no muzzle rise on gatling guns/miniguns

I've shot a .45-70 Gatling gun a couple times. It doesn't move because the whole setup is about 150 pounds.

Muzzle climb is a function of recoil. All guns recoil, especially miniguns. Guns recoil quite differently when held by a human hand and bolted to a MH-60M though. Muzzle climb is specifically a function of recoil expressed by the distance between the bore axis and center of resistance to recoil... the shooters hand or shoulder. The higher the bore axis, the more muzzle climb given a fixed recoil impulse. lowering the bore axis reduces the muzzle climb. You will find that most minigun mounts have the joins in line with the firing barrel.. minimal muzzle climb.

The spinning though could act like a flywheel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeyDf4ooPdo

Check out this science... its pretty interesting... Maybe it has something to do with the ease of controlling the recoil.

Just a WAG, but a few thoughts pop into my head:

Vatiable primer delay/ignition? At 2000 rpm there's 0.015 seconds between the barrel being at top dead center and bottom dead center. Perhaps some bullets exit the barrel below the center of gravity, providing an opposing force?

The gas escaping from the barrel continues to provide a rocket nozzle effect after the bullet has exited. If most of the gas is escaping when the barrel is below the center line that would counteract some muzzle rise.

Gyroscopic stabilization could be a significant factor as well...

As stated above...the recoil force is not above the axis of the mount on high-speed, multi-barrel firearms. Also, the impulses from each round's is such that they overlap into one long shove. Some shock-absorbing mounts can be seen to settle to the rear slightly when the gun is fired and stay there until the trigger (as it were) is released.

Have also heard that, between the force of recoil and the gasses from firing entering the engines, the A-10 slows noticeably when firing it's GAU-8 30mm cannon....but that could just fall under rumors and lies.

The spinning though could act like a flywheel.

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You're into something there -- lateral force applied to a spinning object results in movement at 90 degrees to the force applied.

Now as others have said, it depends on the mount. But assuming the barrels were rotating rapidly, and the gun was mounted so the gun would have some barrel climb, that climb would be translated into the horizontal plane.

Mechanical mounts and sheer weight of the gun.

Muzzle climb is specifically a function of recoil expressed by the distance between the bore axis and center of resistance to recoil... the shooters hand or shoulder.

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Nailed it.

Fire your Glock upside down and see which way the muzzle goes.

There is a lot more reciprocating mass in guns like the 1919 and M2 than a Gatling gun.

Might want to watch this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLE...wjSOCdhbTxxS_5nGhLzop9LjmXVb69EHj7nv-vjnMdTYg

FWIW The ultra shkas is an example of a 3000 rpm single barrel machine gun.

lol its so fun to watch the brass spew out of those things... There's some brass rats at my range who would chase helos around for the stuff

Driftertank said:

As stated above...the recoil force is not above the axis of the mount on high-speed, multi-barrel firearms. Also, the impulses from each round's is such that they overlap into one long shove. Some shock-absorbing mounts can be seen to settle to the rear slightly when the gun is fired and stay there until the trigger (as it were) is released.

Have also heard that, between the force of recoil and the gasses from firing entering the engines, the A-10 slows noticeably when firing it's GAU-8 30mm cannon....but that could just fall under rumors and lies.

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While the A-10 might not slow down, there is one aircraft I've read reports of slowing down during firing, The German Hs_129B-3



They pretty much just took a 7.5 cm PaK 40 and installed it on the plane lol 12 rounds total, semi-automatic.

Just so you know, an M-60D has no muzzle climb either, when mounted on a pintle.... neither does an M-231 in a Brad.

Like they said muzzle climb has to do with the mounting/holding.

The GAU-8 is mounted off the centerline, so that the barrel that is actually firing doesn't impart an off line-of-flight vector to the flight path. In other words so it doesn't kick the plane sideways a bit.

-Jenrick

I always figured it was a positional compromise owing to the need to have a landing gear in the same general area, and of course the feed mechanism...

A m240 does not exhibit muzzle climb when strapped to a 8500 ton ship. Some of it is mounting method and the rest could be design (both gyro stability and gun weight/reciprocating mass) either way it is similar to aiming a fire hose, spray until the work is done

I fired m-60 on pintles and on bipods never noticed any muzzle climb.

just watched the video.
dang, is that gun shooting laser rays ?

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Just .308 at 50 rounds a second.

I always figured it was a positional compromise owing to the need to have a landing gear in the same general area, and of course the feed mechanism...

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Nope. As Jenrick alluded to, the barrel that fires is right on the centerline of the fuselage.

During WW II there was an experimental modification to a DeHavilland Mosquito Fighter/Bomber for anti tank use. In the demonstration the plane lined up on a captured German tank and when the weapon fired the plane visibly slowed. The weapon mounted on the Mossy was a self loading 6 lb cannon in the shape of the 57 mm Molins Gun. They did this test for three shots and afterwards from the viewing stands the tank looked unharmed. But when they looked closer two of the shots went through the turret like it was made of butter, the third shot was lower down and found the engine in it's way. It took the engine out the far side of the tank.


More gatling footage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pd-MpXCMcIs

Of course the recoil of the machine gun slows the plane down. In the case of the A-10 and the controlled fire amount sent out in short bursts and the weight of the plane it may not be all that much but it is still there.

Stories from WWII of fighters on long tail chases are full of accounts of the attacker slooooooowly closing in on the target and when they let off a short burst of fire that it slows them down and the gap opens. Recoil in action.

The muzzle rise issue certainly isn't tied to some magical rounds per minute number. It's strictly due to how the gun is held. If that Terminator scene with the hand held minigun was real the top mounted handle and being hung down from Arnie's shoulder by his arm would result in a muzzle DIVE from the recoil of the real thing. We only get a muzzle rise because our regular hand held or shoulder braced guns all have contact points located below the bore of the barrel. As someone mentioned above, turn the Glock upside down and shoot it and you'd have a muzzle dive instead of a muzzle rise.