1.
AK-47
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The AK-47, or AK as it is officially known is a selective-fire, gas-operated 7. 62×39 mm assault rifle, developed in the Soviet Union by Mikhail Kalashnikov. It is officially known in the Soviet documentation as Avtomat Kalashnikova, Design work on the AK-47 began in the last year of World War II. In 1946, the AK-47 was presented for military trials, and in 1948. An early development of the design was the AKS, which was equipped with a metal shoulder stock. In the spring of 1949, the AK-47 was officially accepted by the Soviet Armed Forces, as of 2004, Of the estimated 500 million firearms worldwide, approximately 100 million belong to the Kalashnikov family, three-quarters of which are AK-47s. During World War II, the Sturmgewehr 44 assault rifle used by German forces made an impression on their Soviet counterparts. The select-fire rifle was chambered for a new cartridge, the 7. 92×33mm Kurz. On 15 July 1943, a model of the Sturmgewehr was demonstrated before the Peoples Commissariat of Arms of the USSR. The Soviets soon developed the 7. 62×39mm M43 cartridge, the semi-automatic SKS carbine, shortly after World War II, the Soviets developed the AK-47 assault rifle, which would quickly replace the SKS in Soviet service. Mikhail Kalashnikov began his career as a designer in 1941, while recuperating from a shoulder wound. I was a soldier, and I created a gun for a soldier. It was called an Avtomat Kalashnikova, the weapon of Kalashnikov—AK—and it carried the date of its first manufacture,1947. The AK-47 is best described as a hybrid of previous rifle technology innovations, Kalashnikov decided to design an automatic rifle combining the best features of the American M1 and the German StG44. Kalashnikovs team had access to weapons and had no need to reinvent the wheel. Kalashnikov himself observed, A lot of Russian Army soldiers ask me how one can become a constructor, each designer seems to have his own paths, his own successes and failures. But one thing is clear, before attempting to create something new, I myself have had many experiences confirming this to be so. There are claims about Kalashnikov copying other designs, like Bulkins TKB-415 or Simonovs AVS-31, Kalashnikov started work on a submachine gun design in 1942 and with a light machine gun in 1943. Early in 1944, Kalashnikov was given some M19437. 62×39mm cartridges and it was suggested to him that this new weapon might well lead to greater things, and he undertook work on the new rifle
2.
Semi-automatic firearm
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A semi-automatic, or self-loading firearm, is one that performs all steps necessary to prepare it to discharge again after firing—assuming cartridges remain in the firearms feed device. Typically, this includes extracting and ejecting the spent cartridge case from the chamber, re-cocking the firing mechanism. For the other forms, the mechanism would require cycling manually prior to firing the next round. An automatic or a selective-fire firearm set to fire automatically would be able to discharge continuously as long as the trigger is held until the magazine or feed device runs out of ammunition. Obviously, this additional feature complicates the design of the sear and disconnector, the first successful design for a semi-automatic rifle is attributed to German-born gunsmith Ferdinand Ritter von Mannlicher, who unveiled the design in 1885. The Model 85 was followed by the equally innovative Mannlicher Models 91,93 and 95 semi-automatic rifles.5 mm ammunition that were fed into the M1894 by a stripper clip. The Auto-5 relied on long recoil operation, this remained the dominant form in semi-automatic shotguns for approximately 50 years. Production of the Auto-5 was ended in 1999, in 1903 and 1905, the Winchester Repeating Arms Company introduced the first semi-automatic rimfire and centerfire rifles designed especially for the civilian market. The Winchester Model 1903 and Winchester Model 1905 operated on the principle of blowback in order to function semi-automatically, johnson, the Model 1903 achieved commercial success and continued to be manufactured until 1932 when the Winchester Model 63 replaced it. Winchester introduced a medium caliber semi-automatic sporting rifle, the Model 1907 as an upgrade to the Model 1905, utilizing a system of operation. Both the Models of 1905 and 1907 saw limited military and police use, in 1906, Remington Arms introduced the Remington Auto-loading Repeating Rifle. Remington advertised this rifle, renamed the Model 8 in 1911 and this is a locked-breech, long recoil action designed by John Browning. The Model 81 superseded the Model 8 in 1936 and was offered in.300 Savage as well as the original Remington calibers, the first semi-automatic rifle adopted and widely issued by a major military power was the Fusil Automatique Modele 1917. This is a breech, gas-operated action which is very similar in its mechanical principles to the future M1 Garand in the United States. The M1917 was fielded during the stages of WWI but it did not receive a favorable reception. However its shortened and improved version, the Model 1918, gave complete satisfaction during the Moroccan Rif War from 1920 to 1926, the Lebel bolt-action rifle remained the standard French infantry rifle until replaced in 1936 by the MAS-36 despite the various semi-automatic rifles designed between 1918 and 1935. In 1937, the American M1 Garand was the first semi-automatic rifle to replace its nations bolt-action rifle as the infantry weapon. The gas-operated M1 Garand was developed by Canadian-born John Garand for the U. S. government at the Springfield Armory in Springfield, after years of research and testing, the first production model of the M1 Garand was unveiled in 1937
3.
