Left to right: .303" AP, Ball, Tracer:
Note the identical shapes of the cartridges & projectiles, distinguished only by some paint on the tips
Yup. That’s what I said. In the curved magazine (not the straight one also made for it). Unsuitable does not mean unusable. It means not suited for.
A tuxedo is unsuitable for going to the grocery store. That does not mean you can’t get through the door in one. Don’t play semantics. Semantics always fall short.
Yup. That’s what I said. In the curved magazine (not the straight one also made for it). Unsuitable does not mean unusable. It means not suited for.
A tuxedo is unsuitable for going to the grocery store. That does not mean you can’t get through the door in one. Don’t play semantics. Semantics always fall short.[/quote]
But they were used, a lot, in a curved magazine - surely that means that they were suitable for the task? I’ve never seen a British Bren used with a straight magazine during the war period - the post war 7.62mm version used one, I believe.
They were used. Not commonly.
They were used. Not commonly.[/quote]
Of course tracer was used with the Bren in an amount that corresponded with the tactical doctrine at that time ie no more or less than other machine guns used by the British army for similair purposes. What a ridiculous statement you make and try and squirm out of as always.
They were used. Not commonly.[/quote]
How do you know? There’s a whole list of links to people describing using tracer in the first post of the thread - are they all liars?
They were used. Not commonly.[/quote]
Prove it!
when tracer is so important, for accuracy, target indication and burning holes in the nasty fuckers, why would the british army issue a magazine that prevents its use?
it seems bizzare to issue an ammunition to troops but then purposefully issue them magazines that are unsuitable for its use, making the ammunition itself redendant and a weighty hindrance to troops on the ground - who after all are carrying three rifles, for sniping, assault and fibua!
You have yet again been caught out!
Ironman fuck off and talk about nailguns and flame throwers and railguns and any other weapons that exist in “Quake” this is after all, your only level of experience and competence with offensive weaponry!
GIMP.
I have it on good authority that the Bren even runs rather well on Mk VI ammo (215gn roundnose), which has a very different shape from normal Mk.VII (174gn spitzer).
This was from anecdote told to me by the esteemed Chris Rhodes at a dinner about his time in Cambridge University OTC. IIRC (words to this effect):
“One day, I was down at the OTC. The CO came to me & said that they hadn’t fulfilled their quota for returns of empty cases, so would I kindly take a coups of BREN guns down the range and shoot some surplus ammunition. So, I drew the weapons, and went to the bunker. The QM provided me with a few thousand rounds of Mk.VI ammunition, left over since before the 1st world war. So, off we trotted to the range. Many people told me that the BREN wouldn’t fire Mk.VI, but I can assure you that not only does it fire it, but it fires it rather well.”
“The original BRNO weapons were also in 7.92mm, then the British altered them to use the .303 British Mk VII cartridge and a curved magazine to accomodate the rimmed cartridge. This was a curse and a source of feed checks and annoyance for soldiers who used them when the flanged rims on the .303 cartridges got into the wrong position overlapping behind the next cartridge in the magazine.”
If you are loading the magazine correctly (either by hand or by machine), it is basically impossible for this situation to occur. If you are exhibiting Bad Drills, then yes it’s possible. But this is the case for the Lee-Enfield rifles as well (something every soldier was extremely familiar with) - indeed for anything that uses rimmed ammunition.
This is not an issue with trained soldiers - in fact, the magazine loading drill is designed to avoid this, and soldiers were expected to load a BREN mag in a minimum amount of time.
The correct drill is (from the 1942 manual):
(i) To fill the magazine (box type).
If you have a filler; clip the magazine into the mouth of the filler. Then see that the filling-lever is as far over to the left as it will go. Fill the hopper with about forty rounds. Thereafter push the filling-lever over to tis right limit and back to its left six times. This will put thirty rounds into the magazine. do not hurry or jerk the filling movements. Six steady pushes and pulls are what is required.
If you have to fill by hand proceed as follows:
(1) Holding the magazine in one hand, opening upwards and horizontal, front end towards you, place a cartridge on the magazine platform so that the cartridge is slightly in front of its final position in the magazine. Press the cartridge down with the thumb of the hand holding the magazine and push it backwards as far as possible with the other hand. Repeat with each round until the magazine is full.
