.276 Pedersen question

[Scorch]

It was only "equaled" 35 years later by the 7.62 x 54 NATO

Never heard of 7.62X54 NATO. Got any documentation?

the Garand, a gun that failed in SO many areas with the .30-06, was reworked and built-up over and over again until it was acceptable to be foisted on our fighting men

Yeah, all those failures. The prototype was modified to get rid of some features the Army didn't want. Primarily the .276 Pedersen cartridge and the detachable box magazine.

IMO the Brit experimental .280 should probably have been chosen over the .30 NATO round

Again, never heard of the .30 NATO round. Got any documentation?

but that's another story about arrogance altogether...

Nuff said . . .

 

[Mike Irwin]

"That is waste and incompetence."

No, that's the very nature of the weapons development cycle.

Just because something new is developed does NOT mean that it has to be adopted.

Sometimes good designs are not adopted for a wide variety of reasons not related to the design.

Sometimes bad designs are adopted for all the wrong reasons.

And sometimes, just sometimes, the right design comes along at the right time and everything is copacetic.

It's REALLY easy to look back at something 75 years later and say "THOSE FOOLS! THOSE FOOLISH FOOLS! THEY SHOULD/SHOUDLN'T HAVE DONE THIS, THAT, OR THE OTHER THING! WHAT WERE THEY THINKING???"

That process, however, is a true waste - a waste of time, and a waste of brainpower.

What do they say about hindsight?

 

[Slamfire]

What do they say about hindsight?

Only works in reverse?

 

[Mike Irwin]

"Yeah, all those failures."

Yep, all those failures.

That's called iterative development.

That's the nature of product development, especially in things like weapons.

The testing methodologies that are in place to catch problems don't always catch everything because they simply can't recreate ever situation.

The simple fact of the matter is that MANY weapons/weapons systems that are now seen as absolute classics had significant teething troubles early on.

 

[moosemike]

The way I remember it we won the war, so what's all this about the Garands failures and design flaws? Was Patton aware of this when he termed it the greatest battle implement ever devised? Who would we have killed with a .276 Pedersen that wasn't shot just as dead with a .30-06? Am I missing something here?

 

[Slamfire]

France in the 1920s began to change from the 8mm Lebel to the 7.5 MAS. By the time the world-wide depression hit, the change-over was only partially complete. They adopted a new rifle in 1936 (the MAS 36) to go along with the conversions they were doing to existing Betherier rifles, but by the time WW II rolled around, the conversion process was only partially completed and they entered the war with a considerable number of 8mm Lebel rifles still in military service.

In the early 1930s Italy decided to change from the 6.5mm Mannlicher-Carcano round to the 7.35mm. They were also significantly hindered by lack of money and entered the war with the change-over only partially compete. Starting in 1941 the Italians actually began to recall rifles chambered in 7.35mm to convert them back to 6.5mm to make supply easier.

The Japanese also attempted to adopt a new cartridge, the 7.7mm, starting in 1939. They were in a somewhat different situation, as the military got pretty much whatever it wanted, but the dual combination of ramping up the war in Asia and the need to increase spending on all levels of the military to support the war effort again torpedoed the effort.

In the United States and Germany the situation was made easier by the fact that they didn't attempt to make a wholesale change -- they augmented the standard military rifle/cartridge combination with new weapons chambering new rounds.

If I can beat a dead horse some more, .

Everyone was broke between the wars, but the military sees things differently. If they get a budget line, they have the money. Congress is the one who decides whether the starving beggars get fed or we use that money to buy new gadgets.

If it is new military gadgets, then new military gadgets it is. The Chief of Staff has an input to the overall Military budgets, but in the end, it is Congress who authorizes it. If the Chief of Staff made a good enough case for a new rifle, then he could have made a good enough case for a new cartridge. It all depends on the political will.

As for the ability to seamlessly transition a new weapon into the inventory, we did that. We did that in spades in WWII. There were lots of new planes, trains, automobiles, ships, blimps, you pick it. You know we made 26 Aircraft Carriers, 80 some odd auxiliary carriers, had a total of 6,600 ships in the Navy by VJ day? We were then the leading manufacturer in the world. Our capacity was in fact greater than Germany, Italy, France, Japan combined. So we could seamlessly transition any darn thing we wanted when we had the political will.

Based on what I hear in the media now, we cannot duplicate this effort. We don't have the manufacturing base that we had 70 years ago.

Of course, WWII was not inevitable and no one knew in the 20’s that we would be going to war in the 40’s.

As for Douglas MacArthur, remarkable man, but the autobiography I read, it was titled “American Caesar”. That ought to be a clue to his management style.

 

[Art Eatman]

In the Depression, the US Treasury was pretty much broke. Once the war got going, the printing presses ran full time. Whole different deal. No comparison. Rationing--which I remember full well--and price controls. "War Bonds". Seamless is easy when there is unlimited funding.

 

[Mike Irwin]

Transitioning an aircraft carrier, or even an airplane, into service is a LOT different than attempting to transition to such a fundamental piece of equipment like a rifle and its associated ammunition.

