Quotulatiousness

September 24, 2020

PIAT: Britain’s Answer to the Anti-Tank Rifle Problem

Filed under: Britain, History, Military, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 25 Nov 2017

Sold for $3,163.

The British began World War Two with the Boys antitank rifle, but like all antitank rifles it rather quickly became obsolete. The replacement for it was adopted in 1942 as the PIAT – Projector, Infantry, Anti-Tank. This was a unique sort of weapon which fired a 3 pound (~1.35kg) hollow charge projectile using a combination of a massive spring and a firing charge much like a rifle grenade blank cartridge — a spigot mortar, really. The large (3.25″, 83mm) projectile was able to defeat almost any tank that would be developed during the war, as it could burn through 3-4 inches of hardened armor. However, it had a terrifyingly short effective range — 110 yards on paper and more like 50 yards in practice.

The PIAT would recock itself upon firing, but the initial cocking was something like a crossbow, requiring the shooter to brace their feet on the buttplate and pull the body of the weapon upwards, compressing the 200 pound (90kg) mainspring. When fired, the weapon has a pretty harsh recoil, although it did not have any flash or backblast like the American Bazooka did. By the end of the war more 115,000 PIATs had been made, and they would serve the British military into the 1950s, when they were replaced with more traditional rocket launchers.

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September 21, 2020

The Iconic “Burp Gun” – Shooting the PPSh-41

Filed under: History, Military, Russia, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 16 Dec 2017

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The Soviet PPSh-41 submachine gun is most distinctive for its very high rate of fire — approximately 1250 rounds/minute — and large drum magazine. What may come as a surprise to those who have not tried it is how this very high rate of fire does not actually make the weapon difficult to control or hold on target. In fact, the PPSh-41 is an easier SMG to shoot effectively than the later PPS-43, at least in my opinion.

The Soviets and the Germans made quite different choices in magazines and rate of fire with the PPSh and the MP40, but both turned out to be very good submachine guns. The glaring weak point of the PPSh are its magazines, and the difficulty in finding a drum that would run reliably in this particular example is why today’s shooting session is done with one of the 35-round stick magazines instead.

Thanks to Marstar for letting me examine and shoot their PPSh-41!

If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow

September 18, 2020

Germany’s Not-So-Light 5cm LeGrW 36 Light Mortar

Filed under: Germany, History, Military, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 2 Sep 2018

Sold for $18,400

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The 5cm 5CM Leichter Granatwerfer 36 was the standard German light infantry mortar going into World War Two. It was designed by Rheinmetall-Borsig in the mid 1930s and adopted in 1936. It fired a 0.9kg / 2 pound mortar bomb with a range of up to 550 meters. In theory, it occupied the same role as the French Mle 1937 50mm light mortar — except it was far heavier than was practical, and substantially more complex to use. The LeGrW 36 weighed in at a hefty 31 pounds (14kg) – nearly four times as much as its French counterpart.

It was a striker fired design, with a trigger lever and thus did not fire immediately upon a round being loaded. It used adjustments in angle to determine range, with a constant projectile velocity (as opposed to venting a varying amount of propellent gas to adjust range). By the middle of the war, it was being pulled out of front-line use, as its weight and relative complexity made it impractical for its intended role.

If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow

September 15, 2020

France’s Super-Light 50mm Modele 37 Grenade Launcher

Filed under: France, History, Military, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 1 Sep 2018

Sold for $1,725

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A new very light and portable mortar to replace the V-B rifle grenade was one of the facets of the French plan for rearmament and modernization after World War I. The concept for the weapons that would become the L.Gr. Mle 37 was first requested in 1924 — but like so almost all the other parts of that arms program, it was crippled by delays through the 1920s and 1930s. Only in the late 1930s when war was looking imminent did the program finally move forward.

