AAA... What goes up must come down

[Clifford Bossie]

Were those outdoor pictures of the SAM's taken at Fort Bliss and/or Biggs AAF?

Some are at Ft Bliss and some at White Sands Missile Range. The HAWK is at War Eagles.

[jet1]

from my recent trip to Normandy, and holland and bastogne and germany and austria and switzerland and england (whew)
an 88 in a museum

[Clifford Bossie]

Strange, but I seem to have never photographed the Chaparelle system.

M55 towed Quad .50. The 50 cal just be hard on airplanes!



M163 Vulcan. Modified from an M113 APC.





M167 towed Vulcan:



The DIVADs which became the M247 Sgt York. And then was cancelled.





8.8cm Flak 36 (German 88)



In case you want to shoot down bioplanes, US Army M1918 3 inch AA.

[Scott Rose]

As I'm going through restoring images to certain threads I was reminded of a project that was shelved years ago. AAA... What goes up must come down. this was to be a resource center devoted to anti-aircraft artillery used in World War II. Other projects have taken precedence over this one but I figured maybe we could start a thread of images of AAA in all it's forms. From machines guns to artillery, hand carried to self propelled. Post your finds here.

I'll start with these...

Anti-aircraft defenses include gun-toting jeeps like the one shown above
(Source: Originally posted by Mark Allen in "FOLLOW ME" ...)


A 50 Cal. Anti-Aircraft Gun Is Mounted On A Jeep At 8Th Air Force Station 167 In England. 14 August 1943, 381St Bomb Group
(Source: Originally posted by Mark Allen in "FOLLOW ME" ...)


A 30 Cal. Anti-Aircraft Gun Is Mounted On A Jeep At 8Th Air Station 167 In England. 14 August 1943. 381St Bomb Group
(Source: Originally posted by Mark Allen in "FOLLOW ME" ...)

[gemmer]

I think the gun in the last pic is a .30 cal.

[Scott Rose]

I think the gun in the last pic is a .30 cal.

Thanks Gemmer, and to all the other who chimed in on this inaccuracy.

[Taigh Ramey]

I think the gun in the last pic is a .30 cal.

I would agree. It looked like a browning 303 used by the British. What's the rest of the mount out of?

[tankbarrell]

It looked like a browning 303 used by the British.

I agree, that must have made ammunition supply an added chore! I think the number on the Jeep implies reverse lend-lease so presumably an ex-British Army Jeep taken back into US service. Perhaps it came with the Browning fitted.

[Scott Rose]

Some Self-Propelled stuff from deep deep deep in the WRG Archive, circa 2000


M-16 Half Track


T-59 Half Track, I don't know if this actually went into service


The T-69, another experiment I think


German Sd.Kfz. 10/4


German Sd.Kfz. 6/2


German Sd.Kfz. 7/2

[PinecastleAAF]

T-59 Half Track, I don't know if this actually went into service

Not really but late in the war they did some field mods and put single 40mm bofors on halftracks and called it the M15-Special. During Korea more were built and given the designation M34. Surviving halftracks with the 'T' designation and pretty rare. Recently I found the only known survivor of about 400 T30's made. It mounted a 75mm pack howitzer so it's not AAA.

[PinecastleAAF]

M13 MGMC with twin .50's, most were rebuilt into M16's.

[PinecastleAAF]

Field mod of an M2. They tested something similar before going with the M13 with the Maxon turret.

[PinecastleAAF]

A spiffy post war M16 with a Twin 40mm Duster behind it.

[dirtysidedown430]

There's a half track with quad 50s near the feather river bout 10 miles from Chico Ca. Its army surplus store but it use's the side lid 50 round ammo box's.

[seagull61785]

From machines guns to artillery, hand carried to self propelled. Post your finds here

Hey Scott,

Do these count as 'hand carried machine guns'? No doubt they have been used as AAA at the odd times in the past.





Baz