Machine Guns - Forgotten Weapons

Chauchat Field Testing vs Mock MG08/15 Nest

December 14, 2019 Ian McCollum 41

Out at the range today with the Chauchat, testing accuracy against a simulated MG08/15 nest at 150 yards. I’ll try out semiauto and full auto (in short bursts), and see how they compare. For reference, […]

Huot Automatic Rifle: The Ross Goes Full Auto

December 13, 2019 Ian McCollum 23

During World War One, Joseph Alphonse Huot, a Canadian machinist and blacksmith living in Quebec, designed a conversion of the Ross MkIII rifle to become an automatic rifle. The Ross was the standard issue Canadian […]

Belgian Model 1915/27 Improved Chauchat

December 9, 2019 Ian McCollum 46

The Belgian Army was the second to adopt the Chauchat automatic rifle, after the French. Almost all of Belgium was under German occupation during World War One, leaving Belgium significantly dependent on French aid for […]

All the Guns on an M4 Sherman Tank (with Nicholas Moran, the Chieftain)

December 7, 2019 Ian McCollum 37

Try out World of Tanks with a special bonus tank using this link! Today Nicholas Moran (the Chieftain) and I are at DriveTanks.com courtesy of Wargaming.net, to show you around a World War Two Sherman […]

Chambers Flintlock Machine Gun from the 1700s

November 8, 2019 Ian McCollum 27

Joseph Chambers invented a repeating flintlock weapon in the 1790s, and I think it is appropriate to consider it a “machine gun”. The design used a series of superposed charges in one or more barrels, […]

Japanese WW2 Training Machine Gun

October 25, 2019 Ian McCollum 15

This is Lot 2086 in the upcoming October 2019 Morphy Extraordinary auction. Before and during World War Two, the Japanese used a variety of training rifles and machine guns in both formal military instruction and […]

Bill Ruger’s Prototype WW2 Light Machine Gun

October 23, 2019 Ian McCollum 21

In April 1940, the US Ordnance Department circulated a request for a new light machine gun to replace the Browning M1919A4. It was to be shorter and lighter than the Browning, and was not to […]

Origins of Constant Recoil: The Ultimax Mk3 (feat. Mae & a Yeti)

October 19, 2019 Ian McCollum 45

This is Lot 2052 in the upcoming October 2019 Morphy Extraordinary auction. The Ultimax light machine gun was developed by James Sullivan for the Singaporean military, and it is the first mass-production machine gun to […]

Before the Lewis Gun was the McClean Automatic Rifle

October 18, 2019 Ian McCollum 24

This is Lot 1158 in the upcoming October Morphy Extraordinary auction. Samuel McClean was a medical doctor from Iowa who began tinkering with firearms designs in 1889, and formed the McClean Arms Company in 1896. […]

Shooting the AuSTEN MkI – Not Actually So Bad!

October 16, 2019 Ian McCollum 14

This is Lot 1019 in the upcoming October Morphy Extraordinary auction. I have read much about the Australian dislike for the Austen submachine gun, but until now I never had the chance to actually try […]