The design, created by Captain Nahan of the Chatellerault arsenal, was adopted in 1937 and a whopping 21,950 were ordered in January of 1938 — and the order was quickly revised up to 50,000. However, only 2900 had been produced by the time of the armistice in June 1940. Production resumed in 1944, and the launcher did see use in Indochina. In addition, its 50mm grenade was the basis for the postwar French rifle grenades, as used on the MAS-36 LG 48, the MAS-44, and MAS-49 rifles. As fired from the mortar, the projectile weighed about one pound (0.4kg) and had a range of 80 to 460 meters, with an effective rate of fire up to 20 rounds per minute.

If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow

September 12, 2020

Shooting the ZB-26: A Jewel of an Interwar Light Machine Gun

Filed under: Europe, Germany, History, Military, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 27 Oct 2017

Sold for $34,500 (transferrable).

Today we have a chance to do some shooting with a ZB-26, a German-occupation 8mm light machine gun made at Brno in Czechoslovakia. The ZB-26 does not get nearly as much attention as LMGs made by the better known powers during the war, but it is an excellent weapon. In addition to being adopted by the Czech military, the gun was sold to about two dozen other countries and used in significant numbers by the Waffen SS.

As one would expect form its reputation, the ZB was smooth, reliable, and very controllable. For all the reasons discussed in yesterday’s history and disassembly video [here], it is a top notch firearm.

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September 10, 2020

Could a Tankgewehr Really Take Out a British MkIV Tank?

Filed under: Germany, History, Military, Weapons, WW1 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 6 May 2017

The Tankgewehr antitank rifle was developed by the Mauser company and adopted by the Imperial German military as an emergency measure to counter the introduction of tanks to the WW1 battlefield. The question is, did they really work? Could a 13.2mm AP bullet from a Tankgewehr really perforate the armor of a British tank? Well today we find out!

The armor on a British tank was steel plate of 6mm, 8mm, and 12mm thickness, through-hardened to Brinell 440-480. We have replicated this with a plate of AR450 (ie, Brinell 450) armor, which we will be shooting at a distance of 50 yards. The ammunition we are using is original 1918 production German AP, and the rifle is a Tankgewehr captured by Allied troops late in the war and brought home as a souvenir.

This video was only made possible with help from three very helpful folks:

MOA Targets provided the steel (and on short notice!): https://www.moatargets.com

Mike Carrick of Arms Heritage Magazine provided use of the T-Gewehr: https://armsheritagemagazine.com

Hayes Otoupalik provided the original ammunition: http://www.hayesotoupalik.com

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If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow

September 8, 2020

British Cabin Pressure Flare Pistols (Quite Unusual)

Filed under: Britain, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 8 Oct 2018

https://www.forgottenweapons.com/brit…

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Signal flares were an important communications tool for aircraft during World War Two, and a multitude of flare pistol types exist with mounting brackets for aerial use. The introduction of pressurized fuselages made this a much more difficult proposition, however. These two flare pistols were designed by the British to maintain the pressurized seal of an aircraft body while still allowing firing and reloading through a pivoting mount and system of seals. I bet you haven’t seen something quite like these before!

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754

If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow

September 5, 2020

Chinese 7.62mm Sten Gun

Filed under: Cancon, China, History, Military, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 13 May 2020

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During World War Two, Canada supplied some 73,000 Sten guns (made by the Long Branch arsenal) to Chinese Nationalist forces in an effort to help them fight the Japanese. These Stens were standard MkII pattern guns, chambered for the 9x19mm Parabellum cartridge. However, many of these were eventually converted to 7.62mm Tokarev ammunition, especially after the victory of the Communist forces over the Nationalists. The conversion involved a new barrel and new magazine and magazine well. The 7.62mm barrels were typically longer than the original ones, and the magazine of choice was that of the PPS-43. Some were done by installed a magazine adapter into the original magazine well, and some (like this one) were done by cutting off the original magazine well and replacing it with a new one. In addition, some Sten guns were made domestically in China, both in 9mm and 7.62mm. The 7.62mm Tokarev cartridge was popular both from Russian pistols and submachine guns and also from China’s long military use of the dimensionally-identical 7.63mm Mauser cartridge in C96 pistols.

