Use of tracer in BREN guns

[Man of Stoat]

I was invited by a certain forum member to read up about the use of tracer ammunition in the BREN, since he still thinks that it was not done due to the curved magazine. Given that tracer and ball cartridges are identical in outline, I have no idea how he came up with this gem - it's certainly not mentioned in Jane's, Smith & Smith's Small Arms of the World, or Hatcher's Notebook, which it would be if it had been a problem. So, thanks to the marvels of google, here's a small selection which should be interesting to the general readership, since the links are mostly war memoirs and this should serve as a small repository for these.

http://www.rootskitchens.co.uk/family/lesstory_meet_lil_before_war.php
28th May. As soon as it was light troop movements along the Therouanne (western) road could be seen from a good observation post on the second floor. Both troops and lorries were fired on by a concentration of every Bren gun with tracer, and made good targets at fourteen hundred yards. This one sided target practice did not last long. Soon the enemy mortars were ranging on the building.
http://www.gordiebannerman.com/bio72.html
Chuck Watson and I had an hour or so to waste. So, armed with a bren gun, 1248 rounds of tracer ammo, and a couple of tommy guns, also lots of ammo, We proceeded down to the river and hip fired at cans, bottles and what ever floated on the fast moving current. We had quite a work out. and a Italian chap came up to us and made signs that he would like to fire the bren gun. So we said okay, showed him how to hold it and said let it go, Fire! Fire he did, but he aimed high,and a magazine of tracers went over the hill going no one knew where. So that was the end of that. Chuck on returning the bren gun was told by Bert Townsend the armourer Sgt that by firing so many tracers we had ruined a barrel. End of borrowing bren guns for hip firing!
http://www.robbysroost.com/mem_commandos.shtml
For the next few days I fought along side the Commandos, as one of them, until they caught up to my battalion. I remember how wide a separation they gave me in any engagement of the enemy during darkness as the Bren I was using fired one tracer every five rounds and would light up the immediate area exposing my position. They thought I was a "crazy Canadian bastard" (their words) which made me even more daring and did wonders for my ego. I was the only Red beret amongst them and although they respected me, I was given a wide berth during any night engagement.
http://www.citinet.net/ak/karlsbad/chapter14.html
For a few moments there was complete bedlam on the German side... falling men... wildly running horses. But front line soldiers as they were, they recovered fast and returned the fire. There appeared multiple puffs of sand in front of us and smacking sounds behind where enemy bullets hit the trees...A painful hiss escaped the bren munitions loader, struck in the leg. The tracer bullets from our machine gun were betraying our position. The enemy kept us pinned down while trying to withdraw behind the barn. They had almost succeeded when I told Janek to hit the barn... For a moment nothing happened... then the whole barn erupted in flames. This time there was no answering fire. The remainder of the German detachment quickly withdrew behind the hill. And a good thing too because we were running short of bren ammunition and the dispatch runner slithering on his belly to our position had an order for me: "Break contact with the enemy and rejoin the Battalion". There was no pursuit.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/richard.sands/page7.htm
Our barrage started and the first of our own shells fell amongst us in the forward companies.There were about 20 casualties around me before we had even begun to move forward. My section of D company were in the garden of a large Chateau type building by a 14 feet high wall which had been breached by our artillery. I was firing the Bren with my Sergeant, 2933041 A (Sandy) Sinclair reloading for me. I was firing tracer and a German Spandau heavy machine gun pinpointed our position. Sandy took a full burst of machine gun fire through his upper arm. The next burst of fire took the barrel clean off the Bren, and a spent round ricocheted and lodge in my face where the two jaw bones hinge. I went mad. I fitted the spare barrel that we always carried and ran at the Spandau firing the Bren from the hip as I went. I took out the Spandau and the three crew manning it but then I ran into about twelve or so Germans and a Tiger tank. I took out some of the infantry but I had no chance against the tank. I ran back to Sandy (he was in a real bad way, his arm was almost torn away) and dragged him by his collar under cover. I set up the Bren for another expected attack but we were ordered to withdraw. Me and Sandy were taken to a dressing station. I hadn't noticed the wounds to my legs (only minor), but my jaw hurt like hell. Ten days later I was on my way back into St Honorine, feeling decidedly sorry for myself, head bandaged and blood stained tunic. This time we took and held St Honorine, probably because we had tank support this time.
http://victorian.fortunecity.com/finsbury/764/ryan.htm
"colors green and red". German machine gunners loaded a tracer bullet every third round or cartridge. One could certainly see as well as hear what was zipping past your head. The rate of fire of the German MG 42 was like 1200 rounds per minute, providing quite a fireworks effect. Fortunately, the high rate of fire reduced the accuracy considerably. The British Bren had a tracer loaded every seventh round. The rate of fire was around 700 rounds per minute and magazine fed rather than belt fed as was the MG 42, which required a two man operation.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ww2/A3038564
We also had with us a Bren Gun, with a box of special ammunition. The cartridge magazines were loaded with a mixture of ordinary bullets, some tracer and some incendiary.
http://www.jamesdorrian.co.uk/Pages/chap10area.html
It was time to get ready. I stationed myself behind the funnel with a spare Bren-gun and some 100-round magazines loaded with tracer bullets. One could sense the land close by and smell the mud and seaweed.
http://www.ku.edu/carrie/specoll/AFS/library/4-ww2/AFSletters/11.html
January 2, 1943.
"Now we have been on the move again and have celebrated the New Year. We happened to spend New Year's Eve right in the middle of a certain very exuberant Division which had its transport scattered for miles around us. It was a lovely bit of rolling country with green grass and little white and yellow flowers blowing in the breeze on every side of us. We sat in our wicker chairs outside the H.Q. office lorry, with a big meal inside us, blowing smoke up into the warm (most unusually so) evening air, rather intoxicated by the freshness of the countryside and the glow of the setting sun in the clear sky. As if by signal, rockets, flares, and every sort of evening fireworks started up all around, and the colors were really very lovely. Tracers were shooting off at a thousand different angles, crisscrossing ell over the sky. One follow would shoot a big yellow flare high up in the air, and then Bren guns with tracer bullets would start shooting a at it from all around. This went on for hours and then at midnight there was a terrific load of stuff thrown up altogether and under the glowing light of flares and rockets we could see everything round about perfectly clearly."


