OCR Text |
Show a New Aircraft Shell Sensitive Can Be Exploded by Force Of Heavy Rain, Army Experts Say. WASHINGTON. The army has developed an aircraft cannon shell that is so sensitive it can be exploded ex-ploded by the force of heavy rain, war department officials said. Ordnance technicians, it also was learned, have developed a version of the famous French 75 mm. field gun, which can be mounted on heavy bombers. Experiments with it, including firing from the air, were started more than six months ego. Both experiments are part of the army's attempt to increase the fire power of combat planes. That need has been demnnstrntprt hv tha war in Europe in which all types of fighting fight-ing planes have become increasingly increasing-ly invulnerable to machine gun fire by the use of heavier armor and self-sealing fuel tanks. Two other proposals for increasing increas-ing fire power are being studied and may be incorporated in standard specifications in the near future. One is a plan to mount two 20 mm. and one 37 mm. cannon on pursuit pur-suit planes. The other is to equip fighters with six heavy .50 caliber machine guns instead of eight .30 caliber machine guns, the armament arma-ment said to be carried by British pursuit planes. Explodes in Wing. The highly sensitive explosive shell for 37 mm. aircraft cannon, war department sources said, is a major development in air armament. arma-ment. Until recently the United States air corps and those of Great Britain and Germany, one source said, have been unable to develop a fuse fast enough to explode aircraft cannon shells before they pass through a target plane. As a result, re-sult, ordinary projectiles, similar to a rifle bullet, have been widely used. A "dead" projectile is destructive if it hits a vital spot on enemy planes, the motor, gas tank, bomb rack or crew quarters, but it will pass comparatively harmlessly through a wing. An explosive shell, however, blows out enough surface wherever it hits to bring a plane -Imm in mnct cases |