Many thanks to the Royal Armouries for allowing me to film and disassemble this interesting submachine gun! The NFC collection there — perhaps the best military small arms collection in Western Europe — is available by appointment to researchers:

https://royalarmouries.org/research/n…

You can browse the various Armouries collections online here:

https://royalarmouries.org/collection/

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N. Oracle #36270
Tucson, AZ 85740

September 2, 2020

Luger Model 1902 Carbine

Filed under: Germany, History, Weapons — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 2 Sep 2016

Failed to sell at auction.

With the advent of successful self-loading pistols, one of the additional markets that many companies tried to appeal to was the compact carbine. Self-loading rifles in proper rifle cartridges would not be developed as quickly as the pistols because their much greater chamber pressures represented a more difficult engineering problem. However by simply attaching a stock and long barrel to a pistol, many ambitious manufacturers hoped to sell a weapon as a sporting carbine. These were done by DWM with the Luger, as well as Mauser’s C96, Mannlicher 1894 pistol, and many others.

Model 1902 was the designation of the major batch of commercially made Luger carbines, although there were several small batches of prototypes prior. Only a couple thousand were made, and they ultimately took quite a long time to all sell — it turned out this type of firearm was simply not very popular for its cost. The same story was true with the other contemporary pistol-carbines — none would be very successful. DWM did make another group of carbines in the 1920s, although those were made from various leftover parts and are both not as nice as the original 1902 guns (which were mostly made in 1904 and 1905) and widely faked.

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August 29, 2020

Durs Egg Ferguson – The Rifle That Didn’t Shoot George Washington

Filed under: Britain, History, Military, USA, Weapons — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 27 Oct 2018

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Captain Patrick Ferguson was a British officer who designed and patented a breechloading rifle in 1776, which would actually see service in the American Revolution at the Battle of Brandywine. Ferguson presented two rifles to the British military for consideration, one of them being this specific gun. In a shooting demonstration on a windy, rainy day he convinced the Board of Ordnance of the viability of his rifle, and a field trials was set in motion. One hundred Ferguson rifles were made for the Crown, and Ferguson was detached from his regiment to be given command of a company of specially trained elite riflemen. His men were drilled in accurate shooting as well as use of the bayonet, they were organized in small groups to make use of cover and concealment, and they were fitted with green uniforms to blend into the terrain. This unit deployed to the American colonies in 1777, and saw action in the Battle of Brandywine.

Unfortunately for Ferguson and his ideas, the unit didn’t make any particularly notable impact on the battle, although not by any fault of their own. Worse, Ferguson was wounded, and because the unit was so heavily dependent on him it was disbanded while he recuperated. He did see service again at the Battle of King’s Mountain, where he was killed in action. This particular Ferguson rifle was made by the noted London gunsmith Durs Egg, and is one of the two guns presented to the Board of Ordnance that began the whole series of events.

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754

If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow

August 26, 2020

London-Made Lorenzonis Repeating Flintlocks

Filed under: Britain, History, Weapons — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 26 Aug 2016

Sold for $28,750 (for the pair).

A 7-shot repeating handgun before cartridges had been invented? Yep, long before. These two pistols are London-made examples of the Lorenzoni system, in which a gun was made with internal magazines of powder and projectiles and a rotating central loading spindle like a modern reloading powder throw. By rotating a lever on the left side of pistol 180 degrees and back, a shooter could load a ball into the chamber, load powder behind it, recock the action, prime the pan, and close the frizzen all in one automated sequence.

This system originated with a German gunsmith named Kalthoff in the mid 1600s, but it was an Italian by the name of Lorenzoni who made it more practical and began building pistols of the type. Lorenzoni is the name that has been generally applied to the system as a result. These two were made by a gunsmith named Glass in London in the mid 1700s — in those days of hand-made firearms, ideas and systems like this would slowly spread and be adopted by craftsmen who were capable of producing them and thought they could find an interested market for them.

The Lorenzoni system offered unmatched repeating firepower for its time, but was hampered by its complexity. Only a very skilled gunsmith could build a reliable and safe pistol of the type, and this made them very expensive.

