How WW2 Planes Shoot Bullets Without Damaging The Propellers

One Simple Technique

How did propeller planes manage to shoot bullets without damaging the propellers themselves? Aren’t the bullets supposed to destroy the blades because the gun is pointing straight at them?

When a turboprop fighter plane with a machine gun is ready to fire, the firing of the bullets is synchronized to avoid hitting their own propeller.

This is done by using a camshaft – the firing of the machine gun is linked to the camshaft.

So, as the propeller turns, the camshaft controls the gun’s trigger, allowing it to know when the gun fires so that the bullets will pass through the gaps between the blades, avoiding hitting them.

Isn’t that neat?!