Weapon recoil momentum. The muzzle velocity and energy of the bullet, the recoil of the weapon. Features of dispersion during automatic fire
Muzzle velocity and bullet energy, weapon recoil
Initial velocity is the speed of the bullet at the muzzle of the barrel. For the initial speed, the conditional speed is taken, which is slightly more than the muzzle and less than the maximum. It is determined empirically with subsequent calculations. The value of the initial velocity of the bullet is indicated in the firing tables and in the combat characteristics of the weapon.
The initial speed is one of the most important characteristics of the combat properties of weapons. With an increase in the initial speed, the range of the bullet, the range of a direct shot, the lethal and penetrating effect of the bullet increases, and the influence of external conditions on its flight also decreases.
The value of the muzzle velocity depends on the length of the barrel; bullet weight; weight, temperature and humidity of the powder charge, the shape and size of the powder grains and loading density.
The longer the barrel, the longer the powder gases act on the bullet and the greater the initial velocity. With a constant barrel length and a constant weight of the powder charge, the initial velocity is greater, the lower the weight of the bullet.
A change in the weight of the powder charge leads to a change in the amount of powder gases, and, consequently, to a change in the maximum pressure in the bore and the initial velocity of the bullet. The greater the weight of the powder charge, the greater the maximum pressure and muzzle velocity of the bullet.
The length of the barrel and the weight of the powder charge increase when designing weapons to the most rational dimensions.
With an increase in the temperature of the powder charge, the burning rate of the powder increases, and therefore the maximum pressure and initial speed increase. As the charge temperature decreases, the initial speed decreases. An increase (decrease) in initial velocity causes an increase (decrease) in the range of the bullet. In this regard, it is necessary to take into account range corrections for air and charge temperature (charge temperature is approximately equal to air temperature).
With an increase in the humidity of the powder charge, its burning rate and the initial speed of the bullet decrease.
The shape and size of the powder have a significant impact on the burning rate of the powder charge, and, consequently, on the muzzle velocity of the bullet. They are selected accordingly when designing weapons.
Loading density is the ratio of the weight of the charge to the volume of the sleeve with the inserted pool (charge combustion chambers). With a deep landing, the bullet significantly increases the density of loading, which can lead to a sharp jump in pressure when fired and, as a result, to a rupture of the barrel, therefore, such cartridges cannot be used for shooting. With a decrease (increase) in the loading density, the initial velocity of the bullet, the recoil of the weapon and the angle of departure increase (decrease).
To hit a person, the kinetic energy of a bullet of normal caliber (6.5-9 mm) at the time of meeting with the target must be at least 78.5 J. The lethality of a small arms bullet remains almost up to the maximum firing range.
The recoil of a firearm is the action when fired, mainly by the reduced force of the pressure of the powder gases applied to the barrel. The recoil causes a push to the shooter's shoulder or arm. The effects of recoil are reduced by a muzzle brake-compensator. In an automatic weapon, recoil is used to reload it.
Just the intensity of the observed lines, since only the number of particles with the right energy is given by this effect. We are not interested in the absolute intensity of the bands, so this aspect of MB spectroscopy is not discussed here. However, we mention that for some substances (usually solid molecular substances), lattice and molecular vibrations are excited to such an extent that at room temperature only a small number of recoilless transitions occur and the spectrum is not observed. Often the spectrum is recorded by significantly lowering the temperature of the sample.
The recoil energy of the crystal after the jet impact is
Secondly, the energy of the y-quanta must lie within the limits of 10 and must be correspondingly large, but the recoil energy must not exceed the vibrational quanta of the lattice.
Without considering it in detail, it should only be pointed out that the value of φ is either negligibly small (the recoil energy of an atom or molecule during the emission of a photoelectron, with the exception of hydrogen photoionization), or can be taken into account as a constant for a given device (the work function of the spectrometer material). The work function of each sample does not usually need to be known since the sample is in electrical contact with the spectrometer. Thus, with a measured kin and a known frequency of monochromatic radiation V, the electron binding energy is directly determined
Mee will impart a rather large recoil energy even to a very heavy atom.
