Comments by "" (@neutronalchemist3241) on "Forgotten Weapons" channel.

  1.  @hendriktonisson2915  But the M38 in 7.35 and the much more common M91/38 in 6.5 (President's choice) have the same barrel lenght and aesthetics, only the caliber differs. ;)
    1
  2. On the positive side, you have to remove very little metal. The cartridges have about the same dimensions, while the 8mm Mauser was a much larger cartridge that required to remove much more metal from the chamber. Also you don't need rarer 7.35 Carcano rifles to convert. 7.35 barrels were obtained from worn out 6.5 Carcano barrels anyway. On the negative, to have much higher performances with only slightly bigger dimensions, the 7.62X51mm NATO works at much higher pressures, 4150 bar vs 3300 for the 7.35X51 (CIP specs). The possibilities for the action to "explode" for the higher pressure are zero. 7.62X51mm NATO are still within the specs of 7.35X51mm proofloads, and much lower than 8mm Mauser proofloads, that the action could handle after having removed much more metal, but certainly it will shorten the life of the rifle.
    1
  3. They got carried by their own dreams. For one and half million rifles, ammo availability would have been a problem. For 15.000, 50.000 or even 200.000 rifles, there were plenty of Italian made ammos already available. Better issuing a repeater with 400 rounds and call it a day (hardly a Volkssturm militian would have survived enough to fire all of them anyway) than issuing a single shooter even with 10.000 rounds.
    1
  4. They got carried by their own dreams. For one and half million rifles, ammo availability would have been a problem. For 15.000, 50.000 or even 200.000 rifles, there were plenty of ammos already available. Better issuing a repeater with 400 rounds and call it a day (hardly a Volkssturm militian would have survived enough to fire all of them anyway) than issuing a single shooter even with 10.000 rounds.
    1
  5.  @MarvinCZ  Instead the Volkssturm was armed with a pletora of different weapons, that had different spare parts and would have required different training that none could give to the militians. Had not the Germans got carried by their own dreams, all of them could have been equipped with a single, quite simple, repeating rifle using a single ammunition. A lot of common logistic.
    1
  6.  @MarvinCZ  That's a backline activity. Only loaded belts are supposed to reach the first line. Rifle's ammos instead comes in nice stripper clips. Another supply line.
    1
  7. This is one of the prototypes covered in the book, the Terni Light Machine Gun http://www.archeologiaindustriale.org/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Il-fucile-mitragliatore-modello-Terni-scontornata-900px.jpg Developed since 1929, tested in 1932 and omologated in 1933. It retained the tilting magazine of the Breda 30, but didn't need an olier and had 30% less components. It was specifically designed to be cheaper, faster to produce and more reliable than the Breda 30, but in the end the improvements were not considered enough to revert the decision to adopt the Breda.
    1
  8. It's the MAB 38/49, that's not even the last model to be manufactured (it will be the 38/57, adopted by the Carabinieri).
    1
  9. This is a visit to the Pietta factory. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdnbNJKJ9ZE As you can see, they use the same tooling to make their repro revolvers and their modern line of semiauto rifles and shotguns. They work in batches. "today revolvers, tomorrow semiauto rifles". It's obvious that those machines can make anything in between. A Fyodorov Avtomat like a M1 Carbine. They only need the right imput. They can make them BETTER actually. With more consistent tolerances than the originals EVER had. So why they don't do it? Because, while manufacturing is not really a problem, designing is. Manual repeaters (revolvers, lever actions...) solve a lot of problems, because timing is decided and force is applied by the shooter. In a semiauto/auto weapon there are a lot of bits that have to work togheter for the weapon to work. Much of those old designs required handfitting, because the admitted tolerances were so that, in a batch of supposedly identical parts, the right ones had to be chosen and coupled for the weapon to work. Worse, there was the "cascade matching" problem. When you took, IE, three parts that matched toghether, because they were all at one end of the tolerance scale, and then there was no fourth part that matched with them, because it should have been beyond the scale. It was a so common issue that, for the Winchester .224 prototype (the competitor of the AR15 in the CONARC competition) Winchester explicitly stated that they designed their rifle so that it couldn't happen. And we were in the late '50s. It was still a severe problem for the M60 MG. Modern CNC machines can't work like that. so the modern designer has to come out with his own completely different, set of admitted tolerances. Not to say that steel of the original composition is often unobtanium. The REAL problem is that most of those designs were not that great to begin with. Even the most successful ones, (IE, the M1 Carbine, to say one) were good FOR THEIR TIME. But the eventual purchaser of a modern repro would expect form it MODERN reliability and durability, otherwise "This is shit! The manufcturer scammed me!". For the designer of the repro, it's like a nightmare. To him is like designing a completely new weapon, with the adjunctive constraint that he can't choose the solutions he KNOWS will work flawlessly. He has to keep it consistent with original solutions that he know work "so-so". That's why modern repros, even when existing, mostly dont' have part interchangeability with the originals.
