eli5 why didn’t they but .50 caliber instead of the 7.62mm in the coaxial and hull gun in the m4 sherman
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Why would they? A M1 today has a 7.62mm coaxial, the majority of the tank has the caliber today.
Take a [look at the two catridges](https://i.imgur.com/F8p3lqm.jpeg) and consider the size, it is a 7.62×51mm not a WWII .30-06 but the result is the same. .50 takes a lot more space. So for the same number of projectiles .50 requires more storage space and that is a major limitation in a tank. 7.62mm it is commonly used in tanks because you can fit more ammunition. You would need to remove the main gun ammunition to have the same amount of .50 as .30. We talk about 4-6x times the ammunition for a smaller caliber for the same space.
It is not just the ammunition the machinegun themself have a different sizer and there is not a lot of it in a tank.
The machine guns are there for use against unarmoured targets and a human gets killed the same way with both, so having more ammunition is an advantage.
The .50 machine gun on top was there for air defense where it has a clear advantage. It was also quite useful against lightly armored targets and used in that way. That is why a M1 has a .50 on the turret today. If you look at typical ammunition load-outs an M1 carries 11,400 7.62 versus 1,000 .50.
The hull and coaxial machineguns were .30-06 caliber, which would be 7.62x62mm in a metric designation but that was not what the US army called them. It is the less powerful development to 7.62×51mm NATO that have a metric designation. I you change the name why not call .50 for 12.7mm?
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