The second difficulty, which remains valid even at low temperatures, is the expenditure of part of the energy during the emission or absorption of an "f-quantum for the recoil of the emitter or absorber. The energy of the emitted quantum becomes less resonant by the value of the recoil energy
In the acts of emission and absorption of 7-quanta, one must also take into account the recoil of the nucleus. During the transition of the nucleus from an excited state with energy to the ground state (the energy of which eo is taken equal to zero), the 7-quantum acquires an energy e, which is less than e by the amount e of the recoil energy of the nucleus, i.e.
The neutron-activated sulfur atoms contained in gas oil enter into the well-known reactions of radioactive isotopes 1421, since the recoil energies released during the decomposition of a new isotope.
When carbon disulfide is bombarded with neutrons, the 3 (n, p) P reaction occurs. The recoil energy of the resulting P is almost 6000 times greater than the energy of the 8-C chemical bond, so the P atoms fly out of the molecule and are distributed in the carbon disulfide medium (in which elemental phosphorus is soluble). P can be isolated from a carbon disulfide solution by washing with water, in which oxidizing agents are dissolved, converting elemental phosphorus into orthophosphoric acid,
The right curve in fig. 15.1 shows the energy distribution of the y-rays required for absorption. The connection between the energies of the sample and the source is visible throughout the figure. As the area of the shaded area of the figure shows, the probability that the source's y-quantum energy will be absorbed by the sample is low. Since the nuclear energy levels are quantized, the probability of absorption of a y-quantum, resulting in a transition in the sample, is very small. The main reason for the discrepancy between the energies of the y-quanta is the recoil energy, since the emitted radiation lies at while the center of the energy distribution of the radiation necessary for absorption lies at E, + K. The value of A for gaseous molecules (10 eV) significantly exceeds the typical value doppler energy. In order for the energy and sample curves to overlap, the Doppler energy must be large enough, i.e. the source must move at a speed of 2 10 cm/s, which is not easy to achieve. However, if the value of K can be reduced or if conditions can be found for a transition that is not accompanied by recoil
In this equation, the insignificant recoil energy is omitted and the work function (4 eV) of the internal metal surfaces of the RFS spectrometer is introduced. The work function of a spectrometer material is the energy required to remove an electron from the surface of the spectrometer. The work function of a sample is different from the work function of a spectrometer material. The sample in the XPS spectrometer is in electrical contact with the spectrometer, and if there are a sufficient number of charge carriers (many samples are dielectrics and charge carriers are formed during irradiation), the Fermi levels for the sample and the spectrometer will be the same. Equation (16.25) can be understood by considering the RSF experiment. During photoionization, the electron of the sample receives some kinetic energy ,. In order to enter the spectrometer, an electron must pass through the entrance slit. Since the operating potentials of the spectrometer and sample are different, the kinetic energy of the electron changes to which is due to either acceleration or deceleration of the photoionized electron by the entrance slit. In the chamber of the spectrometer, the electron has kinetic energy and this energy is measured by the instrument. Thus, to relate the binding energy to the Fermi level, fortunately, it is not necessary to know the work function of each sample.
HOT ATOMS - atoms arising as a result of nuclear transformations. They are called G. a., since their energy corresponds to the energy of atoms heated to millions of degrees. G. a. They are also called recoil atoms, since they perceive the kinetic energy of the recoil of the parent nucleus. Due to the high kinetic energy, the excited electronic state and the high positive charge, G. a. able to enter into such chemical reactions, in which ordinary atoms do not enter. G. a. more and more applications are found in the synthesis of labeled compounds. Promising is the use of G.'s reactions and. in the processes of ammonia synthesis, polymerization, carrying out reactions without a catalyst, etc.
