Gatling gun
The
Gatling gun was the first highly successful rapid-repeating firearm. It was the first firearm to combine reliability, high firing rate and ease of loading into a single device. It was designed by the American inventor
Richard J. Gatling, in 1861 and patented on
May 9,
1862. In modern usage it typically refers to guns with a similar rotating barrel design.
Depending on how one defines the term, the Gatling gun is not the first "
machine gun", despite frequent references to it as such; machine guns operate entirely on a fraction of the power of the fired cartridge, while the Gatling relies on external power (hand crank, or electric/hydraulic motor).
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Gatling gun illustrated in an 1885 encyclopedia in Swedish. |
The Gatling gun was designed in 1861 during the U.S. Civil War. However, in 1862, the U.S. government did not purchase any, for the Gatling guns lacked triggers and were far too heavy to be set up quickly in combat. Even when Dr. Gatling improved the design, it still lacked the desired trigger and weighed an unwieldy 90 lb (41 kg). However, Union General
Benjamin Butler bought twelve and used them successfully on the
Petersburg front. During its debut in combat both Union and Confederate soldiers were awestruck by its power and effect. They were only put into limited service late in the war by the Northern army.
The Gatling gun was hand-crank operated with six barrels revolving around a central shaft, based on the
Puckle Gun. Early models had a fibrous matting stuffed in among the barrels which could be soaked with water to cool the barrels down; this was eliminated in later models as being counterproductive. The ammunition, initially a steel cylinder charged with black powder and primed with a percussion cap (as self-contained brass cartridges had not yet been invented), was gravity-fed into the breech through a hopper or stick magazine on top of the gun. Each barrel had its own firing mechanism. After 1861, new
brass cartridges similar to modern cartridges replaced the paper cartridge, but Gatling did not switch to them immediately.
The model of 1881 was designed to use the Bruce feed system (U.S. Patents 247,158 and 343,532) that would accept two rows of .45/70 cartridges. While one row was being fed into the gun, the other could be reloaded, thus allowing sustained fire. The final gun required four operators. By 1876 the Gatling gun could fire 1,200 rounds per minute, although 400 was more reasonable.
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Patent drawing for R.J. Gatling's Battery Gun, 9 May 1865. |
The Gatling gun is a rotary device, originally powered using a crank. A cylinder of ten barrels, spaced equally around the side of the cylinder, rotates around a central axis. Each barrel fires once per revolution at about the same position.
Originally, the Gatling gun was produced in
calibres ranging from one inch (25.4 mm) down to 0.45 inch (11.43 mm).
The barrels, a carrier, and a lock cylinder were separate and all mounted on a solid plate revolving around a central shaft, mounted on an oblong fixed frame. The carrier was grooved and the lock cylinder was drilled with holes corresponding to the barrels. Each barrel had a single lock, working in the lock cylinder on a line with the barrel. The lock cylinder was encased and joined to the frame. The casing was partitioned, and through this opening the barrel shaft was journaled. In front of the casing was a cam with spiral surfaces. The cam imparted a reciprocating motion to the locks when the gun rotated. Also in the casing was a cocking ring with projections to cock and fire the gun.
Turning the crank rotated the shaft. Cartridges, held in a hopper, dropped individually into the grooves of the carrier. The lock was simultaneously forced by the cam to move forward and load the cartridge and when the cam was at its highest point the cocking ring freed the lock and fired the cartridge. After the cartridge was fired the continuing action of the cam drew back the lock bringing with it the spent cartridge which was then dropped to the ground.
The grouped barrel concept was not new; it had been tried since the 18th century, but poor engineering and the lack of a
unitary cartridge made previous designs unsuccessful. The initial Gatling gun design used self-contained, reloadable steel cylinders with a chamber holding a ball and black-powder charge, and a percussion cap nipple on one end. As the barrels rotated, these steel cylinders dropped into place, were fired, and were then ejected from the gun. The innovative features of the Gatling gun were its independent firing mechanism for each barrel and the simultaneous action of the locks, barrels, carrier and
breech.
