The Browning .50 calibre machine gun was, like the Browning .30, first used by Canadians in the Second World War as a vehicle mounted weapon, though it was not nearly as common in Canadian service as it was in American service. It was not used in a dismounted (“infantry”) role until after the Korean War, though some infantry units used them mounted on halftracks in Korea against Chinese infantry attacks.
The M2 is an air-cooled, belt-fed gun with an effective range of 1,830 meters (2,000 yd) and a maximum effective range of 2,000 meters (2,200 yd) when fired from the M3 tripod. In its ground-portable, crew-served role as the M2HB (HB = “Heavy Barrel”) the gun weighs 84 pounds (38 kg) and the assembled M3 tripod another 44 pounds (20 kg).
The M2 fires the .50 BMG (Browning machine gun) cartridge (eight types, multiple generations of regular ball, tracer, armor-piercing (AP), incendiary, and saboted sub-calibre rounds are available for the .50 calibre), which offers long range, accuracy, and immense stopping power. The closed bolt firing cycle made the M2 usable as a synchronized machine gun on aircraft before and during the Second World War. In the museum are actual shell casings fired from a Mustang aircraft.
M2 mounted on a tripod Mustang aircraft 8 types of rounds