Roger Hill, captain of the Hunt Class destroyer Ledbury had an interesting Pom-Pom crew. He frequently complained to his ‘Guns’ officer about their wearing of football shirts and cloth caps during Operation Pedestal. He also described them as being “a blood thirsty bunch”. On one occasion during Pedestal in order to raise moral amongst a very tired crew Hill deliberately held fire on a pair of attacking SM79s until well within his close range guns (ie he didn’t fire his min armaments in AA configuration) range. He then ordered ‘Open fire’ and both the torpedo bombers were shot down. As one of the SM79 crews clabbered out of their downed and sinking kite the Pom-Pom crew asked for permission to open fire on them! Hill bellowed Convention chapter and verse at them, stating “you may not fire on a defeated enemy, you blood thirsty bastards!” (From Destroyer Captain, Roger Hill).
Just a bit of trivia but the “pounder” cannon sizes used by the British is a holdover from the old days of muzzle loaded cannon. The size of the cannon referred to the weight of the shot fired from it. So a 2 Pounder fires a shell that weighs 2 pounds for example. They only stopped this naming convention completely after WWII.
There's just something about that 8 gun mount that seems awesome. Not just the sight of all 8 barrels going but the idea of how much design work it took to make sure they all feed and ejected without interrupting each other
@@rob5944 I picked the word "awesome" rather than cool because of how it looked and how it worked rather than how it was effective. Damn right the bofors worked better but no shit we all know that.
@@rob5944 the most important thing is that the 40mm Pom Pom was available in large numbers when the war started. The 40mm Bofors, in the mass produced quad mount we mostly think about, did not exist until mid 1942, and did not saw widespread usage in the US Navy until late 42/early 43. By the time the British Royal Navys losses to aircraft were at their height, the 40mm Bofors was not yet available. It is better to have a good enough AA gun for the entire war than to have the best gun for only half the war. And the British were deploying the Pom Poms in numbers of up to 48 barrels per ship in 1939, at a time where the US was designing the Iowa's to have only 16 28mm barrels. Yes the 40mm Bofors existed as a gun from the mid 30s onwards, but those were single land based mounts, which were not suited to mass production. They were designed specifically to require a lot of handwork with "file and drill unti it fits" style instructions, because the Swedish government was trying to give their citizens jobs in the wake of the 1930s economic crisis, so taking as long as possible for a single gun was actually the goal of the designers at that point, otherwise there would be even more unemployment. For this reason the 40mm Bofors saw only limited service before 1942.
The magic was actually in the Remote Power Control of the guns. The Royal Navy used a computer called the HACS high angle control system to calculate the firing solution which itself could use type 285 radar for the range. The system progressively improved with GRUB Gyro Rate Unit Boxes. -The Japanese, German and US Navy had nothing like it in 1940. Way ahead. -Had the Prince of Wales had functioning radar (3 of the 4 were down) and Boffors 40mm instead of POM POM 40mm she would never have been sunk.
It IS a lot of firepower, but don't forget that there is potentially something coming towards you at close to 300mph with maybe a 20mm cannon in the nose. Only takes one hit and you're dead....Doens't even need to hit you! A lot of power, but also probably a lot of fear too!
Mass of fire = pre-radar thinking. Back when your best bet was literally aerial suppressive fire in the hope it would distract the enemy enough to miss you. By the end of the war, proxy fuses and shipboard radar improvements meant the same 40mm Bofors shot down far more enemy (and did it far faster) than in the beginning of the war.
Interesting Fact: Japan and Italy used and produced their own versions of the 2 pounder pom pom up until WW2, when it was succeeded by newer Anti-aircraft guns. Also, Vickers exported a Mark E 6-ton tank model using a 2 pounder pom pom as a self propelled gun carrier; with Thailand being the only customer of that particular model.
One of the reasons Prince of Wales and Repulse got sunk was that the Japanese aircraft didn’t know they where actually under heavy AA fire and largely felt safer and where able to execute their attack runs under less stress thus more accurately all because the Pom Poms lacked tracer rounds. It’s largely only after the Japanese planes returned home did they realize they’d been shot at a lot.
@@Luis-be9mi Post war analysis has shown that had the ships had the tracer rounds, there is a good chance they would have survived. There were 85 bombers attacking them. 4 were shot down and 28 were damaged, many severely. That's over 40% of the attacking force. In other operations, Japanese bombers in similar attacks veered off against lesser AA opposition. As mentioned, the effect on moral and stress seeing tracers converging on you while doing a bomb/torpedo run lessens you focus significantly.
@@Luis-be9mi it's more complicated than that. The British intelligence and admiral in charge were well aware of the bomber thread. They knew a routh number estimate, they knew their airfield location, and they knew their range. The British admiral was actively choosing a course and position that would have kept him out of the bombers range, thus no air cover would actually be required as the japanese planes would not be able to reach them (and no carriers were close), and the British planes were required to support the land battles which was underway at the same time. The planes had the choice of attacking japanese land forces to help the British troops who were losing and needed all the help they could get, or they could fly over a few ships which could not be attacked by the enemy's planes because they were out of range. Which one is more useful? The problem was that just one or two days before the British force sailed, the bomber squadrons got switched out. The new models there were the G4M Betty and G3M Nell bombers, which had longer ranges than the ones stationed there previously. Now the British ships were in range. But the British admiral and intelligence didn't know that. Not providing air cover for these ships might be seen as a mistake when looking at it now with hindsight from an armchair historian position; but at the time from the British view the decision was actually the right one. The planes were needed elsewhere and the British ships should not have been in range of the japanese aircraft, and they were specifically sailing a course not to get into range. It was just bad luck for the British, but from their perspective they did everything right. Except bringing tracer rounds. Had they known that the bomber squadrons had been switched out so they now had longer range, there certainly would have been air cover provided, or the ships would not have sailed so far north. Everything they did was under the assumption that the japanese bombers could not reach them, which was also true 2 or 3 days earlier
In addition to all that, they were actually scheduled to sail with a carrier, but the latter got in an accident just before they were timed to set off so they sailed without it.
Fun fact: the pom-pom, specially in its quadruple and octuple mounts, was considered one of the best anti-aircraft guns used against the kamikaze due to the sheer volume of fire and thus stopping power it had. Experiences with the pom-poms in the Pacific would heavily influence the Royal Navy into developing the Sextuple Bofors mounts installed aboard HMS Vanguard.
"One of the Best" not really. The Boffors quad had twice the range of the 40mm pom pom and more than twice the rate of fire of the octouple POM POM. It was all Britain could afford
They switched to the Bofors for Vanguard for a reason. The PomPom put up a huge volume of fire. But its range was really short for a 40 mm AA gun emplacement. Yes it could have some great stopping power against a kamikaze at point blank range. But everyone involved really would have preferred the enemy plane not get that close to begin with. The Bofors had twice the range and a quad bofors had a higher rate of fire than the 8 barrel pompom. And a better traverse speed and accuracy. They were far from the worst Naval AA guns of the war. But they were nowhere near best either.
There's something about the chunky look and almost ponderous rate of fire of this weapon that has a bit of "charm." If such a label could be applied to a deadly weapon.
I remember the Pom Pom used in BF1, it and the Artillery Truck variant that had it served me well in Anti Air roles, knocked out many aircraft with it, so it proved its worth on the digital battlefield. The WW2 Pom Poms look cooler to me honestly, octupple mounts, cone muzzule, and the mount for it make it look really cool. And nice way to finish the vid, we all are your cheer squad, Johnny.
I guess that's where the guys at GW used as a reference for "this is what it means to say 'more dakka' for Warhammer 40K. Especially those octuple-barreled ones. In lore their are multi-barreled Lascannons and Heavy Anti-Air Boltguns. For those who don't know "Lasgun" or "Lascannon" are Directed Energy Weapons, and "Boltguns" or "Bolters" are either Caselss or Cased micrmissile ammunition with a powder "kicker" charge and a rocket assisted engine in the projectile, often with an explosive or otherwise payload.
