A different kind of wank thread; small arms that should never have seen service

[BlairWitch749]

Place here your small arms that should have been killed off at birth during the 20th century and today

Some BW nominations

The Colt m1892 revolver which saw service in the phillipeans with the US army
1. .38 round why?... you already had the single most successful revolver and round in history with the .45 acp colt single action army... and the .38 round couldn't stop rampaging tribesmen.
2. Why make a double action revolver if you aren't going to teach your troops a double action shooting position
3. The counter clockwise feeding system was totally unnatural for right handed shooters and had a huge tendency to mess up the frame alignment of the gun, rendering accuracy nil
4. The locking mechanism was also crap so that the cylinder was prone to not lining up correctly with the pin-hammer and suffering a misfire

The German G41 rifle (a rare miss for them in terms of small arms)
1. No external moving parts? Specifications made the weapon crazy before it was even on the drawing board
3. The "bang" self loading system was totally unreliable and prone to misfires and accidental discharges (and this is after they have had months to study captured and enemy rifles which used less complicated systems.... like the SVT in Russia
4. What the hell is the point of switching to a semi auto rifle if your are going to load the same old stripper clips through the top instead of using it as a magazine fed weapon (the British had the same sort of backwardness in this regard with their battle rifles too)

 

[CalBear]

Reising Gun - The clown who ordered 100,000 of the poorly made, jam prone pieces of crap should have been forced to use one on Guadalcanal.

Chauchat Light Machine Gun - We need a weapon to use in the mud filled tenches of the Western Front of WW I. Lets use a half moon magazine design for the bottom of the weapon with a OPEN side slot so mud, splinters and other muck can get into the action easier. The guy who designed this needed to be shot with a Lewis gun, after which the French Army could buy it instead.

 

[Ward]

The M-16 rifle as it was when it first entered service in Vietnam .

 

[The Vulture]

The Lahti-Saloranta M/26 light machine gun.

So you guys are probably going to be fighting out in the open in the incredibly rough conditions of a Finnish winter with little downtime, eh? Alright, here's a weapon with 188 separate delicate parts that all need to be cleaned and assembled perfectly in order to function at all. Let's also make it very heavy and give it a very small ammunition capacity. I mean, it's not as though we'll be fighting a desperate defensive war against the Soviet Union or anything.

 

[NothingNow]

The SA 80 Family, Especially the L85. The Steyr AUG is so much better and more reliable it's not even funny.

 

[BlairWitch749]

A couple more shouldn't have beens

The Beretta M1934 pistol.
1. .38 is not a credible military caliber round (and it replaced a functional 9mm gun
2. If you are going to have the puny caliber, one should at least get increased magazine capacity as a tradeoff however this useless gun didn't (7 round mag)
3. Why on earth would you have the slide close when the last round is fired? It makes reloading take longer...WW1 had already happened, they should have known better

The Thompson submachine gun as originally deployed in WW2 (this is with 2 years of observation of friendly and enemy sub machine guns in use)
1. Very expensive, and manpower intensive to manufacture, using too many harder to obtain materials
2. Very poor quality control in the catch and release mechanism, making the magazines very prone to falling out of the gun if you jostle the thing around too much
3. Poor muzzle velocity versus competitors weapons which gave the weapon inferior range despite a larger shell
4. Poor quality control in alignment and sight welding

 

[BlairWitch749]

The Italian Breda series machine guns
1. Outclassed by ALL GPMG's despite intense money and resources being put behind it
2. Closed bolt heavy machine gun....crazy!
3. The rounds had to be coated in special lubricant that created tremendous risk of accidental cookoffs

The BAR (for ww2... although it was too late for ww1 it would have been effective there)
1. It failed to fit into a niche, you are either a battle rifle or a squad support weapon, you can't be both
2. Too heavy and akward to be a battle rifle
3. Too light, too small mags, no interchangable barrels to be a squad support weapon
4. Akward mag alaignment for righties, plus it made the weapon unbalanced, and difficult to fire accurately from a standing position or from the hip

 

[Just Leo]

The Canadian Ross rifle. Didn't like shooting, or mud.