Nuclear processes, as a rule, are accompanied by the release (ejection) of various particles (electrons, neutrons, a-particles, etc.), and
The Universe is energy and each of us is an energy Being, and has its own energy account in the Energy Bank of the Universe. This is the energy, the energy force with which we wake up and create. We receive it constantly, through the channel of Acceptance - Bestowal - during sleep, during play, during creativity, during all kinds of cosmic infusions that occur with round beautiful dates like 1:1; 2:2; 3:3; solstices, equinoxes, etc. It is at this time that a very powerful infusion of energy into the Planet takes place and is an increase in our vitality.
Preservation and alignment of the channel of Acceptance - Bestowal is very important so that all this free energy is stored in excess by the end of the day, i.e. if you have worked to zero or, God forbid, become an energy bankrupt and you have a lack of energy, this means that you will not be able to invest energy either in new projects or in manifestation. There can be no creativity, you have worked to zero.
Why is this happening? Where are we putting our energy? Now, of course, we can talk about those people who have surpluses, but I think that we are all basically used to giving more than receiving. And so, when we give away our energy, it is very difficult to understand the whole mechanism of how this happens. But the most important thing is to understand! And then it will be easy and simple to track all the moments of energy loss. And it is important to remember: everything that we give must come back to us.
Now we are not talking about finances and financial opportunities, we are talking about energy, incl. and money energy. How much we give away, so much energy must be returned. If in total less energy returns to you than you gave away, then you become an energy bankrupt.
Let's imagine the energy bill in rubles. In the morning you have 5,000 rubles on your account, for the whole day you spent 10,000 rubles, and by the end of the day you got a stable minus - 5,000 rubles. This suggests that you have become an energy bankrupt. You don't have enough vital force, vital energy. You cannot create and manifest anything in your reality, you cannot rejoice and you cannot experience a feeling of happiness.
This can be expressed in a long night and daytime sleep, and even waking up, you will have a sleepy, lethargic state and a complete lack of joy, delight, pleasure. Or it can manifest itself as a state of depression.
How do we give energy?
Many of us play this familiar role of rescuer, and when we play this role, the role of rescuer, we completely de-energize ourselves, because the people we have to rescue suck the energy out of us, getting stuck in their drama. We indulge their will, take part in their games and voluntarily give our energy.
Why is this happening? Why do we start saving by helping people? There are a lot of such people, they turn to us with their problems, trying to shift their problems onto us, tell us how bad they are, but at the same time, no matter what you do, they do not want to change and nothing happens in their life.
There are two reasons. The first reason why we start helping is because we all want to be good, earn the love and approval of another person.
The second reason is more serious. When we cannot deal with the pain that is within us, we try to relieve the pain of others. Both are completely inappropriate, because if these energies do not return to you, at least in equal amounts (or even better, if more), then you become an energy bankrupt, this affects your standard of living, your life energy, how you can function and act.
If you do not feel harmony, joy, balance within yourself, then nothing good can happen in your reality, these are the first and second - you will have absolutely nothing to give people in the opposite direction.
Under what conditions does energy loss occur?
One of the reasons is that each of us owns a large number of things, we live in the material world and we have a lot of things. And it takes a lot of energy to maintain all these things. Therefore, all Masters recommend physically checking your luggage so that there are no unnecessary things in the apartment and other places. If you don’t use something for more than six months, it’s probably best to get rid of it. It has been proven in practice that those people who have a lot of rubbish in their apartments, as a rule, have a problem with finances. There is a stagnation of energy. If nothing leaves, nothing new comes.
We will not look far for an example, you are all sitting at the computer, so please look now what is stored in your computer, how many books are stored in the computer and at home that you read once and no longer use them. It’s good if you give them to friends to read, and if they have been lying for a year, two, three, you have learned everything that they contain, you are no longer interested in them, but they create a stagnation of energy that interferes with the harmonious flow of energy. You don't give anything and you don't get anything.
