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0:03:34 – Gun design standing on the shoulders of others
0:08:08 – Swiss adoption of the SIG P320
0:10:43 – High pressure cartridges, like 7mm Backcountry
0:13:46 – FRTs and SuperSafeties
0:17:55 – Is it hard for me to watch the gun mistakes in war movies?
0:18:48 – New .338 Magnum machine guns
0:22:13 – Where will the FN Mag and PKM be in 50 years? 100 years?
0:24:23 – My camo collection
0:27:07 – My thoughts on Project Grayburn (SA80 replacement)
0:29:14 – Why do Valmets not use Galil magazines?
0:31:20 – Plan to collaborate with C&Rsenal again?
0:32:22 – Can other modern MGs match the service life of the MG42 family?
0:33:47 – Why am I not in Discord?
0:34:36 – New gun owner feels overly cautious about gun handling
0:37:23 – What is my process for writing a book?
0:50:16 – Suomi converted to MP40 magazines?
0:52:24 – Porting and commentators in handguns
0:54:27 – Non-firearm videos?
0:55:10 – Overview of my filming equipment
1:01:11 – DeserTech quad-stank mags
1:03:29 – Why don’t we have more P90-style magazines?
ZB-47 video: https://youtu.be/TYVSe6s8kGE
1:06:04 – How would I market the Grot?
1:08:10 – Headstamp AK book with Max Popenker
1:11:23 – Correcting information in the NFA registry
1:13:50 – Engineering considerations for bayonet mounting?
1:15:24 – What gun do I want from Santa?
1:16:30 – What constitutes a “collection”?
1:18:53 – What’s the deal with 1,000 meter iron sights on old rifles?
1:21:43 – Plans to cover more Norwegian arms?
1:22:02 – Why did .30 Super Carry fizzle out?
1:24:24 – Book on the Auto-5?
https://amzn.to/492imcc
1:25:15 – Book on the Lee Enfield?
https://amzn.to/498cdv4
1:26:30 – Book on Japanese rifles?
https://amzn.to/4pRVW4M
1:28:19 – Book on the technical details of firearms tolerancing and heat treating?
“(…)Suomi converted to MP40 magazines?(…)”
III Reich did find way to feed Maschinenpistole 717 (r) https://firearmcentral.fandom.com/wiki/Maschinenpistole_717_(r) which was available to them, namely 7,63x25mm Mauser cartridge (which was close enough to 7,62 mm pattern 1930 cartridge to cycle said weapon).
Note that whilst Koskinen is possibly most recognized as SUOMI magazine, there were also other: coffin 50 and box-20. These were more rectangular in shape and might be mistaken with M.P.38u.40 magazines if manual inspection is impossible (e.g. intelligence gathered from photographs).
Reference the question asked about “Where will the M240 and PKM be in…” and “Can other guns match the MG42 service life…”
First, I think any predictions made right now are going to be overcome by events surrounding drones. I’m not even sure that there’s going to be scope for small arms above individual weapons, and those are possibly going to be limited to last-ditch self-defense. If you’re fielding a killer drone fleet at a ratio of ten drones to every enemy infantryman, weeeeeelll… I’m not putting any money into the opposing side’s insurance fund. Bad investment, that.
Where it all winds up is still up in the air, and we’re still in the “FA” round, yet to reach “FO”. That being said, it’s entirely possible that the classic belt-fed MG we all know and love is DOA as a tactical tool. Possible; not certain. I could see the entire role being eliminated, but if they can come up with good countermeasures for the drones, maybe not.
As to the lifespan of the MG42, what you’re really asking here is which vision of “how to use a machinegun” lasted the longest. With the adoption of the MG5, I think we can safely say that the German military has totally forgotten everything it ever knew about machineguns that differed from the Allied school. The rate of fire that the majority of modern “theorists” identify as a deficiency actually had a damn good reason for existing that the majority of idjit-class commentators simply don’t understand. The entire point was to get as many projectiles into a beaten zone as far away as possible, in the shortest time: No more, no less. You did that because you wanted to kill everything you could around those fleeting glimpses that you got of the enemy, and that was why the Germans were specifying 1500-1800rpm for the successor to the MG42. They had their reasons, and I tend to agree with them. From a tripod, shooting at max range, that consideration is critical to delivering good effect.