 

[BlairWitch749]

The japanese type 92 hmg.... short clips and the rounds had to be specially greased which caused buildups in the breach and misfires....low rate of fire and akward to use; a real loser

 

[Dan]

The M-16 rifle as it was when it first entered service in Vietnam .

Actually, the British got a few of these for use in the jungle and never had a problem with them. Then again, they didn't believe the manufacturers claim of a self cleaning bolt and cleaned the rifle regularly.

The SA 80 Family, Especially the L85. The Steyr AUG is so much better and more reliable it's not even funny.

Erm, the L85 IS the SA80. Secondly, while the early models recieved bad press, this was down to a few small points: The UAT versions supplied had plastic parts made by Palitoy. In the UK, Palitoy were better known for making Action Man, the UK version of GI Joe. So when a bunch of squaddies, used to the L1a1 SLR, get this smaller lighter weapon and see that the foregrip is made by a toy company...
Thirdly, the problem with the L85 were mostly, and I say this from personal experience, down to use error.
Jamming in desert conditions - accepted wisdon for desert use is that rifles should have minimal oil used to prevent them gumming up. The L85's bolt is designed to weep like an eye and clear gumming in the same way. So under oiling, which is correct for every other weapon in the world in the desert, is wrong for the L85. Over oiling for Jungle use is still correct for the L85 though.
The other issue with the rifle failing to feed is again down to the way magazines were carried. Normal practice is to store them upside down in the mag pouch, doing this caused the retaining lip on the magazine to bend, preventing rounds from feeding, as soon as it was discovered, squaddies would then use a gerber to bend the lips back, weakening them each time it happened until they broke. Using Armalite magazines resolved this until the H&K Manufactured ones were available.
The L85a2 probably only has the HK416 as serious competition these days.
As for the AUG being superior in all areas, that wasn't the view of the Australian army in the slightest when it was introduced. It was seen in a worse light than the L85 and M16 combined.
The Steyr AUG is a good piece of kit, comfortable, accurate, but less interchangability of magazines and magazine types. The AUSAUG on the other hand, wouldn't work in the jungle, wouldn't work in the desert, (the main two terrains that make up Australian geography), and would fall apart when dropped. Now, I really hope that the Australian government followed the same plan as did the British government - call in someone who knows what they're doing to fix it, but it was, as I understand an issue of their own making. Litterally.
Rather than having Steyr make the rifles for them, they bought the licence instead.

My actual nomination for Small arm that shouldn't have seen service was the Sten Mk1.
Yes, very simple, easy to make etc, but horribly tempremental and equally prone to jam or ND if you looked at it wrong.
Later models weren't that bad, and did well, but you had to treat it with extra respect less it bite you. Other than that, the British, like the Germans have generally been lucky with small arms with few duds, but I suspect, for different reasons - the British used far fewer weapon types, and no radical weapon types, (apart from the automatic loading revolver - that was just made of WIN ). The Vickers MK1 onwards, the Short Magazine Lee Enfield, and Bren in their various guises have around 250 years of service between them in the British Army.
The Germans on the other hand made lots of good weapons in the same time.

 

[BlairWitch749]

Actually, the British got a few of these for use in the jungle and never had a problem with them. Then again, they didn't believe the manufacturers claim of a self cleaning bolt and cleaned the rifle regularly.


