The Sperry Ball Turret

 

A Sperry ball turret, used on the famous American B-17 heavy bomber

A ball turret was a spherical-shaped, altazimuth mount gun turret, fitted to some American-built aircraft during World War II. The name arose from the turret's spherical housing. It was a manned turret, as distinct from remote-controlled turrets also in use. The turret held the gunner, two heavy machine guns, ammunition, and sights. The Sperry Corporation designed ventral versions that became the most common version; thus, the term "ball turret" generally indicates these versions. 

The gunner sighted between his elevated feet and routinely stayed inside the turret for up to 10 hours on a mission. The turret was too small to hold both the gunner and his parachute, thus the gunner was required to rotate the turret, exit into the fuselage and put on his parachute should the plane be going down. Statistics showed the Ball Turret gunner was the least likely member of the crew to be wounded, as he was surrounded by armour plate, however, he was also the least likely to survive should the plane be shot down.

Ball Turrets were often fitted with weaponry up to 13mm however installation of 15 or 20mm cannons posed issues to the cramped and confined nature of the ball turret. As such they tended to be phased out post mid-war for remote controlled turrets with flatter profiles and more horizontal space for larger weaponry which started to become necessary in the years leading up to, and after the second world war.
Such turrets are now quite rare as most were removed from war surplus bombers pressed into postwar civilian service.

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