CANNON big enough to knock down heavily armored enemy planes may soon replace the machine guns on U.S. Air Force jet fighters. The Air Force has given Buffalo Arms, Inc. of Buffalo, N.Y. the first contract ($4,000,000) for a new fast-firing, 30-mm. aircraft cannon whose projectile is nearly three times bigger than that now used in the .50-cal. machine guns.

A URANIUM rush is on in Wyoming. A strike in Fremont County, says the Atomic Energy Commission, seems to be the first "important new discovery" in the state.

GERMANY has passed the U.S. as the world's No. 2 shipbuilder. By the latest count, German shipyards are building 153 ships aggregating 651,527 gross tons v. 55 ships totaling 564,822 tons in U.S. shipyards. Still No. 1: the United Kingdom, with 316 ships totaling 2,190,329 tons.

WILLOW Run, built by the Government for plane production by Ford in World War II and bought in 1948 by Kaiser, may end up as a General Motors plant. G.M., which leased 40% of Willow Run after its Hydra-Matic transmission plant at Livonia burned down last Aug. 12, is sounding out Kaiser Motors on the possibility of buying the huge property.

NOW is the best time to get into the cattle business," said J. Douglas Gay Jr., newly elected president of the American Hereford Association. "When you're sleeping on the floor, you can't fall out of bed. If the cattle market is not on the bottom now, it's awfully close. The only direction to go is up."

GLENN McCarthy, blocked a year ago from selling shares in his new oil company, now has SEC approval for his stock registration. He plans to issue 10 million shares at $2 per share to finance his comeback, wildcat for oil in Bolivia, the U.S. and Canada.

MATHIESON Chemical Corp. will offer $16 a share to buy a half-interest in Reaction Motors, Inc., maker of rocket engines, 32% owned by Laurance Rockefeller. Mathieson, which has just opened a plant to produce hydrazine for rocket fuel, is willing to pay nearly $1,000,000 to get a steady market for the product.

HOWARD Johnson, the roadside restaurant man, is going into the motel business. He has formed a new company to build and franchise motels, plans to include restaurants in some of the units. The first three will be set up in Florida.

JAPAN'S prewar industrial giant, Mitsubishi, has big expansion plans. Westinghouse has orders from two Japanese utilities for three complete 75,000-kw. electric power plants to be installed in industrial areas and to serve as models for others to be built by Mitsubishi under Westinghouse licenses. Cost of the three, largest ever exported from the U.S.: $29.5 million.

RCA's color-telecasting equipment will start going to TV stations next month in expectation of early FCC approval of color broadcasts. First will come equipment to relay network color shows; delivery of cameras to originate local color programs will start in March.

FLORIDA will get a mile of new luxury hotels and apartments as a result of one of the nation's biggest sales of undeveloped land. Real-estate men James S. Hunt and Stephen A. Calder paid $19.4 million for 2,466 acres along the coastline near Fort Lauderdale, plan to develop the site over a 20-year period.

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