Erm, the L85 IS the SA80. Secondly, while the early models recieved bad press, this was down to a few small points: The UAT versions supplied had plastic parts made by Palitoy. In the UK, Palitoy were better known for making Action Man, the UK version of GI Joe. So when a bunch of squaddies, used to the L1a1 SLR, get this smaller lighter weapon and see that the foregrip is made by a toy company...
Thirdly, the problem with the L85 were mostly, and I say this from personal experience, down to use error.
Jamming in desert conditions - accepted wisdon for desert use is that rifles should have minimal oil used to prevent them gumming up. The L85's bolt is designed to weep like an eye and clear gumming in the same way. So under oiling, which is correct for every other weapon in the world in the desert, is wrong for the L85. Over oiling for Jungle use is still correct for the L85 though.
The other issue with the rifle failing to feed is again down to the way magazines were carried. Normal practice is to store them upside down in the mag pouch, doing this caused the retaining lip on the magazine to bend, preventing rounds from feeding, as soon as it was discovered, squaddies would then use a gerber to bend the lips back, weakening them each time it happened until they broke. Using Armalite magazines resolved this until the H&K Manufactured ones were available.
The L85a2 probably only has the HK416 as serious competition these days.
As for the AUG being superior in all areas, that wasn't the view of the Australian army in the slightest when it was introduced. It was seen in a worse light than the L85 and M16 combined.
The Steyr AUG is a good piece of kit, comfortable, accurate, but less interchangability of magazines and magazine types. The AUSAUG on the other hand, wouldn't work in the jungle, wouldn't work in the desert, (the main two terrains that make up Australian geography), and would fall apart when dropped. Now, I really hope that the Australian government followed the same plan as did the British government - call in someone who knows what they're doing to fix it, but it was, as I understand an issue of their own making. Litterally.
Rather than having Steyr make the rifles for them, they bought the licence instead.

My actual nomination for Small arm that shouldn't have seen service was the Sten Mk1.
Yes, very simple, easy to make etc, but horribly tempremental and equally prone to jam or ND if you looked at it wrong.
Later models weren't that bad, and did well, but you had to treat it with extra respect less it bite you. Other than that, the British, like the Germans have generally been lucky with small arms with few duds, but I suspect, for different reasons - the British used far fewer weapon types, and no radical weapon types, (apart from the automatic loading revolver - that was just made of WIN ). The Vickers MK1 onwards, the Short Magazine Lee Enfield, and Bren in their various guises have around 250 years of service between them in the British Army.
The Germans on the other hand made lots of good weapons in the same time.

A lot of the Sten's problems where magazine related though (and the magazine was a problem in the thompson and the mp-40 as well)... poor quality control in the spring production and calibration led to all of the long single stack mags having serious feeding problems. (plus the troops where sometimes careless loading them damn things ie putting 31 rounds in a magazine meant for 30 and permanently damaged the spring so that the magazine would no longer feed correctly... The Suomi and PPSH and Thompson with 50 round drum didn't have any of the feeding issues we associate with ww2 sub machine guns

 

[von Adler]

The Italian Breda series machine guns
1. Outclassed by ALL GPMG's despite intense money and resources being put behind it
2. Closed bolt heavy machine gun....crazy!
3. The rounds had to be coated in special lubricant that created tremendous risk of accidental cookoffs

The BAR (for ww2... although it was too late for ww1 it would have been effective there)
1. It failed to fit into a niche, you are either a battle rifle or a squad support weapon, you can't be both
2. Too heavy and akward to be a battle rifle
3. Too light, too small mags, no interchangable barrels to be a squad support weapon
4. Akward mag alaignment for righties, plus it made the weapon unbalanced, and difficult to fire accurately from a standing position or from the hip

Actually, Belgium, Sweden and Poland made good use of the BAR - in the FN-Browning shape with pistol grip, bipod and quickly interchangable barrel.

http://www.gotavapen.se/gota/artiklar/kg/kg_bilder/kg37v901w.jpg

 

[Gridley]

I'd say the problem with the BAR was the US Army trying to use it to replace the squad light machine gun, instead of supplementing it. I think reorganizing the squad to have both a LMG and a BAR would have been greatly superior to most other power's squad org.

 

[Alexius]

Erm, the L85 IS the SA80. Secondly, while the early models recieved bad press, this was down to a few small points: The UAT versions supplied had plastic parts made by Palitoy. In the UK, Palitoy were better known for making Action Man, the UK version of GI Joe. So when a bunch of squaddies, used to the L1a1 SLR, get this smaller lighter weapon and see that the foregrip is made by a toy company...

