Comments by "" (@neutronalchemist3241) on "Breda 37: Italy's Forgotten Heavy Machine Gun" video.

@TheArklyte In modern notation, this is an MMG. At that time, it was considered an HMG. When this had been made, the designers knew WWI HMGs, and they knew their many weaknesses (need for water, fragility of the water jacket...). The Breda 37 had not been made like that by chance.
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An MMG is a crew served weapon. if one of the crew is wounded, one of the infantrymen takes his place, because the MMG is more important than a rifle.
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Crew served weapon. it feed from one side, where there are the full box of ammos, and eject from the other side, where there are the boxes of spent strips.
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It had been made in 20mm and 37mm.
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@222TripleJ the only problem with the Italian classification is that people consider the one used only by the US "right" by default. The Italian classification was done exclusively by mass. A tank was light under the 10 tons, medium between 10 and 20 tons, heavy over 20 tons. L6/40, light tank weighting 6 tons adopted in 1940. M14/41, medium tank weighting 14 tons adopted in 1941. P26/40, heavy tank weighting 26 tons adopted in 1940. The Brits classified their tanks light , cruise and infantry. the Germans didnt' have a classification, they only numbered the models (Panzer II - III - IV). The US classification was so good that their "Heavy" tanks were so heavy to be scarcely useful, had been practically unused in WWII, and the entire concept had been replaced by that of MBT later but, for some reason, the P26/40 being a heavy tank was "laughable".
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@kino_61 The Reggiane 2000 had the closed cockpit since the first day of war. The closed cockpit Macchi C.202 and Reggiane 2001 entred in line in 1941. The Cr.42 was phased out of first line use in 1941, around the same time the Brits phased out the biplane Gloster Gladiator. The last purchaser of the Cr.42 had not been the Regia Aeronautica, but the Luftwaffe, that purchased 63 samples in 1943, to replace their biplanes Henschel Hs 123, that they found very useful, but whose production couldn't be restarted. The RAF had sergeant pilots as well, throughout the war and well into the '50s. The US had them until 1942. Most of the Luftwaffe pilots were NCO. Same for the Soviets.
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Yeah. The fin on the bolt carrier is only a further safety, that the tray can't move as long as the bolt is forward. That was probably needed because the loader can insert the trays one after the other (so with the one he had in hand pushing the one firing) and he could have been too energic.
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No, Breda was the surname of the founder of the company, Ernesto Breda. There are several "Breda" town in Italy (IE, Breda Di Piave).
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@hendriktonisson2915 So you talk about GPMGs because, during WWII, five years after the adoption of this MG, had been designed a single GPMG that influenced others? The Americans were using water cooled M1917 still in Korea. The Goryunov sg-43 had been adopted in 1943. Does it resemble more this one, or the MG42? In reality, the "GPMG" concept never imposed itself. The GPMGs you are talking of, today, are used almost exclusively as vehicular MGs. Are you that stated that loading a strip was a disadvantage. It wasn't. Loading Breda's strips was faster than loading belts, so it wasn't a disadvantage. It doesn't count if it was much or not that much faster.
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They used in WWII.
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@kino_61 "The Gloster Gadiator was way better" in what exactly? It was 34km/h slower than the Cr.42, it had 100km shorter range, it had worse armament. The Cr.42 could also carry bombs, the Gladiator couldn't.
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@hendriktonisson2915 For the last one, it's a completely made-up problem. Were the crews of belt-fed machine guns supposed to reload spent belts? This MG was made PRECISELY for sustained fire. It was a MG made specifically for suppressive fire (while, IE, the MG42 was a point weapon, and German Gunners were instructed to not use it for suppressive fire) because, as said, to insert the strips one after the other reduces the dead times in respect to changing belts.
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Nine guys were needed to CARRY THE AMMOS. Do you think those grow spontaneously alongside the MG (in canvas belts)? A MMG (HMG then) could fire THOUSANDS of ammos in a single action. Were you planning to carry them with three guys?
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No such thing as 7.92 Mauser in WWII. The Germans rarely designated it 7.9, and more often only by the kind of ammo (S. Patrone, s.S Patrone...).
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@robertmaheu7583 And what does the "signal magazine you have" counts for? You could have brought your granny's opinion for that matter.