You're also erroreously trying to compare appropriations processes between the other nations and the United States - they can't be compared adequately. Unlike the United States, France, Italy, Japan, etc., didn't have nearly the civilian government oversight or control that the US military had.

Funding for military projects had to be, as they are now, reappropriated every year. That's how the entire rifle/cartridge program came very close to being canceled several times during the 1920s.

MacArthur also came into the process in the 1930s (I believe he became CoS in 1931 or 1932) at a time when military budgets were being put under even greater pressure than ever before.

Saying it takes "political will" is also a bit of a chimera.

In 1920 the US's greatest military hero of the time, Gen. John Pershing, came back to the United States and repeatedly testified in Congress to attempt to keep the civilian government from literally gutting a military force that had just participated in, and won, World War I.

If John Pershing didn't have the political pull with the civilian government at that time, what makes anyone think that Douglas MacArthur, who was at that time simply another career military officer, would have more pull than a man whom Congress lauded as the greatest American military figure since George Washington?

 

[Scorch]

Of course, WWII was not inevitable and no one knew in the 20’s that we would be going to war in the 40’s.

Actually, we knew we would be at war with Japan by the late 1920s.

So we could seamlessly transition any darn thing we wanted when we had the political will.

Perhaps, but Americans seem to be a bit short of "political will".

 

[BrianBM]

Well. Didn't mean to start a serious dispute here. Since it happened, I might as well pick up a dead cat or two and wade in.

Did the prototype .276 Garand show any propensity for jamming, or dirt collection, during testing? Would the testing have been demanding enough to show up such a propensity?

The .30-06 Garand and BAR took a clip of seven rounds and a magazine of twenty - I think. The smaller diameter of the .276 would have permitted more. Perhaps ten in a clip and 25 in a BAR magazine? That's an increase in firepower that probably would've meant more than whatever disparity in per-round wounding power was involved. If the round was workable .. but that's pure hindsight. Like an earlier poster, most of what I think I know about MacArthur comes from "American Caesar," (GREAT read) and the book's theme about the Depression years is that MacArthur was committed to preserving the leadership corps and potential of the Army first and foremost, at the expense of hardware and experimentation as necessary. That priority seems vindicated to me. Better to have a better officer corps than a bigger clip, so to speak.

The thought that inspired the original question was an idle curiosity as to whether the .276 could've simplified logistics by being usable in a submachine gun, in lieu of adding the .30 round used by the carbine and the grease gun. Firing a rifle cartridge in a subgun sounds like a great way to make a huge muzzle flame, but the .45 Thompson had one anyway, and the Army liked it well enough. [what was the cartridge in the Reising gun, anyway?] IMHO if the cartridge wasn't tested in a submachine gun, or in a lighter rifle, there's no way to know.

 

[Gehrhard]

There are numerous books that include the details. Heck, it is on the internet in Practically Shooting - The Garand and even mentioned in Wiki about the Garand.


"On Jan 4, 1932, the Ordnance Board turned in it’s report recommending adoption of the .276 caliber Garand rifle T3E2.
It was considered a mere formality that it would go to the Ordnance Dept heads for approval, then on to the War Dept, and we would have a new rifle. It was a such a sure thing that people started preparing for it and began work on how to allocate funds (which in the early days of the Depression would have been quite a job).

But the report never even made it from the Ordnance Board to the head of the Ordnance Dept.

Some officer named General Douglas MacArthur, Army Chief of Staff, said “No”."


Mac over-road the Ordnance Department/Semiautomatic Rifle Board unamimous adoption of the .276 Garand. It was a done deal, and he killed it. Then the Army spent a coupla years addressing issues. Like it or not, EVERYONE agreed that the better rifle/ammo was bypassed for the bigger, heavier, lower fire-powered .30 caliber version that lasted only from 1936 to '57 primarily due to short-sightedness. Garand had been working on a .30 version for 16 years, Generals fight the last war too, and there was a Depression.

 

[Evil Monkey]

The thought that inspired the original question was an idle curiosity as to whether the .276 could've simplified logistics by being usable in a submachine gun,

From my understanding, if the US adopted the 276, the pistol caliber SMG would've never been used afterwards. The only reason SMG's existed was because of a lack of close range firepower in trench warfare. Remember most rifles at that time were bolt action. The US could've went to WW2 with a mag fed 276 but didn't.

Even the Russians had an opportunity with the Federov rifle family but did not follow through.

 

[Jim Watson]

Brian, you need to get some facts straight before you debate.

The .30-06 Garand and BAR took a clip of seven rounds and a magazine of twenty - I think. The smaller diameter of the .276 would have permitted more. Perhaps ten in a clip and 25 in a BAR magazine?