Ideally, you’d have a means of lowering the rate of fire for LMG use out to about 600m from the bipod, but if you can only have the one, optimize for long-range killing.
The MG42 and MG3 were built in accordance with the German school of machinegunnery. Since they have abandoned that school, well… Here we are. Due to the inimical effect of NATO’s tendency to demand homogenity, the German school is probably dead. Sadly.
Because of that, the guns built supporting the entirely inadequate “rest of NATO” doctrines will go on for as long as machineguns are a thing.
So… Yeah. The real question is “Will the doctrine last?”, not how long the guns will be on issue. I think there was probably a lot of room for the Germans to have designed something along the lines of the SIG 710-3 that would have plugged right into their existing doctrine base, but they obviously did not want to do that, so here we are at the inglorious end of German machinegun philosophy.
Personally, if I were to win the lottery tomorrow, I’d spend a bunch of money doing the research in all the archives, tease out the interwar work that was done, along with all the rest, and try to create a bit of a renaissance in machinegunnery. I know the material is out there, it’s just that nobody really cares to bother looking for it, or trying to understand it. The US Army, for example? Never really recognized that the Germans had a “thing” going; none of the supposed technical intelligence on the MG34/42 family ever seemed to get anything about those guns right, especially with regards to doctrine and usage.
If I win the lottery, I will fund you, to fund them; needs doing. Thats a fact. Alot of stuff does really, especially now with these flying… Menaces. Everything has changed; saw a picture recently of somewhere in Ukraine – A village covered in a (Spiders web) it appeared; drone, fibre optic cables, it transpired.
I read a Flashman novel when I was younger; wolves, snow, some fit bird… Sounded very “Russian” the Crimea. Crimean War etc, bit Russian that part of the world probably. I doubt what has happened. Can or will be judged, as being a good idea, going forward, in regards how it developed – Culmanating in, the inevitable, now, accordingly. Sig Spear rounds, might be some scope for dual mags, switch between mags. Maybe an Fg42 platform could assist with this, as a layout 20/30 one side, 10 spears the other… Going to need them with China probably, I mean that Taiwan place looks, a bit at risk; if ever there was a need for some sort of potential advantage…
“And before any Wlod appolgists appear; well if you could get any of your own to stay and fight for you now, you having had the majority slaughtered in a pointless offensive on Russia (Doubtless advised upon by some British tit in a cocked hat, who can’t get anyone to fight for their own army anymore, incidentally.) – But no. So do everyone a favour sign a peace deal and feck off to Haifa.” Fact. Cause – Rona, the world went mental, move on.
And talking about the Sa80 if there was one thing it spawned that was any good, it was the Lsw. Now. What, if they thought about it “In Britains, seemingly wanting… Cocked hat world of tits.” Could they do with that. Nothing? About sums you lot up, no wonder we can’t even field a merchant Navy ship (Important that isn’t it, really. For everthing else.) 7.62mm That mofo, Bren 7.62mm mags. Much better platform – Instill fear, into our enemy. Every other fecker blasting them. Reloads, I’m reloading, give it to them.
“Fear!” Aye, as they will hit, much more.
Oh and sort of brutal, compared to here… Russians…
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=RD8mGBaXPlri8&playnext=1&si=1EvV2nCmnTLqsIAi Loads of Gingers in Russia “You want to check Porn hub” seemingly like, alot of Scots, gingers… Anyway lets hope they sort it all out between them; or some of it – Jesus’s birthday afterall.
Merry Christmas! Bit of sort porn there, you have a nice day. Christmas day, god bless… Each and everyone, on this Jesus’s birthday!!! Like YAY!! Party. Yay!!
Problem with .30 SC is that’s a locked breech, high pressure, ammo.
Being a locked breech ammo, any pistol in .30SC will be a converted 9mm gun (because id doesn’t make sense to design a gun exclusively in .30 SC). So, the only advantage will be some more round in the magazine.
Had it been a “8mm Roth Steyr Magnum”, a round more powerful than .380 ACP, with a reduced diameter (so with more rounds in the magazine), but still usable in a simple blowback gun, it would have had some chance.