Gun barrel
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A gun barrel is a part of firearms and artillery pieces. The hollow interior of the barrel is called the bore, a gun barrel must be able to hold in the expanding gas produced by the propellants to ensure that optimum muzzle velocity is attained by the projectile as it is being pushed out by the expanding gas. Modern small arms barrels are made of known and tested to withstand the pressures involved. Artillery pieces are made by various techniques providing reliably sufficient strength, early firearms were muzzle-loading, with powder, and then shot loaded from the muzzle, capable of only a low rate of fire. During the 19th century effective mechanical locks were invented that sealed a breech-loading weapon against the escape of propellant gases, the early Chinese, the inventors of gunpowder, used bamboo, a naturally tubular stalk, as the first barrels in gunpowder projectile weapons. Early European guns were made of iron, usually with several strengthening bands of the metal wrapped around circular wrought iron rings. The Chinese were the first to master cast-iron cannon barrels, early cannon barrels were very thick for their caliber. Bore evacuator Bore snake Cannon Muzzle Polygonal rifling Rifling Slug barrel Smoothbore
4.
Piston
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A piston is a component of reciprocating engines, reciprocating pumps, gas compressors and pneumatic cylinders, among other similar mechanisms. It is the component that is contained by a cylinder and is made gas-tight by piston rings. In an engine, its purpose is to force from expanding gas in the cylinder to the crankshaft via a piston rod and/or connecting rod. In a pump, the function is reversed and force is transferred from the crankshaft to the piston for the purpose of compressing or ejecting the fluid in the cylinder, in some engines, the piston also acts as a valve by covering and uncovering ports in the cylinder wall. An internal combustion engine is acted upon by the pressure of the combustion gases in the combustion chamber space at the top of the cylinder. This force then acts downwards through the rod and onto the crankshaft. The connecting rod is attached to the piston by a swivelling gudgeon pin and this pin is mounted within the piston, unlike the steam engine, there is no piston rod or crosshead. The pin itself is of hardened steel and is fixed in the piston, a few designs use a fully floating design that is loose in both components. All pins must be prevented from moving sideways and the ends of the pin digging into the cylinder wall, gas sealing is achieved by the use of piston rings. These are a number of iron rings, fitted loosely into grooves in the piston. The rings are split at a point in the rim, allowing them to press against the cylinder with a light spring pressure. Two types of ring are used, the rings have solid faces and provide gas sealing, lower rings have narrow edges. There are many proprietary and detail design features associated with piston rings, pistons are cast from aluminium alloys. For better strength and fatigue life, some racing pistons may be forged instead, early pistons were of cast iron, but there were obvious benefits for engine balancing if a lighter alloy could be used. To produce pistons that could survive engine combustion temperatures, it was necessary to develop new alloys such as Y alloy and Hiduminium, a few early gas engines had double-acting cylinders, but otherwise effectively all internal combustion engine pistons are single-acting. During World War II, the US submarine Pompano was fitted with a prototype of the infamously unreliable H. O. R, although compact, for use in a cramped submarine, this design of engine was not repeated. Media related to Internal combustion engine pistons at Wikimedia Commons Trunk pistons are long relative to their diameter and they act both as a piston and cylindrical crosshead. As the connecting rod is angled for much of its rotation, a longer piston helps to support this
5.
