I just now noticed how in a German documet dated February 1945 the MK 214 cannon is shown having a caliber of 55mm.
It also has information on the weight of one round, which would mean that the ammunition was produced in that caliber for a high velocity aircraft or AA cannon.
This begs the question whether the MK 214 was infact a 55mm cannon instead of the 50mm that is often quoted, or if the cannon started out as 50mm cannon but was planned to be changed to 55mm, since the 55mm caliber was considered the optimal caliber to bring down a 4-engined bomber, probably B-29 sized, in a single shot with a Mineshell.
Here’s the document in question:
https://www.ww2technik.de/sites/dflak/5,5%20cm%20flak.htm
I hope you understand german. If not, it is an article about the 5,5cm Flak, which was designed in 1943. The germans never really used it only few prototypes were made until 1944 when they realised they needed a “Mittelkaliber” (medium calibre; anything between 3.7-8.8 cm) Flak. They also did some Testing on Ju 88s by replacing the BK 50 with the so called “Gerät 214”. maybe this led to some confusion with the naming as the germans werent really good at comunicating between eachother.
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Yeah, I had a feeling they might have mixed up some data with already ongoing 55mm cannon development.
Particular if the Rheinmetal cannon was later called Gerät 214, it would certainly cause some confusion with the Mauser MK 214.
But wait. It actually says that the Gerät 214 was simply a Gerät 58 (55mm FlaK) gun carriage where they mounted the BK 5, to create some sort of makeshift intermediate FlaK cannon, probably since they couldn’t start 55mm FlaK production easily at the time.
So maybe the confusion about the MK 214 being a 50mm cannon was actually because of the Gerät 214?
It says they built 50 pieces, which is probably a lot more than MK 214 were built.
The article doesn’t say anything about that. Just that the BK 5 was a 50mm gun for heavy destroyers, based on the Ju-88.
Wouldn’t make any sense since the Gerät 214 is described as a combing the 5cm aircraft cannon with the gun mount from the Gerät 58 55mm AA gun.
I feel like it would also make more sense to call it Gerät 214, if they actually mounted the MK 214.
I can not imagine that they produced that many BK 5s to begin with.
However in this document the MK 214 is refered to as 50mm caliber gun.
I’m just not sure where it’s from.
It says the weight of two MK 214 is 1060kg (probably including ammunition), which is below the 650kg figure from the first document.
I am sharing data on German aircraft cannons found in a book written by a member of the Japanese Navy. During the war, information on aircraft cannon technology might have been sent from Germany to Japan. I hope this will be helpful for your research.
MK 214/B
- Manufacturer: Krupp Rheinmetall
- Caliber: 55 mm
- Muzzle velocity: Unknown
- Projectile weight: 1,800 g
- Rate of fire: 180 rpm
- Weight: 649 kg
- Remarks: Experimental
The Complete Picture of Aviation Technology, Volume 2. edited by Jun Okamura, et al. 1955. p. 59
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I see. So the MK 214/B might have been an evolution of the original 50mm MK 214/A to fire the 55mm Mineshells.
But I guess the gun that was fitted to the Me 262 was the MK 214/A.
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Someone else allready mentioned, sry didnt read everything, but anyway here my part.
By “A trip to the Mauser Werke”(after war interrogation) i found out beforhand, that the Mk214a is 50x420mm and the Mk214b is 55x450mm.
Both existed.
(I used that book for 2 suggestions.)
Dont habe the exact page anymore, here one part. Both were actually put into a Me 410, i didnt bother to suggest the b, because no Ap ammo, more He performance, so i didnt bother.
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Or maybe i do make a suggestion, with P ammo, it would be a weaker against armored ground targets, but stonger against everything else.
But there’s no real information on the 55mm ammunition, is there?
I doubt it was fitted on any actual plane.
There is enove we need tho?
55mm He-I (m) 1,8 kg 420g HTA 1000m/s
And a Practise round would dish out around 51mm pen (the calculator gives 103,44mm for ap, 55mm 0g filler 1,8kg 1000m/s)
Thank you for your additional info (including @KillaKiwi with your post further up)
Yall have given me new info on the 55x450mm ammo, which i gladly update my informatic Aircraft armarment topic with.
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Yeah that pretty much sums it up.
Mk 214A → 50mm
MK 214B → 55mm