The smallest calibre gun also had a Broadwell drum feed in place of the curved magazine of the other guns. The drum, named after L. W. Broadwell, an agent for Gatling's company, comprised twenty stick magazines arranged around a central axis, like the spokes of a wheel, each holding twenty cartridges with the bullet noses oriented toward the central axis. This significant invention does not appear to have been patented separately, and may have been included in the April 9, 1872 patent, U.S. 125,563; a post and base, apparently for mounting a Broadwell drum, is visible in Figure 13 of U.S. 125,563. As each magazine emptied, the drum was manually rotated to bring a new magazine into use until all 400 rounds had been fired.
The Gatling gun was largely replaced after the development of the gas or
recoil blowback concept, which is the basis of most modern machine guns. Such guns could be made smaller and lighter, and were less expensive to produce.
*The
Royal Navy used fixed Gatling guns on board warships, intended to repel boarders. By the mid-nineteenth century though, boarding ships was no longer practical, and so the Gatlings mounted on board ships never saw close-range action.
*The
Naval Brigades serving during the
Anglo-Zulu Wars used them alongside their artillery. At the
Battle of Ulundi in 1879, Gatling guns were used to slaughter thousands of
Zulu warriors who were forced to charge directly into their field of fire.
*Gatling guns saw action during the British
bombardment of
Alexandria in 1882.
*During the
Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871, several Gatling guns were purchased by
Léon Gambetta on behalf of the
Government of National Defense, and were used by the French armies fighting in the provinces, to replace the defective
mitrailleuse.
*Gatling guns were used by the US side during the
Spanish-American War, most notably during the
battle of San Juan Hill. Some 31 gatling guns in all were purchased by the
US Army before the war ended. [
1]
*Gatling guns were used throughout the
Indian Wars against several Native American nations as the Western Expansion continued. The
Battle of the Little Big Horn, in which
George Armstrong Custer and his men were routed by combined
Lakota and
Cheyenne forces, could have had a very different outcome had Custer brought the Gatling guns that had originally been in his detail.
Although unused for many years, Gatling guns made a return when very-high rate-of-fire weapons were needed in military
aircraft and ship-based
CIWS, with
electric motors handling rotation. One of the main reasons for the resurgence is the tolerance for high-volume fire. For example, if 2000 rounds were fired non-stop from a five-barreled Gatling gun, it would mean 400 rounds per barrel which would be acceptable. The same amount through a machine gun of the same caliber would mean 2000 rounds per (its only) barrel, resulting in overheating and probable damage.
One example is the
M61 Vulcan 20 mm cannon, the most commonly-used member of a family of weapons designed by
General Electric and currently manufactured by
General Dynamics. It is a six-barrelled Gatling capable of more than 6,000 rounds per minute, a rate unachievable with a conventional machine gun. Similar systems are available ranging from 5.56 mm to 30 mm (There was even a 37mm Gatling on the
prototype T249 'Vigilante'
AA platform), the rate-of-fire being somewhat inversely-proportional to the size and mass of the ammunition (which also determines the size and mass of the barrels). During the
Vietnam War, the 7.62 mm calibre M134
Minigun was created as a helicopter weapon. Able to fire 6,000 rounds a minute from a 4,000 round linked
belt, the Minigun proved to be one of the deadliest weapons ever built and is still used in helicopters today.
They are also used with lethal effectiveness on USAF
AC-130 and
AC-119 Gunships, their original high-capacity airframes able to house the items needed for sustained operation. With sophisticated navigation and target-identification available, they pose a serious threat to any enemy. The crew's ability to concentrate the Gatling's fire very tightly produces the appearance of the 'Red Tornado' [
2] from the
tracers in the firing mix, as the gun platform circles a target at night.
In addition to the abovementioned benefits, many modern systems have the advantage of being externally-driven (as opposed to relying on the energy from fired cartridges). This increases their reliability, as cartridge firing failure will not interrupt the operation cycle. Additionally, certain other stoppages, such as faulty extraction and many feeding-related problems, are eliminated or reduced considerably due to the external power source. It should however be noted that although uncommon and mechanically-complex, modern systems that derive power from the ammunition do exist. In fact, the world's fastest Gatling is one, the 10,000 RPM
GSh-6-23.
Contrary to popular depictions of modern gatling guns (usually the M134
Minigun and variants thereof) as personal handheld weapons, their usage as such would be impossible in real-life. The first problem is weight; the gun alone is already a moderate amount, which however may still be tolerable enough for a physically-fit person to carry.
