#MachineGuns

Our last episode with Col. Dillon, the infantry officer discusses U.S. small arms and some of their finer points of employment within the Vietnam War while on his two tours there as a battalion field grade officer. The Colt 1911? Great for shooting off locks. The M16A1? Dillon actually credits that rifle with getting through the Battle of Ia Drang due to the ability to carry more ammunition over the M14. M60s? Issues with barrel changing in the middle of a firefight due to the barrel mounted bipods. Blooper carriers/grenadiers never used their mechanical sights when employing their M79 grenade launchers.

Caseless: The ammunition designer’s holy grail, and the engineer’s worst nightmare. It would obsolete the cartridge case overnight, resulting in cheaper, lighter, and more compact ammunition. Weapons would be able to carry 50, 60, or more rounds in slim, inexpensive magazines, and expel them at a rate of fire much higher than current weapons are capable of – not only because the ammunition is lighter and therefore more could be carried to feed such thirsty guns, but because the extraction and ejection cycles of the weapons themselves could be eliminated.

Norwegian ammunition company Nammo has come up with a solution to the anti-drone predicament. The company’s answer is to develop 40x53mm high-velocity grenades using programmable components that allow soldiers to lase the distance to an enemy UAV, transmit that data into the grenade, which then programs that grenade to airburst at that particular altitude. Using bursts to maximize the effectiveness of the explosions around a drone, the likelihood of taking it out of commission can increase, given an accurate distance program is used.

Last month drawings of MKEK’s domestically produced FN MAG were released to the public, along with a 5.56x45mm NATO design. Through that and the specification pages on the companies website, we know that the company is finally coming out to the public over long-term plans to replace aging MG3s made under license by MKEK since 1974. What we have now is video footage of what appears to be function-testing of an MKEK MFY-71 (Makineli Tüfek-71/ Machine Gun 71) GPMG outside a factory or at least a rudimentary test range. The barrel lacks any front sight, and doesn’t have a final factory finish applied, along with the receiver rivets, feed tray cover, and bipod.

Turkish owned, Kazakh manufactured, and soon to be Malaysian based subsidiary of Aselsan recently demonstrated a Remote Weapons Station based around the 7.62x51mm NATO Dillon M134 Minigun at Defense & Security 2017 held in Bangkok Thailand. The design has Stabilised Advanced Remote weapon Platform (SARP) as its name and is apart of Aselsan Malaysia, a subsidiary based in Kuala Lumpur. It is a mount that is designed around a variety of weapon systems, primarily the .50 BMG M2 and the FN MAG. However it can also be utilized with a Russian AGL and an M134 Minigun. Included with the platform are a thermal imaging capability, automatic target tracking (to include low flying drones), ballistic computer, and an ability to work in numerous environments. The company has stated that the design is in use by 13 different countries.

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, among production weapons, some of the best-designed machine guns in existence today, incorporating the operating concept of the PKM into a weapon with light overall weight, exceptionally robust construction, and modern features. Also, unlike the PKM, the Negev is select-fire, with a semiautomatic fire setting in addition to fully automatic.

In the coming decades, it is likely that one of the biggest challenges facing small arms ammunition designers will be solving the problem of how to deal with advanced body armors. The problem is already percolating to the surface, as Level IV body armor – which is immune to virtually all general issue rounds below .50 caliber – becomes more available and less expensive. Already, an individual can equip themselves with a full set of Level IV plates and a carrier for less than $1,000. As armor improves, it will only get lighter, cheaper, and more resistant to fire.

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 telescoped belt fed weapons in testing right now: A 5.56mm CT light machine gun, and a 7.62mm CT medium or general purpose machine gun.

At IPAS 2017, Iran’s Defense Industries Organization showcased various grenade launchers and anti-material rifles the state owned company is bringing to the Iranian (and possibly Iran’s allied customers) market. Displayed first is almost an exact copy of the South African Milkor M32 six cartridge semi-automatic 40x46mm grenade launcher.

This year’s IPAS 2017 held in Tehran featured a number of designs seen previously such as Iran’s 7.62x54mm PKM GPMG, and 12.7x108mm Dshk Heavy Machine Gun copies. But of particular interest was what appears to be a shortened PKM with a barrel cut to around 14 inches, a telescoping butt stock based on the AR15, polymer pistol grip, and what appears to be a canvas or polymer assault drum. Also notice the shortened compensator and relatively simple sling attached, especially if the machine gun is designed to be used in an “Assault Phase”. From a cursory glance, it appears that the conventional Iranian Infantry is armed with small arms of local licensed manufacture by the Defense Industries Organization such as MG3s, MP5s, and G3 rifles (currently this appears to be transitioning to Stoner based designs). Whereas the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps is equipped with locally produced or imported Soviet bloc weaponry such as PKMs or AKMs. If we were to ever see this PKM variant in use by Iranian security forces, a likely place would probably be with the IRGC in a smaller team or special operations capacity.

Marcolmar makes semi-automatic, legal copies of the Czech Uk.59, and similar copies of the Soviet PKM General Purpose Machine Gun. So why not clone the two together and bring the resulting creation into the 21st Century, with polymer furniture, an updated design, and Picatinny rails? Meet the UKM, Marcolmar’s attempt to bring civilians a legal belt fed design that incorporates elements of both the PKM and the Uk.59 without losing any of the capabilities of either, and modernizing the design. For those who are still interested in the traditional belt-fed look, the older designers are out there on the market, but this UKM is for a newer crowd of gun owners that want a little bit extra.

While the majority of the defense industry is fixated on the adoption of the 7.62x51mm NATO MPT-76 select fire rifle by the Turkish Land Forces (which is still not complete in the least), or the more recent release of a 5.56x45mm version, MKEK has quietly been rolling out plans for two locally produced versions of foreign GPMG designs. Specifically these are essentially a modernized Turkish version of the PKM, but in 7.62x51mm NATO, in addition to what appears to be a direct copy of the FN Herstal, what would appear to be licensed produced version of the FN MAG, also in 7.62x51mm.

Marcolmar is a small but very dedicated company in northern Indiana that produces semi-automatic beltfed versions of historically significant small arms from the Soviet era. Tackling a very difficult task such as taking the Czech Uk.59 GPMG and turning it into a legal, semi-automatic, ATF approved firearm that you could purchase through an FFL isn’t a small task at all. The owner David Bane, brings his passion of military and small arms history to life, along with an outstanding crew behind him to back him up. In this video he takes us through the timeline of his company, and will be doing so for the next several episodes of TFB TV.

This year at DSEi 2017 a number of countries had their lesser known and newly developed vehicle mounted Remote Control Weapon Stations (RCWS) on display for the defense industry exposition in London. Rather than list each entry individually, it is fitting that we include them all here for readers to examine and compare. Although the United States has fielded multiple versions of vehicle mounted remote weapon systems, probably the CROW being the more well known design throughout the U.S. Army, some of these other countries are much lesser known. Specifically at DSEi 2017 were designs from Slovenia, Slovakia, Belgium, and the UAE.

A father and son from Somerset, UK made a surprising discovery while dredging a local river for scrap with a magnet. They pulled up parts from dozens of rifles, pistols, machine guns and shotguns.