The E-series Garands were a series of prototypes made at Springfield Armory to test all sorts of different changes to the basic rifle design, from flash hiders to folding stocks. The M1E4 is a design that uses a new gas system developed by J.C. White in the 1930s, and adapted to the M1 by Earle Harvey (better known for his later work on the T25 rifle designed to replace the M1 after the war) in 1941. The was intended to remove the dog-leg bend from the operating rod to improve manufacturing efficiency. It is a gas expansion and cutoff system, and it was tested at Aberdeen in 1943.
The M1E4 did not pass initial testing, but the system was revisited in 1944 with some improvements as the M1E9. It is tested in 1945, but the war ends before development can be fully finished. However, Earle Harvey used the system in his T25, and it was also used in the T44 – which became the M14. The M1E4 here is the origin of the M14 (and M60) gas system.
Thanks to the Springfield Armory National Historic Site for giving me access to this truly unique specimen from their reference collection to film for you! Don’t miss the chance to visit the museum there if you have a day free in Springfield, Massachusetts:
https://www.nps.gov/spar/index.htm
JC White Gas-Operated Prototype: https://youtu.be/rXAmnoMR2aI
JC White Prototype LMG: https://youtu.be/ZHR_kDlEUrw
JC White Prototype Toggle-Locked Rifle: https://youtu.be/I6o4TW36dBc
So… Ian. Friend. Pal. Documentarian of arms…
Just how in the hell does this gas system design do anything at all to remove the dogleg in the operating rod? From what you’ve shown us here, that dogleg is still there, with its intrinsic force-bias to the right of the action, which either indicates that I don’t know what the term “dogleg” refers to, or… I dunno. Confusing as hell, TBH.
This has always been the downfall of the Garand and Garand-like weapons, to my eye. The force path is not straight; because of that, there’s a built-in torsion to the whole system that creates problems that a straight force path would have solved from the beginning.
It would probably have been a great idea to have a standard Garand stripped for disassembly alongside this one so we viewers could see the differences.
“(…)Documentarian(…)”
Mentioned in description Earle Harvey received US Patent 2582989 GAS PISTON FOR FIREARMS available at https://patents.google.com/patent/US2582989A where he envision that
…adapting this. actuating mechanism. to a series of different guns, or to similar guns firing different charges the major diameter of the piston and the diameter of the gas port remain constant. The effective piston area is adjusted to the requirements of a particular weapon by varying the diameter of the piston portion 24 and stem hole I5. Thus a number of weapons difiering widely in ballistic characteristics may be actuated by a gas cylinder assembly of which all basic physical dimensions excepting two may be identical in all cases…
Judging from what I’m seeing in the diagrams and reading in the description, Harvey’s goal was to have a single pattern of gas-piston system, with one set of standardized components, that would be used in all gas-operated weapons from lightweight carbines on up to (probably) Squad Automatic Weapons (BAR?) and (possibly) medium machine guns (gas-operated replacement for Browning M1917 or M1919?).
The only things that would be different on any of the above would be the cannelured rod sticking out of the front of the piston face (part 24) and the front plate with a hole for same (part 15). (I’m reading this as best I can while navigating his strange syntax and numerous typos.)
From what I see, the result would be rather like the variable gas system of the ZB26/Bren or the later FAL, except that the gas volume would be “set” for each individual type of weapon at the factory and not be changeable in the field. it would in essence be a “one size fits all” gas piston assembly with different pre-determined fixed settings for each weapon’s specific cartridge, breech pressure, and etc.
This would seem to have all the drawbacks of a variable gas system (complexity, etc.) and none of the advantages (unlike such variable systems, its “designed-in” inability to vary gas throughput to deal with environmental conditions, wear, different lots of ammunition with different powders, etc.).
In the end, you would have carbines with a larger and heavier gas system, rifles with a largely equal mass and dimension gas system, and SAWs or MMGs with lighter and physically smaller gas systems.
This would probably increase the weight of the carbine unacceptably, while probably making it more reliable in terms of cycling, particularly on full-auto.
It would seem to have little or no effect one way or the other on a purely semi-automatic full-caliber rifle.
It might lighten the SAW and MMG a bit, but I suspect it would not stand up to sustained full-auto cycling as well over time.
And as Kirk points out, the off-center operating rod issue is not mentioned at all.
Given extremely good QC on ammunition, this system might result in a better gas-operated GPMG than, say, the M60.
But a “One Gas Piston To Rule Them All” system?
No, I don’t think so.
clear ether
eon
I don’t have extensive experience with any other implementation of this design concept than with the M60 machinegun, but I’ll tell you this much: There are a lot of trade-offs with the concept, and I don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze.
Looking at this iteration of the design, I see that gas tube end cap and the first thing I think is “Yeah, they’re gonna want to safety-wire that bitch…”, because that threaded plug is going to vibrate itself loose and fall off. That’s what those things do, in the field. Even badly fouled ones do that, should the safety wire fail.