The problem however, continues. For feasible combat use, a large ammunition supply is required due to the high rate of fire. Depending on what the firing rate is, a few hundred to even a thousand or more rounds would be needed. The sheer weight will considerably slow down if not outright immobilize a person. The problem is exacerbated by the power consumption of most modern systems. For instance, an M134 operating at maximum would constantly draw 130
A for its 28 V
DC/115 V
AC electric motor, the equivalent of a few
car batteries.
Recoil is another inhibiting factor. Even at their slowest rated operating speeds, they produce far more recoil than anyone could stably handle. In the
Arnold Schwarzenegger film
Predator,
Jesse Ventura's character had to be propped up during sequences where his M134 was fired, even though it fired only
blanks.
While perhaps a minor consideration,
torque from the rotating assembly would also have to be accounted for.
Due to their impressive destructive power, gatling guns are popular as weapons in
mass media, though often depicted in impossible but nonetheless awe-inspiring usage, as outlined above.
Movies:
* In
Terminator 2: Judgment Day, an M134 is used.
* A compliment of gatling guns appeared in
The Last Samurai at the final battle between the
Samurai and the Empire of
Japan.
* In
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Davy Jones' ship
The Flying Dutchman mounts a rotating pair of "triple cannons" in her bow, behaving much like an ancient ancestor of the gatling gun.
* In
Resident Evil: Apocalypse, the personal weapon of
Nemesis is a gatling gun.
* In
Superman Returns, one of the villains wields a unique eight-barreled Gatling gun with its own support frame.
* In
Wild Wild West, Loveless' mechanical spider has many Gatling guns attached to it.
* In
Shanghai Knights, Wu Chow attempts to use a Gatling gun to eliminate the royal family.
* In
The Matrix,
Neo attacks three
agents with a helicopter-mounted Gatling when rescuing Morpheus.
Television:
Video games:
In certain video games, gatling guns are curiously portrayed mostly due to gameplay balance issues; these come usually in the form of inferior firing rates, low-quantity ammunition, and abnormally-long spin-up times.
* In
Metal Gear Solid, the superhumanly-strong
Vulcan Raven carries an
M61 Vulcan, complete with a massive ammunition drum.
* A gatling gun is a hidden bonus weapon in the
Resident Evil series.
* In
Tekken 5,
Jack-5 has a gatling gun available as a customization. Additionally, it also appears in the endings of
Bryan Fury and
Yoshimitsu.
* Gatling guns are available as weapons in
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
* The
Fallout series features two miniguns, the Avenger and Vindicator. There is also an entirely-fictional gatling
laser gun.
* In
Star Fox: Assault, one of the character-borne weapons is an unmounted gatling gun.
* In
Syndicate, miniguns are among the weapons one's squad can equip.
* Gatling-type weapons appear in various games by
id Software, including
Wolfenstein 3D,
Doom and its sequels and
Quake 2. In almost all of these cases the weapon is inaccurately referred to as a
chaingun.
* In
Battlefield 2, players may control the two
M134 miniguns mounted on the
Black Hawk helicopters. Also making an appearance (in the Booster Pack
Armored Fury) is the
A-10's
GAU-8 Avenger gatling cannon.
* In
Shadow the Hedgehog, the gatling gun is the weapon acquired from the F-6 Bigfoot series, starting with 40 bullets.
Literature:
*In the
anime and
manga series
One Piece, one of the main character Luffy's powerful attacks are named after the Gatling Gun.
*
Volley gun *
Mitrailleuse*
Maxim gun*
Revolver cannon*
Phalanx CIWS*
CIWS*
List of Military Gatling & Revolver cannons* --
Gatling gun* --
improved Gatling gun* --
revolving battery gun* --
improvement in revolving battery guns*
"Colt 30 Cal Gatling Gun Model 1900 Army" drawings*http://www.world.guns.ru/machine/minigun-e.htm
*
Nazarian`s Gun`s Recognition Guide*
Description of operating principle with animation from How Things Work website*
Gatling Land Boom - 1893 Hamburg, NY*
Rubber Band Gatling Gun - Make your own.