Action (firearms)
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In firearms terminology, an action is the mechanism that handles the ammunition or the method by which that mechanism works. Breech-loading weapons have actions, actions are not present on muzzleloaders. The mechanism that fires a muzzle-loader is called the lock, actions can be categorized in several ways, including single action versus double action, break action versus bolt action, and others. The term action can also short, long, and magnum if it is in reference to the length of the rifle’s receiver. The short action rifle usually can accommodate a cartridge length of 2.8 in or smaller, the long action rifle can accommodate a cartridge of 3.34 in, and the magnum action rifle can accommodate cartridges of 3.6 in, or longer in length. Manual operation is a term describing any type of firearm action that is loaded one shot at a time by the user rather than automatically. For example, break action is a form of operation using a simple hinge mechanism that is manually unlatched by the operator. These are actions wherein the breechblock lowers or drops into the receiver to open the breech, there are two principal types of dropping block, the tilting block and the falling block. In a tilting or pivoting block action, the breechblock is hinged on a pin mounted at the rear, when the lever is operated, the block tilts down and forward, exposing the chamber. The best-known pivoting block designs are the Peabody, the Peabody–Martini, the original Peabody rifles, manufactured by the Providence Tool Company, used a manually cocked side-hammer. The 1871 Martini–Henry which replaced the trapdoor Snider–Enfield was the standard British Army rifle of the later Victorian era, charles H. Ballards self-cocking tilting-block action was produced by the Marlin Firearms Company from 1875, and earned a superlative reputation among long-range Creedmoor target shooters. Surviving Marlin Ballards are today highly prized by collectors, especially those mounted in the elaborate Swiss-style Schützen stocks of the day. A falling-block action is a firearm action in which a solid metal breechblock slides vertically in grooves cut into the breech of the weapon. Examples of firearms using the falling block action are the Sharps rifle, in a rolling block action the breechblock takes the form of a part-cylinder, with a pivot pin through its axis. The operator rotates or rolls the block to open and close the breech, it is a simple, rugged, a break action is a type of firearm where the barrel are hinged and can be broken open to expose the breech. The earliest metallic-cartridge breechloaders designed for military issue began as conversions of muzzle-loading rifle-muskets. The upper rear portion of the barrel was filed or milled away, an internal angled firing pin allowed the re-use of the rifles existing side-hammer. The Allin action made by Springfield Arsenal in the US hinged forward, france countered in 1866 with its superior Chassepot rifle, also a paper-cartridge bolt action
6.
Hammer (firearms)
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The hammer is the term given to the part of a firearm that converts stored up potential energy into the initial source of energy to fire a projectile. It is so called due to the fact that it resembles a hammer in both form and function, the hammer itself is a metal piece that forcefully rotates about a pivot point. In firearms, the weapon is held in a cocked state. When in this state, the hammer has been pulled back, once the hammer has been released, it snaps back into its unprimed position and strikes one of various mechanisms to ignite the gunpowder and fire the projectile. Many firearms in modern times employ a system wherein a hammer comes into contact with a firing pin after it has released from its primed state by the pull of the trigger. Many modern firearms have the ability by choice of the user or by design to automatically prime the hammer by pulling the trigger and these are often called double action triggers, for they both prime the hammer and release it in the same motion. Other modern weapons still allow the option for the user to manually prime the hammer, in doing so, the user reduces the pull force needed to discharge the weapon, for no additional work must be done to prime the hammer when firing. The issue quickly arose of how to ignite the gunpowder while maintaining the weapon’s aim at the target. Initially, the problem was solved by using a “slow match”, the smoldering end of the rope would then be manually brought into contact with the gunpowder through a touch hole in the barrel of the weapon when the user was ready to shoot. It proved difficult for the shooter to keep the weapon aimed and level as well as ignite the gunpowder with the slow match. The first step to a true hammer system arose shortly after the introduction of the slow match and it acted as an arm, known as a serpentine, that held the lit slow match. When the trigger was pulled, the arm would swing forward from its cocked state via potential energy stored in a spring and bring the lit match into contact with the gunpowder. The weapon could be utilized with increased accuracy, since the shooter could maintain both hands on the weapon, by 1509, the wheellock system arose to solve some difficulties of the matchlock system, though it was a very expensive system. The wheellock system used a piece of pyrite attached to an arm called a dogshead that would be brought into contact with a wheel that rotated when the trigger was pulled. This would, in turn, shower sparks upon the gunpowder, the wheellock represented a major advancement, for it removed the need for maintaining a continually lit slow match which could go out or give off the shooter’s location in a time of need. Following the introduction of the matchlock, the flintlock was introduced in the mid-1600s and this would also cause pieces of steel to flake off and ignite due to the friction thereby igniting the gunpowder. This method was far less expensive that the wheellock system. In 1822, the system was replaced with what can be called the first hammer system
7.
