Thanks to Milkor USA, I have a chance today to do some shooting with both the M32 and M32A1 rotary grenade launchers they make for the US military. I’m using 40mm chalk training ammunition, with some steel targets at about 75-85 meters. In live fire, it’s quite clear how much of an improvement the M32A1 trigger is over its predecessor!
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on Shooting the Milkor M32 40mm Grenade Launcher
The USMC adopted the Milkor USA M32A1 rotary multiple grenade launcher (MGL) in 2012. The history of this weapon goes back to South Africa, where designer Andries Piek was inspired to create it after building the 37mm “Stopper” for the South African police and then seeing a Manville 25mm gas launcher in the movie Dogs of War. He created a 6-barrel 40mm launcher that was adopted by the South African military, and proved quite popular. It was adopted by other countries subsequently, and by the early 2000s a company bought rights to produce it in the United States – Milkor USA.
The original M32 version was used in small numbers by US SOCOM, and the updated M32A1 widely purchased by the US Marines. The A1 version has a shorter barrel and is generally strengthen, allowing it to fire medium-velocity grenades instead of just the low velocity loadings. This increased its effective range from 375m to 800m as well as allowing larger grenade payloads and increased effectiveness on target.
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on Milkor M32 and M32A1 40mm Grenade Launchers
Canada was the first country to formally adopt the FN FAL as its standard service rifle, and in 1958 it added the C2 light machine gun version of the FAL to its arsenal. The C2, later updated to C2A1, was a heavy-barreled version of the regular FAL rifle. It shared all the same basic action components, but with a dual-use bipod/handguard, a rear sight calibrated out to 1000 meters, and 30-round magazines as standard. The gun was mechanically fine, but not a great light support weapon, as its rifle lineage sacrificed handling and sustained fire capability. Only about 2700 were produced, and it was ultimately replaced by the C9 (FN Minimi) in the 1980s.
Many thanks to Movie Armaments Group in Toronto for the opportunity to showcase their AR-10 rifles for you! Check them out on Instagram to see many of the guns in their extensive collection:
When the 1968 machine gun amnesty was announced in the US, it was treated with widespread suspicion among gun collectors. Some thought it would merely a pretense to find and arrest owners of unregistered machine guns. Others though it was just the first step in a prohibition and confiscation of machine guns. Both of these groups would prove to be wrong, however and the amnesty was in fact a true amnesty.
In fact, the amnesty was even more substantial than people recognize even today. It was not just an amnesty for possession of an unregistered machine gun, but also pretty much any crime associated with the gun. For example, it would legalize guns that had been stolen from military property rooms, and guns with defaced serial numbers. In fact, it even allowed felons to register machine guns, and retain the legal right to own them to this very day.
The H&K Mk 23 pistol was developed in the 1990s for the US Special Operations Command and US Navy. The goal was to produce an “offensive handgun” that could serve as a primary armament for a special forces operator as well as a backup arm. It was required to be no more than 12 inches long, fit a suppressor and aiming module with laser and illumination options in both visible and IR spectrum, have at least 10-round magazines, chamber .45 ACP (specifically a 185gr +P loading), and pass a 30,000 round endurance test.
Only two companies were able to supply acceptable initial pistols; H&K and Colt. The Colt pistol failed to pass the 1st phase testing. H&K presented a gun based on the recently-developed USP design, was ultimately chosen as the project winner; adopted as the Mk 23 pistol in 1996. The testing this pistol went through during development is really quite remarkable.
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
The Grande Puissance — High Power — was John Browning’s last firearms design. In fact, he only began the design; it was taken to completion by his protege Dieudonné Saive at FN in Belgium. It was the best military handgun of the time, with a double-stack 13-round magazine capacity, and chambered for the 9x19mm cartridge. Belgium was the first nation to adopt it for military service, purchasing 1,000 guns for field trials and approving them in 1935 for standard issue as the GP-35.
The Belgian trials guns have a distinctive oval ejection port, which would be changed on production models. They were also fitted with flat board shoulder stocks and tangent sights adjustable up to 500 meters. These features would last until German occupation of the FN factory complex during World War Two, when the guns were simplified under German occupation production.
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on Belgian GP35: The First Military Browning High Power
In the 1960s, the Sterling company began to worry about the prospects of continued sales of the Sterling (Patchett) SMG, especially in light of new competitors like the H&K MP5. Its chief design engineer, Frank Waters, created the S11 as a gun to replace the classic Sterling. The S11 was based on a simple stamped/folded steel receiver, and was intended to have a lower unit cost than the Sterling. It kept the excellent Patchett magazine, but had a barrel and sights offset to the left side, and offered two separate bayonet lugs – one for the No5 rifle and one for the L1A1/FAL.
Unfortunately for Sterling, it was determined that the tooling cost would have made the S11 actually more expensive than the existing guns, whose tooling costs had been long since covered. Also, the S11 was just not a very good or very reliable design – a “donkey in a thoroughbred race” to quote one Sterling manager. This one prototype was the only example ever made, and the project was shelved in 1967 in favor of expanding into more civilian models of the original Sterling.