Note. Normally, although the magazine will hold thirty rounds, only 28 will be inserted in order not to overstrain the magazine spring.
(2) Care must be taken in loading to avoid getting the rim of any cartridge behind that of the cartridge next to it (i.e. inserted immediately before it) since this will cause a rim over rim stoppage.
If you do not perform this correctly, then yes, it is possible to load the magazine wrongly, although even then it’s still quite hard to do since the tip of the bullet will hit the front end of the mag. In fact, with one of the mags I’ve got (I’ve got 2), it’s actually IMPOSSIBLE to load it wrong, since the rear ends of the magazine lips are too close together to allow the rim to pass through, forcing you to insert the cartridge base a good inch forward.
Hell, this is even the way you normally load loose rimless ammunition into a magazine to ensure that they’re all as back as far as they’ll go.
So this is really rather more of a theoretical problem than a practical one, and one which is common to anything magazine-fed using rimmed ammunition.
And your source is just a comment on a forum-type thing by some Aussie bloke called “sherro”. Surely you can do better than that to show how much of a real, practical, in-combat problem this is? With trained troops it’s not a problem at all.
And this has nothing whatsoever to do with tracer!
Well as I was in the ACF in the good old days when they were still given Lee Enfields and .303 Brens to play with I can, hand on heart, say I never once saw any stoppages caused by the magazine in fact I cant recall any problems with the Brens at all, and that was when they were being used and abused by a bunch of 13 - 18 year old kids (funnily enough we sometimes even fired tracer). Later during my time in the regular army I came across the 7.62 LMG version which operated just as good (could fire tracer aswell but seeing as this has a straight mag there is no problem :lol: )
I have loaded enough Bren magazines and can tell you that it is very easy to load them without having stoppages due to overlapping rims. A person who can’t load them correctly is IMO quite daft.
Jan
I’m surprised about this. I would have assumed that the roundnosed bullet will give feed problems.
Jan
I have loaded enough Bren magazines and can tell you that it is very easy to load them without having stoppages due to overlapping rims. A person who can’t load them correctly is IMO quite daft.
Jan[/quote]
You are in the German army? The German army uses Brens?
I’m surprised about this. I would have assumed that the roundnosed bullet will give feed problems.
Jan[/quote]
That was the surprising thing - most people assumed that the round nose would cause problems, but it didn’t!
I was never in any army, due to the political situation of my home town West Berlin when I was of draftable age. But I handle British and other WW2 weapons regularly. I even own a deactivated Bren. I’ve fired Bren guns too, though with blanks only so far (hopefully later this year I will fire one with live ammo on a range).
Jan
Edit:
I can field strip a Bren and put it back together in less than a minute. I know the drills on it from own experience (not just read in a book, though I have the manuals as well.) I can do the same with a Sten, a PPSh 41, a Lee Enfield (both No.1 and No.4), a P14, a Mosin Nagant and an M1 Carbine.
I would agree Stoat, even loading 7.62, 9mm and 5.5.6 the round is placed in and pushed back. I cannot remember the time you had to load a mag by hand in, but with practise it was not a problem. I would kneel and hold the mag between my knees and start with five round in each hand alternately putting the rounds in and pushing them back. Also part of the drill for loading the mag onto the Bren was with the left hand hold it in front of you so you could see down the back of the mag to ensure that the first 10 or so round were loaded properly.
I did not know the Bren had a feeder. The SLR one was crap and never used so was the early SA80 one. I acquired a US one and it was the dogs dangly bits when I left I pasted it on to another deserving cause.
There existed two feeders, one which used standard .303 Lee Enfield chargers and the other one for loose rounds, but I’m not sure if they were ever issued. AFAIK they were only experimental models.
Jan
I just timed myself loading a .303 Bren magazine with loose blanks. It takes me about one minute.
You don’t need loader for .303 Bren mags, but for the Sten you’ll definitely need one. The magazine spring is so stiff and the friction on the magazine walls is so big that you will only get about ten rounds in by hand.
Jan
Edit for typo