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@robertmaheu7583 The Germans first called it M88/8 (“case type based on military model 88 / nominal caliber 8 mm”) then, after Mauser modified it, it 8x57J and 8x57JS (spitzer) and those are still the official CIP definitions, dating back well before WWII.
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@hendriktonisson2915 The problem is exactly that you are jumping back and forth between now and WWII. "that is the reason why no one used feed strips after WW2" We are not using WWII belts either for that matter. The belts we use NOW are different form the WWII ones. Belts had to EVOLVE to phase out strips. "To my knowledge in WW2 MG ammo was not always distributed in belts and the usage of disintegrating belts was limited to aircraft MGs so reloading belts was quite common." NOT UNDER FIRE. IT WAS A BACKLINE ACTIVITY and it was made with belt loaders. The difference with the Breda 37 strip loader, is that the Breda 37 strip loader is faster than any manual belt loader I've seen. "Most GPMGs do not really require constantly holding the belt" NOW (and why the hell are you talking about GPMGs? This is a WWII MG). In WWII an MG jamming was not a question of "if", nor of "when". It was a question of "how often" and, since holding the belt reduced the jammings, it was done every time possible. Actually to change a belt requires MUCH morte time than simply keeping on inserting strips one after the other. The Breda Strips can be inserted without stopping fire at all. Again GPMG? GPMG are what's used NOW. This is a WWII MG!
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So why this is made with so few parts?
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If you want to fire less, you can use less ammo bearers. An MMG is a crew served weapon, and it's more important than 9, or 90, bolt action rifles.
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It's stripped by the top of the bolt. The fin is an additional safety. It prevents the strip to be pushed in too energically by the loader.
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Then the 9 soldiers came under fire from a PKM on a tripod over a km afar and discover not only their assault rifles, but also their SAW firing from a bipod, are as useful as blowguns.
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It's a tale. And not told for the Breda 37 only. It seems that, since the Breda 30 lubricated cartridges, then all the Italian MGs had to lubricate the cartridges. The manual actually advises soldiers to NOT lubricate the ammos for any reason.
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MGs are crew served weapons. The pretense they are not always led (and keeps on leading) to problems.
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@aaronwilkinson8963 And how many ammos does it has with two people carrying gun, tripod and ammos? What's the effective firing range from the bipod, if you choose to not carry the tripod? If you are limiting an MG to the number of rounds two (or one!) people can carry along with the gun and tripod (and a spare barrel I hope), you are seriously misusing it. Reality is that the FN MAG, today, is rarely seen not placed on a fixed position, or mounted on a vehicle, but today is not WWII. In WWII the thousands of rounds a MG could fire in a single action had to be CARRIED BY SHOULDER. And, as soon as a vehicle is no more available, that's still true today. Of that 9 men crew, three carried the weapon, the spare barrel, the tripod and all the accessories needed to mantain the weapon. The other six were ammo bearers AND any of them had a carbine and ammos for it. It's not that, while the ammo fired and two people (gunner and loader) were servicing it directly, the others were doing nothing.
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Two. The 7.35 had been aborted due to the start of the war. Both Sweden and Norway did the same, keeping the 6.5 for rifle duty and developing a specialized MMG round, while Nederlands kept the 6.5 for rifle duty and adopted the 8mm Mauser as MMG round. US instead had one rifle and one carbine cartridge, and the Germans one rifle and one "sturmgewehr-volkssturmgewehr" cartridge. Japan had the most confusion, with the 6.5mm and 7.7mm rounds both used for rifles.
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The MG 34 was milled, and VERY complex and expensive to manufacture. What's really expensive is not milling (every one of millions of M1 Garands, or tens of millions of bolt action rifles used in WWII, was milled) but precision milling.
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@tatumergo3931 Not really. The concept of the automatic weapon as the centre of the infantry formation came form the observations on WWI, and is typically European. In WWII it was not only of the Germans, but also of the Brits and even of the Italians. The weapons were different, but the concept was the same. That's why, IE, all of them concentrated more on the development of the automatic firearm than on the infantry rifle. From this concept comes that the automatic weapon is a crew-served weapon. All the infantry squad is a squad of ammo and spare parts bearer for the automatic weapon. The American concept, that still persists, is that of the infantry squad as a squad of riflemen with the automatic weapon as support. That's why, IE, the US, in WWII, had an exceptional rifle, and a subpar LMG. That's why the XM250 had just been selected as SAW for the US Army. The ideal of the Ordnance Corp is to have the MG served by a single men. The XM250 doesn't even have an attachment point for the tripod, because none is going to carry a tripod, nor a quick exchange barrel, because none is going to carry a spare barrel. The MG gunner is going to carry all the belts for the gun, and the 400 rounds he can carry in total are not going to overheat the barrel.
