Thread: Best SMG?

Originally Posted by sappersgt

I found the MP40 doable, never had the chance to fire the M3.

Would you mind to elaborate on the characteristics of the MP-40? And where did you find one of these?

Originally Posted by Triple C

Would you mind to elaborate on the characteristics of the MP-40? And where did you find one of these?

Armies never throw anything away, they had one in the armory. One of good things about being a Corporal was I could check out any weapon they had. I checked out a MP40, a PPSH, Sten, Thompson and an Owen. They balked at letting me have the BOYS however!:(

I found the MP40 a functional weapon, not anywhere near as comfortable to shoot as my Uzi. It was fairly easy to control, possibly due to the lower rate of fire. It would be effective.

Originally Posted by sappersgt

I checked out a MP40, a PPSH, Sten, Thompson and an Owen. They balked at letting me have the BOYS however!:(

Ooh boy. Now you gotta talk about all of them!

Originally Posted by Triple C

Ooh boy. Now you gotta talk about all of them!

Not much to tell. I had my choice of duty weapons, I used that as an excuse to shoot whatever they had in the armory. That was one of the fun things about being in the army.

I picked the Uzi as my duty weapon mainly because I qualified Expert and figured don't mess with success. I was a comparatively lousy shot with the FAL (R1), G3 and R4. The Uzi was 9mm and every one of us had a 9mm sidearm. That meant you get ammo from anybody in pinch. The problem with the Thompson and PPSH was no one else besides me would be carrying that ammunition. There weren't enough magazines for the MP40 and the Sten was well, a Sten.

I kept trying to get them to let me play with the BOYS. I wanted to try mounting a scope on it, maybe a side rail and use it as a sniper rifle. I also asked if they had any captured 14.5mm Russian made "elephant guns". I was finally told to knock it off, if I didn't they'd find something unpleasant for me to do.

there were many instances in ww2 where 14,5mm rifles would brake shooters shoulder, even thou they had muzzle break, and padding, and rifles weighed 40-50lb, still, press it not hard enough against your shoulder, that will hurt.

Originally Posted by sappersgt

Not much to tell. I had my choice of duty weapons, I used that as an excuse to shoot whatever they had in the armory. That was one of the fun things about being in the army.

I picked the Uzi as my duty weapon mainly because I qualified Expert and figured don't mess with success. I was a comparatively lousy shot with the FAL (R1), G3 and R4. The Uzi was 9mm and every one of us had a 9mm sidearm. That meant you get ammo from anybody in pinch. The problem with the Thompson and PPSH was no one else besides me would be carrying that ammunition. There weren't enough magazines for the MP40 and the Sten was well, a Sten.

I kept trying to get them to let me play with the BOYS. I wanted to try mounting a scope on it, maybe a side rail and use it as a sniper rifle. I also asked if they had any captured 14.5mm Russian made "elephant guns". I was finally told to knock it off, if I didn't they'd find something unpleasant for me to do.

You didn't miss much with the Boys. I have fired them in both .55 Boys and .50 BMG, and its nothing special. I have also seen one converted to .50 Vickers, although it was a static display. The gun is bulky for the cartridge by today's standards, especially the long bbl. Recoil was surprisingly substantial, too.

How do you like the Owen? I have never fired one of those.

The gun we have at work I wish I could fire is the 20mm Solothurn. The ammo is just too scarce and expensive for playing. Its a beautifully made rifle.

OK here we go, a topic I can speak to. The MP 5 has a locking bolt face that disengages a few micro sec's after firing (similar in theory to the M-16 but praticly it is very different) and it is to this that the weapon owes a great deal of it's accuracy (along with good engineering.) It is also the weapon I voted for and as a close quarters weapon I've fired well a lot of ammo through a number of different models (and I agree with the cleaning comments, every hour of firing means 2 cleaning but we always used electrical tape over the barrel to prevent sand and dirt from fouling the action). Now to critize the weapon I have but one complain the safety lever cannot be rotated upward - back to safe - without shifting the operator's grip. This remains as the single legitimate ergonomic criticism as if you need to switch it back you may have to move off taget and in combat I do not like to do so. The P-90 seems an excellent weapon (I've only fired 6 mags in 2 test fires through it) from all accounts from those I know that have run it through Live fire exercizes, but it just doesn't have the MP 5's history of trial by fire yet, but give it a few years to see if it holds up over time as well. I'd be happy to be wrong and revise my view. And as to what is the need for shooting at an Armored target at 200 yards plus with a sub, well SNAFU, comes to mind. It should be a soft target just a quick sweep or a intell patrol in an urban setting (Sub gun is the best primary weapon choose) and then the unexpected, a sniper? or irrgular unit? maybe a local millia? now hitting lightly armour targets at 200 meters seems like a pretty good design feature? But the PDW is I think going to need a few years of good use before it will convince some of us of it's effectiveness.

Originally Posted by GraniteForge

You didn't miss much with the Boys. I have fired them in both .55 Boys and .50 BMG, and its nothing special. I have also seen one converted to .50 Vickers, although it was a static display. The gun is bulky for the cartridge by today's standards, especially the long bbl. Recoil was surprisingly substantial, too.

How do you like the Owen? I have never fired one of those.

The gun we have at work I wish I could fire is the 20mm Solothurn. The ammo is just too scarce and expensive for playing. Its a beautifully made rifle.

I found the Owen slightly awkward, with it's top magazine and offset sights. The grips were a plus and it seemed to fire well enough. It was heavier than the Uzi but not as much as the Thompson.

What kind of ammo does the Solothurn use? Is it a shorter cartridge like the old MG151?