Hallelujah!
Also factor in economics at the macro level. Downturns, especially global ones, are a bad time to introduce “boutique” small-arms calibers, or indeed “boutique” anything.
The early 1980s downturn put paid to 9mm Federal. The early 90s one put the kibosh on .40 S&W. And so on.
There’s also perceived need to consider. Anybody wanting a locked-breech pistol with 9 x 19mm or .45 ACP ballistics and especially muzzle energy would likely go for something in one of those two calibers. Someone wanting more ME would likely tend toward 10mm in an autoloader or .357 Magnum in a revolver.
.30 SC failed for pretty much the same reason .40 Short & Weak did. It didn’t offer anything the user couldn’t get in a more easily obtained, widely available, and less expensive ($/rd) cartridge.
Confession; I was involve in the statistical analysis that led to .40 S&W. The problem was, I and other analysts were advocating for .357 160-grain ballistics, which .40 S&W could deliver without resorting to 9 x 19mm +P pressures- and wrecking Beretta M92s. The FBI wanted essentially a .45 ACP 185-grain medium velocity target load, i.e. a .38-40 WCF, to “make training easier”. Meaning, their agents were intimidated by the muzzle signature and recoil of the 4″ .357 with 125-grain JHP at full velocity; they wanted something “easier to shoot”, never mind results or lack of same at the receiving end. In the end, the Bureau won and everybody else lost interest. Moral; the bureaucracy always wins.
As for rounds between .380 ACP and 9 x 19mm in a blowback, I give you 9 x 18mm Ultra. Which was basically a ballistic reiteration of 9 x 20SRmm Browning aka “9mm Browning Long” that didn’t even sell to European police. Its Russian analogue, 9 x 18mm Makarov, only sold because the State ordered it and the Army saluted and said “Yes, Comrade Commissar” as per SOP.
That said, 9 x 18Mak is actually a pretty good service cartridge, working in simple blowback actions with ballistics and energy approximating standard-velocity .38 Special 158-grain RNL of the 1960s. If somebody offered me something like an FEG PA-63 in 9 x 18mm and a thousand rounds of ammunition for a reasonable price, I’d take it before they came to their senses.
As with anything else in commerce, it’s no good going after a perceived gap in the existing product lines. First and foremost, make sure the gap is real, then ask yourself why it’s there.
Nine times out of ten, the answer is that the things “either side” of it get the job done without “over-specialization”.
That’s as true of cartridges as it is of cars. Ask Dodge about the 1982-84 Rampage pickup sometime.
clear ether
eon
@eon,
You speak great wisdom.
I would, however, like to point out that a huge component of what goes into “commercially/militarily successful” has far more to do with human idiocy and politics than it has to do with much of anything else.
8mm Lebel, for example? WTF? Why? Just… Why, for the love of God and all that is holy?
Likewise the weird factoid that everyone agrees that a 6.5-6.8 bore diameter gives you really good ballistics, but… Nobody away from the periphery ever adopted any such thing, successfully.
The Germans? They had Mauser’s incredibly successful and highly praised 7X57 Mauser. What did they do? Oh, yeah… This residual from the abortion that was the Commission Rifle, the 7.92X57. Granted, they were developed at about the same time, but Spanish service showed the superiority of the smaller projectile, among many others.
I honestly think that cartridge popularity is mostly a crap shoot, and a huge one at that. Stuff that should have succeeded just doesn’t, and stuff that does succeed rarely does so on the technical merits. I mean, why on earth did 9mm Parabellum get so big, when in fact it’s not all that great a cartridge? I’d put 9mm up there with 5.56mm NATO, in that it’s small enough to get nasty opinions, but not big enough to emphatically shut people up, while still demonstrably just working.
The other factor that has to be taken in would be that the surrounding matrix of fact has to be aligned just right. Case in point, along the lines of your Dodge Rampage: Examine the much-loathed Pontiac Aztek, while doing a quick compare/contrast with the beloved Honda Ridgeline, which is basically a reskinning of the Aztek concept with Honda guts. When the Aztek came out, it was to near-universal disdain and ridicule; given a few years, the Ridgeline is lauded as the perfect vehicle for those who don’t need a truck every day.