The other big question to be asked with anything like this is “Why? Why am I doing this in the design? Does it really gain me anything really necessary to the functioning of this weapon, or is it just “Nice to have…”?
Look at the AK47 family, to include the PK/PKM series. They’re all weapons with just about every single extraneous feature elided out or evolved away, and that’s why they’re so damn ubiquitous. You don’t see this sort of “Nice to have” engineering anywhere in any of them.
So, ask yourself: Why are we doing this? Is it necessary, or just an elegant bit of self-indulgence? Could the weapon function without it?
There are reasons that the AK family of weapons is considered “over-gassed”, and that’s because Kalishnikov eschewed “elegant”. He also didn’t worry about much past the question of “Does this work? Does it work under harsh conditions? It does? OK, good enough…”
Ideally, you want to have your weapons built to the Kalishnikov school of functionality, no matter what. Elegant just causes problems, and this is “elegance as applied in the wrong way to the wrong thing”.
You don’t need your gas system to be self-regulating. If you’re building a sporting rifle that you want to be able to function with everything from light varmint projectiles to heavy big game projectiles, with all sorts of loads? Yes, absolutely… Something like this idea is a good idea, and a good way to solve the problem.
Military application, where you’re firing military ammo of specific design? Tell me, why are you wasting time and machining effort on something like this? What’s the point? Do you need it, in most of your military use-cases?
I would submit that you do not. Go with Kalishnikov; his stuff works. See the difference between the M60 and the PKM, for examples.
Which is exactly why the AK type weapons became the default choice of the Third World.
When your army consists of at best semi-literate tribalists whose idea of making something work consists of kicking it, whacking it against a rock, and/or shrugging and saying “if Allah wills it, it will work”, your standard rifle ideally should be as rugged, mule-stupid and dumbass-proof as possible.
The Mauser bolt action fits this description. The Arisaka even more so. (FFS, the Mexican army used both of them right through Mexico’s “Revolution at 10, 2, and 4” era.)
No American rifle has ever really qualified. Every one we’ve had from the Krag on has required reasonable maintenance by soldiers and armorers with actual IQs.
(Before anybody starts in about the Springfield, they should go back and read Hatcher’s Notebook. He was very accurate about the Springfield rifle and the Lewis gun, and his words viz both will burn forever.)
It works for us because all joking aside, our soldiers are not semi-literate tribalists. Most of them are better-educated than the average Third World senior officer, even the 18-year-old buck private with a GED.
Well, it used to be that way. Looking at post-modern U.S. education, I’m seeing HS graduates who cannot read, write or even do basic math. Even compared to their teachers, I’m apparently a bloody Ph.D today. But I digress.
If you want a sophisticated, versatile IW or SAW or GPMG that can handle a wide variety of situations, you want a decently-educated, well-trained soldier operating and maintaining it. Somebody like what “Bandit-Six” described in The Last Centurion by John Ringo;
That is the difference between U.S. troops and just about everybody else’s from south of the equator and/or east of Suez.
GGA, today it may be the difference between a U.S. PFC and a typical European NATO country LCPL for all I know. Remember, I’m a civilian.
Also remember that as W.H.B. Smith once said, while American “boys” and “girls” in our halcyon past often learned to shoot before they learned to ride a bicycle (I know I did), most Third World soldiers never even see a small arm until their ruler hands them “a rifle, a uniform, and a demand for obedience”.
That may be the ideal for all governments “owned” by Fearless Leaders but it drastically reduces the effectiveness of the “end product”.
So you probably want to hand that “half-trained recruity” an AK. Just to be on the safe side.
cheers
eon
“(…)No American rifle has ever really qualified. (…)”
So… TRW LMR https://modernfirearms.net/en/assault-rifles/u-s-a-assault-rifles/trw-lmr-eng/ specifically created …for various pro-US (or anti-communist)movements in the third world countries… is actually unable to do that?
@ Daweo;
Yes. That’s exactly why it was rejected. It never lived up to the specification and in fact required more TLC than the M16A1 with M193 ball to keep functioning.
cheers
eon
true modularity
The principles that are being used here;
a metered amount of high pressure gas being fed into a cylinder,
a cut off operating after a short distance of piston travel,
then adiabatic expansion of that gas, to do work,
Were arguably worked out by Murdoch, then developed into working form and commercialised by his young friend, Richard Trevithick, in the last quarter of the 18th century, for steam engines.
Neither Murdoch nor Trevithick achieved the elegance of using the sleeve of a trunk piston to achieve both the metering and cut off.
Simple question; how difficult would it be to make a direct impingement action? Like Swedes did.
If I get what you’re asking properly, the issue with making a direct gas impingement system out of the Garand would be “Where does the gas go? And, how does it interact with the bolt locking mechanism?
The way the Garand is built, a top-mounted direct gas impingement system would be challenging to implement. You could do it, but then you’d have to figure out how to get that to act with a rotating bolt underneath it.
