The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia: Japanese 40mm Ho-301
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The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia | |
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| Ammunition | 40 x 129 caseless HE |
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| Projectile Weight | 1.29 lbs585 g |
| Velocity | 760 feet per second232 meters per second |
| Range | 490 feet150 meters |
| Rate of fire | 450 rounds per minute |
| Gun weight | 196 lbs89 kg |
The Ho-301 cannon was installed in a small number of Ki-44 "Tojo" fighters. It was a rather odd duck, achieving its high rate of fire by eliminating the cartridge and placing the propellant charge in a rear chamber of the projectile itself. This made for a simple and compact gun design, since there was no need for any cartridge extraction mechanism, but this came at the cost of a very low muzzle velocity, which adversely affected range and accuracy. One source (Mikesh 2004) has described the gun as an automatic grenade launcher and likened it to the Type 89 "knee mortar". The action was advanced primer ignition blowback. Ammunition came in boxes of 10 rounds, suggesting the fixed gun on the "Tojo" was good for one or two short bursts, though these would have been lethal against even the largest bombers if on target.
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