The most important blockages, in which energy is written off from our energy accounts, are two human emotions or, one might say, qualities. The first is anger. When we experience uncontrolled anger or an outburst of aggression, we experience a powerful outflow of energy. Any Master must maintain harmony and be in a state of balance and peace. If an outburst of anger occurs, then we give away a lot of energy, which is then very difficult to return back. The second is the constant condemnation of someone. Judgment is multiple. Condemnation is a type of human thinking, the level of development of his consciousness. If we constantly, even over trifles, discuss someone (although we try to avoid this), then in the maximum version this is a JUDGMENT. And this happens over and over again and causes the maximum outflow of your energy.
In this case, energy vampires are not needed, you yourself voluntarily, consciously or not, give away your energy, constantly being in some kind of judgment and discussion of people, and what happened to someone and somehow. If you take part in judgment and condemnation, if you try to keep abreast of the affairs of all your friends, acquaintances and acquaintances of their acquaintances, you thereby overwhelm yourself with information and create a blockage for the free and harmonious flow of energy.
It is very important to align and balance the channels of acceptance and return of energy. The most powerful channel alignment tool is gratitude. The real gratitude we feel. The word thank you does not refer to the energetic form of gratitude.
Gratitude is second only to Love in its power. If you experience a feeling of gratitude, there can be no distortions in the flows of Acceptance and Return.
Our physical body stores very little energy. We pass all the energy through ourselves and on how pure our channels are, on how little distortion we have and how often we experience a feeling of gratitude, the more we can pass energy through ourselves and then even more of it will return to us.
If we want it to be financial abundance, it will be financial abundance.
All of us, Lightworkers, are the Vanguard of New Laws and New Energies, and we shouldn't pat each other on the head,
proclaiming spiritual and material poverty.
We are thriving Masters of New Energies, and as you go through activation after activation, you leave the energy signature of the Master on your subtle bodies, which everyone can see. If after that you continue to be in the energy of anger, condemnation, pity, you get energy “arrivals”. And this happens for the benefit of your Soul, to lead you to the Path of the Master finally and irrevocably.
I wish every Lightworker to live a conscious and abundant life as a New Life Weaver.
In Love and Service Ludmila Anikina
In this article, I deliberately refuse any matan, abstruse terms and other grandiloquent words. That is why the text contains various inaccuracies and formal errors. But there will be no vectors, derivatives, integrals and other boring science.
In theory, at school we learned Newton's laws and, at the same time, the conclusions from them. Remember action equals reaction? m1a1=m2a2 (minuses are omitted), where m is the mass, and ˜ is the acceleration. This implies the law of conservation of momentum (momentum). Recall what an impulse is: a vector physical quantity, which is a measure of the mechanical motion of a body.
In classical mechanics, the momentum of a body is equal to the product of the mass m of this body and its speed v, the direction of the momentum coincides with the direction of the velocity vector. p=mv. And the law looks like this: In a closed system, the vector sum of the impulses of all bodies included in the system remains constant for any interactions of the bodies of this system with each other. This is one of the interpretations.
And now we will remember the laws of jet propulsion. They directly follow the law of conservation of momentum: MrocketsVrockets=MgasVgas, where Mrockets, Vrockets are the mass and velocity of the rocket, and Mgas, Vgas are the mass and velocity of gases emanating from the rocket. So we get an impulse, we consider the force of interaction, the acceleration of the rocket. For some reason, “great specialists” do not appear who declare with aplomb that the speed of a rocket should be calculated not through the momentum “MgasVgas” of reactive gases or the repulsive force, but through their energy (MgasVgas² / 2). Well, I have not met such "specialists".
But there are a lot of "specialists" who judge the recoil of a firearm by the muzzle energy of a bullet. They often find that SUDDENLY the recoil energy of the weapon is equal to the muzzle energy of the bullet. Why the weapon does not kill the shooter is not clear.