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Not when you are firing at 2km distance.
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Not two cycles. It feeds when the bolt goes forward and extract when the bolt goes rearward. The only change id that the spent brass, instead of hitting an ejector, hits the rear rim of the feed strip, and stays there.
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Still the M60 didn't have the bolt nut spring loaded, and to close the top cover with the bolt forward (a quite easy to make mistake) meant to break the feeding mechanism.
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@M.M.83-U The standard gun crew of the time was 9. It was 9 for both the US and the Germans. A US machine-gun platoon had 4 MGs and 35 men. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/fKeZNcL1Fw0
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@Gaspard129 7.35 Carcano was not really used. .303 British was used only in aerial MGs, 12.7X81mm (.5 Vickers) was used only in aerial heavy MGs, 13.2x99mm Hotchkiss was used only in residual (it had already been replaced by the 20mm Breda automatic gun on any unit large enough to carry it) AA mgs of the Navy. So the Army used TWO different cartridges for rifles and machine guns. BTW McArthur was dead wrong. There was not that big reserve of 30-06 ammos, not to say of BAR, in the US inventory, in the .30s, to justify sticking to it (or to the BAR for that matter). And, since the .30-06 was unsuitable for many uses, they had to introduce A SECOND CALIBER anyway, the .30 Carbine. That was still not optimal anyway. The only thing that can be said in his defense is that the .276 pedersen was little better, and its only real advantage were two rounds more in the M1 clip. A round similar to the .30 Remington for infantry rifles, carbines and LMGs, and the .30-06 for the MMG, would have been the optimal solution.
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@tomhenry897 None. It's a completely made-up problem. The 7.7 (.303 British) and 12.7 (.5 Vickers) were used only by the Air Force on the aircrafts. The 7.35 Carcano was not used anywere. The 13.2 Hotchkiss was used only by the Navy on AA machineguns (residually, because the Navy had already replaced the 13.2mm Breda 31 with the 20mm Breda 65 on any unit big enough to carry it. Only submarines and patrol boats-torpedo boats still used the 13.2mm ). The Italian Army used two rifle calibers (8mm Breda and 6.5 Carcano) like the, ho so foresighted, US Army used two rifle calibers (.30-06 and .30 Carbine).
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@Gaspard129 Sorry, it seems to me that you answered before really having understood my post, so, please, try reading slower this time. "our entire inventory of machine guns was in .30-06, dude..." And so? If I SPECIFICALLY said that the .30-06 SHOULD HAVE BEEN USED ONLY FOR THE MMGs, what's the problem if "our entire inventory of machine guns was in .30-06"? Reason more. There were more than enough of them to use the inventory of .30-06 ammos, so the fact that there were many .30-06 ammos already in the arsenals WAS A FALSE PROBLEM. "And you think the different ammunition for aerial, naval, ground service is of no importance..." As a matter of fact, despite having been througly bombed, among the many shortcomings the Italian army suffered, there had NEVER been a shortcoming of ammo production. Italian aircrafts and ships always took off and set sails with the magazines at full capacity. That's because, in respect to the number of rifle caliber ammos the Army needs, the number .303 needed by the aviation was completely residual. As a matter of fact (2) the .303 was a residual caliber for the aviation that had almost entirely switched to the 12.7X81, and, since the Italian Army, like the German one, didn't use weapons in .50 caliber (the next step from the 8mm Breda was the 20×138mmB Long Solothurn) what the Air force did chose was completely indifferent. As a matter of fact (3) the residual use of 13.2mm by the Navy didn't cause any problem because, having switched to the 20×138mmB Long Solothurn for almost all the units since the mid '30s, the Navy already had enough 13.2 rounds in the inventory, for the few units that still used it in WWII, to supply them for not one but two world wars. "To your point about a lighter rifle/lmg cartridge like .30 Remington and heavier mmg cartridge like .30-06, this makes sense from a tactical perspective. It potentially creates a serious complication from a strategic level..." Again, since the .30-06 was not really satisfactory for any use other than in MMGs, the US Army ENDED UP USING TWO RIFLE CALIBERS ANYWAY, with the only difference that NONE of the two calibers was really optimal for the riflemen, being the .30-06 too heavy and the .30 Carbine too light. So what was specifically the logistical problem in having TWO good calibers, one for MMGs (the .30-06) and one for riflemen and LMGs (a kind of .30 Remington), instead of having TWO so-so calibers? McArthur simply made a mistake.
