In this interview at Enforce Tac 2024 with Heckler & Koch, James Reeves delves into the exceptional features of the new HK 421 light machine gun. The discussion highlights the gun’s advanced technical specifications, such as its cutting-edge gas-operated system that enhances reliability [Read More…]
In this episode of TFBTV, James Reeves visits the KCI booth at Red Oktober 2021 to try their magazines and drums with a full auto RPK Light Machine Gun. James talks with Mark at KCI – a former Green Beret – about the RPK and about KCI’s magazines. ««« GUN AND GEAR GIVEAWAYS [Read More…]
While in the last 20 years many European firearms industries faded into obscurity (just look at France, Spain, and Portugal), other countries seem to successfully expand their industries. At the recent IDEF 2021 exhibition in Istanbul, Turkey, I came across several new [Read More…]
In this episode of TFBTV, James Reeves gets to take the SIG LMG-68 for a test drive at SIG Academy in New Hampshire. We talk to members of the design team about the LMG-68’s development, history, production, and capabilities. As previously reported on The Firearm Blog by Matt Moss: “The [Read More…]
In this episode of TFBTV, James Reeves discusses the history of the M60 machine gun and some of its little-known advantages and disadvantages. Moreover, James reviews reports from the U.S. Army that discuss the effectiveness, range, accuracy, and reliability of the M60. We also look at tests pitting [Read More…]
In this episode of TFBTV, James Reeves visits Surefire’s gun vault and looks at an incredibly rare find: The Surefire MGX. This light machine gun or “LMG” is something like the mix between an Ultimax 100 machine gun, an AR-15/M16, and a Stoner 63. This LMG has almost no recoil due [Read More…]
During the ARMY 2020 exhibition, Kalashnikov Concern has revealed the prototype of a new belt-fed 5.45x39mm light machine gun called RPL-20. Earlier, in an interview given to RIA Novosti news agency, Dmitry Tarasov, the CEO of Kalashnikov Concern, said that that [Read More…]
In an effort to find a new light machine gun a team of Indian Army and Defense Officials have started a tour to visit firearms manufacturers, including Arsenal in Bulgaria. The tour then continues to Israel and Israel Weapon Industries (IWI), before heading on to South [Read More…]
Molot Arms, best known as the manufacturer of VEPR shotguns recently shared a photo of a new belt-fed machine gun on their social media. According to Molot’s Facebook post, the weapon can feed from belts and magazines and is chambered in 7.62x39mm. Reportedly [Read More…]
Today’s guest post is written by Andrey Ulanov. Andrey is a firearms enthusiast, historian, researcher and writer. He is the author of numerous interesting small arms articles in various websites. Here is an example of an article written by Andrey. Let’s [Read More…]
The Czech ZB30 was probably one of the better light machine gun designs that saw extensive use during the Second World War. Nations such as Japan and Britain copied aspects of it in the Bren and Japanese Type 99 LMG. It was also license-produced in some other countries as well. It was a top mounted [Read More…]
US Special Operations Command has ordered more light machine guns from FN Herstal. The Department of Defense has announced the award of an indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contract to FN for an undisclosed number of MK46 and MK48 light machine guns for US SOCOM. [Read More…]
At a recent amnesty program held by the Israeli Defense Forces, a first model Dror in .303 British turned up along with a number of other small arms that had been surrendered as part of a drive to return historical small arms from IDF veterans or otherwise. In this [Read More…]
The Charted Industries of Singapore Ultimax is one of the most renowned light machine guns in the world, yet has never really been adopted to the full extent of what it was capable of. The only real military it served was the Singaporean Armed Forces. It was used by multiple other countries and [Read More…]
The Stoner 86/ ARES LMG-1 unfortunately never received much fanfare in the time that it was produced. Originally intended as Eugene Stoner’s concept idea for the SAW trials in what would later become the FN Herstal M249, it never reached full production potential. Truly a shame considering the [Read More…]
The Israeli Dror Light Machine Gun was born during a time of necessity. What would later become the state of Israel was fighting off numerous enemies all around it and needed every weapon system possible. Through this endeavor, a sympathetic employer who formerly worked at Johnson Automatics helped [Read More…]
At the end of the past month, we reported about the adoption of AK-12, AK-15, AEK-971, and AEK-973 rifles by the Russian military. Back then it was not clear if they are going to adopt the RPK-16 light machine gun, too. Today, Kalashnikov Concern and TASS [Read More…]
At the 2018 SHOT Show Industry Day at the Range, Florida gunmaker FightLite Industries, best known for their SCR “ban state” lower receiver that allows “compliant” rifles to be made using AR-15 components. FightLite also is the manufacturer of [Read More…]
This experimental Soviet light machine gun was designed in a military academy called “F.E. Dzerzhinsky Artillery Academy” by a gentleman named Major E. Gorov. In 1942, Gorov finished the designing process of his light machine gun and submitted it to [Read More…]
Is the US Army pushing for a new high-powered 6.Xmm caliber with their new NGSAR program? Recently, the listing for the NGSAR industry day in December was updated with a document describing in part the agenda of the second conference. Scheduled for 9:45 in the morning [Read More…]
The Czech Republic are to purchase over 100 general purpose machine guns from FN Herstal. The Czech Army has agreed a deal to procure FN’s version of the Minimi light machine gun chambered in 7.62x51mm. In a contract notice published on 22 November, the Czech [Read More…]
The US Army will be holding a second Industry Day for its Next Generation Squad Automatic Rifle program, which seeks to replace the M249 light machine gun with a new longer-ranged, lower signature automatic rifle. The Industry Day will be held at Picatinny Arsenal on [Read More…]
Rounding out our coverage of Machinegunapalooza 2017 – by which I mean the numerous machine guns of the 2017 Association of the United States Army annual meeting – we have the IWI Negev (5.56mm) and Negev NG-7 light machine guns. These Israeli belt feds are, [Read More…]
We have already seen the 6.5mm CT Carbine prototype brought out by Textron for the 2017 Association of the United States Army annual meeting, but TFB also got an up close and personal look at Textron’s cased telescoped machine guns. Textron has two different cased [Read More…]
At the 2017 Association of the US Army (AUSA) Annual Meeting, Textron System displayed for the very first time their firing 6.5mm CT Carbine prototype. Previously, only non-firing mockups had been shown to the public, but after successful tests this summer the real [Read More…]
The Russian PKM: Arguably the best general purpose machine gun in the world, it combines a robust reliability with best-in-class light weight. Ian McCollum of Forgotten Weapons recently released two video overviews of the weapon, giving us a good enough excuse as any to [Read More…]
The excellent firearms reference website Modern Firearms is undergoing a major move to a new location, with a much improved interface and look. Although the new site is still in beta, it already appears to include most if not all of the pages from the original, in an [Read More…]
Mikhail Degtyaryov of Kalashnikov Gun Magazine published a couple of images of an ongoing Molot project of making a dual-feed (fed both from a magazine and belt) light machine gun. You can immediately tell that the firearm shown in the images is in the prototyping [Read More…]
Knight’s Armament Company has announced a new very light weight belt fed light machine gun – which they have appropriately termed the Stoner X-LMG (for “Extra Light Machine Gun). The new weapon is based on the previous Knight’s LMG, itself a [Read More…]
Coke’s slogan is “Taste the Feeling”, but maybe in the Ukraine it should be “the Army’s Rust Remover!” instead. “We use Coca-Cola when the gun is rusty. Coca-Cola takes rust away” says Ukrainian Ground Forces machine [Read More…]
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