Many thanks to the Royal Armouries for allowing me to film and disassemble this one of a kind submachine gun! The NFC collection there – perhaps the best military small arms collection in Western Europe – is available by appointment to researchers:
Over many years of filming with my high speed camera, I have a decent little library of malfunctions in a wide variety of guns. These don’t normally make it into videos, and I figured it would be neat to present a bunch of them together. Enjoy!
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on Slow Motion Malfunctions of Exotic Firearms
The SPIW program began in 1962 with entries from Colt, Springfield, AAI, and Winchester. The first set of trials were a complete failure, and both Colt and Winchester abandoned the project at that point. AAI pressed on, producing these second generation rifles – one for trials in 1966 and one after. Both are chambered for the XM-645 5.6x57mm single-flechette cartridge. Under testing, both showed multiple serious problems in reliability, noise, cook-offs, and accuracy. The company would struggle on for years continuing to develop the flechette rifle system, but would be ultimately unsuccessful.
Thanks to the Rock Island Arsenal Museum for allowing me access to film this very interesting rifle! If you are in the Quad Cities in Illinois or Iowa, the Museum is definitely worth a visit. They have a great number of small arms on display as well as an excellent history of the Rock Island Arsenal.
Eugene Stoner’s AR-10 and AR-15 use an operating mechanism that is often called “gas impingement,” but which is actually a cleverly structured gas piston located within the bolt carrier. Gas is tapped from the barrel and moved all the way back to just behind the chamber, where it enters the bolt carrier. There the carrier and bolt act as the two parts of a sealed piston, and when the bolt carrier moves rearward the cam pin forces the bolt head to rotate and unlock. The expanding gas is then vented out through holes in the side of the bolt carrier. By locating the piston on the same axis as the barrel, the harmonics are improved and the overall weight of the gun can be reduced by using the gas piston elements as mass in the bolt carrier assembly. Contrary to the old adage “it shits where it eats,” the operating gasses are not vented into the magazine or chamber, and the system has proven to be very reliable.
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on How Does it Work: Stoner’s AR System
The MP5 is widely considered the best submachine gun ever made, for its reliability, its handling, and its closed-bolt delayed-blowback action. It is so widely praised, in fact, that H&K’s efforts to replace it with less expensive polymer submachine guns have largely failed, as their customers simply insist on the MP5.
I have had only a brief bit of experience actually using the MP5 myself, and I wanted to take this opportunity while visiting H&K to fix that. So, does it live up to its reputation?
In a word, yes.
Many thanks to H&K USA for providing me access to this MP5A3, and to Trijicon for graciously providing use of their range!
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on At the Range with the Iconic MP5A3
George Lanchester was the engineer responsible for originally reverse engineering the German MP28 submachine gun for production by the British, under the designation Lanchester. Once he finished that design work, the gun was put into production by the Sterling Engineering Company, and Lanchester went to work for them as part of the manufacturing process. Once there, he began tinkering with improved designs to reduce the weight of the gun – one of its main drawbacks. He created these three prototypes, but went no further, as government officials ordered him to stop when they discovered this work in 1942. By that time the Sten was in production, and continued development of the Lanchester was seen as a waste of time and resources.
The guns remained in the Sterling company’s reference collection, and elements of the final stock design would resurface in a later prototype design in the 60s. Beyond that, these guns were a simple dead end of design.
Many thanks to the Royal Armouries for allowing me to film and disassemble these unique submachine guns! The NFC collection there – perhaps the best military small arms collection in Western Europe – is available by appointment to researchers:
Gas-delayed blowback is a relatively uncommon operating system used in handguns. It is not an efficient mechanism for high-pressure rifle power cartridges, but works well with something like 9mm Parabellum. It tends to provide benefits of light felt recoil and better-than-average accuracy, in exchange for overheating much more quickly than other systems.
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Comments Off on How Does it Work: Gas-Delayed Blowback
Whether it is described as a machine pistol, a submachine gun, or a personal defense weapon, the PM63 Rak is really not the best examples of this sort of thing to actually shoot. The open-bolt/slide mechanism is very cool from an engineering and design perspective, but does in fact have a tendency to hit one in the face, as inadvertently demonstrated by my high-speed video shooting volunteer. Even if it doesn’t do that, the sights reciprocating on the slide make it a difficult gun to shoot accurately.
Thanks to Movie Armament Group in Toronto for giving me the opportunity to take this to the range! Check out MAG on Instagram: https://instagram.com/moviearmamentsg…
The PM-63 Rak is a pretty interesting Polish Cold War machine pistol or personal defense weapon. It fires from an open bolt, but uses a slide like a pistol rather than a bolt in an enclosed receiver like a typical SMG. There are several other interesting elements to the design, so let’s take a closer look…
Thanks to Movie Armament Group in Toronto for giving me the opportunity to bring you this video! Check out MAG on Instagram: https://instagram.com/moviearmamentsg…