And something from an ex-Cadet:
http://www.kbnet.com/cgi-bin/read?book=guestbook1967&page=2
Seeing the comments about camps etc, anyone remember CCF summer visits to Sennybridge & Cultybraggan camps? All I seem to remember is episodes like someone operating a bren gun with tracer bullets suddenly veering from the targets to see if he could bag some welsh mutton. Loch water was also bl**dy cold if I recall.

And someting from a 1942 manual:
http://www.weapons.org.uk/bren/manual.html
THE BREN LMG: ONLINE MANUAL
This page is a copy of the Bren Light Machine Gun chapter in the SMALL ARMS MANUAL written by Lt. Col. J. A. Barlow, S.A.C. of The West Yorkshire Regiment published in 1942.
<snip>
Ammunition. Any .303 British Service

QED, mijn heer.

[Walther]

Stoatman,

A very nice book is

The Bren Gun Saga by Thomas B Dugelby, published by Collector Grade Publications, not cheap but with a lot of information about the Bren and it's Czech ancestors.

Jan

[South African Military]

Wait im confused. Can someone explain to me what tracer ammunition is???

[Walther]

Tracer = ball ammo, where the bullets are hollow in the back and the cavity is filled with a pyrotechnical compound, which burns during flight after having been ignited by the powder flash. This way you can follow the flight ofg the bullets. In German called Leuchtspur.

Jan

[South African Military]

Tracer = ball ammo, where the bullets are hollow in the back and the cavity is filled with a pyrotechnical compound, which burns during flight after having been ignited by the powder flash. This way you can follow the flight ofg the bullets. In German called Leuchtspur.

Jan

So basically its usually used at night? But doesnt that make you more vulnerable to attack?

[Man of Stoat]

Tracer = ball ammo, where the bullets are hollow in the back and the cavity is filled with a pyrotechnical compound, which burns during flight after having been ignited by the powder flash. This way you can follow the flight ofg the bullets. In German called Leuchtspur.

Jan

So basically its usually used at night? But doesnt that make you more vulnerable to attack?

It's used during the day too - it's very visible.

Yes, it can give away your position. Modern tracers have 2 burning compounds one after the other - a dull-burning one 1st & a bright burning one 2nd. This makes the tracer appear to light up about 50m from the firing position, to help to avoid giving the position away.