In the 1961 movie "Sink The Bismarck", the octuple pop-pom is often shown as the Germans' AA defense. Funny enough, if the Germans had a rapid-fire close AAA weapon like that they MIGHT have had a chance to fend off the air attack that doomed them.
That was the quad barrel 2 cm Flak 30, Flak 38 and Flakvierling 38, chambered into the 2,0cm (.78 in) to fire the 20×138mmB or Long Solothurn, not a bad gun really especially in its quad system, but the gunners were all green,
Specially considering how Bismarck's AA suite was mostly comprised of 20mm guns in single mounts and the utterly useless 37mm breach loading dual gun mounts.
The Bismarck was actually doomed by a cost cutting measure that made perfect sense, at the time. The assumption was that the Bismarck would only need to engage aircraft that were attacking itself, so it would never be engaging crossing targets, let alone receding targets. Compounding the issue was forgetting to account for possible wind condition when selecting the calibrated speed range of the fire control predictor. With the Bismarck heading full speed, into gale force winds, instead of being sitting ducks for the 10.5cm, radar directed heavy AA battery, the swordfish were closing at too slow a speed to be within the calibrated speed range, so the predictor could not supply the correct setting for the variable timed fuses. If the predictor was designed for area defense, the predictor would have been more expensive, but the calibrated speed range would have included high performance aircraft flying at the ship, high performance aircraft flying away from the ship, and all speeds, including zero, between those extremes, which would have doomed the incoming swordfish.
Most AA guns fired HE though, so you wouldn't get hit by a shell but shrapnel (you can see most of the ammo cases mounted on the feeds during the video with a big HE painted on them in white)
if you want more in depth detail "our own devices" also just released a video about the pom poms and their service history. it unfortunately did not include pom pom audio, so thanks for that johnny :)
You really got me with the outro! Amazing that the design was still valid and effective after 50 years. I had no idea that it was used all the way back in the Boer War.
I'd say a way to bring back the iconic feel of the pom-pom would be a rotary 40mm CIWS, rounds larger than those used in the Avenger GAU-8 rotary cannon.
@@WolfeSaber While looking at the difference in weight between a 20mm Oerlikon and an M-61 Vulcan shows it might not be as heavy as I originally thought, the $30 dollars or so a round might get a little pricy with a 40MM CIWS.
Great video; Love seeing these lesser well known weapon systems talked about. You should talk about the Japanese Type 92! One of the most underrated HMGs of the war that layered terror onto units facing the Japanese. Extremely accurate, no recoil thanks to weight- was even issued with optics and could sustain heavy fire with little delay thanks to the atrocious air cooling fins and machined metal
The WW2 visuals and props are a big part of what made SW universe feel so lived in. I had heard several WW2 era weapons got cannibalised to create some of the props though, despite them probably belonging in a museum or something. Still, I love the look of the original trilogy and its visual language creates one of the most immersive fictional worlds I've ever seen on film. Kind of a tandem charged missile if you take my meaning
@@ThommyofThenn Back in the 70s a lot of WW2 weapons were dirt cheap as they were made in huge numbers and were practically obsolete in terms of military use, by this point in time everyone had pretty much moved onto the AK pattern rifles, M16, FN FAL or G3.
British QF 1-pounder pom-pom was the 1st autocannon in the world in 1890 & the 1st antiair gun in 1903. Not bad for Victorian Engineering? Glad you covered this Johnny QF 2-pounder naval gun outshine the QF 1-pounder pom-pom. Swedish Bofers were a great gun in ww2 but they only began production in 1934 17 years later then British QF 2-pounder Mark II entering service in 1917. Britain had a lot of equipment left over from ww1 so they found ways like strapping them together to get use out of them. The USA basically built it's military up from the ground & similar for Germany prior as a lot of ww1 Equipment the Germans had from ww1 was sold in their recession or decommissioned under treaty agreements & such. Britain, France & Russia had a real mixed bags of armaments from ww1 & sometimes even earlier used for ww2.
@@rob5944The USA has no permanent anti air autocannon & Autocannon in general in ww2 they adopted the Swedish Bofors (Chrysler) 40 mm/56 under licensee. Only Autocannon the USA had at the outset of ww2 was 1.1-inch/75-caliber gun from 1938-1942 with some ~1000 made. The USA Could not have won the pacific war if not for Swedish Engineering! Britain had anti air autocannons from 1903. USA only started production poorly in 1938 & due to the shortage of Autocannons did something no other power did mounting M2 browning's in place of autocannons for anti air protection which was not suited to anti air but nice for infantry support fire. The USA post ww2 realised the short comings of not having sufficient autocannons they hired ex Nazi's to develop the M39 revolver cannon in 1952 based on the German Mauser MG 213 which would be developed M61 Vulcan rotary Autocannon that the Germans envisioned but lacked the means & funds at the time to achieve it. Even the USA would take decade & 1/2 with naughty Germans! Most of NATO's Equipment is just ww2 German technology with new panels & a ne coat of paint on it. GM3 is just a MG42 sim lined. Glock 17 & all standard Nato pistols descended from the Walther P38 & Walther model 8 version 3 manner of aluminium framing, Walther P38 even had plastic parts & internals have not really changed to day since the PP & PPK versions. What is still used the USA made that any nation outside the USA uses from US technology! Go out side the USA no one uses an M1911. You used cowboy era arms in ww2 & in ww3 you will use ww1 arms like the M1911 & M2 browning machine gun. We Limeys of the isles of Blight might have a command slow to change but we have the weapons of the previous war not a century ago. Yanks are a special breed of Anglo! The USA is so lucky it is geographically isolated from the world so it can avoid war on it's shores not by skill but two massive oceans! It's like the English channel on crack.
@@rob5944 Fair 1.1-inch/75-caliber gun it was replaced by the Oerlikon 20 mm cannon but that is German so no wonder USA couldn't get those then adopting the Bofors 40mm as mentioned. Even the USA M4 autocannon didn't get the kinks sorted till 1942 in not massive use but a 1/2 a dozen 0.5 cals machine guns aren't a bad substitute 7 the USA had about 2 million by wars end. Why the everything that moved had an M2 browning bolted to it even if it wasn't really needed but hay worked as a big pacifier when the Germany did Arial attack on the few occasion they had air superiority in the late war. A pom pom didn't knock out air targets consistently let alone a machine gun. Rest of the world doctrine in ww2 for CAS was hunker down in the tank or find cover. Americans likes making a light show guns. German pilot mentions of it is quiet comical. Only the USA can literally throw munitions at every problem for nothing & continue a war. The USA's real power domestic industry till your nation shipped it over to china. Mad how much of USA small arms munition is made in the USA today even for the military market. Is rather concerning! You here about the Chinese having at least 20 fatal viruses stored in California to insufficient safety then the FBI & CDC did no testing sweeping the problem under the rug. Someone important must want that Beijing money? We have the same insufferable problem in the UK from that den of thieves called parliament but not so blatant or corrupt. Barmy that we in the west even opened up china to the west much less letting their foreign agent have near free reign though our we at least have people watching them all hour for Britain is a much smaller land mass then the USA. Not hard to hide anything in the USA considering the size of it.
@@rob5944Only thing I do like about the States is you haven't got an Electric eye watching you every second you are outside your house! Give it time it will be an Orwellian state here the weighted anchors & the USA will likely follow suit as the surveillance technology improves. I don't know who to be more concerned of, the Chinese or our own leadership? We live in strange times.