Consider a spherical vacuum example. So, in a vacuum under conditions of weightlessness, there is a motionless (yes, in the accepted inertial coordinate system, blah, blah, blah - there will be no more matan) “spherical gun” TT with a mass of 0.91 kg. And now he shoots a “spherical bullet” with a mass of 0.0055 kg (5.5 g) at a speed of 480 m / s. For simplicity, we will assume that this is an elastic interaction. We neglect all kinds of rotations of the bullet and the rest.
So the "spherical TT" threw a spherical bullet away from itself. According to the law of conservation of momentum MstVst = MbulletsVbullets. From: Vpis= MbulletsVbullets/Mpis=0.055*480/.091=2.9m/s. That is, after expansion, the “spherical TT” will move at a speed of only 2.9 m / s.
Let's take and calculate their energies after the expansion:
Epules \u003d 0.0055 * 480² / 2 \u003d 633.6 J.
Epist \u003d 0.91 * 2.9² / 2 \u003d 3.82 J.
Oh my God! How so!! The pistol has 165 times less energy!!! Maybe that's why, when fired, the arrow does not kill with a flying pistol?
But let me, you say, but what about the law of conservation of energy? And where does it come from, this energy? Isn't it the conversion of the thermal energy of burning powder gases into the mechanical energy of a bullet? But in fact, a firearm is an inertial internal combustion engine. It just moves the bullet for the most part. And his efficiency is usually very so-so.
Let's get to the point. Any, absolutely any source describing recoil formulaically operates not with the energy of a bullet, but with its momentum! In order to make sure of this, not much is enough: drive the queries “weapon recoil”, “weapon recoil momentum”, “weapon recoil force”, “weapon recoil energy” into the search engine. Wherever there are formulas (including descriptive ones), they operate not with the muzzle energy of the bullet, but with its momentum. Try to refute. Formally.
Everything would be fine, but except for the bullet, the weapons are repelled by the high-temperature powder gases emanating from the barrel. It’s just a reactive force, the right word.
Therefore, the total momentum of the weapon flying back is considered in the form:
WeaponsVweapons=MbulletsVbullets+MgasesVgases.
Naturally, the recoil momentum will be greater than the momentum of the bullet. But it is extremely difficult to assess the effect of powder gases. Their speed is very high (up to 2000 m / s), but the mass is small and the process of departure from the barrel is difficult to take into account. There are a number of empirical formulas for calculating the recoil momentum of a cartridge. Yes, it is the recoil momentum of the cartridge. It consists of the recoil momentum of the bullet and the recoil momentum of the propellant gases. I use Blagonravov's EMNIP formula, which is common in the Soviet school:
Io=mc*(1+(mp/mc)*(1275/V))*V, where:
M - the mass of the weapon
mc - bullet mass
mp - mass of gunpowder
V - bullet speed
Empirical kit 1275 walks a little depending on the speed of the bullet, but that's not the point. Read: Babak F.K. "Fundamentals of small arms" (Article 43) or Kirillov V.M., Sabelnikov V.M. Small arms cartridges.
The theoretical recoil energy is obtained by finding the recoil velocity (dividing the recoil momentum of the cartridge by the mass of the weapon) and then the banal MoruzhVerzh² / 2. And we get from several J to several tens of J. For example, in the notorious TT, the amount of gunpowder is 0.00052 kg (0.52 g), from which the recoil momentum of the cartridge is 3.3 kg * m / s, and the recoil energy of the gun is 5.98 J. In theory. Everything is different in life.
The weapon is held by the shooter, which means additional mass is added to the weapon. The movement of the weapon from the recoil is damped by the body of the shooter. Recoil can be "smeared" by the movement of the weapon's mechanics. DT or DTK can be used, in which the weapon is inhibited by the reactive action of gases. The maximum recoil force depends on the bullet's breakaway pressure, etc.