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@Gaspard129 Did you ever considered to read what's written? Ammos and weapons are not selected all at the same time, so there is a residual use of them. That's why, in the Gulf war, the US Army had the 9mm for the Beretta M9 and the .45 ACP for the Grease Gun, that was still in the inventory. Why the US Army found itself in a similar situation then? Why it's still using two rifle calibers? You seem to think a completely hypotetical situation is the reality. Reality is that, despite the US having used the 20×102mm Vulcan for something like 70 years, Variants of the HS.404 in 20X110mm Hispano had been also used until VERY recently. The two calibers overlapped for over 50 years.
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@Gaspard129 So you end up using two rifle calibers for the Army exactly like the US in WWII and the US right now? Wow! It seems terrible! So why the US Army used TWO rifle cartridges not only "after Korea" but "DURING KOREA" and "BEFORE KOREA, RIGHT IN WWII"? Because that benefit existed before. Did you notice that the attempts to replace both 5.56 and 7.62 repeatedly over the last 40 years repeatedly failed for 40 years? So, since the US military have its "important tradition" they are right in having two rifle calibers, and the others are wrong? What the US does with its ranges doesn't change the fact that its Army was using two rifle calibers in WWII exactly like the Italian one.
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@Gaspard129 Now let me spell it for you. 1) the Italian army used TWO rifle cartridges exactly like the US one. That's factual. They took that decision having judged the 6.5 Carcano / 7.35 Carcano a good cartridge for individual rifles and LMGs but not for MMGs. You are none to judge if they were right, or if they benefited from it or not. Your strictly personal opinion on the matter has exactly ZERO factual value. 2) The Italian army decided to use TWO rifle calibers in 1935, BEFORE their entry in WWII. The US Army decided to use TWO rifle calibers in 1940, BEFORE their entry in WWII. What was special in 1932 so that it was not possible to take that decision then? The oh-so-cash-strapped US Army, back then, was adopting a new, semiauto (because semiautos were notoriously poor men's rifles in the '30s) rifle, and the moment to change the service cartridge is usually EXACTLY when a new rifle is adopted. Italian Army used TWO rifle cartridges in WWII exactly like the US one, with the difference that the Italian cartridges were strictly separated, ONE for MMGs, ONE for rifles and LMGs. US had one for MMG, LMGs and rifles, and another for other rifles. Who "made for unnecessary complication"? (your very personal opinion on tangible benefits has little value). McArthur was obviously wrong in sticking to .30-06, since the US Army had to adopt another cartridge 8 years later, finding itself with two rifle cartridges, none of them really satisfactory when used by riflemen and LMGs.
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@Gaspard129 Fact is that the US Army was adopting a new semiauto rifle, and fact is that the moment to change the service cartridge is usually EXACTLY when a new rifle is adopted. Had they adopted the right cartridge for the rifle in 1932, they would have fielded it with the rifle in 1940 instead than sticking with the wrong cartridge in 1940 and having to field another wrong cartridge in 1940. The Italian army decided to adopt an heavier round for MMG because they judged the 6.5 Carcano / 7.35 Carcano a good cartridge for individual rifles and LMGs but not for MMGs. They did because the 6.5 carcano/7.35 Carcano hasn't good penetration against hardened targets (light armors), that instead the 8mm could easily overmatch, and mind that one of the use of MMGs was as vehicular MG and in coaxial mounts. Sweden took the same decision with the 8x63mm for HMGs and keeping the 6.5 Swedish for BOLT ACTION rifles. The Dutch took the same decision, using 7.92 Mauser for MMGs (other than a limited number in .303 British) and keeping 6.5X53R for BOLT ACTION rifles. Both NATO and Russia are currently using a similar double standard. You are none to judge if they were right, or if they benefited from it or not. Your strictly personal opinion on the matter has exactly ZERO factual value. You should also avoid inventing pseudo-necessities, like when you pretend to talk about "bolt actions", since the only thing that it makes evident is that you dont' know what you are talking about.