The reasons for using tracer are marking targets ("Watch My Tracer!"), helping machine-gunners aim (helping with "kentucky windage", and psychological - you can see it coming at you.

[Sturmtruppen]

the good an old bren!

[Man of Stoat]

In response to our esteemed member's other point about the mag giving problems, it was only a problem to design. Once the design was perfected, it made the BREN one of the most reliable LMG designs ever.

There's lots of clever features with the BREN magazine to cope with the rimmed ammunition - the obvious one is the curve. Another is a pressed-steel insert attached to the follower to stop the follower from tipping & causing jams. The third, most clever one is the rearmost reinforcing rib (there's 2 on the side of the mag - the one I'm talking about is the one nearest the camera):

http://www.islandnet.com/~ragnew/mike_gun/images/brenmag.jpg

This reinforcing rib actually holds the rims between itself and the back of the magazine. I discovered this when converting a BREN magazine to feed short-necked blanks. The question was whether a full-length insert was needed to keep them in the correct position, or whether a short insert acting as a feed ramp was possible. On close examination, I discovered that the reinforcing rib held the rims, thus preventing the cartridges from moving forwards in the magazine. So I just cut the follower back & bolted a small block of metal filed into a feed-ramp into the front of the mag.

Another nice BREN piccy:
http://www.6th-airborne.org/resources/bren3_low.jpg

[SMLE]

Man of Stoat, am I right in thinking that the magazines used in the later 7.62 version of the Bren could also be used with the SLR? I'm sure I've seen a photo of a Para during the Falklands armed with a scoped SLR with what looked like a Bren mag. I presume some modification to the spring might have been necessary?

[Man of Stoat]

Man of Stoat, am I right in thinking that the magazines used in the later 7.62 version of the Bren could also be used with the SLR? I'm sure I've seen a photo of a Para during the Falklands armed with a scoped SLR with what looked like a Bren mag. I presume some modification to the spring might have been necessary?

Yes, it can be used directly with no issues - the mag spring's strong enough to push 30rds against gravity - I've done it!

http://www.photodump.com/direct/stoatman/slrwlmgmag.jpg

[Walther]

The Bren Mk2 and Bren Mk3 were converted to 7.62 Nato (L4A3 resp. L4A2) by installing a body insert into the magazine well to accept FAL magazines, a new chromium plated barrel with a SLR flash hider, a new bolt, a new ejector, a new magazine catch, a new gas shield, a new magazine well cover and a new rear sight calibrated for the 7.62 Nato ammo.

Jan

[King_Nothing]

http://img177.echo.cx/img177/6071/brengun1cd.jpg

[Man of Stoat]

http://img177.echo.cx/img177/6071/brengun1cd.jpg

Is that a TRACER I see streaking out of that BREN?

But but but but but Ironman said that they couldn't use tracer! :twisted:

Good find, king nothing!

[SMLE]

But but but but but Ironman said that they couldn't use tracer! :twisted:


When you refered to "a certain forum member " claiming that tracer was never used in the Bren, I somehow knew you meant Tinwalt. Weird isn't it? It was just a feeling, like.

Of course, everyone knows you can't use it past 300 metres...

[Man of Stoat]

Someone asked this question:


YOU dodge the issues or completely fail to make ANY attempt to understand them.

Bullhockey. I dodge nothing. That's bullshot. Name one thing that I dodge. Can't? Right.

Here's a complete thread he's dodging, since it shows he's wrong.

[IRONMAN]

I was invited by a certain forum member to read up about the use of tracer ammunition in the BREN, since he still thinks that it was not done due to the curved magazine.

Show me where I said tracers were not used in the Bren. Please.

[Man of Stoat]

Show me where I said tracers were not used in the Bren. Please.

First here:

http://www.ww2incolor.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1909&highlight=tracer#1909

The BAR could also fire tracer, armour piercing, and incendiary rounds, which were unsuitable in the Bren because of it's curved magazine.

And you re-iterated it here, although the word "commonly" had been inserted, with an invitation to read up on it:

http://www.ww2incolor.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=8290&highlight=tracer#8290

Btw, the Bren had problems because of it's curved mag, and that is why tracer rounds were not commonly used in it. Read about it and see for yourself.