The pictures and film of the pom pom guns in action are iconic images of the Royal Navy in WW2. There's something mesmerising about those 8 barrels relentlessly firing in sequence with the crew closed up around them feeding in the ammunition from both sides with that unique rhythmic noise going on.
Maxim was a genius, most of his guns have lasted for decades in service, some with more modifications than others, some longer than others, but all with the genius design intact.
If the pom poms were firing then the enemy were getting dangerous close. My father was a Marine aviator on the USS Block Island (2) , the first Block Island was sunk by a German submarine, the only carrier lost in the Atlantic. During the battle of Okinawa the pilots were spread out in the carrier to prevent multiple pilot casualties as happened on another carrier. My father said that as the kamikazees got closer the long range guns started firing ,then the mid range and finally the pom poms which meant the Japanese were really close. All the meanwhile all they could do was to listen to the guns firing. He flew a TBM during that time, dropped a 1,000 lb. bomb on Naha castle on Okinawa, along with blowing up a lighthouse, he said he wouldn’t have attacked the lighthouse but the Japanese started firing at him. And the fact he still had rockets left after a bombing run. He served during WW 2, the Korean War and taught fighter school during Vietnam , earned 2 distinguished flying crosses along with numerous medals over that time. Flew the Stearman (Submarine patrol in the Virgin Islands) Hellcat, TBM, Corsair, Panther and Sabre jet, and finished with A4 Skyhawks in the late 60s. In Korea he landed a TBM on the beach in North Korea to drop off 2 Army intelligence soldiers and picked up 2 to take back. But he said he flew more beer and bullets than bombs in his TBM during Korea. Another role in Korea was flying a Twin engine Beechcraft up and down Korea getting parts and mechanics to various air bases to fix up damaged planes. A most unassuming kid from Wyoming.
Actually, a single Bofors was considered as effective as two pom-poms, not eight. So a quad Bofors, as used by the US Navy, would be equivalent to an eight-barreled Pom-Pom. Single Pom-Poms were used in large numbers on motor gun boats (MGBs), older destroyers, and many other vessels. Quad Pom-Poms were mounted on newer destroyers and cruisers, which in many cases retained them until well into the 1950s, even though there were plenty surplus Bofors available.
Just watched "On Our Own Devices" video on the 2pdr pompom with an example gun on display at the HMCS Chippewa museum in Winnipeg. This was a very good companion piece.
The Americans considered the Pom Pom but went with the Bofors instead, Herr Maxim; I took a machine gun und made it bigger, what more could the yanks possibly want!?!
My Dad was coxswain on MGB 659 operating in the adriatic and Mediterranean. She was eqiped with a twin barrel pom pom as well as a six pounder and twin oerlikon. He said the rapid rate of fire of the pom pom was an enormous benefit when engaging Nazi shipping in night raids. RIP Dad
According to FW, the 4 mount groupings had a de-synchronizer, to avoid harmonics that damaged the mounts...apparently this was not needed for the 8 gun groupings. I find it funny how both the British and the Americans thought the same way about ordinance. McArthur decided on the caliber of the M1 Garand (30.06 caliber) based on the MASSIVE stocks of leftover WW1 rifle ammo, so the far more effective .28 caliber isn't used. And the British used Maxim Pom-Poms, based on stocks of leftover WW1 ammo, while the US used the far better Bofors autocannon. And the Dad jokes just never stop...🤣
Jesus, that Nordfelt Flak 14...there ought to be a statue of limitations on how big something can be and still be belt-fed! And neat footage throughout!
I think I read somewhere back in the day (maybe Starlog Magazine) that production designers on Star Wars: A New Hope where highly influnced by weapon from WW2. Many of the blaster props were WW2 machine guns. You can see how they modeled the surface cannons on the Death Star on the Pom Pom Guns.
Fun facts: If you play Warhammer 40K: Boltgun, When you firing the Heavy Bolter, the Bolter sound share similarities to the Pom-Pom Gun (but firing faster)
Great Stuff as ever. Was the clip with John Hall interview from armoured carriers channel?.if you haven't seen it I'd highly recommend the channel. Great mix of old footage and interviews.. That channel is criminally under subscribed
Always with AA gun weaponry and their weirdly charming organ gun variations. Strange to not see any fictional media for this, by the way, even if they'll be similar looking blueprints from a Star Wars Legends sourcebook or whatever. And on a over the top literal standpoint, cheerleading pompoms are better off as secret emergency grenades, particularly the smoke kind.
Now you need to remember that 40mm ie 2 pounder Pom Pom had automatic fuze setter for it designed in interwar period for use in dual purpose ie direct action and timed fuzes. Imagine if that feature was retained by the time of WWII and octuple mountings? Just need one command from radar and all fuzes are set to correct distance😂
An absurd amount of firepower to be pointed at a single target... I wish someone would restore one of these Octo Pom's so we could see it in action one more time.
The original Pom Pom was a brass-bodied, water-cooled 32mm autocannon first deployed in WWI. Pro tip: Let go five rounds, wait 2 seconds, fire five more. Prevents heat buildup while maintaining impact-triggered explosive disapproval on the foolish zeppelin that dared park its carcass in your back yard.
Before CIWS rotary cannons, Pom-pom and Chicago Piano guns are multi-barreled AA guns used in a number of warships including battleships and aircraft carriers during WW2, both by Britain and the United States.
The gunnery officer on HMS prince of wales which was sunk by Japanese aircraft, wrote a battle report after being rescued from the sinking ship. His description is a scene of chaos. On sighting the attacking aircraft, all AA armament engaged the enemy. One by one the guns jammed and artificers were racing round freeing up the guns. At the height of the battle there were less than half defending the ship. The cause of this calamity was the ammunition stored in ready use lockers. After months of heat and humidity the ammo had degraded and this he maintained led to tragedy, in not being able to fully defend the ship. It was mainly the 2 pounder ammo that compromised the ship. In my time in the navy we had 40mm bofors and 4.5 inch AA weapons. Ready use lockers had long been discarded and ammo was stored in magazines. Like supermarkets today ammo had a use by date and was fired off in mid ocean with gun teams from all branches manning the guns. Great fun!!.
Those WW1 Germans appeared to be stationed at the coast which made me think this is an almost forgotten little theatre of the war. What happened when the trenches met the sea or the Swiss border?
My Dad was an Ordinance Artificer in HMS Belfast in 1943 and 1944 and was heavily involved with the maintenance and operational efficiency of the two sets of octuple pom poms which were mounted between the two funnels. They have long since been removed however it would be great to see these guns re mounted on Belfast and would add much authenticity to the museum ship HMS Belfast. I wonder if this has ever been contemplated by the Imperial War Museum who run this great old ship.
You will notice the complete lack of ear protection there. My grandfather was in the artillery in World War I and his hearing was never the same afterwards. My father seemed to have escaped too much damage in spite of being the number two on an Oerlikon for some time. I think he was lucky he got a radar qualification eventually. A lot less noisy.
@@JohnnyJohnsonEsq i would need a better explanation why that would be because it makes no sense why a gun neither made or used by America would be called a "Chicago" anything
It's well documented. Even the veteran speaking in the clip called it the "Chicago.. Something." As to the logic here I'm guessing they were both paying tribute to the Chicago tpe-writer Aka Thompson Submachine gun which the Brits were also starting to use at the beginning of WW2. Though there are lots of nicknames in the military that don't always make sense and have no obvious origin.
My friends father used these weapons in WW2. He said they jammed all the time, and were not thought very effective. In period film you can see some in effect jamming all the time.