    1
  10. This is a visit to the Pietta factory. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdnbNJKJ9ZE As you can see, they use the same tooling to make their repro revolvers and their modern line of semiauto rifles and shotguns. They work in batches. "today revolvers, tomorrow semiauto rifles". It's obvious that those machines can make anything in between. A Fyodorov Avtomat like a M1 Carbine. They only need the right imput. They can make them BETTER actually. With more consistent tolerances than the originals EVER had. So why they don't do it? Because, while manufacturing is not really a problem, designing is. Manual repeaters (revolvers, lever actions...) solve a lot of problems, because timing is decided and force is applied by the shooter. In a semiauto/auto weapon there are a lot of bits that have to work togheter for the weapon to work. Much of those old designs required handfitting, because the admitted tolerances were so that, in a batch of supposedly identical parts, the right ones had to be chosen and coupled for the weapon to work. Worse, there was the "cascade matching" problem. When you took, IE, three parts that matched toghether, because they were all at one end of the tolerance scale, and then there was no fourth part that matched with them, because it should have been beyond the scale. It was a so common issue that, for the Winchester .224 prototype (the competitor of the AR15 in the CONARC competition) Winchester explicitly stated that they designed their rifle so that it couldn't happen. And we were in the late '50s. It was still a severe problem for the M60 MG. Modern CNC machines can't work like that. so the modern designer has to come out with his own completely different, set of admitted tolerances. Not to say that steel of the original composition is often unobtanium. The REAL problem is that most of those designs were not that great to begin with. Even the most successful ones, (IE, the M1 Carbine, just to say one) were good FOR THEIR TIME. But the eventual purchaser of a modern repro would expect form it MODERN reliability and durability, otherwise "This is shit! The manufcturer scammed me!". It doesn't exist "it seldomly work because the originals were like that too". For the designer of the repro, it's like a nightmare. To him is like designing a completely new weapon, with the adjunctive constraint that he can't choose the solutions he KNOWS will work flawlessly. He has to keep it consistent with original solutions that he know work "so-so". That's why modern repros, even when existing, mostly dont' have part interchangeability with the originals.
    1
  11. It's one of those that probably will never be made. First, it's quite complicate, second, Fedorov himself admitted it had reliability issues. But the purchaser of a modern repro would want MODERN reliability (not even 1917 reliability) from it. He wouldn't accept "it seldomly work because the originals were like that too". For the designer of the repro, it's like a nightmare. To him is like designing a completely new weapon, with the adjunctive constraint that he can't choose the solutions he KNOWS will work flawlessly. He has to keep it consistent with original solutions that he knows work "so-so".
    1
  12. A tilting system, being it a tilting barrel like the Browning or a tilting locking block like the Beretta/Walther will always have less surface friction, and so less lubrication needed and/or surface wear.
    1
  13. It's more complex than a tilting action, and it has more surface friction, so needing more lubrication.
    1
  14.  @tommasomorandini1982  Nor you can make the rule "it's a delayed blowback if the bolt moves, but the barrel stays still", because in a Revelli action (today used by the FN Five-Seven and the Ruger 57) that's considered a delayed blowback, the barrel recoils, but at a slower pace than the bolt.
    1
  15. A short recoil action (Browning, Beretta/Walther, or that CZ...) opens that way. Simply the barrel recoils with the slide for the first few mm.
    1
  16. The long recoil action is notoriously felt-recoil-enhancing due to the heavy reciprocating mass. Hovever, at the time, other systems were unreliable, due to the charateristics of shotguns' ammos (too dirty for gas action, and with a lot of different loads). The first improvement over the long recoil for semiauto shotguns had probably been the Bernardelli Semiautomatico of 1949, a mix of delayed blowback and inertia actions.
    1
  17. Especially in late 19th - early 20th century, many weapon designs that make one think "what were they thinking?" had been made to circumvent a patent. Today you can do practically all that you want. The patent for that solution expired decades ago.
    1
  18.  @someguy5444  A Beretta A300 is sold around 700$, a Stoeger (a beretta subsidiary) M3000 inertia driven for around $500,
    1
  19. 80 years ago maybe. Already the Bernardelli Semiautomatico of 1949 was a mechanical improvement, and later the Beretta gas action was on anoter planet, reliability wise, than any other semiauto shotgun.