And I did read about it, and I did see for myself that I was correct.

Ladies and gentlement of the jury, I rest my case.

C'mon, ironman, that was too easy! :lol:

edited to fix emboldening

[IRONMAN]

And the Bren did have problems because of the curved magazine, and tracer rounds were not commonly used in it. I never said tracer rounds were not used in it. :idea:

This:

since he still thinks that it was not done due to the curved magazine.

is not what I said, now was it. No, it is not. Nor is it what I thought. :idea:

[Man of Stoat]

Aah, so now Ironman replies saying that what he said meant something different. Rien se change!

You said that "tracer, armour piercing, and incendiary rounds, which were unsuitable in the Bren because of it's curved magazine. "

"unsuitable" would tend to mean "unuseable".

The problems with the curved mag were DESIGN problems - once a good magazine had been designed, the BREN was one of the most reliable LMG designs ever.

Tracer were very commonly used in it - read the 1st post of this thread, ffs. There's a guy firing about 1200 rds of just tracer with no problems (apart from burning a barrel out).

I've provided many links describing use of tracer in Brens. You have yet to back up your contention. Provide a link where it says that they were NOT commonly used. I betcha can't.

[Man of Stoat]

Here (again) is a link to copy of the Bren Light Machine Gun chapter in the SMALL ARMS MANUAL written by Lt. Col. J. A. Barlow, S.A.C. of The West Yorkshire Regiment published in 1942.

http://www.weapons.org.uk/bren/manual.html

Now, you would have thought that if tracer were "unsuitable" for use in the BREN, then it would be mentioned in the Small Arms Manual?

But no! It says:

Ammunition. Any .303 British Service

And even advises the use of tracer when shooting against aircraft:

As an A.A. mounting the tripod leaves a good deal to be desired, and there is now a tendency to abondon it as such and fire at aircraft from the hip or from a recumbent position. This is quite feasible if tracer ammunition is available, but without such ammunition the problem of hitting a fast moving aircraft without any means of aiming makes this practice of extremely doubtful value, and the cause of a great and inevitable waste of ammunition.

And this problem would have been mentioned in Hatcher's Notebook or Small Arms of the World..

Are you still flogging this dead horse, ironman?

[Man of Stoat]

Left to right: .303" AP, Ball, Tracer:

http://www.photodump.com/direct/stoatman/aptracerball.jpg

Note the identical shapes of the cartridges & projectiles, distinguished only by some paint on the tips

[IRONMAN]

You said that "tracer, armour piercing, and incendiary rounds, which were unsuitable in the Bren because of it's curved magazine. "

"unsuitable" would tend to mean "unuseable".

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.

[BDL]

You said that "tracer, armour piercing, and incendiary rounds, which were unsuitable in the Bren because of it's curved magazine. "

"unsuitable" would tend to mean "unuseable".

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.

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.

[IRONMAN]

But they were used, a lot, in a curved magazine

They were used. Not commonly.

[Fuchs66]

But they were used, a lot, in a curved magazine

They were used. Not commonly.

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.

[BDL]

But they were used, a lot, in a curved magazine

They were used. Not commonly.

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?

[Man of Stoat]

But they were used, a lot, in a curved magazine

They were used. Not commonly.

Prove it!

[Bluffcove]

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.

[Man of Stoat]

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."

[IRONMAN]

"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."

http://www.rt66.com/~korteng/SmallArms/bren.htm

[Man of Stoat]

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!

[Fuchs66]

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: )

[Walther]

"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."

http://www.rt66.com/~korteng/SmallArms/bren.htm

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

[Walther]

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."

I'm surprised about this. I would have assumed that the roundnosed bullet will give feed problems.

Jan

[IRONMAN]

"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."

http://www.rt66.com/~korteng/SmallArms/bren.htm

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

You are in the German army? The German army uses Brens?

[Man of Stoat]

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."

I'm surprised about this. I would have assumed that the roundnosed bullet will give feed problems.

Jan

That was the surprising thing - most people assumed that the round nose would cause problems, but it didn't!

[Walther]

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.

[2nd of foot]

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 this has nothing whatsoever to do with tracer!

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.