They were not very effective compared to the US 40mm Bofors gun, but compared to other medium WW2 era AA guns, the Pom Pom was still very good. It was better than the 20 and 37mm guns fielded by Germany and Italy, and we don't need to talk about Japans 25mm gun. Statistically, you need thousands of rounds to destroy a single incoming enemy aircraft, which is why gun crews often think their guns were not that effective. Even the 40mm Bofors needed on average more than 1700 rounds to shoot down a single plane (see US anti aircraft action report September 1945). I don't know numbers for the Pom Pom, but due to its lower velocity it is likely higher. But what often gets forgotten is the psychological effects on the attacking planes crew, when you know you are being targeted by such a gun, you are very likely to break off your attack, or drop your bomb/torpedo early (which makes it far easier for the ship to evade). However, those factors are not visible directly to the gun crew, and they are very hard to measure in numbers, but they make out most of the effectiveness of an AA gun. Even USN 40mm Bofors gunners often felt like their guns were not that effective.
Remember my grandad a young gunner at the time before he started to man the guns said when you was sweeping to clear the empty shells from the deck you would come across clippings of fingers from when reloading the odd finger would get trapped and end up on the deck. He also was assigned to the Atlantic convoys and there was a time Irish fishermen would shine lights on the convoy when coming in from the south they said to cut it which they was ignored so a couple rounds was fired over their heads and before you know it, the sea was pitch black again.
Mistake around 2:50 The pom-pom wasn't called the chicago piano, that nickname was used by the americans for their 1.1 inch (28mm) AA gun that they used before the introduction of the 20mm oerlikon
You should make a review on top Break revolvers in film . A top rank revolver was used to assassinate William McKinley and and there are many examples like the Webbly used by the British and guns like I have the Harrington Richardson premier the same gun used in Sherlock Holmes.
The "chicago piano" is not the pom pom. It was a nickname for the 1.1 inch (28mm) anti aircraft quadmount used on american ships at the start of the war. It was never used on british ships. It was a failiour and was replaced by the bofors.
Small correction about US usage, the US Navy did equip the 1.1 inch "Chicago Piano" in the first part of the war. This was replaced by the Bofors around the time of the Battle of Midway and was on new construction up until mid-1943 when it was started to be put on older ships coming back for repairs and maintenance.
My great grandad was a gunner for these guns on the HMS Renown throughout the entire war. He even spoke about having to fight off Kamikaze pilots at one point.
I got an idea for my ship-based video game I'm working on: *any British WW2-era vessels, but are "modernized"; & either had their modern versions of 37mm AAA as well, or bofors dressed up to look like pom-poms* 'cuz y'know, Logistics Also, didn't know that the sole existence of the mark 8s is to burn through the old stockpiles of munitions made from WW1
I always wonder if any of the people shooting these weapons had hearing protection. Can't find any evidence that they did. Several times, including at 5:09 they look like they aren't even wearing earplugs.
I'm confused, I thought the term "Chicago piano" referred to the American 4x28mm AA mount, not the 40mm POM-POM? Was that an error or was the term used as a nickname for both weapon systems?
@@JohnnyJohnsonEsq That's very interesting. Especially since while I get the idea for the 4x28mm, the pom-pom mounts look NOTHING like a piano. History is just weird like that sometimes though.
Just an idea but Johnny would have content for ages if he's ever gonna tell abridged life story of every major or extraordinary warship - USS Enterprise (CV-6), HMS Hood, sisters Bismarck and Tirpitz, cruiser Graf Spee, Yamato Musashi and Shinano, USS Laffey (DD-459) etc.
Roger Hill, captain of the Hunt Class destroyer Ledbury had an interesting Pom-Pom crew. He frequently complained to his ‘Guns’ officer about their wearing of football shirts and cloth caps during Operation Pedestal. He also described them as being “a blood thirsty bunch”. On one occasion during Pedestal in order to raise moral amongst a very tired crew Hill deliberately held fire on a pair of attacking SM79s until well within his close range guns (ie he didn’t fire his min armaments in AA configuration) range. He then ordered ‘Open fire’ and both the torpedo bombers were shot down. As one of the SM79 crews clabbered out of their downed and sinking kite the Pom-Pom crew asked for permission to open fire on them! Hill bellowed Convention chapter and verse at them, stating “you may not fire on a defeated enemy, you blood thirsty bastards!”
(From Destroyer Captain, Roger Hill).
When you said "a bloodthirsty bunch" I knew that AA crew are very well-trained, and *maybe* a bit much & a bit eager
@@jehoiakimelidoronila5450 Good point. I know that when you train and train and train for something you get very eager to do it for real.
F'king glorious!
Operation Pedestal made it but the losses were staggering.
They were going to sluice them?
Just a bit of trivia but the “pounder” cannon sizes used by the British is a holdover from the old days of muzzle loaded cannon. The size of the cannon referred to the weight of the shot fired from it. So a 2 Pounder fires a shell that weighs 2 pounds for example. They only stopped this naming convention completely after WWII.
Yea the British used to be some especially silly buggers
Not exactly...the Centurion 20pdr came out in 1948.
@@richardbradley2335 WWII ended in 1945. The 20 Pounder is why I said after WWII.
Yeah. The Anti-Tank Gun in the Sherman Firefly - was a "17 Pounder".
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That is really interesting and good video here too.
There's just something about that 8 gun mount that seems awesome. Not just the sight of all 8 barrels going but the idea of how much design work it took to make sure they all feed and ejected without interrupting each other
Yes, perhaps not as effective as 40mm Bofors but I bet it made one feel better!
@@rob5944 I picked the word "awesome" rather than cool because of how it looked and how it worked rather than how it was effective. Damn right the bofors worked better but no shit we all know that.
@@rob5944 the most important thing is that the 40mm Pom Pom was available in large numbers when the war started.
The 40mm Bofors, in the mass produced quad mount we mostly think about, did not exist until mid 1942, and did not saw widespread usage in the US Navy until late 42/early 43.
By the time the British Royal Navys losses to aircraft were at their height, the 40mm Bofors was not yet available.
It is better to have a good enough AA gun for the entire war than to have the best gun for only half the war. And the British were deploying the Pom Poms in numbers of up to 48 barrels per ship in 1939, at a time where the US was designing the Iowa's to have only 16 28mm barrels.
Yes the 40mm Bofors existed as a gun from the mid 30s onwards, but those were single land based mounts, which were not suited to mass production. They were designed specifically to require a lot of handwork with "file and drill unti it fits" style instructions, because the Swedish government was trying to give their citizens jobs in the wake of the 1930s economic crisis, so taking as long as possible for a single gun was actually the goal of the designers at that point, otherwise there would be even more unemployment. For this reason the 40mm Bofors saw only limited service before 1942.
The magic was actually in the Remote Power Control of the guns. The Royal Navy used a computer called the HACS high angle control system to calculate the firing solution which itself could use type 285 radar for the range. The system progressively improved with GRUB Gyro Rate Unit Boxes.
-The Japanese, German and US Navy had nothing like it in 1940. Way ahead.
-Had the Prince of Wales had functioning radar (3 of the 4 were down) and Boffors 40mm instead of POM POM 40mm she would never have been sunk.
And you could shut barrels down to allow some cooling
Imagine being in control of eight 40mm guns, the sheer power one must’ve felt.
The gunners were probably scared to death because like you only fired it when you under attack.
I wouldn't be surprised if your whole body shook after firing the guns, not to mention the booming in your ears.
If anything like a Trench dirt whacker there is a lot of lactic acid in your arms from the constant vibrations and motion
It IS a lot of firepower, but don't forget that there is potentially something coming towards you at close to 300mph with maybe a 20mm cannon in the nose. Only takes one hit and you're dead....Doens't even need to hit you! A lot of power, but also probably a lot of fear too!
Mass of fire = pre-radar thinking. Back when your best bet was literally aerial suppressive fire in the hope it would distract the enemy enough to miss you.
By the end of the war, proxy fuses and shipboard radar improvements meant the same 40mm Bofors shot down far more enemy (and did it far faster) than in the beginning of the war.