M1 Garand
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The M1 Garand is a.30 caliber semi-automatic rifle that was the standard U. S. service rifle during World War II and the Korean War and also saw limited service during the Vietnam War. Most M1 rifles were issued to U. S. forces, the Garand is still used by drill teams and military honor guards. It is also used by civilians for hunting, target shooting. The M1 rifle was named after its Canadian-American designer, John Garand and it was the first standard-issue semi-automatic military rifle. By all accounts the M1 rifle served with distinction, General George S. Patton called it the greatest battle implement ever devised. The M1 replaced the bolt action M1903 Springfield as the standard U. S. service rifle in the mid 1930s, although the name Garand is frequently pronounced /ɡəˈrænd/, the preferred pronunciation is /ˈɡærənd/, according to experts and people who knew John Garand, the weapons designer. French Canadian-born Garand went to work at the United States Armys Springfield Armory, in 1924, twenty-four rifles, identified as M1922s, were built at Springfield. At Fort Benning during 1925, they were tested against models by Berthier, Hatcher-Bang, Thompson, and Pedersen and this led to a further trial of an improved M1924 Garand against the Thompson, ultimately producing an inconclusive report. As a result, the Ordnance Board ordered a. 30-06 Garand variant, in March 1927, the cavalry board reported trials among the Thompson, Garand, and 03 Springfield had not led to a clear winner. This led to a gas-operated.276 model, in early 1928, both the infantry and cavalry boards ran trials with the.276 Pedersen T1 rifle, calling it highly promising. The.30 Garand, however, was dropped in favor of the.276.30 gas-operated Garand be resumed, twenty gas-operated.276 T3E2 Garands were made and competed with T1 Pedersen rifles in early 1931. The.276 Garand was the winner of these trials. The.30 caliber Garand was also tested, in the form of a single T1E1, a 4 January 1932 meeting recommended adoption of the.276 caliber and production of approximately 125 T3E2s. Meanwhile, Garand redesigned his bolt and his improved T1E2 rifle was retested, on 25 February 1932, Adjutant General John B. On 3 August 1933, the T1E2 became the semi-automatic rifle, caliber 30, in May 1934,75 M1s went to field trials,50 were to infantry,25 to cavalry units. The first production model was successfully proof-fired, function-fired, and fired for accuracy on July 21,1937, production difficulties delayed deliveries to the army until September 1937. Machine production began at Springfield Armory that month at a rate of ten rifles per day, despite going into production status, design issues were not at an end. The barrel, gas cylinder, and front sight assembly were redesigned and entered production in early 1940, production of the Garand increased in 1940 despite these difficulties, reaching 600 a day by 10 January 1941, and the army was fully equipped by the end of 1941
8.
