I imagine the recoil of a powerful machine gun or cannon would decelerate a plane significantly. Is this an issue?
Asked
Active
Viewed 51 times
0
-
Short version of the answer: No. – Therac Jun 06 '21 at 10:19
-
Significantly? No. Compare the mass of the ammunition being fired to the mass of the aircraft. For a .50 caliber, typical bullets weigh about 40-50 g. Say the gun fires 20 bullets per second, that's about 1 kg per second. A typical fighter, say an F-16, weighs something over 9000 kg. Muzzle velocity would be about 900 m/s, vs a subsonic (jet) speed of 200-300 m/s. – jamesqf Jun 06 '21 at 17:17