[Walther]

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

[Walther]

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

[Man of Stoat]

I just timed myself loading a .303 Bren magazine with loose blanks. It takes me about one minute.
You don't need laoder 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

And did you put any in wrong??? ;)

[Walther]

I just timed myself loading a .303 Bren magazine with loose blanks. It takes me about one minute.
You don't need laoder 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

And did you put any in wrong??? ;)
No, I got them all (28 rounds) in correctly, at first try ;-)


Jan

[Man of Stoat]

No, I got them all (28 rounds) in correctly, at first try ;-)


Jan

Wow! Does this mean that "sherro" from Australia is wrong about it being a "curse", just like he's wrong about the calibres of the Chinese Mauser pistols? (they were 7.63 and .45ACP, fyi - SAOTW doesn't mention any Chinese use of the 9mm ones).

Off topic: I spoke German on the phone "in anger" for the 1st time in ages this evening - booking a Ferienwohnung in Switzerland :D And I didn't lapse into Dutch, although I will admit to using a colloquialism due to it being close to Dutch (beinah, cf. bijna)

[2nd of foot]

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

can not remember the correct time but at a minute you would have failed :lol:

[reiver]

As a non-military type, as I've read this debate, one question in particular keeps occuring to me, for which I would be grateful for an answer.
Ironman wrote :
The BAR could also fire tracer, armour piercing, and incendiary rounds, which were unsuitable in the Bren because of it's curved magazine.
Could someone, preferably Ironman, since he seems to be the only one making this assertion, please advise me as to the difference between tracer/armour piercing/incendiary rounds, and normal ball ammo, which might make them unsuitable for use in a curved magazine?
From the photgraphs posted of them, they all look externally identical to me.

[Walther]

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

can not remember the correct time but at a minute you would have failed :lol:
Yeah, but I was limited by the number of rounds I can hold in each hand.

Jan

[Fuchs66]

Yeah, but I was limited by the number of rounds I can hold in each hand.

Jan

The trick for the test is to have as many as possible in your hand with the bases of the rounds facing away from you and the rest lined up on the floor to your right hand side (if you're right handed) also with the bases facing away from you. Then lots of quick thumb work. :lol:

[Walther]

Thanks for the tip! 45 seconds now!

:lol:

Jan

[Fuchs66]

Thanks for the tip! 45 seconds now!

:lol:

Jan

See it works :lol:

That was going back a long time to my ACF years ooooooo about 25 years ago :lol: We had to complete the mag loading test as part of our SAA tests for IIRC our 3 Star qualification.

[King_Nothing]

http://img278.imageshack.us/img278/4521/3032gs.jpg

Just if anyone's interested.

[Bluffcove]

Thanks for that very interesting - Whilst I dont doubt its legitimiacy other users of this forum have previously "drawn" their own conclusions.

Have you got a reference for that diagram?

[King_Nothing]

Just got it from this site:

http://web.ukonline.co.uk/stephen.johnson/arms/

[Bluffcove]

Thank you kindly.

[arhob1]

Some interesteing quotes in your first post Man of Stoat - thanks.

A few questions though:

1 - What did SMLE mean when he said "Of course, everyone knows you can't use it past 300 metres..."? Does he mean that the tracer burns out after this range? Is this a typical range for tracer (the burn not the round of course)?
2 - The bren gun looks very heavy to me - how practical is/was it to fire this weapon from the hip?
3 - Is the Bren related in any way to the Sten other than a nicely rhyming name!?
4 - Is the Bren the Brit equivalent of the US BAR?

TIA

[Man of Stoat]

Some interesteing quotes in your first post Man of Stoat - thanks.

A few questions though:

1 - What did SMLE mean when he said "Of course, everyone knows you can't use it past 300 metres..."? Does he mean that the tracer burns out after this range? Is this a typical range for tracer (the burn not the round of course)?
2 - The bren gun looks very heavy to me - how practical is/was it to fire this weapon from the hip?
3 - Is the Bren related in any way to the Sten other than a nicely rhyming name!?
4 - Is the Bren the Brit equivalent of the US BAR?

TIA

1-he was being sarcastic -- it was an ironman reference. The distance for tracer burnout is 900 m plus, depending...
2-it weighs just over 10 kg.
3-only in that the "EN" in both cases stands for "Enfield".
4-yes and no -- the US never adopted a proper light machine gun. The BAR is a heavy automatic rifle, whereas the Bren is a proper light machine gun. The US attempted to fill the gap with the M1919A6 Browning, but that was far too heavy. See threads passim.