    1
  20. Winchester prototype Model 1911, ribbed for your pleasure.
    1
  21. Had it been an Inertia failure, he would have had a failure to eject, but the ejection was very strong and consistent. Probably, due to the right-handed grips, he inadvertently hit the slide-stop lever during the recoil, infact the gun didn't fail to feed (like in the round hitting the ramp and being stuck there), but simply held open.
    1
  22. Had it been an Inertia failure, he would have had a failure to eject, but the ejection was very strong and consistent. Probably, due to the right-handed grips, he inadvertently hit the slide-stop lever during the recoil when shooting left-handed, infact the gun didn't fail to feed (like in the round hitting the ramp and being stuck there), but simply held open.
    1
  23. Probably, due to the right-handed grips, he inadvertently hit the slide-stop lever during the recoil, infact the gun didn't fail to feed (like in the round hitting the ramp and being stuck there), but simply held open.
    1
  24. An Hotchkiss Portative.
    1
  25. Not an original BM59. But you can modify a Garand to resemble a BM59 while retaining the caliber. And someone surely did.
    1
  26. No BM59 had been made converting a rifle. After the war Beretta received the Wincester tooling for the production of the M1 rifle (they were worn out and unusable, but good to see what the production stages were and build new tooling) along with a ton of spare parts never assembled. That's why many BM59 have the original Winchester and Springfield markings on the receiver. That's also why the Danish soldiers preferred the Breda made M1 to the Beretta ones. Breda rifles were all made with new parts, while the Beretta ones could have receivers made during the war with old tooling, that had a rougher surfaces.
    1
  27.  @andrewstein2226  The front part of the BM59'a op rod is a short and straight cylinder. That of the M1 is longer and slightly bent (WWII's GIs had to be specifically instructed to not straighten it, since it could seem it had been bent by chance during use). The elasticity of the long and bent op rod easen extraction, but it interferes with an eventual burst.
    1
  28. What really helped was the straight op-rod (M1's bent one, in full auto, became a spring whose armonics interfered with the burst, jamming the action) and to get rid of BAR's magazines, that were pretty bad, and were reliable only if helped by the inertia of the heavy bolt of the BAR).
    1
  29. Actually it was nearly identical to the US M1 Carbine bayonet, only the muzzle ring diameter differs. The Italians retained the same bayonet with the AR70/90 too.
    1
  30. Not only the tooling, but even the existing parts. The BM59 receiver, stock, rear sight and trigger group were the original M1's slightly modified, and often they retain their original Winchester and Springfield markings.
    1
  31. It works perfectly fine.
    1
  32. It could pierce through a WWII helmet at that distance.
    1
  33. Sorry, but the Army didn't want ANYTNING else than the M9. The XM10 trials had nothing to do with slide separation, It was the Congress forcing the Army to redo the test to appease S&W, since, reading the XM9 requirements to the letter, it shouldn't have been eliminated after the life expectancy test, as it did. That's because, thus performing worse than both Beretta and SIG, it was still above the minimum required (the S&W had been eliminated after one of the three pistols tested cracked a frame before having fired 5000 rounds, but the requirement was for a life expectancy of over 5000 rounds ON AVERAGE, and, on average, the life expectancy was over 5000 rounds) and so it should have passed and competed on price with Beretta and SIG. In the end, Beretta won the XM10 trials without even competing. It refused to submit pistols for the tests, and so the Army used off-the-shelf guns.
    1
  34. Because it didn't "won the M9 trial in everything but cost". In the service life test only the 92F and the H&K P7 reached the 7000 rounds threshold with all three pistols intact. The P226 cracked a frame at 6523 rounds fired, but was allowed to pass, since the requirement was just for a service life, on average, of over 5000 rounds. the P226 failed the dry mud test, with only 79% reliability in those conditions. Being that significantly lower than the 1911 control weapon, it should have been eliminated due to the rules of the competition (notice that instead, in the XM17 trials, there was conveniently not a M9 control weapon around to be seen). It was allowed to keep on competing, because the Army wanted at least two manufacturers to compete on price, so it was simply decided that the dry mud test result was "not so important" and the result was simply not considered. So, not counting the result of the tests were the 92F performed better than the P226, then the P226 performed better than the 92F.
    1
  35. In the XM9 program, other than failing the endurance and firing pin energy test, the reliability was less than 1/4 of that of the Beretta 92. In the XM10 program, being the control weapon no more the 1911, but the M9 and, due to the rules of the competition, to perform significantly worse than the control weapon even in one of the tests meant to be eliminated, the chances of the S&W to win without a complete redesign of the weapon were practically none.
