bad WW2 weapons

[Pilot1]

Brewster F2A Buffalo. This the P-40 and Grumman Wildcat are what we entered WWII with.

 

[harmonica]

I forgot about the Boulton Paul Deviant --a fighter with a turret

 

[Pilot1]

I forgot about the Boulton Paul Deviant --a fighter with a turret

Never even knew that existed. Did a little research. Yeah it ended up being used in gunnery practice as a target tow, and air sea rescue. lol! Yeah, not Britain's finest hour.

 

[harmonica]

I forgot about the Boulton Paul Deviant --a fighter with a turret

Never even knew that existed. Did a little research. Yeah it ended up being used in gunnery practice as a target tow, and air sea rescue. lol! Yeah, not Britain's finest hour.

yes, not many people know about it because it was a failure

 

[Oddball]

^^^^^^Yep. The Panther was designed to counter the T-34, and it did that well. It was also better than anything the other Allies had. I always thought the Germans would have been better off with focusing on Panther production, than Tigers, or King Tigers.

With the exception that it, like nearly all of Germany's cutting edge weapons systems, was pressed into service before all the bugs were worked out of it....Scads of them were captured intact because they would break down and be abandoned.

 

[Pilot1]

Japanese Nambu Pistol. More dangerous to the person using it due to unexpected discharges. So unreliable, that it took Japanese officers at least three or four attempts to commit Hari Kari with it. Most used the more dependable small sword.

 

[harmonica]

Japanese Nambu Pistol. More dangerous to the person using it due to unexpected discharges. So unreliable, that it took Japanese officers at least three or four attempts to commit Hari Kari with it. Most used the more dependable small sword.

.....I'm no expert, but I thought the Japanese industrialization age was long after Britain's and America's.....so I'm guessing their weapons manufacturing would've been ''far behind'' .

 

[ABikerSailor]

Bad weapons of WWII that are "bad" as in badass?

The P-51 Mustang gets my vote.

P-51 Mustang | Facts, Specifications, & History

As far as "bad" as in not so great weapons? I did a bit of research, and this is the one that I thought should get the grand prize, because it was a tank that was made with CORRUGATED METAL for the skin. A rifle would go straight through that. And, I'm pretty happy that it never had to see combat.

Worst Weapons of WWII: Luckily Some Were Never Used

Bob Semple “tank” in New Zealand, which was really a farming tractor with corrugated iron bolted onto it. It never saw combat, hence it is only an honorable mention on this list.

The overall incompetence of the creation was remarkable for any tank, let alone one that was meant to serve in the Second World War. Based on a design seen on a U.S. postage stamp, and built without any formal blueprints, the tank managed to be both unusually heavy and underarmored.

Bob Semple tank
Since it only used corrugated iron for protection, it would have only hoped to survive small arms fire, let alone a hit from another tank. For offense, it had six light machine guns mounted on all sides of the vehicle, so it could not have damaged other tanks, either.


It was remarkably slow, in part due to the fact that it had to stop in order to shift gears unless it was going down hill. Despite these obvious flaws, it was still thought the vehicle would be of some use in combat, although it was admittedly a desperate measure.

 

[westwall]

what were some bad weapons of WW2?
here's the PIAT anti-tank weapon
says effective range about 100 yds--but in reality it was much shorter
over 30lbs compared to about 14 for the bazooka

The PIAT’s cocking system bordered on the bizarre. Inside the tube of the weapon was an enormous spring. The soldier unlatched the shoulder pad, stood on it, gave the weapon a half-turn to unlock the body from the shoulder pad, then lifted the weapon straight up, which cocked the spring. When the gunner heard a click, he knew the weapon was cocked. He then reattached the shoulder pad with another half-turn, raised the weapon to his shoulder, and took aim. Cocking the PIAT took a lot of strength. If the gunner could not get enough leverage to overcome the power of the spring, he simply had to start the process over.

Warfare History Network » Ordnance: The British PIAT (Projector Infantry Anti-Tank) Gun

Yeah, the PIAT was shit for sure. However, one of them did make the most important shot of the D-Day invasion. So, it did its job.

 

[westwall]

Japanese Nambu Pistol. More dangerous to the person using it due to unexpected discharges. So unreliable, that it took Japanese officers at least three or four attempts to commit Hari Kari with it. Most used the more dependable small sword.