M1 carbine
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The M1 carbine is a lightweight, easy to use.30 caliber semi-automatic carbine that was a standard firearm for the U. S. military during World War II, the Korean War and well into the Vietnam War. The M1 carbine was produced in variants and was widely used by not only the U. S. military. It has also been a civilian firearm. The M2 carbine is the version of the M1 carbine capable of firing in both semi-automatic and full-automatic. The M3 carbine was an M2 carbine with an infrared scope system. Despite its name and similar appearance, the M1 carbine is not a version of the M1 Garand rifle. It is a different firearm and it fires a different type of ammunition. It was simply called a carbine because it is smaller and lighter than the Garand. On July 1,1925, the U. S. Army began using the current naming system where the M is the designation for Model, therefore, the M1 rifle was the first rifle developed under this system. The M1 carbine was the first carbine developed under this system, the M2 carbine was the second carbine developed under the system, etc. Prior to World War II, U. S. Army Ordnance received reports that the full-size M1 rifle was too heavy and cumbersome for most support troops to carry. During prewar and early war field exercises, it was found that the M1 Garand impeded these soldiers mobility, as a rifle would frequently catch on brush, bang the helmet. Many soldiers found the rifle slid off the shoulder unless slung diagonally across the back, additionally, Germanys use of glider-borne and paratroop forces to launch surprise attacks behind the front lines, generated a request for a new compact infantry weapon to equip support troops. This request called for a compact, lightweight defensive weapon with greater range, accuracy and firepower than handguns, while weighing half as much as the Thompson submachine gun or the M1 rifle. The U. S. Army decided that a carbine would adequately fulfill all of these requirements, Paratroopers were also added to the list of intended users and a folding-stock version would also be developed. In 1938, the Chief of Infantry requested that the Ordnance Department develop a rifle or carbine. This led to a competition in 1941 by major U. S. firearm companies, Winchester at first did not submit a carbine design, as it was occupied in developing the. 30-06 Winchester M2 Military Rifle. The rifle originated as a design by Jonathan Ed Browning, brother of the famous firearm designer John Browning. 30-06 M2 rifle, Williams incorporated his short-stroke piston in the existing design
9.
M14 rifle
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The M14 rifle, officially the United States Rifle,7.62 mm, M14, is an American selective fire automatic rifle that fires 7. 62×51mm NATO ammunition. It gradually replaced the M1 Garand rifle in U. S. Army service by 1961 and in U. S. Marine Corps service by 1965. It was the standard infantry rifle for U. S. military personnel in the contiguous United States, Europe. The M14 was used for U. S. Army, Navy and Marine Corps basic, the M14 was the last American battle rifle issued in quantity to U. S. military personnel. The M14 is the basis for the M21 and M25 sniper rifles which were replaced by the M24 Sniper Weapon System. A new version of the M14, the M14 Enhanced Battle Rifle has been in service since 2002, the M14 was developed from a long line of experimental weapons based upon the M1 rifle. Although the M1 was among the most advanced infantry rifles of the late 1930s, modifications were already beginning to be made to the basic M1 rifles design during the last months of World War II. Changes included adding fully automatic firing capability and replacing the eight-round en bloc clips with a box magazine holding 20 rounds. Winchester, Remington, and Springfield Armorys own John Garand offered different conversions, garands design, the T20, was the most popular, and T20 prototypes served as the basis for a number of Springfield test rifles from 1945 through the early 1950s. The two men were transferred to Springfield Armory in late 1945, where work on the T25 continued. The T25 was designed to use the T65 service cartridge, a Frankford Arsenal design based upon. 30-06 cartridge case used in the M1 service rifle, after experimenting with several bullet designs, the T65 was finalized for adoption as the 7. 62×51mm NATO cartridge. Olin Industries later introduced the cartridge on the market as the.308 Winchester. After a series of revisions by Earle Harvey and other members of the.30 light rifle design group following the 1950 Fort Benning tests, the T25 was renamed the T47. Lloyd Corbett, an engineer in Harveys rifle design group, added various refinements to the T44 design, including an operating rod. The T47, which did not have a roller and performed worse in dust. A Newsweek article in July 1953 hinted that the T48/FAL might be selected over the T44, during the winter of 1953–54, both rifles competed in the winter rifle trials at U. S. Army facilities in the Arctic. FN engineers opened the gas ports in an attempt to improve functioning, as a result, the T44 was ranked superior in cold weather operation to the T48. In June 1954, funding was made available to manufacture newly fabricated T44 receivers specially designed for the shorter T65 cartridge
10.