@Kirk,
Aztek had the same problems as the early-model Chevy Lumina minivan. (Truth in Advertising; I used to own one of the latter.)
First, in crowing about its use of non-metallics (i.e. plastics), they made a bunch of things out of “plastics” that should never have been made so. Like the working parts inside the doors. Rustproof plastic door and body panels? Excellent idea. Plastic window mechanisms? Bad idea. Plastic door lock mechanisms? Incredibly bad idea. The parts that ended up failing most frequently, especially on Lumina.
And then there was the glass. That strange angled, almost Bauhaus-looking backlight on the Aztek and the huge windscreen of the Lumina. Both looked exotic; the Lumina’s windscreen combined with its body resulted in something that looked like a 24th Century Starfleet shuttlecraft. Paint it white and put that red stripe and little gold chevron on each side, you’d see what I mean.
But those two pieces of glass were insurance adjusters’ nightmares. Easily broken, and not just in accidents; Aztek backlights often shattered if the hydraulics closed the tailgate too hard, and the Lumina’s windscreen often fractured due to expansion in hot weather, especially in the southern states. Both were hugely expensive to replace, often costing more than just replacing the entire vehicle after a few years’ depreciation.
Also, talking about southern exposures, those huge expanses of glass turned the vehicles into Easy-Bake Ovens on sunny days, and the air-conditioning couldn’t keep up, resulting in breakdowns. Pets and children left in the were in danger from heat, more so than most such vehicles.
The giant plastic “dashboard” of the Lumina, with age, “glossed” enough to reflect sunlight up into the windscreen and right into the driver’s eyes. Talk about a safety hazard; sunny winter days made driving a Lumina to the mall an adventure most people would rather not have.
The later model Luminas had radically redesigned front ends, looking more like the old ChevyVan 30, but by then the damage to the brand was done.
The Aztek really couldn’t be redesigned. It was what it was. That’s why it died along with the Pontiac brand name.
They were both examples of 1990s theories of “futuristic” design. And ended up in the same category as the Gyrojet in the 1960s.
As for the 8mm Lebel, it’s even more difficult to explain than 0.303in Enfield. Granted, it was designed for a tubular-magazine feed (hence the annulus in the casehead to catch the tip of the next round in line and keep it away from the primer), but exactly why the Lebel had a tubular magazine in the first place (the Vitali and Lee box magazines were already in use) is even harder to explain.
Similarly, exactly why .300 Savage was chosen as the basis for what became 7.62 x 51mm NATO has never been adequately explained, other than Ordnance insisting on “.30-06 performance” in the T-47 and later automatic rifles. The .25 Remington would have been a far better choice. So would 6.5 x50SRmm Arisaka for that matter, except for its odd taper and semirim.
Fun fact; a Type 38 in 6.5 x 50SRmm can easily be rebored and rifled to .308in, and then rechambered to .308 Winchester. The dimensions of the 6.5 chamber are small enough that rechambering to .308 cleans it up perfectly, and the rim diameter/thickness are nearly identical, so even the extractor and ejector don’t generally need alterations. The result actually was one of the nicer “sporterized” jobs way back when, as the highly practical drum safety required no alterations for scope mounting.
Design is more of an art than a science, no matter what is being “designed”.
And “artists” aren’t necessarily always practical. Their “visions” often get in the way of actually seeing.
cheers
eon
The 1982-84 Rampage pickup is a brilliant example. The question one keeps asking is ‘Why?’ I knew a gentle in Juneau who said he realized he had a drinking problem after he bought one.
The 1991-93 Nissan NX is another example. As an “entry-level” sports coupe it made some kind of sense. Then they remade it into a switch-roof wonder that could be a sports coupe or a sports wagon depending on which rear window assembly you snapped on it.
Car thieves, especially chop-shop “employees”, loved that switch-roof version. Stealing them was literally a snap if you knew where the release clips were (and every car booster from Long Island to Lompoc did).
They didn’t steal them to resell. They stole them to strip for parts to sell, since the NX had the same mechanics as almost every other Nissan product.
The NX was the car booster’s equivalent of AutoZone or Advance Auto Parts. One stop shopping, open 24/7, no payment required.