For all their use, its a real shame that not so many of these WW2 icons survive today. Especially in the crazy 8 mount.
Interesting Fact:
Japan and Italy used and produced their own versions of the 2 pounder pom pom up until WW2, when it was succeeded by newer Anti-aircraft guns.
Also, Vickers exported a Mark E 6-ton tank model using a 2 pounder pom pom as a self propelled gun carrier; with Thailand being the only customer of that particular model.
Hold on is the mark e with the 2-pounder still around in Thailand?
@@jehoiakimelidoronila5450 At least 7 examples are preserved on Thailand as the Type 76.
Also some British source called their Vickers 25mm gun to be a pom-pom too
Including Type 96 Japanese one
8 40mm rapid firering autocannons. Now that is a lot of dakka.
too much dakka they became poms
@@jeffreylmAuwith so much Pom that we had to add another one
As I call it the royal navy's pipe organ
Luckily they picked up that name cause their American allies also had name their early 1.1 inch AA gun, Chicago Piano/Typewriter
‘Because they go pom-pom-pom-pom-pom-pom-Pom’ seaman John hall
Chicago Piano is the American 1.1" autocannon; not a pom-pom.
Hey, that’s also what we called your mom in the Navy!
@@greengabe5She really was a magnificent pipe organ. I think the nickname pom-pom came from the sound of her head bouncing off the headboard.
One of the reasons Prince of Wales and Repulse got sunk was that the Japanese aircraft didn’t know they where actually under heavy AA fire and largely felt safer and where able to execute their attack runs under less stress thus more accurately all because the Pom Poms lacked tracer rounds. It’s largely only after the Japanese planes returned home did they realize they’d been shot at a lot.
That and that Prince of Wales and Repulse were sent out without any air over. Further proving the importance of air power.
@@Luis-be9mi Post war analysis has shown that had the ships had the tracer rounds, there is a good chance they would have survived.
There were 85 bombers attacking them. 4 were shot down and 28 were damaged, many severely. That's over 40% of the attacking force. In other operations, Japanese bombers in similar attacks veered off against lesser AA opposition.
As mentioned, the effect on moral and stress seeing tracers converging on you while doing a bomb/torpedo run lessens you focus significantly.
@@Luis-be9mi it's more complicated than that. The British intelligence and admiral in charge were well aware of the bomber thread. They knew a routh number estimate, they knew their airfield location, and they knew their range.
The British admiral was actively choosing a course and position that would have kept him out of the bombers range, thus no air cover would actually be required as the japanese planes would not be able to reach them (and no carriers were close), and the British planes were required to support the land battles which was underway at the same time. The planes had the choice of attacking japanese land forces to help the British troops who were losing and needed all the help they could get, or they could fly over a few ships which could not be attacked by the enemy's planes because they were out of range. Which one is more useful?
The problem was that just one or two days before the British force sailed, the bomber squadrons got switched out. The new models there were the G4M Betty and G3M Nell bombers, which had longer ranges than the ones stationed there previously. Now the British ships were in range. But the British admiral and intelligence didn't know that.
Not providing air cover for these ships might be seen as a mistake when looking at it now with hindsight from an armchair historian position; but at the time from the British view the decision was actually the right one. The planes were needed elsewhere and the British ships should not have been in range of the japanese aircraft, and they were specifically sailing a course not to get into range.
It was just bad luck for the British, but from their perspective they did everything right. Except bringing tracer rounds. Had they known that the bomber squadrons had been switched out so they now had longer range, there certainly would have been air cover provided, or the ships would not have sailed so far north. Everything they did was under the assumption that the japanese bombers could not reach them, which was also true 2 or 3 days earlier
Daamn, that's actually extremely interesting and good info. Thanks for sharing.
In addition to all that, they were actually scheduled to sail with a carrier, but the latter got in an accident just before they were timed to set off so they sailed without it.
Fun fact: the pom-pom, specially in its quadruple and octuple mounts, was considered one of the best anti-aircraft guns used against the kamikaze due to the sheer volume of fire and thus stopping power it had.
Experiences with the pom-poms in the Pacific would heavily influence the Royal Navy into developing the Sextuple Bofors mounts installed aboard HMS Vanguard.
Quad mounted Bofors were devastating enough, but six?
"One of the Best" not really. The Boffors quad had twice the range of the 40mm pom pom and more than twice the rate of fire of the octouple POM POM. It was all Britain could afford
They switched to the Bofors for Vanguard for a reason. The PomPom put up a huge volume of fire. But its range was really short for a 40 mm AA gun emplacement. Yes it could have some great stopping power against a kamikaze at point blank range. But everyone involved really would have preferred the enemy plane not get that close to begin with. The Bofors had twice the range and a quad bofors had a higher rate of fire than the 8 barrel pompom. And a better traverse speed and accuracy. They were far from the worst Naval AA guns of the war. But they were nowhere near best either.
There's something about the chunky look and almost ponderous rate of fire of this weapon that has a bit of "charm." If such a label could be applied to a deadly weapon.
I remember the Pom Pom used in BF1, it and the Artillery Truck variant that had it served me well in Anti Air roles, knocked out many aircraft with it, so it proved its worth on the digital battlefield.
The WW2 Pom Poms look cooler to me honestly, octupple mounts, cone muzzule, and the mount for it make it look really cool.
And nice way to finish the vid, we all are your cheer squad, Johnny.
The cone muzzle was to keep sailors night vision when firing the gun at night. Interesting stuff.
I guess that's where the guys at GW used as a reference for "this is what it means to say 'more dakka' for Warhammer 40K. Especially those octuple-barreled ones.
In lore their are multi-barreled Lascannons and Heavy Anti-Air Boltguns.
For those who don't know "Lasgun" or "Lascannon" are Directed Energy Weapons, and "Boltguns" or "Bolters" are either Caselss or Cased micrmissile ammunition with a powder "kicker" charge and a rocket assisted engine in the projectile, often with an explosive or otherwise payload.
In the 1961 movie "Sink The Bismarck", the octuple pop-pom is often shown as the Germans' AA defense. Funny enough, if the Germans had a rapid-fire close AAA weapon like that they MIGHT have had a chance to fend off the air attack that doomed them.
That was the quad barrel 2 cm Flak 30, Flak 38 and Flakvierling 38, chambered into the 2,0cm (.78 in) to fire the 20×138mmB or Long Solothurn, not a bad gun really especially in its quad system, but the gunners were all green,
Specially considering how Bismarck's AA suite was mostly comprised of 20mm guns in single mounts and the utterly useless 37mm breach loading dual gun mounts.
The Bismarck was actually doomed by a cost cutting measure that made perfect sense, at the time. The assumption was that the Bismarck would only need to engage aircraft that were attacking itself, so it would never be engaging crossing targets, let alone receding targets. Compounding the issue was forgetting to account for possible wind condition when selecting the calibrated speed range of the fire control predictor. With the Bismarck heading full speed, into gale force winds, instead of being sitting ducks for the 10.5cm, radar directed heavy AA battery, the swordfish were closing at too slow a speed to be within the calibrated speed range, so the predictor could not supply the correct setting for the variable timed fuses. If the predictor was designed for area defense, the predictor would have been more expensive, but the calibrated speed range would have included high performance aircraft flying at the ship, high performance aircraft flying away from the ship, and all speeds, including zero, between those extremes, which would have doomed the incoming swordfish.
Imagine your aircraft being hit by two or three 2 pounder shells. That's got to make a mess of the rest of your day.
Most AA guns fired HE though, so you wouldn't get hit by a shell but shrapnel (you can see most of the ammo cases mounted on the feeds during the video with a big HE painted on them in white)
@@Sazabi4prez These were impact-fuzed, so the shell would still hit.
the skin of the Frame is no thicker than a Drink Can
You wouldn’t have made it to the supermarket before closing time
@@Sazabi4prez The only 40mm cannon with proximity fused shells during WWII was the Bofors, the Pom-Pom's ammo was too old for them.