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@Gaspard129 I've clearly offended your (ignorant) sensibilities pointing out that you pretended to talk about Italy's logistic situation in World War 2 without knowing anything about it, as you are now ignoring, or you are simply too stupid to understand, that I talked about decisions made by US , Netherlands and Sweden at the same time. You clearly are unable to understand that the Italian Army used two rifle cartridges in WWII like the US Army did. You are clearly clutching at straw, pretending your very personal opinion on relative convenience of cartridges for bolt action rifles to count for something in respect to the opinion of the people that HAD to operate them. You are clearly unable to understand that, deciding a round for a rifle in 1932, it would have fielded with the rifle, not before it, and the decision to stick with the wrong caliber in 1932 led to have to use two not-so-great calibers in 1940. Other than not even understanding even what a "rifle caliber machine gun" is, since you put .50 caliber MGs in it, you are not even able to understand that every army, US one included, has a residual use of old weapons in old calibers. You are evidently simply too ignorant and stupid to judge if the Italian Army benefited to have a heavier caliber for MMGs or not. Your strictly personal opinion on the matter has exactly ZERO factual value. Oh, sorry, I forgot to mention Norway among the nations that, in WWII, used an heavier round for MMGs (Colt M/29 in 7.92X61 Norwegian) and kept 6.5 Swedish for BOLT ACTION rifle. Now answer this question, my idiot friend. Since Italy, Netherlands, Sweden and Norway decided to stick to 6.5 for BOLT ACTION rifles, and use an heavier round for MMGs. What army fielded a MMG in 6.5 in WWII?
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It is. Serial number 31166.
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Not really, this is made for suppressive fire. The MG42 is a point weapon.
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@hendriktonisson2915 The names are misleading here. The Breda 37 had not been adopted in 1937, and the Fiat-Revelli 1914/35 had not been adopted in 1935. 1935 is the year when it had been adopted the ammo, "Cartuccia per mitragliatrice Mod. 1935" (cartridge for machine-gun mod. 1935). The Breda 37, a scaled down version of the 20mm Breda 20/65 (1935), that was a scaled down version of the 37mm Breda 37/54 (1932), both tray-fed, had been adopted, first by the Navy, in 1936 (and even the production started in 1936), and infact it had been first called Breda 36, and the early boxes of ammos were marked Breda 36. The Fiat-Revelli M1914/35 had not been made by FIAT, that quit manufacturing small arms in 1930. It was a conversion made by MBT. I don't know when they exactly started converting old WWI MGs, but it's higly improbable they came up with the complete conversion and the belt in 1935. The instruction manual of the gun is dated 1937. So that belt simply didn't exist when the Breda 37 had been designed.
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@michaelfeenin551 The 91/24 were made by cutting the barrel at the centre, boring the treaded part (the part that goes into the reciver) and then inserting the final part of the barrel (the part with the faster twist rate) into the bored hole. That way they had the correct twist rate.
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Not really. It doesn't exist a real GPMG. The FN MAG, like this, is a fixed position MG. It has the volume of fire, but not the mobility. The PKM is a LMG. It has the mobility, but not the volume of fire.
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Infact it was. Putting it back in the strip, and you don't need an ejector, and a separate ejection port for the cases and the strips, that are entry points for dirt and weaken the structure. We need an "explanation" on why it works that way, because we are not used to this system, but the only answer is "because it was easier this way".
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Look at 17:50 On the side of the bolt where there is a pin. those large parts on the side of the bolt, and the triangular shaped fin over he bolt, are the locking lugs. When the bolt rises, they enters into corespondent recesses into the receiver.
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@hendriktonisson2915 Reloading was a backline activity. It was not supposed to be done in first line. If your WWII MG uses 200-250 round belts, that means you are going to change belt many times in action, and the assistant is going to keep that belt in hand all the time only to to reduce the frequency of jammings. We dont' use many WWII things, cloth belts, not disintegrating belts (like those of the FIAT M35)... It's not "belt good, strip bad". Belts had to EVOLVE to be good.
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Infact. Many people see the Breda designs, and start complaining about all the required machining and how complicate and expensive the weapon was to manufacture. Not knowing that Breda designs had been adopted after competing with others. Especially Scotti - Isotta Fraschini designs, that were very simple to produce. But somehow, Breda always managed to keep low the price of its heavily machined guns. Because they knew how to design for easy tooling. Mostly straight cuts, with no tight tolerances required.
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