For comparison, let's calculate the characteristics of a couple of cartridges (according to one of the options):
9x19Steam: 8g, 360m/s, 0.4g of gunpowder: 518J, 3.39kg*m/s.
5.7x28: 2g, 716m/s, 0.5g of gunpowder: 513J, 2.07kg*m/s.
The muzzle energy of the bullet is almost the same, but the momentum is different.
By the way, as an independent work, I propose to think about why cartridges 5.56x45 and 5.45x39 are called not low-energy, but low-pulse. Why do the smart uncles involved in the development of weapons use such terminology?
We are primarily interested in the following conclusions:
The muzzle energy of a bullet is not a criterion for the recoil of a weapon.
For the same muzzle energy of a bullet, a cartridge with a heavier and slower bullet will always give more recoil.
It is convenient to use the recoil momentum of a cartridge only for assessing the recoil of a weapon and comparing cartridges, and not for calculating it, recoil, the exact value.
The use of the recoil energy of a barrel moving relative to the weapon is one of the oldest and most successful principles for building small arms automation. In more than a century since the appearance of the first such systems in the world, the widest range of weapons with a moving barrel has been produced - from compact pistols to machine guns and automatic guns.
However, it should be noted that there are significant gaps in this spectrum. In particular, only a very small number of models of hand-held long-barreled weapons with such automatic equipment (smooth-bore guns and especially rifles) have achieved any noticeable success. Why this happened, we will briefly analyze below.
Recoil is a fundamental property of any throwing weapon, resulting from Newton's third law, which states that any mechanical action causes an equal but oppositely directed counteraction.
Hiram Maxim's patent for his first self-loading carbine using recoil energy
Hugo Borchard's patent for a pistol with a moving barrel, put into mass production in 1893
In our case, this means that throwing a bullet or other projectile with the force of expanding gases leads to the fact that the throwing weapon receives an impulse of movement equal to the total impulse of the projectile (bullet) and the powder gases that left the barrel, but directed in the opposite direction. It is this impulse that forms the recoil - the movement of the weapon in the direction opposite to the direction of the shot. In the case of weapons with a fixed barrel and a rigid locking of the barrel, all this impulse from the barrel is transmitted to the body of the weapon and through it to the hands or shoulder of the shooter or to the installation.
Sectional view of the legendary Mauser C.96 pistol
John Browning's patent for a long-stroke rifle that inspired the production Remington model 8 rifle
The first who managed to use in practice the previously wasted recoil energy of a weapon to carry out its automatic reloading was the American inventor Hiram Maxim, who at that time lived in Europe. In 1883, he filed a patent application describing a conversion of the Winchester repeating carbine with a Henry brace and underbarrel magazine.
Having added a spring-loaded recoil pad to the carbine, Maxim connected this recoil pad with a system of rods and levers to a shortened reload lever located in front of the trigger guard, so that with each shot, the movement of the entire carbine back relative to the recoil pad rested on the shoulder of the shooter caused automatic reloading of the weapon.
Soon, this highly experienced self-loading carbine was followed by the first fully automatic machine gun of its own design, in which the barrel with its shank and the bolt connected to them by a cranked pair of levers got the opportunity to move under the action of recoil inside the weapon box, stretching the return spring. This first machine gun was followed by others, and by the beginning of the 20th century, Maxim machine guns had become one of the most popular and successful weapons in their class for a long time.
The Colt model 1900 pistol was the first production moving barrel pistol designed by John Browning.
Colt model 1900 pistol, partially disassembled
Other inventors soon followed Maxim. In 1893, Hugo Borchard created the first more or less commercially successful self-loading pistol with a moving barrel. The very next year, the Mauser company received a patent for its version of a self-loading pistol using the recoil energy of a moving barrel, in 1896 John Browning joined this glorious cohort with his first “pistol” patents.
By the beginning of the 20th century, various variants of automation systems using the recoil of a moving barrel had firmly taken their place among the most successful designs of self-loading and automatic weapons.
