MG FF & MG FF/M aircraft cannon
Official wording
Oerlikon, MG-FF and MG-FFM, cal. 20mm aircraft cannon.
What this entry requires
- INFOATF states no date; production was about 1936–1945.
- INFOStill an NFA firearm; only registered examples transfer, with ATF approval (26 U.S.C. 5812, 5861).
Editorial facts · Our research
- Country
GermanyBasis: outside reference ¹- Manufacturer
- Ikaria-Werke & others (Oerlikon licence)Basis: the ATF wording
- Type
- CannonBasis: the ATF wording
- Action
- Select-fire / autoBasis: outside reference ²
- Caliber
- 20mmBasis: the ATF wording
- Made
- 1936–1945production; ATF states no dateBasis: estimate ³
- Service
- Military
Source
- Official wording
- ATF P 5300.11, April 2025 edition · Section IV · PDF p. 86 ↗ · ATF original ↗
- Entries
- 1 line
- Verbatim check
- Checked against the PDF text before every release
- Editorial facts
- Confidence: Medium · Last revised 18 October 2026 (Evidence pass) · How we rate confidence
- References
- 1. Wikipedia, “MG FF cannon” ↗, country: infobox origin Nazi Germany; developed by Ikaria Werke Berlin
- 2. Wikipedia, “MG FF cannon” ↗, action: drum-fed, blowback-operated (API blowback) automatic aircraft autocannon
- 3. Wikipedia, “MG FF” ↗, years (estimate: partly supports it): developed 1936 (en: 'developed in 1936 by Ikaria Werke Berlin'); fitted from 1937, MG FF/M introduced 1940, still fitted from 1943 for Schräge Musik; no production end year stated
- Fact tags
- ATF the ATF wording states it.
- REF ¹ an outside reference supports it; the number points to the list of references.
- ESTIMATE an approximate or indirect reading, for example the production range of the base model.
- NO CITATION we haven’t attached a reference for this fact; it’s our editorial reading, not ATF’s.
- Source checked
- 20 October 2026: ATF’s page still lists the April 2025 edition
- Corrections
- 1 change · see below
Correction history
- Evidence passEditorial confidence: High → Medium. Re-rated after its references were re-checked and some details couldn't be confirmed.
Historical context
Image: Wikimedia Commons, “MGFFLRG.jpg” by No machine-readable author provided. Domas~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. Retrieved October 2026.
Summary: Wikipedia, “MG FF cannon”. Text CC BY-SA 4.0.
FROM WIKIPEDIA
The MG FF was a drum-fed, blowback-operated, 20 mm aircraft autocannon, developed in 1936 by Ikaria Werke Berlin of Germany. It was a derivative of the Swiss Oerlikon FF F cannon, with the Oerlikon FF design itself a development of the Imperial German World War I Becker 20 mm cannon, and was designed to be used in space-limited, fixed mountings such as inside aircraft wings, although it saw use as both an offensive and a defensive weapon, in both fixed and flexible format. It saw widespread use in those roles by the German Luftwaffe, particularly during the early stages of World War II, although from 1941 onwards it was gradually replaced by the Mauser firm's 20 mm MG 151/20, which had both a higher rate of fire and muzzle velocity.