You put the gas impingement system underneath, then your issue is “Where’s the gas going…?”, because that’s going to be inside your stock at that point.
You want a gas impingement system in the Garand, you really want redesign the whole weapon to something along the lines of the Ljungman or MAS-44 family of rifles, something built around the idea. Rotating bolts, the way that Garand implemented them in the M1? Not easily done.
It’s a reasonable question, but I think the issues I point out above sort of explain why Garand stuck with a piston/operating rod design. You’re sort of forced into that with the way he chose the rotating bolt and implemented that.
Thanks
I had a MAS 49/56 in .308. No experience with the Garand.
The 49/56 was a good shooter and simple. But no rotating bolt, so I understand why it would be more difficult to mate to a direct impingement action.
I don’t think “rotating bolt” would be so much the problem as the Garand’s implementation of it. After all, the AR-10/15 work just fine with a modified direct-impingement gas system.
Garand was working from a set of blindered constraints, offered up by the Ordnance folks. They just knew, of course, what a rifle should look like. I’d wager that if Garand had offered up something like the AR-10, which didn’t fit any of the existing preconceived notions, then that would have been it for the whole program.
Even if it worked better.
The social aspects of the whole thing are really almost more important than the engineering ones. The information about how combat worked in those days just after and during WWI, but the ability to comprehend the implications and take appropriate action just wasn’t there.
I would lay you long odds that if you somehow managed a time machine, and went back to either pre-WWI or pre-WWII with the modern implementation and understanding of what they really needed for combat? You’d be either ignored, or laughed out of the briefing room.
Hell, I would lay long money on the idea that you could go back to 1930, set up the production and design infrastructure to allow full-scale production and use of something like an actual assault rifle/LMG combination, and you’d still play merry ‘effing hell getting anyone in authority to even entertain the idea of adoption.
This is currently being manifested as the NGSW program, wherein they’re basically recapitulating the rank and arrant stupidity of the M-14/7.62 NATO debacle.
The really interesting and complicated crap is, I will repeat, the cultural stuff over the engineering. The engineering is really trivial, compared to trying to convince the US military that they have misunderstood, at a fundamental level, how combat works in the modern age.
You pretty much just described the entire frigging design program debacle that resulted in the M14. It started in 1944 when Ordnance sent out a RfP for a new selective fire rifle which (to make a long story short) had most of the attributes of the German FG42. (under 8 lbs. weight, selective fire, open bolt on full-auto, closed bolt on semi, 20-round magazine, built-in bipod, and etc.)
Springfield and Remington got the nod and kept trying to redesign the M1 Garand to fit the parameters. (Which of course didn’t work.)
Earle Harvey took a look at what Ordnance was asking for, and came up with the T25 prototype.
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/m14-development/t25/
John C. Garand went even further with the T31;
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/t31-john-garands-bullpup/
And Springfield came up with the T33 in 1949;
https://smallarmsreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/header-95-768×198.jpg
All of the above were rejected by Ordnance. The T25 and T33 lost out because they “weren’t enough like the M1”, meaning they didn’t use the M1 action that Ord was firmly attached to.
And Garand’s T31 repelled Ord like a cross supposedly repels Vampyrs on the grounds that it “didn’t look like a rifle“, period. Ord were apparently in shock because the man who gave them the M1 had…come up with something that wasn’t even remotely an M1.
In the end of course, we ended up with that historic aberration known as the M14. Which incidentally had almost none of the attributes Ord had insisted on in 1944. (Look at an M14 and an FG42 side-by-side, you’ll see what I mean.)
So yes, there was no frigging way you could have “sold” an actual, modern AR design to Ord back then. It was tried, at Ord’s “request”, and every time Ord basically said, “But it’s not an M1 with extra sprinkles on top, go away.”
clear ether
eon
“(…)M1 with extra sprinkles on top(…)”
If you want that, then use ZK 420-S https://www.vhu.cz/samonabijeci-puska-zk-420-s/
which will provide you:
– enhanced accuracy
– detachable magazine
– bigger capacity (10)
– wider choice of cartridge type (presented specimen is 7,9 mm Mauser, following other are known to exists: 7,5 mm Swiss, 6,5 mm Scandinavian, 7,65 mm Mauser, 7×57 mm Mauser, 7,62×63 mm)
– ability to easily adjust gas system
a direct impingement Garand…
you’d probably end up with a female version of a kalashnikov bolt carrier
It would have to be something like that, and the resultant mechanical abortion would basically mean that you were building a Garand in name only…
If you wonder what Mikhail would change inside M1 rifle design wonder no more and look at Kalashnikov-Petrov carbine https://gunsforum.com/topic/1550-karabin-kalashnikova-i-petrova-kalashnikov-and-petrov-carbine/
(with catch that usage of intermediate cartridge was dictated by GAU, not decision of Mikhail or Petrov)
Great unknown stuff !!