    1
  36. Parkerization does wonders on corrosion resistance for cheap and, reading the requirements of the XM9-XM10 program, it's evident the US Army at the time cared A LOT about corrosion resistance and practically nothing about resistance to sandy environments. Unfortunately, parkerization and sand are instead a recipe for disaster, since sand tends to stick to parkerized surfaces, so we can have an idea on how this pistol would have performed in the next 30 years, had it been adopted.
    1
  37. Both SIG and Beretta refused to submit pistols for the XM10 trials. The Army used off-the-shelf M9 as control weapons.
    1
  38. Beretta good, handgun stage too difficult for the shooter.
    1
  39. 9mm Largo and 9mm parabellum are different case with different dimensions. 9mm Largo is slightly more powerful in the typical loads.
    1
  40. No, it's dimensionally similar to the .38 ACP, or .38 Auto, that's a different cartridge than the .380 ACP. In their typical loads the 9mm Largo (9X23mm) is slightly more powerful than the 9mm Parabellum, but with a lower pressure, due to the bigger internal volume of the case, so it tends to be less stressful for the actions.
    1
  41. Yeah, 1911 disassembly had never been a piece of cake. That was actually an improvement.
    1
  42. The only real similarities are that they are both blowback and looked like a 1911. The vietnamese one had a non rifled barrel, and many brazed parts to fire a more powerful cartridge than the 9mm largo, it probably was only a rank badge. This seems actually a well made gun.
    1
  43. There is nothing saying this action not being sound. The Isard spring has 28 twists, the 1911 32, the Astra 27. The thickness of the wire is about the same. In all likelyhood they had about the same stiffness when new. The stiffness of the mainspring has practically no importance in keeping the action of a blowback handgun closed for enough time to safely eject the case. It's the mass of the slide that does all the work. The only real function of a stiffer mainspring is to mitigate the felt recoil and the force with which the slide slams into the receiver at the end of it's travel, so a stiffer spring prolongs the life of the frame/slide. However, the force that has to be absorbed is the same for blowback and short recoil pistols. Infact, IE, the Hi-Point mainspring has the same stiffnes of the Glock. More than pointing to the dimension of the spring, Ian should have measured the stiffness of the spring. A smaller spring can have the same stiffness of a bigger one, it wears out quickier, and so has to be replaced more often, but the durability of the spring was probably not the main concern of the designers of this handgun.
    1
  44. The Astra 400 is a straight blowback in 9x23mm largo.
    1
  45. in typical loads, it's slightly more powerful than 9mm Parabellum, but, due to the larger case, it obtains those performances with less pressure, so it's less punitive for the action.
    1
  46.  @atomicsmith  Sorry, but 7lb bolt / 3 (leverage factor) / 3 (reduction factor based on other calibers, since 10 ounces compared to 1.7 lbs and 12 ounces compared to 2.3 lbs are about 1/3. Let's ignore the fact that the results of the formula are increasingly off as the power of the rounds increase) is 0.78 pounds, not 1.45. You have also to subtract from the 7lbs the weight of the bolt and the weight of the delaying lever (that on average moves at the same pace of the bolt), but let's ignore that too for now. Do you think the bolt carrier on a FAMAS PLUS THE RECOIL SPRING TUBE AND CHARGING LEVER (that recoil with the bolt carrier, also half the weight of the recoil spring contained in the tube should be counted)) has a weight so much different than 0.78 pounds? I should say it's a bit more.
    1
  47.  @atomicsmith  To accelerate a mass at double the speed in the same time you don't need double the energy, but four times the energy. To triple the speed you need nine times the energy.
    1
  48. It’s incredible this had been proposed in the ’50s. You expect a contraption like that to have been proposed in late 19th / early 20th century (apart for the stamped steel receiver). Considering already the Mannlicher 1885 had an accelerator, and so the patents on way simpler and sturdier accelerator designs had long expired, there was no need to make it so complex. Not to say of the open bolt design, that was already a not so great idea in the 1932 Scotti Mod.X (and it was 1932), but the Scotti at least had a pretty lightweight bolt!
    1
  49. The instantly switchable ejection port of the Beretta ARX 160. Make the pins captive. A quick exchange barrel. It would be better to not have to rely on the soldier cutting off the gas first to fire a rifle grenade.
    1
  50. The level of machining involved in doing those receiver and bolt is huge. For that alone it doesn't seem a design very apt to equip a mass army.
    1