[X-Pence]

I see the BAR as a burden on a soldier, in the sence that they were used as a squad support weapon witch can move with the troops and they have a 20 round clip so its hardly going to supress an enemy without constant reloading and i suppose reloading a weapon like that might take a bit longer than reloading a bren.

[Firefly]

I see the BAR as a burden on a soldier, in the sence that they were used as a squad support weapon witch can move with the troops and they have a 20 round clip so its hardly going to supress an enemy without constant reloading and i suppose reloading a weapon like that might take a bit longer than reloading a bren.

I dont agree. I think the BAR was much better than the Bren as its magazines were straight and the bullets didnt have to be bent to fit in it.

[Topor]

I see the BAR as a burden on a soldier, in the sence that they were used as a squad support weapon witch can move with the troops and they have a 20 round clip so its hardly going to supress an enemy without constant reloading and i suppose reloading a weapon like that might take a bit longer than reloading a bren.

It's not a "clip", it's a magazine - a "clip" is what was used to reload the M1 Garand & was ejected as expendable when empty.

[X-Pence]

I see the BAR as a burden on a soldier, in the sence that they were used as a squad support weapon witch can move with the troops and they have a 20 round clip so its hardly going to supress an enemy without constant reloading and i suppose reloading a weapon like that might take a bit longer than reloading a bren.

I dont agree. I think the BAR was much better than the Bren as its magazines were straight and the bullets didnt have to be bent to fit in it.

You actuly think the bullets were bent, ha. It came as a shock when you said that.

The Bren would be easyer to reload than a BAR and Better at supporting troops in terms of accuracy and mag size.

[Man of Stoat]

[
I dont agree. I think the BAR was much better than the Bren as its magazines were straight and the bullets didnt have to be bent to fit in it.

Has ironman hacked your account? Or is this a Wah?

[Cuts]

You actuly think the bullets were bent, ha. It came as a shock when you said that.

The Bren would be easyer to reload than a BAR and Better at supporting troops in terms of accuracy and mag size.

It was the Germans rather than the British who used bent bullets.

They were called 'Krumeier' and specially developed for the Krumlauf of the StG-44.
Known colloquially as a load of 'Manneier.'

[Firefly]

[
I dont agree. I think the BAR was much better than the Bren as its magazines were straight and the bullets didnt have to be bent to fit in it.

Has ironman hacked your account? Or is this a Wah?

Well as I have a very good hunch that X-pence is Bluff Cove as well as various other people, I'd call it a Wah!

[Twitch1]

Tracers in any weapon were very dirty and corrosive. Their trajectory was often less than true to the marking of the path of the other rounds also.

[Timbo in Oz]

First off, the Bren was NOT the first curved mag .303 rimmed LMG adopted by the British Empire.

The Vicker's Berthier being adopted by the Indian Army some time before and successfully used, along with many Brens, by Indian Army infantry throughout WW11. depended on ease of supply from the factory/s in India.

Just in case you doubt my word on any of this I was a small arms instructor, and marksmanship coach, having paased for 'marksman and coach' at our Infantry Centre.

the VB's magazine was the first attempt to deal with the rim's issues, and the VB was the runner up in the trials, the British and Indian armies had a deal of expereince with this matter by then.

Tracer and Automatic weapons - they are 'not a good thing' because of fouling of the barrel, and with gas operated weapons the whole piston and cylinder, and that is all. They were used because the soldiers believed they helped, even though they knew what cleaning them would be like.

the BAR was in comparisonn to the BREN - as an LMG - a complete PoS, the BAR was designed from the get-go, to be used in the attack fired from the hip.

Yet, the bren was also better at firing from the hip, less violent action and better balance, even without the sling.

I know.

okay

[1000ydstare]

Tracer trajectory is slightly off compared to ball rounds when fired. This is because they are lighter than ball because they are slightly hollow for the "tracer".

I don't know about the extra fouling though. Not come across any of this sort of thing before.

The tracer is inside the bullets jacket, so fouling shouldn't be any worse than a ball.

Not something I have noticed to be honest.