I think we should all CHEER Johnny, he's a LEADER in his field.
🙏
Yeah. My favorite users of the Pom Pom's were the girls.
.
OK Bob@@BobSmith-dk8nw
if you want more in depth detail "our own devices" also just released a video about the pom poms and their service history. it unfortunately did not include pom pom audio, so thanks for that johnny :)
By "just released," the OP means "two days ago."
Our Own Devices and Johnny are both Canadian. It's something in the water!
Sweet, I'll check it out!
They were also found to be very useful against kamikaze at the end of the war. One sailor said the eight guns would "ermode" a kamikaze.
never disappoint on the out-tro
Pom-Pom guns. The most friendly sounding guns in history.
And off course. Johnny Johnson, the most friendly labrador loving ace!
You really got me with the outro!
Amazing that the design was still valid and effective after 50 years. I had no idea that it was used all the way back in the Boer War.
Ma-Duece, "50 years? Hold my beer."
I'd say a way to bring back the iconic feel of the pom-pom would be a rotary 40mm CIWS, rounds larger than those used in the Avenger GAU-8 rotary cannon.
@@frednone No lie there!
@@WolfeSaber While looking at the difference in weight between a 20mm Oerlikon and an M-61 Vulcan shows it might not be as heavy as I originally thought, the $30 dollars or so a round might get a little pricy with a 40MM CIWS.
@@WolfeSaberjust maybe, the Chinese 20 barrel rotary 30mm prototype might interest you
Great video; Love seeing these lesser well known weapon systems talked about. You should talk about the Japanese Type 92! One of the most underrated HMGs of the war that layered terror onto units facing the Japanese.
Extremely accurate, no recoil thanks to weight- was even issued with optics and could sustain heavy fire with little delay thanks to the atrocious air cooling fins and machined metal
you can see the influence in starwars turbo-lazers
The WW2 visuals and props are a big part of what made SW universe feel so lived in. I had heard several WW2 era weapons got cannibalised to create some of the props though, despite them probably belonging in a museum or something. Still, I love the look of the original trilogy and its visual language creates one of the most immersive fictional worlds I've ever seen on film. Kind of a tandem charged missile if you take my meaning
@@ThommyofThenn most of the cannibalized stuff was just surplus, nothing museum worthy.
@@AdamantLightLP thanks that makes me feel better about it
@@ThommyofThenn Back in the 70s a lot of WW2 weapons were dirt cheap as they were made in huge numbers and were practically obsolete in terms of military use, by this point in time everyone had pretty much moved onto the AK pattern rifles, M16, FN FAL or G3.
British QF 1-pounder pom-pom was the 1st autocannon in the world in 1890 & the 1st antiair gun in 1903.
Not bad for Victorian Engineering?
Glad you covered this Johnny QF 2-pounder naval gun outshine the QF 1-pounder pom-pom.
Swedish Bofers were a great gun in ww2 but they only began production in 1934 17 years later then British QF 2-pounder Mark II entering service in 1917.
Britain had a lot of equipment left over from ww1 so they found ways like strapping them together to get use out of them.
The USA basically built it's military up from the ground & similar for Germany prior as a lot of ww1 Equipment the Germans had from ww1 was sold in their recession or decommissioned under treaty agreements & such.
Britain, France & Russia had a real mixed bags of armaments from ww1 & sometimes even earlier used for ww2.
Good point, for instance, didn't the US use the old 1 inch four barrel AA early war?
@@rob5944The USA has no permanent anti air autocannon & Autocannon in general in ww2 they adopted the Swedish Bofors (Chrysler) 40 mm/56 under licensee.
Only Autocannon the USA had at the outset of ww2 was 1.1-inch/75-caliber gun from 1938-1942 with some ~1000 made.
The USA Could not have won the pacific war if not for Swedish Engineering!
Britain had anti air autocannons from 1903.
USA only started production poorly in 1938 & due to the shortage of Autocannons did something no other power did mounting M2 browning's in place of autocannons for anti air protection which was not suited to anti air but nice for infantry support fire.
The USA post ww2 realised the short comings of not having sufficient autocannons they hired ex Nazi's to develop the M39 revolver cannon in 1952 based on the German Mauser MG 213 which would be developed M61 Vulcan rotary Autocannon that the Germans envisioned but lacked the means & funds at the time to achieve it.
Even the USA would take decade & 1/2 with naughty Germans!
Most of NATO's Equipment is just ww2 German technology with new panels & a ne coat of paint on it.
GM3 is just a MG42 sim lined.
Glock 17 & all standard Nato pistols descended from the Walther P38 & Walther model 8 version 3 manner of aluminium framing,
Walther P38 even had plastic parts & internals have not really changed to day since the PP & PPK versions.
What is still used the USA made that any nation outside the USA uses from US technology!
Go out side the USA no one uses an M1911.
You used cowboy era arms in ww2 & in ww3 you will use ww1 arms like the M1911 & M2 browning machine gun.
We Limeys of the isles of Blight might have a command slow to change but we have the weapons of the previous war not a century ago.
Yanks are a special breed of Anglo!
The USA is so lucky it is geographically isolated from the world so it can avoid war on it's shores not by skill but two massive oceans!
It's like the English channel on crack.
@@arnijulian6241 yes, that's it the 1.1 inch I believe.
@@rob5944 Fair 1.1-inch/75-caliber gun it was replaced by the Oerlikon 20 mm cannon but that is German so no wonder USA couldn't get those then adopting the Bofors 40mm as mentioned.
Even the USA M4 autocannon didn't get the kinks sorted till 1942 in not massive use but a 1/2 a dozen 0.5 cals machine guns aren't a bad substitute 7 the USA had about 2 million by wars end.
Why the everything that moved had an M2 browning bolted to it even if it wasn't really needed but hay worked as a big pacifier when the Germany did Arial attack on the few occasion they had air superiority in the late war.
A pom pom didn't knock out air targets consistently let alone a machine gun.
Rest of the world doctrine in ww2 for CAS was hunker down in the tank or find cover.
Americans likes making a light show guns.
German pilot mentions of it is quiet comical.
Only the USA can literally throw munitions at every problem for nothing & continue a war.
The USA's real power domestic industry till your nation shipped it over to china.
Mad how much of USA small arms munition is made in the USA today even for the military market.
Is rather concerning!
You here about the Chinese having at least 20 fatal viruses stored in California to insufficient safety then the FBI & CDC did no testing sweeping the problem under the rug.
Someone important must want that Beijing money?
We have the same insufferable problem in the UK from that den of thieves called parliament but not so blatant or corrupt.
Barmy that we in the west even opened up china to the west much less letting their foreign agent have near free reign though our we at least have people watching them all hour for Britain is a much smaller land mass then the USA.
Not hard to hide anything in the USA considering the size of it.
@@rob5944Only thing I do like about the States is you haven't got an Electric eye watching you every second you are outside your house!
Give it time it will be an Orwellian state here the weighted anchors & the USA will likely follow suit as the surveillance technology improves.
I don't know who to be more concerned of, the Chinese or our own leadership?
We live in strange times.
The pictures and film of the pom pom guns in action are iconic images of the Royal Navy in WW2. There's something mesmerising about those 8 barrels relentlessly firing in sequence with the crew closed up around them feeding in the ammunition from both sides with that unique rhythmic noise going on.
I believe the nickname "Chicago piano" was a play on the nick name "Chicago typewriter" which was a nickname for the Thompson "Tommy " submachine gun.
