"Machine Gun Day" Topic

Hello folks,

Today was an awesome day. The Iron Ivan Team had the pleasure and privilege of being able to shoot some of the WWII (and post war) weapons from the collection of a good friend. With our friends from our gaming club we spent the day putting lead downrange. It was an amazing opportunity.

I posted the videos from the shoot on my blog:

link

Hope you enjoy!

The list of WWII weapons we have now fired is growing quite long and the list of stuff we have yet to fire much shorter…

Still, there is always next year.

awesome…:)

Sending mass amounts of rounds down range from pieces of history and engineering is always a great day.

If you ever get a chance head to one of the big shoots in NV or KY, talk to some of the guys on the line and explain to them what you do and you will get not only get great technical info on the guns but quite a bit of historical perpective(a lot of the guys are hisorians of the guns they shoot) and you might be able to finangle some trigger time on the guns of the era you haven't had a chance to fire.

edited for poor typing skills!

Er…

You live in a country where it is legal to fire these weapons..

Very cool!

Now, will you be editing any part of your rules as a result?
--
Tim

Wish I was there.

Patrice: Not sure what you mean. Is this a statement or a question? The collection we fired is both legal to own and shoot in our state (laws vary by state). We were on private property, the local law enforcement and people living nearby were aware we were shooting. One of the supervisors from the local police department came down and hung out with us while we were shooting.

Tim: Good question! To be honest, it has reinforced some of my ideas in rules writing and confirmed some of my long standing hunches. These weapons are brutal. We had some technical difficulties with the fact that these were 65+ year old weapons firing some pretty crappy and unreliable ammo, but when it got down to it and they ran well…it just proved to me how deadly and versatile these weapons would be to a trained crew. Hell, if I can engage multiple targets out to 50 yards, change targets easily, maintain a sight picture, fire controlled bursts, and generally operate the weapon…what could a trained crew do?

No wonder WWII squad and platoon level point of contact combat was so deadly. It really made me realize how fearsome these weapons were and how going up against them would have been so difficult.

I also learned a lot about their limitations. There are so many things that can go wrong with these weapons. Like I said, we were just some untrained schlubs firing old, seen better days weapons, but I can see how easily it can be for things to go wrong. The bipod can get wonky, a belt can get twisted, you can have feed problems (from simple to very very bad), stuck cartridges, bolts getting jammed up, parts like springs coming loose or causing problems.

I see now why assistant gunners are so important.

Still, when they work, they are amazing. A trained crew using a new weapon with plenty of good ammo is a deadly tool. I also really appreciate the difference between heavy and light machine guns and how they are used and would be applied.

It really made me appreciate the hands on aspects of things I have only ever read about. It was a great experience. I hope to cross off more WWII weapons from my list.

Two years ago, the BAR was the most impressive. This year it was the MG-42 and the Maxim.

Looks like you got some first hand experience with jams and getting hot brass on your arm. I envy you having the chance to do this.

Hot brass, burned fingers on barrels, sore shoulder…it was awesome!

The sound of freedom!

…if I can engage multiple targets out to 50 yards, change targets easily, maintain a sight picture, fire controlled bursts, and generally operate the weapon…what could a trained crew do?

No offence but on a two-way range your abilities tend to be degraded.

I wanna live in the States & machine-gun things…

Though you do raise an interesting point about sight picture and range. The other weekend we had a go at seeing when a standing man disappeared behind the front sight post of a Mosin and it was about 300 metres.

Now, obviously, you'd not be trying to cover the whole target with your sight. That isn't the point. The point is that a standing man at that range is really small to the naked eye.

You can see why SOP in the Red Army seems (from German accounts) to have been to hold your fire to 100 metres or less and then let rip – despite what the manual says.

Lucky sob's!
If I lived free and armed -you'd find me on the range practically every day………..
Great to hear the different rates of fire between the weapons…the Russian kit sounds significantly slower than the others……..(until SWMO insisted I turn the volume down!!)
On the up side I've played with the Bren,.30cal & GPMG…

Frontovik: Ha! Good point about the two way range. We talked about that a lot both when shooting and when the gun had problems: if you were being attacked by enemy infantry, how easy it was to rapidly change targets and adjust your fire and also how terrifying it must have been when the gun went down…

I think what I really came away with is that if a schlub like me with no experience and no training can do it, imagine how deadly a trained and experienced crew would be.

Gaz: Jealous…I really want to try the Bren some day :) I'd be at the range every day except that ammo is so expensive, haha.

I wanna live in the States & machine-gun things…

Don't need to live here, just need to know who and when to visit!

Most of the gun nerds (because we *are* nerds) will be more than happy to help out a visitor who can't 'play' with the fun toys back home.

I'm already on call for several of the Asian exchange students on campus who want to go shooting, it's just still too dry out south of town to safely go shooting (bad fire risk, I don't want to be the guy who starts a fire!).

Reminds me, I need to check on the next high-explosive shoot they schedule. My big rifle needs to stretch her legs again!