If IIRC the argies used 1:1:1 tracer in the Falklands 1 ball, 1 Tracer and 1 AP. I think the Brits used it too as it was captured and as far as I know there were no dramas with it.

Any sources for this extra fouling? Unless there was a difference in the propellant or something.

[Topor]

Most modern tracer is of a "delayed" ignition type, so there will be no fouling of the barrel.

[Man of Stoat]

Most modern tracer is of a "delayed" ignition type, so there will be no fouling of the barrel.

Actually, the burning compound is in two parts -- it is ignited in the barrel, but the first part of the compound burns dimly, and the second part burns brightly.

[Timbo in Oz]

Exactly, how else could the compound ignite if not in the barrel. and if it does it will add its own muck. Esp. after a few mags, or a 250 rd belt.

As most (red) tracer uses red phosphorous, the fouling can be quite sticky.

Have I seen action? I've been fired at and fired back, okay? Mostly, I was at B'n HQ at base / Tac hq.

While I was a member of our citizen military forces (CMF ~ NatGuard?!) I did well enough in a couple of ARA (regular army) courses (Int ones), to be asked to do FTDuty in what was then known as the RAS(upplement), during the early 1970's, when our TaskForce in Phuoc Tuy province was being run down.

[2nd of foot]

I must admit it never occurred to me that one type of round was dirtier then the other. I fired it, it went bang, I cleaned it.

Firing several thousand rounds SF I could not tell the difference between muck from ball or tracer, it’s just muck and you gave it a very hot bath and scraped off the carbon.

[Halger280HVMag]

Erm .....The Brens that I used, and qualified with, used the exact same rounds the rifles used...No bent bullets....

Magazines were easy to load correctly.....

They functioned with tracers perfectly well, and came with spare barrels and HEAVY gloves with which to change-out the barrels....It takes only seconds to change a Bren barrel....

I learned to keep my BDU or coverall wrist cuffs buttoned to avoid Bren-Elbow.....

Cleaning involved 45 gallon drums filled with boiling water, funnels,pull-troughs, jags and 4X2's (NO, not a 2
x4)

Ball or Tracer...It was ALL dirty and corrosive.....

Here's a little info on tracer....

Tracers are special bullets that are white phosphorus-tipped or contain a powder in their base that burns very brightly during their flight. This enables the shooter to follow the bullets' trajectories. The shooter then, typically, "walks" his cone of fire onto the target by seeing where the tracer is going. Tracers have been used extensively in machine guns since World War I (1914-1918) and are usually loaded at a ratio of one tracer per four rounds in ground guns, and one tracer per every two or three rounds in aircraft guns.

A tracer projectile is constructed with a hollow base filled with a pyrotechnic flare material. In US and NATO standard ammunition this is usually a mixture of strontium salts and a metal fuel such as magnesium perchlorate. This yields a bright red light. Russian and Chinese tracer ammunition generates green light using barium salts.

Tracers can never be a totally reliable indicator of a gunner's aim since all tracer rounds have different aerodynamics and even weight from ordinary rounds. Over long ranges the stream of tracer rounds and the stream of ordinary rounds will diverge radically, especially given that a tracer bullet's mass decreases over time because the tracer material in its base burns and vaporizes. Although advances in tracer design have diminished this problem it still exists in modern ammunition.

Due to their pyrotechnic payload all tracers are incendiary in nature; although incendiary tracer bullets, some incorporating white phosphorus, are more effective.

Besides guiding the shooter's direction of fire, tracer rounds can also be loaded at the end of a magazine to remind the shooter that the magazine needs changing, particularly when using a weapon (such as an AK-47) that does not lock the bolt back when empty. The Soviet Air Force during World War II also used this practice for aircraft machine guns. Of course this often alerted the enemy that the pilot in question was low on ammo and thus vulnerable.

There are three types of tracers: bright tracer, subdued tracer and dim tracer. The standard tracer starts burning immediately after exiting the muzzle. A disadvantage of bright tracers is that they give away the shooter's location to the enemy—as an old military proverb puts it; tracers work both ways. Bright tracer can also overwhelm night vision devices, rendering them less useful. Subdued tracer burns at full brightness after a hundred or more yards to avoid giving away the gunner's position. Dim tracer burns very dimly but is clearly visible through night-vision equipment.

from Wikepedia......


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracer_ammunition

2 cents....... :)