helical" mag. AFAIK, the only small arm produced so far that used a helical mag was the Calico smg family.

AS for the VF-11 gunpod, it could be that only the magazine body is curved, to better fair it into the gunpod body during flight.

I agree. I have only seen the Calico using a helical magazine. The Calico system is definatly very "interesting". Generally the design is too unreliable for contemporary military use, but does allow for a "massively" higher capacity for a less "critical" consumer market.

Actually, the PP-19 Bizon also uses a helical magazine. http://world.guns.ru/smg/smg08-e.htm

I know about this gun only cuz I play the Firearms HL mod

Feed is from "helical" magazines, made mostly of plastic and mounted under the barrel. Design of those cylindrically shaped magazines is loosely based on American Calico designs.

LMAO!

btw has anyone ever seen one of the "plastic" cars made in russia during the late 70s-80s? You thought the Yugo was bad :lol:

I have to question the reliability of this firearm.

[Vifam7]

LMAO!

btw has anyone ever seen one of the "plastic" cars made in russia during the late 70s-80s?  You thought the Yugo was bad :lol:

I have to question the reliability of this firearm.

Aren't the Russians known for creating reliable GI-proof weapons? I mean, I don't know of any Russian weapon that had troubles like the M16.

---------

Vifam7

[Godzilla]

According to the vf-4 RPG stats from here: http://www.steelfalcon.com/Macross/vf4.shtml, the VF-4 can carry GU-11 Gunpods as well. It can carry up to 2 but missile capacity would be limited.