That's the wrong pistol. The one you are referring to is the Type 94 Nambu.

 

[Pilot1]

Japanese Nambu Pistol. More dangerous to the person using it due to unexpected discharges. So unreliable, that it took Japanese officers at least three or four attempts to commit Hari Kari with it. Most used the more dependable small sword.

.....I'm no expert, but I thought the Japanese industrialization age was long after Britain's and America's.....so I'm guessing their weapons manufacturing would've been ''far behind'' .

I'm no expert either, but that sounds about right. I just no that to the Japanese, and even to a degree the Europeans, a sidearm was a symbol of being an officer, more than an actual weapon. However, you could actually fight with most other country's pistols.

 

[Pilot1]

Japanese Nambu Pistol. More dangerous to the person using it due to unexpected discharges. So unreliable, that it took Japanese officers at least three or four attempts to commit Hari Kari with it. Most used the more dependable small sword.

That's the wrong pistol. The one you are referring to is the Type 94 Nambu.

Thanks. I believe you are correct.

 

[Mike Dwight]

What did this thread mean by BAD?! I'm getting confused. Some of these barely left drawing boards. I'm not going to call that "bad". Is it "bad" when it didn't perform? or what? Most of the European riflemen ended up fighting World War 1 bolt-action trench wars all over, with the Mosin Nagint for Russians, the British Enfield , the german kar-98 ,the Japanese. So America's late industrialization was full of rifles with clips the m1 garand or m15 or BAR or Thompson, automatic fire, well-stocked soldiers, and barely any million dead frozen Russia Nazis, etc. Its highly recommended.

 

[ABikerSailor]

I'm no expert either, but that sounds about right. I just no that to the Japanese, and even to a degree the Europeans, a sidearm was a symbol of being an officer, more than an actual weapon. However, you could actually fight with most other country's pistols.

Here in the American military, a symbol of someone being an officer is that they have a sword when in full dress uniform.

I think that in Japan, the officers carried swords as well.

 

[harmonica]

What did this thread mean by BAD?! I'm getting confused. Some of these barely left drawing boards. I'm not going to call that "bad". Is it "bad" when it didn't perform? or what? Most of the European riflemen ended up fighting World War 1 bolt-action trench wars all over, with the Mosin Nagint for Russians, the British Enfield , the german kar-98 ,the Japanese. So America's late industrialization was full of rifles with clips the m1 garand or m15 or BAR or Thompson, automatic fire, well-stocked soldiers, and barely any million dead frozen Russia Nazis, etc. Its highly recommended.

good/bad/odd/whatever ....that's how these threads usually go

 

[ABikerSailor]

One of the strangest bombs ever created was the Dambuster bouncing bomb. They released it over water and it would skip to the target, usually a dam.

 

[harmonica]

What did this thread mean by BAD?! I'm getting confused. Some of these barely left drawing boards. I'm not going to call that "bad". Is it "bad" when it didn't perform? or what? Most of the European riflemen ended up fighting World War 1 bolt-action trench wars all over, with the Mosin Nagint for Russians, the British Enfield , the german kar-98 ,the Japanese. So America's late industrialization was full of rifles with clips the m1 garand or m15 or BAR or Thompson, automatic fire, well-stocked soldiers, and barely any million dead frozen Russia Nazis, etc. Its highly recommended.

.....good point on the bolt action vs the semi-automatic /etc ..interesting to learn how that happened....

 

[harmonica]

One of the strangest bombs ever created was the Dambuster bouncing bomb. They released it over water and it would skip to the target, usually a dam.

and it worked perfectly--but they lost a ''lot'' of the bombers
the aiming devices were ingeniously simple
Dambusters bomb sight tops £41,000
plus the altitude was adjusted by two searchlights

 

[whitehall]

The FP 45 liberator pistol. The U.S. made about a million of them at about ten cents a piece from stamped parts. Single shot .45 of questionable reliability allegedly dropped to partisans under the theory "use a gun to get a gun" you can hardly find a single relic today outside of WW2 land fills.

 

[harmonica]

The FP 45 liberator pistol. The U.S. made about a million of them at about ten cents a piece from stamped parts. Single shot .45 of questionable reliability allegedly dropped to partisans under the theory "use a gun to get a gun" you can hardly find a single relic today outside of WW2 land fills.

this one? I do recall seeing partisans with these