It should be noted that the main competitor of automation systems with a moving barrel - a system using the pressure of gases removed from the barrel with a fixed barrel, appeared almost simultaneously with the systems described here. However, for quite a long time, gas exhaust systems were noticeably less popular, and here's why.
Browning's "Auto-5" shotguns are probably the world's most widely used action-bore hunting guns.
John Browning poses in this photo with his M1917 machine gun, which, like the Maxim system, used a movable barrel and made the Maxim systems the most serious competition
An early long-travel Remington Model 8 self-loading rifle
Over a century old catalog page advertising Remington model 8 rifles
The earliest automatic weapons systems were created during the period of transition from black powder to smokeless; the intra-ballistic properties of the new smokeless powders were still very poorly understood, and the powders themselves could have very different characteristics in terms of the development of pressure in the barrel when fired.
At the same time, systems with a moving barrel depended only on the total recoil momentum during firing, and therefore were much less sensitive to variations in the powder charge and the projectile, provided that the total momentum received by the barrel at the time of the shot was within the limits determined by the designer, often pretty wide.
The main disadvantage of moving barrel systems was, as is usually the case, the source of its main advantages - that is, the moving barrel itself. In order to ensure the required reliability of the weapon in the conditions of the barrel expansion caused by heat, as well as accumulating soot or dust and dirt penetrating from the outside, the barrel, of necessity, had to have some gaps at the interface with the fixed elements of the weapon. This inevitably led to a loss in accuracy and accuracy of fire compared to systems with a fixed barrel.
In addition, the movable barrel needed support at least at two points - at the breech and in the muzzle of the barrel, or, in extreme cases, not far from its middle. Most systems with a movable barrel for this reason had a casing covering the barrel along its entire length (or at least to the front fulcrum), which inevitably increased the weight and cost of the weapon.
The M2NV heavy machine gun is another extremely successful example of a short-stroke system designed by Browning in the early 1920s and is still in service today.
Maxim machine gun in service with the British colonial troops, 1895
As a result of the foregoing, very few rifles with a moving barrel were produced in the world. The most successful (in terms of the number of issued) army models was probably the American Johnson Model 1941 rifle of the year (Johnson M1941), released in the amount of several tens of thousands of pieces.
The American hunting rifle Remington model 8 and its development model 81 became the most massive commercial model of a rifle with a moving barrel. Between 1906 and 1950, about 140 thousand units of this rifle designed by the legendary John Browning were produced.
For comparison, gas-operated self-loading rifles and carbines were produced on both sides of the conflict during the Second World War alone, with a total circulation of more than 10 million units. The production of machine guns with a movable barrel (Maxim, Browning systems, German MG-34, MG-42 and others) also amounted to millions of pieces over the same period.
True, there was one exception here - the self-loading shotgun of the same Browning system, known as the Auto-5, was produced in Belgium for almost 100 years, from 1902 to 1999, with a total production of over 2 million units. In addition, over 800,000 units of the licensed version of this system, the Remington model 11 shotguns, were produced in the USA. All other moving-barrel shotguns ever made in the world have not remotely been able to repeat this success.
In the period after the Second World War, in connection with the development of both knowledge about the internal ballistics and dynamics of weapons, and the creation of more advanced gunpowders, the development of new systems of machine guns with a moving barrel began to gradually fade away, giving way to simpler and more convenient systems with gas-operated automatics. . True, a number of structures created before the Second World War or during it still remain in service. First of all, these are the German MG-3 machine gun and the American Browning M2HB heavy machine gun.
The first model of the Maxim machine gun with a movable barrel
Johnson Model 1941 rifle, one of the few military rifle systems with a moving barrel that was mass-produced
But pistols with a moving barrel are still being produced all over the world in hard-to-calculate quantities, which can best be described as "millions of pieces a year." This is explained by the ease of use of this scheme when combining the functions of the automation engine and the locking unit in the weapon barrel.