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August 23, 2020

Variations of the .455 Webley Fosbery Automatic Revolver

Filed under: Britain, History, Military, Weapons — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 17 Apr 2020

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These are lots #558, 559, 1585, 1586, 3535, and 3536 in the upcoming RIA Premier Auction. It was scheduled for April, but has been postponed — check their web site for upcoming Online Only auctions every month, though!

Today we are taking a look at the different variations in .455 caliber Webley-Fosbery automatic revolvers. The two main types are the Model 1901 and Model 1903 (the Model 1902 was the very rare .38 caliber version). The main change between the two is the change from a coil mainspring to a V mainspring, to improve reliability when dirty; done in response to British military testing. In addition the 1903 has an improved fire control mechanism, a lower hammer profile and a new cylinder removal system.

Within the Model 1903, there is also a change from a standard frame and cylinder to shortened versions of both. These changes occurred at about serial number 3350, in 1912. The shortened cylinder was made to fit the new Webley MkII ammunition, which was notably shorter than the MkI type — and a shorter cylinder reduced weight.

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Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N. Oracle #36270
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August 20, 2020

Nock 6 Barrel Flintlock

Filed under: Britain, History, Weapons — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 16 Nov 2016

Sold for $40,250.

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Henry Nock was a highly respected and very talented British gunsmith, who manufactured a wide variety of arms including military muskets for the British Army. He is probably best known on the internet for his 7-barreled volley gun (which fires all seven charges simultaneously), intended for naval ship boarding operations. This particular gun resembled that volley gun design, but is actually a self-priming flintlock pepperbox. Its cluster of 6 barrels is manually rotated, allowing the used to fire six separate shots before needing to reload. The priming mechanism and lock bear a remarkable similarity to the Collier repeating flintlocks, and it is suspected that this system was developed by Artemis Wheeler of the United States.

August 16, 2020

Collier Flintlock Revolvers

Filed under: Britain, History, Weapons — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 9 Nov 2016

Sold for:
First Pattern Musket: $51,750
Second Pattern Rifle: $46,000
Second Pattern Pistol: $63,250

Elisha Collier is probably the best-known name in flintlock revolvers — to the extent that any flintlock revolvers are well known. Because of the great cost and required skill to manufacture a functional repeating flintlock handgun without modern machine tools, these weapons were never common, but they were made by a number of gunsmiths across Europe. Collier and a fellow American gunsmith named Artemis Wheeler developed this particular type (the specific contributions of each party are not known), and Collier patented it in England in 1818. He proceeded to market the guns, which appear to have been made for him under contract by several high-end British gunsmiths (including Rigby and Nock).

Collier made three different basic types of guns. They share the main feature of a revolving cylinder which must be indexed manually between shots (seeing them while traveling in India was reportedly the inspiration for Samuel Colt’s idea to connect the mechanical functions of hammer and cylinder to invent the single action revolver). The first two patterns of Collier are flintlocks, differing in lock and cylinder design, as well as having slightly different mechanisms to self-prime. The third pattern was actually made as percussion guns, as Collier’s guns were being made right at the end of the flintlock period and the dawn of the percussion cap. In total, 350-400 guns were made, including 50-100 bought by the British military for use in India.

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August 13, 2020

Development of the Luger Automatic Pistol

Filed under: Germany, History, Military, Weapons, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 31 Oct 2016

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Lugers! there are approximately a gazillion different recognized varieties, because the pistol became so popular and iconic. And yet … they all kinda look the same, don’t they? (If you are a Luger collector, don’t answer that!) A great many (I daresay the significant majority) of the Luger variations are minor changes in production details. So, what was involved in the mechanical evolution of the Luger?

Not much, really — which is a testament to the talents of Georg Luger. He got the gun almost totally right on his first try. There are, however, two major variants of the Luger mechanically — the 1900 model and the 1906 model. In this video I will walk through the differences between these two, as well as the initial Borchardt pistol that Luger used as his starting point and a couple other relevant milestones (a Swiss trials gun and a transitional French trials gun). And since they are the most common of the military models, we will also take a quick look at the German Army, Navy, and Artillery models.

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