Originally Posted by sappersgt

I found the Owen slightly awkward, with it's top magazine and offset sights. The grips were a plus and it seemed to fire well enough. It was heavier than the Uzi but not as much as the Thompson.

What kind of ammo does the Solothurn use? Is it a shorter cartridge like the old MG151?

Good question. I have never seen an MG151.

I can tell you that the Solothurn we have chambers, I believe, the Solothurn "short" cartridge. I know that each round of ammo we have comes in individual stiff cardboard tubes, and it is all brass cased with Waffenamt headstamp. I will see if I can arrange access to the ammo vault with both a camera and ruler, and then we may see.

Originally Posted by Andy-GER

Oh yes, you can call that a difference

I asked our armorer about the smg´s used for the range only, and he experienced similar problems (he has to clean them). They fire about 1.000 rounds a day, and sometimes he has to open the locking peace with a hammer, or by hitting the cocking lever at the edge of the workbench. After that, he throws every piece in an ultrasonic bath, and goes to lunch for a while.

This is why my squad has some flawless, hardly used mp5 to be used in regular duty. We like reliable guns



iThank you, Jeff. Years ago i felt in love with a young lady from London...no better way to learn a foreign language (with a little emphasis on other things than guns...)
In your case, you know enough to survive here in skid row. )

regards

Andy

Andy,

You're welcome, and thank you, although I do try to avoid skid row wherever I am. Your suggestion of finding a linguistically complementary young lady has obvious merit.

As to the guns, your armorer has perfectly described the MP5 I know so intimately: lock it into a vise and hammer it open. I have done this many times, even with live ammo chambered.

-Jeff.

Originally Posted by GraniteForge

Good question. I have never seen an MG151.

I can tell you that the Solothurn we have chambers, I believe, the Solothurn "short" cartridge. I know that each round of ammo we have comes in individual stiff cardboard tubes, and it is all brass cased with Waffenamt headstamp. I will see if I can arrange access to the ammo vault with both a camera and ruler, and then we may see.

The reason I ask is because a few years back I had a unique opportunity to talk at length with an old Wehrmacht Oberfeldwebel. He mentioned a 20mm AT rifle and said as they couldn't find ammo for it he sent an Obergefreiter out to a neighboring Luftwaffe base to get some MG151 ammo. The aircraft cannon cartridge would fit but they could only fire single rounds. It ended up cracking the breech after several rounds so they left it.

The story how they ended up with it was interesting. His company had been detached from his parent division and ended up in Courland. He was one of the few evacuated. He received orders to transfer all NCOs to a divisional replacement company in Germany. The company was then disbanded and all other ranks were absorbed to the unit they had been attached to.

He arrived in Germany with himself, a Feldwebel, 2 Obergefreiters and 6 Gefrieters, 4 of which had been recently promoted. He was given 160 green replacements. The replacement company disbanded and assumed the number of a company in his division. He was ordered to warehouse full of captured weapons to equip his men. He armed them with Czech made Bren guns, two Hungarian WWI issue heavy machine guns and of course a 20mm AT rifle. Having no transportation they forced marched east to find their parent division. Covering 30 miles a day they lost about a quarter of the replacements on the way.

He said the Czech Bren guns would jam with the issued German ammo. They would take the individual rounds and "seat" them with a hammer against a block of wood and then they would cycle. They got rid of them as soon as they could.

I found the whole story a fascinating tale both of improvisation and an illustration of how the Wehrmacht "rebuilt " units. Saving the cadre of experienced NCOs, filling them up with replacements and arming them with whatever came to hand.

Originally Posted by sappersgt

The reason I ask is because a few years back I had a unique opportunity to talk at length with an old Wehrmacht Oberfeldwebel.

...

I found the whole story a fascinating tale both of improvisation and an illustration of how the Wehrmacht "rebuilt " units. Saving the cadre of experienced NCOs, filling them up with replacements and arming them with whatever came to hand.

What a great story! Thank you for sharing that. Those Wehrmacht NCOs were incredibly resourceful and tough.

I have a close friend whose family is mostly from Hesse (I am supposed to add: Hesse-Kassel, not Hesse-Darmstadt). The traditional male family occupation is forester/hunt master. In the Army, they tended to be either trackers/snipers/intel types, or work with the animals. He had a great uncle who was a long-service Heer NCO when captured at Stalingrad. The Russians kept him prisoner until almost 1960.

The interesting part is that for most of that time, he was armed, and spent much of the time without supervision. Because of his outstanding stalking and hunting abilities, and his skills at living off the land, he was first made a hunter for his remote prisoner camp, and then for a group of camps. He would roam in a wide arc, taking game and leaving caches of food for parties of guarded prisoners who would follow days behind him. The camps were generally not fenced, so in addition to goint out when they needed meat, he could leave whenever he wanted, to go into the isolation of being alone, armed, and experience some sort of freedom for a while.

And I checked some reference material, and I see why the MG151 round could function and fire singly in the Solothurn, but also why it would damage the gun. The MG151/20 uses a 20 x 82mm cartridge, whereas the Solothurn 'Short' cartridge (used in the S18-100) is 20 x 105 mm, and the Solothurn 'Long' cartridge (used in the S18-1000 and S18-1100) is 20 x 138mm. Both Solothurn cartridges are belted.

So, I can see it being theoretically possible to fire the shorter cartridge in the larger gun, although it would be a pretty sloppy fit, perhaps requiring the use of some sort of adapter or chamber block, but its very likely that some of the firing pressure will leak back and damage the mechanism.

Thompson .45 with that 50 round disk
PPSh - 41 with that 71 round disk :D