There’s a reason it only lasted two and a half model years.
clear ether
eon
Regarding the discussion of .30SC in a blowback action, its is worth condidering that hipoint did indeed manage to pull it off, in both pistol and carbine form. Granted, this pistol was (as per usual) heavy enough to beat a charging rihno to death with, but as far as I know the carbine worked fairly well. That said, since both used single stack magazines, the increase in capacity was minimal.
Every round can be shoot by a blowback action.
When is stated “shootable by a simple blowback action” its implied “without weight disadvantages”. 😉
The level of power that makes this possible in pistol rounds is that of the 9mm Browning Long / 9mm Glisenti / 9mm Ultra (9mm Makarov being a tad lower).
.380 ACP +P is sometimes at the same level, but it’s not an official CIP or SAAMI spec (contrary to 9mm Parabellum +p). It’s simply the round manufacturer saying “I load the round as hot as I want” and, as a consequence, only a pair of pistol manufacturers allow the use of .380 ACP +P in their guns.
And, being 9mm, those rounds have not dimensional advantages over 9mm Parabellum (9mm Browning Long is even longer, and semi-rimmed).
8mm Roth Steyr has practically the same power than the three above, in the same length than 9mm Parabellum (even a tad shorter), with a straight walled and rimless case. Pressure is higher than 9mm Ultra (2100 bar vs. 1800) but, due to the smaller base surface, the recoil impulse should be a tad lower, so it should be shootable in a simple blowback gun.
Coal you know, Nazi Germany tried using it in last ditch jet plane “Things” wonder if you could drone that… Being serious, squished pyamid shape body, upper a bbq, aye. Above a wing, which looks like the top “Triangle” of said pyramid, drop the lot from a height, make the top wing of some sort of ceramic… Pot “Good at taking heat” lower pyramid = bomb, heater for bbq, I know… Drop, air forced under top wing, forces bbg heated air out of back thrust. Essentially a fuel assisted, propelled glide bomb, point; depends.
Aye so a wing above, a gap, below a bbq grill charcoal, coal something, that is the top side of the lower pyramid, in the lower portion, heater for coal thing, below bomb etc. Why… Er… Drone launched, devices as oppose the drone being the device; glide bomb lark, increased range out of shoot downy’ness range. Along those lines. Overall, it looks like a flatish pyramid.
Above a ceramic wing. Drop. Point, depends… Don’t know have to make wee ones, from the smallest drone, to bigger ones, for the biggest. And something in-between. Thrust point originally, was something cheap and air, as far as I can gather. The hot air is thrust, seemingly.
Possibly make the entire thing out of pot, the Chinese just made a concrete missile. What I would say to Wlod, is our last election = Result, worst government ever. Why? Couldn’t have been folk not voting for the Tories as they don’t want to get smoked by Russia. 2nd nobody joining the forces, couldn’t be YOU again could it, you with folk not wanting WANTING to get smoked by Russia. So think on, never mind what Estonia says. They don’t we have know. In time, we will rebuild some factories, as of now we have none. You used all of everyone in Europes stocks. Sign that deal.
Pot smoking. As that old guy says .45 somebody. THATS WAS YOU, with that offensive. Or probably, more likely… Us, Britain wasn’t it. General Melchitt.
And whats the worlds best gun? A Ppsh with a Pps mag well and Nagant folding bayonet.
“(…)Chinese just made a concrete missile(…)”
As I do not following recent development in missilery in said country I need further details w.r.t. said development.
“(…)Nagant folding bayonet.”
Said utensil was not standard equipment of Model 1895 revolver. What do you mean exactly by that?
“(…)smallest drone, to bigger ones, for the biggest. And something in-between(…)”
If you need similar-shaped UAV of different size then use Lockheed Martin NOMAD https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/sikorsky-nomad.html
“(…)increased range(…)”
Are you sure “bbq grill charcoal” as fuel is best choice in terms of propulsive energy extracted from each 1 kg of said fuel?
“(…)pyamid shape body(…)”
If you need tetrahedon-shaped flying machine then use Armstrong-Whitworth Waverider see 5th image from top at https://military-exotic.blogspot.com/2024/04/armstrong-whitworth-waverider-1958-1960.html