Didn't the same thing happen with the M16 and Mattel?

My entry would be the Nambu pistol, which was known for accidentally going off in the holster...

 

[Landshark]

1. .38 round why?... you already had the single most successful revolver and round in history with the .45 acp colt single action army... and the .38 round couldn't stop rampaging tribesmen.

The .45 Colt, (ACP stands for Auto Colt Pistol which wasn't introduced until the M1911 in 1911), was a black powder round. The .38 used smokeless propellant which brought it in line with the USArmy's modern weapons. Also it was introduced in 1892, six years before the Spanish American War and the Philippine Insurection created any need for a round the could stop rampaging tribesmen.

2. Why make a double action revolver if you aren't going to teach your troops a double action shooting position.

Because it was 1892 and no one was using double action shooting positions except a few serious shooting pioneers.

4. What the hell is the point of switching to a semi auto rifle if your are going to load the same old stripper clips through the top instead of using it as a magazine fed weapon (the British had the same sort of backwardness in this regard with their battle rifles too)

The G41 wasn't a battle rifle it was a sniper/designated marksman's rifle, rapid reload wasn't a particular requirement. Britain didn't use a detatchable magazine for the SMLE, which I presume is what your talking about, because charger loading was the norm at the time and the SMLE's magazine was only detatchable as an aid to stripping and cleaning the rifle.

The Beretta M1934 pistol.
1. .38 is not a credible military caliber round (and it replaced a functional 9mm gun

.38 is a nine millimeter calibre you mean .380. The weapon it replaced, the Glisenti M1910, was not a functional 9mm gun, it was a not particularly notable 1st generation self loader that fired a reduced charge 9mm bullet unique to the Glisenti.

1. Outclassed by ALL GPMG's despite intense money and resources being put behind it

None of the Breda machine guns, in fact no other machine guns outside of Germany, were GPMG. You're comparing weapons to a completely different class of weapons.

 

[Landshark]

The Canadian Ross rifle. Didn't like shooting, or mud.

You can blame that on whoever wouldn't set up a factory to make SMLE's in Canada. If the manufactuers wouldn't set up a factory the Canadian government should've and if they couldn't the British government deffinately should have.

 

[Landshark]

Erm, the L85 IS the SA80.

It's also the L86 Light Support Weapon, hence SA80 family.

 

[Landshark]

The M60 GPMG. I get that the USArmy was rightly impressed by the MG42 and wanted an equivalent weapon but why try and combine the MG42 with the FG42? Just copy the MG42 for heaven's, (and your soldiers) sakes. The Germans managed it with the MG3, they could have even helped you properly change from metric to imperial, then you'd have had a working machine gun and we'd have cool pictures of GI's rocking the Vietnamese jungle with MG42's.

The M14 rifle. The Ross Rifle of it's generation. Perfect for target shooting, hunting and sniping. Totally fucking useless for anything else. Putting aside the fact that it's cartridge offered no improvement on either it's predecessor or it's alternatives there's the fact that it was basically a pre-war design with a few bells and whistles added and was inferior not only to foreign weapons like the FNFAL and the G3 but to home grown ones like the AR10, so the Pentagon didn't even have that as an excuse.

 

[Aelita]

The M1 Garand would have been quite a better rifle had they stuck with the 7mm round instead of requiring the use of the 30-06. The stopping power and range of the 30-06 are useless in 20th century warfare except for in a handful of specialized roles. Volume of fire and recoil control are much better. The 7mm Garands could fit 10 rounds instead of 8, and had much more manageable recoil.

 

[Petike]

The Canadian Ross rifle. Didn't like shooting, or mud.

It's probably the most epic example of a firearm that was produced and distributed en masse because national pride and politics had a stronger say than common sense. Still, it had one redeeming value : It was a very good sniper rifle.

And for that matter, the early WWI versions of the Lebel rifle were also quite prone to nasty malfunctions. I'm not really suprised the French eventually switched to the Berthier rifles during the later parts of the war...