The effect of a moving barrel on accuracy at typical "pistol" distances is very small, so moving barrel systems will remain the most suitable for use in powerful service and combat pistols for a considerable time to come.
Speaking about the technical aspects of systems with a movable barrel and its rigid locking at the time of the shot, it should be mentioned that all such systems, as a rule, are divided into two classes - “with a long barrel stroke” and “with a short barrel stroke”.
The German machine gun Mg.42, one of the most widespread and successful machine guns with a moving barrel, is still in service in many countries under the symbol Mg3
A Beretta APX pistol, incompletely disassembled to demonstrate the simplicity of modern movable barrel pistols.
Diagram illustrating the general principles of operation of long-stroke systems
In systems with a short stroke of the barrel, the length of its rollback under the action of recoil until the moment of disengagement from the bolt, as a rule, is significantly less than the length of the cartridge. Usually for small arms, this length ranges from 0.5 cm to 3 cm, after which the barrel and bolt are uncoupled, the barrel stops, and the bolt continues to move back under the action of accumulated inertia, removing and ejecting the spent cartridge case in recoil.
Then, in the roll forward, the bolt sends a new cartridge into the barrel and at the end of its path it again engages with the barrel for the next shot. In most long-barreled systems (for example, machine guns), the mass of the bolt, as a rule, is noticeably less than the mass of the barrel, so that most of the momentum accumulated during their joint initial recoil is "lost" uselessly when the barrel, after disengaging from the bolt, stops in the receiver.
In order to take advantage of this "wasted" momentum, many systems have introduced a so-called shutter accelerator. This mechanical device in the form of a lever or a pair of rollers interacts with the bolt and fixed structural elements of the weapon in such a way as to transfer part of the impulse from the barrel to the bolt by accelerating the bolt relative to the barrel with the barrel decelerating along the way.
In pistols, where the mass of the barrel and bolt are usually comparable, or even where the bolt is heavier than the barrel, such a scheme has no practical application. Almost the only serial pistol that had a lever bolt accelerator in its design was created in the mid-1930s in Finland (Lahti m35) and had a relatively short and therefore light bolt.
This elegant Roth-Haenel self-loading rifle, produced shortly before the First World War, had an automatic design by Karel Krnk with a long barrel
Another little-known example of a moving barrel system is the Walther No.1 shotgun, which had a lever lock like the Makim or Luger systems, but lost outright to the Belgian Browning Auto-5 shotguns.
Long-stroke systems are distinguished by the fact that in them the barrel, coupled to the bolt, travels together the full recoil path inside the receiver, while the length of this path is necessarily greater than the full length of the cartridge.
At the end of the rollback, the bolt is intercepted in the rear position by a special sear, and the barrel, under the action of its return spring, begins to move forward. In this case, the bolt is first unlocked, then the barrel, moving forward, “leaves” the spent cartridge case remaining on the mirror of the fixed bolt. After the sleeve is completely out of the chamber, it is ejected from the weapon.
When the barrel comes to its extreme forward position, it automatically turns off the sear holding the shutter, and the shutter, under the action of its spring, rushes forward, sending a new cartridge into the barrel and, at the end of the roll, again engaging with the barrel. Due to the large mass and long path of movement of the movable system, structures with a long barrel stroke, as a rule, have a low rate of fire, as well as a slightly more complex design. Because they are much less common than systems with a short stroke of the barrel.
Today, the most popular class of weapons using automatic moving barrels are self-loading pistols.
As we have been able to see from this very brief overview, moving barrel systems have a number of undoubted advantages that determined their success, both in the early stages of the creation of automatic weapons and at the present time (though mainly only for self-loading pistols). The shortcomings of these systems have led to the fact that at present, in long-barreled weapons, gas-operated automatics have become the dominant scheme, which we will discuss in the next article.
In the next article in the series, you will learn about weapons that use the energy of powder gases vented from the barrel.