The issue Garand clip holds 8 not 7. The real .276 clips actually held 10.
I have not read of any proposal for a .276 BAR and do not know what the plan was for an automatic rifle when the .276 Garand was recommended.

idle curiosity as to whether the .276 could've simplified logistics by being usable in a submachine gun,

No. It was a full power rifle round and could not be contained by the typical blowback SMG. No reason they could not have moved on to a selective fire infantry rifle like a smaller caliber M14 or FN FAL. But I have my doubts about their controllability even so. And they would have been much heavier than a SMG.

in lieu of adding the .30 round used by the carbine and the grease gun.

The M3 "grease gun" was a .45 cal true SMG with no relation to the carbine.

a huge muzzle flame, but the .45 Thompson had one anyway,

Straw man. Mil-spec .45 ACP does not have much muzzle flash at all. Less in the 10.5" barrel of the Thompson. At least the ones I have shot had negligible muzzle flash.

[what was the cartridge in the Reising gun, anyway?]

.45 ACP, same as Thompson and grease gun.

IMHO if the cartridge wasn't tested in a submachine gun, or in a lighter rifle, there's no way to know.

As I said, it could not have been put in a submachine gun. I can guess that there might have been a true carbine - a shorter lighter version of the infantry rifle - later on in lieu of the M1 Carbine, but that is unknowable. There might have been more emphasis on pistol caliber submachine guns. Or a .45 select fire carbine with the stock and sights of the M1 might have been enough gun for the role without adding a caliber.

 

[Slamfire]

Did the prototype .276 Garand show any propensity for jamming, or dirt collection, during testing? Would the testing have been demanding enough to show up such a propensity?

Could have. Nothing in Hatcher's Notebook but then prototypes are expected to have problems.

The military acquisiton cycle is divided into phases. Broadly you could call them Concept stage, development stage, production stage, and fielding. DoD changes the names every new administration https://dap.dau.mil/policy/Documents/Policy/Final back-120408_singles.pdf but if you can see there are a lot of activities from start to stop in any weapon procurement.
Big Corporation follow similar lifecycle models but these are not on the web.

Prototypes could be late in concept stage but I think these prototypes were early in the development stage. They would have been issued to troops for troop trials and more problems would have surfaced. Everything takes time and usage, problems fall out, and even then, at the end of it all, for example, the gas trap system of the Garand had to be changed even after the rifle was type classified.

Something that was not discovered in the Garand design till millions had been made and been issued world wide was seizing of the bolt lug in hot wet conditions. The roller bolt was developed in WWII but it once you have millions in the field it is too much of a mess to retrofit. The roller bolt made it to the M14.

Designs can always be improved. As was said "better is the enemy of good enough". At some point you have to get it out the door. All manufacturers hope to get a reasonably reliable product out there with as few problems as possible.

Development time is absolutely critical and is needed to surface as many problems as possible before the weapon hits the big time. An example of a weapon system that was not fully developed but was issued in the middle of a war was the M16. It had so many issues that troops died because of the unreliability of the thing. It was introduced far too early into combat. Now, sixty years later, it is a mechanically reliable item, but it still has fundamental issues that could not be changed because the retrofits would have required a complete redesign.

You can read the declassified “The report of the M16 rifle panel” There is a base document and at least ten appendices. You really have to search for Appendix 4, the one on ammunition. It is the most interesting to me from a lack of development view point.

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA953110

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA953117&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA953120

Once you get into these things you see all sorts of studies analyses, tests, that should have been conducted prior to the weapon entering service.

According the book "The Gun", it still took years of tweaking to perfect the basic AK47.

 

[gyvel]

Some years ago I read a statement in an article about the Pedersen rifle to the effect that one Ordnance Board member cited the toggle being prone to hit the brim of the "campaign hat" during prone firing.

Can't say if that was true or not, but it was in the article.

 

[Mike Irwin]

As I indicated in my previous message, virtually any new weapons system takes a multitude of tweeks and changes to get it right, or righter, often to correct things that show up in the field that no amount of testing showed or ever would show.

The M-14 is a perfect example of that. After years of basic development, followed by testing phases that were designed around conditions found in combat in World War II from Europe to the Pacific, flaws in the design still showed up once the rifles made their way to the field.

That is the nature of the development and procurement cycle. The holy grail is to create the perfect weapon the first time around. I can't think of a single case where that has ever happened.

 

[BrianBM]

Jim Watson, I'm quite content to be corrected. No intention to debate; that would imply more knowledge then I've got. This was idle curiosity and speculation, as described. And thank you for the information.

 

[Gehrhard]

Actually, everything I've read shows the M14 was a politically pushed gun that failed in pretty much every test against its main competitor until they were rigged and was basically foisted upon us, again, and lasted just a few years as our main-issue gun while it also underwent corrections. Actually, unforgiveable.

If we had the .276 Garand I still think we would have leapfrogged to much better than the M-14 or even M-16's.

 

[BrianBM]

At the risk of provoking another unintended uproar .... what was the main competitor? The FN FAL?

 

[Jim Watson]

Yes.
The Garand descendant that was adopted as the M14 was tested as T44, the FN FAL we tried was listed as the T48.

(The invasion of Japan was planned to be fought with selective fire box magazine .30-06s in the T20 or T22 series of Garand derivatives.)