Browning (7.7 mm)

Description

The Browning (7.7 mm) is a Browning M1919 machine gun adapted to fire the British .303 round (7.7 mm) and is seen predominantly on British aircraft.

Vehicles equipped with this weapon

Note that the SB2U-2, the single American plane armed with the Browning .303, has a unique gun with lower accuracy than the ones found on British planes.

General info

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Available ammunition

• Default: T · AP · AP-I · Ball · I
• Universal: T · AP · AP-I · AP-I · I
• Tracers: I-T · AP-I · I-T · AP-I
• Stealth: AP-I · AP-I · I

The British version of the Browning comes with a very potent incendiary round, which is capable of setting even the toughest adversary alight. The armour-piercing incendiary round shares this destructiveness, which is why the use of either Stealth or Tracer ammunition belts is recommended. Unlike the original American variant, the British Default belt is somewhat usable due to a lower amount of ball rounds, but researching the belts should still be a relatively high priority.

Comparison with analogues

The 7.7 mm Browning is similar in performance to the American 7.62 mm Browning.

Comparable machine guns to Browning (7.7 mm)
	Name	Year of Creation	Mass	Rounds Per Minute	Ammunition	Feed Type
▄	Browning (7.7 mm)	1935	14 kg	1,000 RPM	7.7 x 56 mm	Belt
▃	Browning (7.62 mm)	1919	14 kg	1,000 RPM	7.62 x 63 mm	Belt
▅	Type 92 navy (7.7 mm)	1932	8 kg	600 RPM	7.7 x 56 mm R	Drum
▄	Darne 1933 (7.5 mm)	1916	8.4 kg	1,350 RPM	7.5 x 54 mm MAS	Belt
▄	Breda-SAFAT (7.7 mm)	1935	12.5 kg	900 RPM	7.7 x 56 mm R	Belt
▀	MG 17 (7.92 mm)	1934	10.2 kg	1,200 RPM	7.92 x 57 mm	Belt
▂	ShKAS (7.62 mm)	1932	10.5 kg	1,800 RPM	7.62 x 54 mm R	Belt
▄	MAC 1934 (7.5 mm)	1934	10.7 kg	1,350 RPM	7.5 x 54 mm MAS	Belt/Magazine

Usage in battles

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Pros and cons

Pros:

• High rate of fire
• Tracer belts are composed entirely of incendiary bullets which are effective at setting fires
• Has higher velocity, accuracy and is less prone to jamming than other LMGs such as the MG 15 and ShKAS
• On planes with Hispano cannons and Browning machine guns, the .303 tracers can be used to aim the 20 mm shells

Cons:

• Pitiful damage against aircraft structures such as spars and skin (same as other LMGs)
• High damage drop-off (same as other LMGs)
• Poor stock belts with relatively high ball round content

History

The original main aircraft-mounted machine gun for Britain was the Vickers, a World War I design that was mostly unchanged from the guns used by the British Army Machine Gun Corps. In the inter-war period, the United States and the United Kingdom both evolved their aircraft designs and recognized it was better if newer aircraft mounted their machine guns on the wings instead of the fuselage. This change would necessitate using a new machine gun which the Air Ministry requested in 1930. In 1931, Colt Firearms in the United States, who collaborated with the Belgian company FN, presented their new aircraft variant of the M1919A4 Browning Machine Gun to the Air Ministry. The Air Ministry ordered their first 60 Brownings in 1936, but they required some changes to the design. The most significant change is the conversion to open bolt from the original closed bolt design. This change was done to reduce the risk the cordite propellant used in British ammunition would "cook off" or get so hot the gun would start firing on its own. The modification meant the guns could no be synchronized to fire through a propeller, but it was mostly irrelevant due to the switch to wing-mounts.

The Browning was first mounted on biplane fighters like the Gloster Gladiator or Hawker Fury, replacing the Vickers guns previously used, but it would more notably used on Britain's primary fighters of the war, the Supermarine Spitfire and Hawker Hurricane. These new fighters had eight guns based on calculations made by Captain F.W. "Gunner" Hill, who concluded that eight guns each capable of 1,000 rounds per minute would be the optimal armament for future fighters in 1934. However, during the Battle of Britain in 1940, this configuration was found to be obsolete leading to the development of Hispano Mk.II cannon for these fighters to provide more firepower. These new cannon armed fighters did however, keep four of the outboard Brownings in place due to the outboard cannons freeze in the air. However, this problem would be fixed near the end of the war with the Hispano Mk.V which would lead to the Browning being phased out.

Along with their fighters, the .303 Browning was used in fixed mounts on the Fairey Fulmar naval reconnaissance aircraft and early models of their bombers such as the Bristol Blenheim, Fairey Battle, Handley Page Hampden, the American lend-lease Martin Maryland and Baltimore, Fairey Swordfish, American Lockheed Hudson and Douglas Boston, Blackburn Skua, and Bristol Beaufort. It was also used in electrically-operated turrets made by Boulton Paul and Nash & Thompson, and continued to see use in the fighter-bombers and night fighters of the de Havillard Mosquito aircraft even after it began getting phased for the Hispano cannons.Thanks to lend-lease, the USSR also get to use the .303 Brownings on the Hurricane Mk IIB and fighters of the Hurricane design. According to Soviet pilots, it was as reliable as their own ShKAS machine guns, but frequently failed when exposed to dust required cloth covers for the feeding and ejector port.

Media

Videos

Britain's aircraft-mounted .303 Browning machine gun with weapons expert Jonathan Ferguson - Royal Armouries

British .303 Browning Mk II* Aircraft Machine Gun - Forgotten Weapons

See also

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• reference to the article about the variant of the cannon/machine gun;
• references to approximate analogues by other nations and research trees.

External links

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Aircraft machine guns
USA
7.62 mm	Browning · M134 Minigun
12.7 mm	GAU-19 · M2 Browning · M3 Browning
Germany
7.62 mm	MG3
7.92 mm	MG 15 · MG 17 · MG 81
12.7 mm	FN M3P
13 mm	MG 131
USSR
7.62 mm	DA · GShG-7.62 · PKT · PV-1 · ShKAS
12.7 mm	A-12.7 · Berezin UB · TKB-481 · YaK-B
Britain
7.62 mm	FN 60.30 · L8A1
7.7 mm	Browning · Lewis · Vickers E · Vickers K
Japan
7.7 mm	Te-1 · Type 89 · Type 89 'special' · Type 92 · Type 97 navy
7.92 mm	Type 1 · Type 98
12.7 mm	Ho-103 · Ho-104
13 mm	Type 2
13.2 mm	Type 3
China
12.7 mm	QJK99-12.7-1
Italy
7.7 mm	Breda-SAFAT · Lewis
7.92 mm	FN Browning
12.7 mm	Breda-SAFAT · FN M3M · Scotti
France
7.5 mm	Darne 1933 · Fabrique Nationale Mle 38 · FN Browning · MAC 1934 · MAC 1934T · Mle 33 · Mle 1923
7.62 mm	PKA
7.92 mm	FN-Browning M.36 No.3 · FN-Browning M.36 No.4
Sweden
7.7 mm	FN-Browning M.36 No.3
8 mm	Ksp m/22 · Ksp m/22 Fh · Ksp m/22 Fv · Ksp m/22-37 R
12.7 mm	Akan m/39A · Akan m/40 · Akan m/45 · LKk/42
13.2 mm	Akan m/39 · Akan m/39A