M60 machine gun
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The M60, officially the United States Machine Gun, Caliber 7.62 mm, M60, is a family of American general-purpose machine guns firing 7. 62×51mm NATO cartridges from a disintegrating belt of M13 links. There are several types of ammunition approved for use in the M60, including ball, tracer, introduced in 1957, it has served with every branch of the U. S. military and still serves with other armed forces. S. The M60 is a machine gun that fires the 7. 62×51mm NATO cartridge commonly used in larger rifles. It is generally used as a weapon and operated by a team of two or three individuals. The team consists of the gunner, the assistant gunner, the guns weight and the amount of ammunition it can consume when fired make it difficult for a single soldier to carry and operate. The gunner carries the weapon and, depending on his strength and stamina, the assistant carries a spare barrel and extra ammunition, and reloads and spots targets for the gunner. The ammunition bearer carries additional ammunition and the tripod with associated traversing and elevation mechanism, if issued, the M60 can be accurately fired at short ranges from the shoulder thanks to its design. This was a requirement for the design and a hold-over in concept from the M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle. It may also be fired from the bipod, M122 tripod. M60 ammunition comes in a cloth bandolier containing a box of 100 pre-linked rounds. The M60 uses the M13 ammunition link, a change from the older M1 link system with which it was not compatible, the cloth bandolier is reinforced to allow it to be hung from the current version of the feed tray. The later models changed the ammunition box attachment point and made this adaptation unnecessary, the M60 machine gun began development in the late 1940s as a program for a new, lighter 7.62 mm machine gun. It was partly derived from German guns of World War II, early prototypes, notably the T52 and T161 bore a close resemblance to both the M1941 Johnson machine gun and the FG42. The final evaluation version was designated the T161E3 and it was intended to replace the M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle and M1919A6 Browning machine gun in the squad automatic weapon role, and in the medium machine gun role. One of the weapons tested against it during its procurement process was the FN MAG, the U. S. Army officially adopted the T161E3 as the M60 in 1957. The M60 later served in the Vietnam War as an automatic weapon with many U. S. units. Every soldier in the squad would carry an additional 200 linked rounds of ammunition for the M60. The up-gunned M113 armored personnel carrier ACAV added two M60 gunners beside the main.50 caliber machine gun, and the Patrol Boat, during the Vietnam War, the M60 received the nickname The Pig due to its bulky size
11.
General-purpose machine gun
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Modern GPMGs fire full-power rifle cartridges such as the 7. 5×54mm French,7. 5×55mm Swiss,7. 62×51mm NATO,7. 62×54mmR,7. 92×57mm Mauser, etc. With the MG34, the German Wehrmacht introduced a new concept in automatic firepower - the Einheitsmaschinengewehr general-purpose machine gun. Yet simply by changing its mount, sights and feed mechanism, during World War II, the MG34 was superseded by a new GPMG - the MG42. The MG42 was more efficient to manufacture and more robust, the MG34 and MG42 influenced many post-World War II general purpose machine guns, many of which are still in use today. It lent design elements to the Belgian FN MAG and the American M60, while spawning the Zastava M53, Swiss M51, and Austrian MG74. Mk 48 machine gun M240 machine gun HK21 UKM-2000 Pecheneg machine gun AEK-999 Type 80 machine gun German MG3, Heckler & Koch MG4 German Heckler & Koch MG5, the new standard machine gun of the German Army Belgian FN MAG, which copied the MG42s feed-system and trigger-mechanism. It is the most widely used GPMG among western armies, American M60, which uses the MG42s feed-system and stamp-steel construction. It has been replaced in U. S. service by the M240, French AA-52, which more or less copies the MG42 feed-system. It has been phased out in favour of the FN MAG. Russian PK/PKM family of multi-purpose machine-guns, widely exported, peoples Republic of China, the Type 67 and later improved models. German Heckler & Koch HK21, based on the Heckler & Koch G3 rifle and widely exported Swiss MG51, light machine gun Medium machine gun Heavy machine gun Squad automatic weapon List of firearms
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