Yooo its been a while but a topic ive wanted you to cover😊 Anyways keep up the good content johnny :)
haha the pompom girls at the end of the video is a nice touch of humour
I love hearing about guns from the 1880’s simply evolving up to 1918-1940
Maxim was a genius, most of his guns have lasted for decades in service, some with more modifications than others, some longer than others, but all with the genius design intact.
If the pom poms were firing then the enemy were getting dangerous close. My father was a Marine aviator on the USS Block Island (2) , the first Block Island was sunk by a German submarine, the only carrier lost in the Atlantic. During the battle of Okinawa the pilots were spread out in the carrier to prevent multiple pilot casualties as happened on another carrier.
My father said that as the kamikazees got closer the long range guns started firing ,then the mid range and finally the pom poms which meant the Japanese were really close. All the meanwhile all they could do was to listen to the guns firing. He flew a TBM during that time, dropped a 1,000 lb. bomb on Naha castle on Okinawa, along with blowing up a lighthouse, he said he wouldn’t have attacked the lighthouse but the Japanese started firing at him. And the fact he still had rockets left after a bombing run. He served during WW 2, the Korean War and taught fighter school during Vietnam , earned 2 distinguished flying crosses along with numerous medals over that time. Flew the Stearman (Submarine patrol in the Virgin Islands) Hellcat, TBM, Corsair, Panther
and Sabre jet, and finished with A4 Skyhawks in the late 60s. In Korea he landed a TBM on the beach in North Korea to drop off 2 Army intelligence soldiers and picked up 2 to take back. But he said he flew more beer and bullets than bombs in his TBM during Korea. Another role in Korea was
flying a Twin engine Beechcraft up and down Korea getting parts and mechanics to various air bases to fix up damaged planes. A most unassuming kid from Wyoming.
Actually, a single Bofors was considered as effective as two pom-poms, not eight. So a quad Bofors, as used by the US Navy, would be equivalent to an eight-barreled Pom-Pom. Single Pom-Poms were used in large numbers on motor gun boats (MGBs), older destroyers, and many other vessels. Quad Pom-Poms were mounted on newer destroyers and cruisers, which in many cases retained them until well into the 1950s, even though there were plenty surplus Bofors available.
Just watched "On Our Own Devices" video on the 2pdr pompom with an example gun on display at the HMCS Chippewa museum in Winnipeg. This was a very good companion piece.
The Americans considered the Pom Pom but went with the Bofors instead, Herr Maxim; I took a machine gun und made it bigger, what more could the yanks possibly want!?!
*b i g g e r g u n s*
More reach out and touch someone...
My Dad was coxswain on MGB 659 operating in the adriatic and Mediterranean. She was eqiped with a twin barrel pom pom as well as a six pounder and twin oerlikon. He said the rapid rate of fire of the pom pom was an enormous benefit when engaging Nazi shipping in night raids. RIP Dad
According to FW, the 4 mount groupings had a de-synchronizer, to avoid harmonics that damaged the mounts...apparently this was not needed for the 8 gun groupings.
I find it funny how both the British and the Americans thought the same way about ordinance. McArthur decided on the caliber of the M1 Garand (30.06 caliber) based on the MASSIVE stocks of leftover WW1 rifle ammo, so the far more effective .28 caliber isn't used. And the British used Maxim Pom-Poms, based on stocks of leftover WW1 ammo, while the US used the far better Bofors autocannon.
And the Dad jokes just never stop...🤣
logistics are 90% of a war. That's what really defeated the Germans.
I believe the name pom pom was derived from the sound the guns made during fiering
No, it's because they were primarily operated by squads of cheerleaders due to their excellent teamwork.
@atomic_wait sis boom bah! Go team!
Fun fact: Ammo bearers on a 8-barrel pom-pom reply to all orders with "HUUUUUH?"
Gunners reply reply with: "WHAAAT'D YOU SAAAY???"
TBH, it looks more like an organ than a piano
The large multi gun pompom mounts were the last of the crazy steampunk looking weapons in large scale use.
Jesus, that Nordfelt Flak 14...there ought to be a statue of limitations on how big something can be and still be belt-fed!
And neat footage throughout!
I'm watching the way it rocks and thinking no way in hell they're hitting anything.
@@evh1734 "Barrage box"
When you miss but still want to sound cool to the other AAA guns.
a video about naval anti flash protection would be neat.
I think I read somewhere back in the day (maybe Starlog Magazine) that production designers on Star Wars: A New Hope where highly influnced by weapon from WW2. Many of the blaster props were WW2 machine guns. You can see how they modeled the surface cannons on the Death Star on the Pom Pom Guns.
The P51 Mustang sound was a favourite os Lucas as well
Most of the hand held weapons in Star Wars were basically Sci-Fi WW2 weapons
My Dad Was captain of a pom pom in HMS Bellona during WWII
The end made me laugh out loud! :)
Fun facts:
If you play Warhammer 40K: Boltgun,
When you firing the Heavy Bolter, the Bolter sound share similarities to the Pom-Pom Gun (but firing faster)
Great Stuff as ever. Was the clip with John Hall interview from armoured carriers channel?.if you haven't seen it I'd highly recommend the channel. Great mix of old footage and interviews.. That channel is criminally under subscribed
Always with AA gun weaponry and their weirdly charming organ gun variations. Strange to not see any fictional media for this, by the way, even if they'll be similar looking blueprints from a Star Wars Legends sourcebook or whatever.
And on a over the top literal standpoint, cheerleading pompoms are better off as secret emergency grenades, particularly the smoke kind.
Those gunners hearing must have had a very short shelf life
The VA has determined your hearing loss is not service-related.
Now you need to remember that 40mm ie 2 pounder Pom Pom had automatic fuze setter for it designed in interwar period for use in dual purpose ie direct action and timed fuzes. Imagine if that feature was retained by the time of WWII and octuple mountings? Just need one command from radar and all fuzes are set to correct distance😂
You could also call it HRM's Pipe gun as it resembles the Scottish Bagpipes
An absurd amount of firepower to be pointed at a single target... I wish someone would restore one of these Octo Pom's so we could see it in action one more time.
Same
00:47 Dude is standing next to the loudeners without hearing protection. Military grade tinnitus right there.
The chicago piano was a 1.1 inch quad mount that was replaced by the bofors
Pretty neat weapon
The original Pom Pom was a brass-bodied, water-cooled 32mm autocannon first deployed in WWI.
Pro tip: Let go five rounds, wait 2 seconds, fire five more. Prevents heat buildup while maintaining impact-triggered explosive disapproval on the foolish zeppelin that dared park its carcass in your back yard.
The Chicago Piano was the (troublesome) early war US triple 28mm anti-aircraft gun.
That's the US Navy. In the Royal Navy the nickname referred to the 8-barrelled pom-pom.
Before CIWS rotary cannons, Pom-pom and Chicago Piano guns are multi-barreled AA guns used in a number of warships including battleships and aircraft carriers during WW2, both by Britain and the United States.
Correction. Under the diverse conventions, the lighter explosive shell allowed was not a 1 pound projectile, but a 400 grams one.
2:44 The Chicago Piano was the multi-barreled US 1.1“ gun IIRC.
They shared the nickname oddly enough
2:47 wasn’t the Chicago piano nickname given to the US quad 1.1 inch mount, not the PomPom?
Both oddly enough!
@@JohnnyJohnsonEsq Huh, I didn’t know that.
