Machine Guns - Forgotten Weapons

Vintage Saturday: Short-Lived Nation

August 6, 2016 Ian McCollum 135

The Republic of Biafra was supported by Czechoslovakia during its brief existence, and the men here are equipped with a Czech ZB-53 machine gun and what appears to be a CZ-47 or CZ-247 submachine gun.

M1915 Villar Perosa Video

August 5, 2016 Ian McCollum 39

The Villar Perosa is one of the first small machine guns developed and used by a military force. It was designed in Italy and introduced in 1915 as an aircraft weapon, to be used in […]

W.A.R. – the Winchester Automatic Rifle

August 1, 2016 Ian McCollum 30

With the failure of the G30M and G30R to lead to any military orders (American or otherwise), the Winchester company took the advice of the Ordnance Department to scale the design up to an automatic […]

Semiauto RPD Light Machine Gun (Video)

July 13, 2016 Ian McCollum 67

The RPD was the first belt-fed light machine gun (or squad automatic weapon) developed by the Soviet Union. It was designed in 1944 for the then-new M43 cartridge (7.62x39mm), although wartime exigencies followed by post-war […]

Q&A #5: Rollin White and Other (Better) Designers

June 28, 2016 Ian McCollum 51

Questions in part I of today’s Q&A: 1:04 – What was Rollin White’s revolver like? 7:09 – Why did pan magazines disappear? 10:14 – Why no pointed pistol bullets? 13:24 – Funky rounds like Trounds […]

Belgian soldier smokes a cigarette during a fight between Dendermonde and Oudegem Belgium in 1914.

Vintage Saturday: Smoke Break

May 28, 2016 Ian McCollum 54

This is a really good photo of a Belgian Maxim, although it appears to be staged – the man has his thumbs on the trigger, but there does is not ammo belt in the gun.

Vintage Saturday: Liberators

May 14, 2016 Ian McCollum 45

This is a pretty widely-published photo, but it sure is a good one. It also shows very clearly the US’ horrible excuse for a backpack of the time. For the record, the soldier on the […]

BSA 1926 & 1929 Thompson SMGs

May 11, 2016 Ian McCollum 35

In the early days of the Thompson Submachine Gun, the Auto-Ordnance Company was looking for customers globally. General John Thompson had personally run a demonstration of the gun in England in June of 1921, which […]

RIA: Thompson T2 Submachine Gun Prototype

April 26, 2016 Ian McCollum 46

The T2 submachine gun was Auto-Ordnance’s entry into the ongoing competition to replace the classic Thompson submachine gun with something more economical to produce. It was a closed-bolt, select-fire design using a progressive trigger and […]

Yugoslav 8mm Chauchat M1915/26 Photos

March 25, 2016 Ian McCollum 42

Reader Mihajlo sent me a couple cool photos of Yugoslav troops with Chauchats converted to 8x57mm. Here’s his commentary: Here’s a picture from WW2 Yugoslavia I’d like to share with you. The guy on the […]