@@wolftamer5463Also the first variations of the thompson got the name, because of their infamous use by gangsters at the time like Al Capone
one cant help but admire man's determination to bring lead down range
The gunnery officer on HMS prince of wales which was sunk by Japanese aircraft, wrote a battle report after being rescued from the sinking ship. His description is a scene of chaos. On sighting the attacking aircraft, all AA armament engaged the enemy. One by one the guns jammed and artificers were racing round freeing up the guns. At the height of the battle there were less than half defending the ship. The cause of this calamity was the ammunition stored in ready use lockers. After months of heat and humidity the ammo had degraded and this he maintained led to tragedy, in not being able to fully defend the ship. It was mainly the 2 pounder ammo that compromised the ship. In my time in the navy we had 40mm bofors and 4.5 inch AA weapons. Ready use lockers had long been discarded and ammo was stored in magazines. Like supermarkets today ammo had a use by date and was fired off in mid ocean with gun teams from all branches manning the guns. Great fun!!.
Those WW1 Germans appeared to be stationed at the coast which made me think this is an almost forgotten little theatre of the war. What happened when the trenches met the sea or the Swiss border?
My Dad was an Ordinance Artificer in HMS Belfast in 1943 and 1944 and was heavily involved with the maintenance and operational efficiency of the two sets of octuple pom poms which were mounted between the two funnels. They have long since been removed however it would be great to see these guns re mounted on Belfast and would add much authenticity to the museum ship HMS Belfast.
I wonder if this has ever been contemplated by the Imperial War Museum who run this great old ship.
Great ending!!
Very interesting video, thanks for taking the time to upload it.
Not a lot of ear protection in those old clips. Ahh, the good ol' days!
such a distinct and recognizable sound
You will notice the complete lack of ear protection there. My grandfather was in the artillery in World War I and his hearing was never the same afterwards. My father seemed to have escaped too much damage in spite of being the number two on an Oerlikon for some time. I think he was lucky he got a radar qualification eventually. A lot less noisy.
A small bit of cotton wool may have made all the difference.
Also Canadian Tribal-class Destroyers were Equip with a Single Quad 2-pdr before Wartime Modifications. To 40mm Bofors
the British 2-pdr "pom pom" wasn't called the "Chicago piano" that was the American 1.1 inch (28mm) AA gun
Both were.
@@JohnnyJohnsonEsq i would need a better explanation why that would be because it makes no sense why a gun neither made or used by America would be called a "Chicago" anything
It's well documented. Even the veteran speaking in the clip called it the "Chicago.. Something." As to the logic here I'm guessing they were both paying tribute to the Chicago tpe-writer Aka Thompson Submachine gun which the Brits were also starting to use at the beginning of WW2. Though there are lots of nicknames in the military that don't always make sense and have no obvious origin.
My friends father used these weapons in WW2. He said they jammed all the time, and were not thought very effective. In period film you can see some in effect jamming all the time.
They were not very effective compared to the US 40mm Bofors gun, but compared to other medium WW2 era AA guns, the Pom Pom was still very good. It was better than the 20 and 37mm guns fielded by Germany and Italy, and we don't need to talk about Japans 25mm gun.
Statistically, you need thousands of rounds to destroy a single incoming enemy aircraft, which is why gun crews often think their guns were not that effective. Even the 40mm Bofors needed on average more than 1700 rounds to shoot down a single plane (see US anti aircraft action report September 1945). I don't know numbers for the Pom Pom, but due to its lower velocity it is likely higher.
But what often gets forgotten is the psychological effects on the attacking planes crew, when you know you are being targeted by such a gun, you are very likely to break off your attack, or drop your bomb/torpedo early (which makes it far easier for the ship to evade). However, those factors are not visible directly to the gun crew, and they are very hard to measure in numbers, but they make out most of the effectiveness of an AA gun.
Even USN 40mm Bofors gunners often felt like their guns were not that effective.
Remember my grandad a young gunner at the time before he started to man the guns said when you was sweeping to clear the empty shells from the deck you would come across clippings of fingers from when reloading the odd finger would get trapped and end up on the deck. He also was assigned to the Atlantic convoys and there was a time Irish fishermen would shine lights on the convoy when coming in from the south they said to cut it which they was ignored so a couple rounds was fired over their heads and before you know it, the sea was pitch black again.
Man, that 8 barrel Pom Pom gun is one mean looking weapon!
Mistake around 2:50 The pom-pom wasn't called the chicago piano, that nickname was used by the americans for their 1.1 inch (28mm) AA gun that they used before the introduction of the 20mm oerlikon
It was oddly enough used for both.
As Borat would say "Very niiiiice"
I guess it was spray and pray with the pom. the proximity shell changed everything. I still to this day think that shell is incredible.
Yay Team! Go Johnny! To the next one, see ya there.
Thanks for that pun to get my day started :)
Ears were much stronger back then
Pom-pom was Chicago Piano? Isn't it 1.1"/75?
My Grandad crewed one a pom pom gun in WWII. Hms mazurka i think. Corvette.
Massive respect to him and all the lads that served or are serving!
“Seaman” 😂 this is why we replaced that word with O.S., A.B 😂
You should make a review on top Break revolvers in film . A top rank revolver was used to assassinate William McKinley and and there are many examples like the Webbly used by the British and guns like I have the Harrington Richardson premier the same gun used in Sherlock Holmes.
I think the British seamen shooting Pom Pom guns wore short short skirts and finished their volleys by doing the splits.
Great video. Thank you. The comparison between the Pom Pom and the Bofors was very interesting.
The "chicago piano" is not the pom pom. It was a nickname for the 1.1 inch (28mm) anti aircraft quadmount used on american ships at the start of the war. It was never used on british ships.
It was a failiour and was replaced by the bofors.
They shared the same nickname oddly enough
@@JohnnyJohnsonEsq wow. I just checked and you are right. Well that sure is confusing.
@@jakobc.2558 I know right? It's my bad though I should have talked about it in the video.
Post war the Mk 6 40mm mount only had six barrels. These were fitted to HMS Vanguard with some being radar-directed.
Small correction about US usage, the US Navy did equip the 1.1 inch "Chicago Piano" in the first part of the war. This was replaced by the Bofors around the time of the Battle of Midway and was on new construction up until mid-1943 when it was started to be put on older ships coming back for repairs and maintenance.
Oddly enough the 1.1 inch simply shared the same nickname "Chicago Piano." Otherwise the guns are not related.
My great grandad was a gunner for these guns on the HMS Renown throughout the entire war. He even spoke about having to fight off Kamikaze pilots at one point.
I got an idea for my ship-based video game I'm working on: *any British WW2-era vessels, but are "modernized"; & either had their modern versions of 37mm AAA as well, or bofors dressed up to look like pom-poms* 'cuz y'know, Logistics
Also, didn't know that the sole existence of the mark 8s is to burn through the old stockpiles of munitions made from WW1
I have always loved seeing this weapon used in film.
I always wonder if any of the people shooting these weapons had hearing protection. Can't find any evidence that they did. Several times, including at 5:09 they look like they aren't even wearing earplugs.
I'm confused, I thought the term "Chicago piano" referred to the American 4x28mm AA mount, not the 40mm POM-POM? Was that an error or was the term used as a nickname for both weapon systems?
Both weapons
@@JohnnyJohnsonEsq That's very interesting. Especially since while I get the idea for the 4x28mm, the pom-pom mounts look NOTHING like a piano.
History is just weird like that sometimes though.
It is! I heard once they were paying tribute to the "Chicago Type Writer" aka Thompson submachine gun which the brits started using early in the war.
Octuple Pom-pom would be a good band name.
Just make the barrel a few inches shorter and the funnel 50 centimeter wider. Maybe it makes this farce more accurate.
BF1 has this anti-air gun too.
It lays down a pretty sick beat
I've always thought the pom-poms were a little pompous myself. I'm sorry that one slipped out.
Just an idea but Johnny would have content for ages if he's ever gonna tell abridged life story of every major or extraordinary warship - USS Enterprise (CV-6), HMS Hood, sisters Bismarck and Tirpitz, cruiser Graf Spee, Yamato Musashi and Shinano, USS Laffey (DD-459) etc.
The army v navy game is hardcore.