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87-655: This article is about the name. For the bullet, see Spitzer (bullet) . Spitzer is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: Andre Spitzer (1945–1972), Israeli fencing coach and victim of the Munich massacre Bernard Spitzer (1924–2014), American real estate developer and philanthropist, father of Eliot Spitzer Eliot Spitzer (born 1959), 54th Governor of New York (2007–2008) Frank Spitzer (1926–1992), Austrian-born American mathematician, author of Spitzer's formula Frédéric Spitzer , 19th century art dealer, after whom

174-486: A Portuguese fleet sent to India to take part in a colonial war in the 1740s. Also in 1737, it was mentioned that a German engineer had invented a 10-pounder cannon capable of firing 20 times in a minute. In 1740, a cannon able to shoot 11 times per minute was developed by a Frenchman called Chevalier de Benac. Meanwhile, not long after in England, in 1747 a cannon able to simultaneously charge and discharge itself 20 times in

261-439: A ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of approximately 0.321 to 0.337 (ballistic coefficients are somewhat debatable), along with a dimensionally redesigned chambering and bore (designated as "S-bore") and new double-base (based on nitrocellulose and nitroglycerin ) smokeless powder loading, which delivered a greatly improved muzzle velocity of 878 m/s (2,880 ft/s) from a 740 millimetres (29.1 in) barrel. The S Patrone

348-421: A swivel gun that did not need cleaning or muzzle-loading and was capable of being made to any dimensions and used as an ordinary cannon at a moment's notice and firing 40 shots a minute was invented by a native of Ireland. Also in 1828 a revolver cannon capable of firing 12 shots a minute and worked by 2 artillerymen was invented by a Frenchman called Lesire-Fruyer. In 1854 this cannon would be put on display at

435-516: A tripod or on a vehicle; when carried on foot, the machine gun and associated equipment (tripod, ammunition, spare barrels) require additional crew members. Light machine guns are designed to provide mobile fire support to a squad and are typically air-cooled weapons fitted with a box magazine or drum and a bipod; they may use full-size rifle rounds, but modern examples often use intermediate rounds. Medium machine guns use full-sized rifle rounds and are designed to be used from fixed positions mounted on

522-556: A 'spitzer' design, the new 9.7 grams (150 gr) flat base projectile that had a ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of approximately 0.405 with a cupro-nickel alloy jacket was incorporated into the M1906 .30-06 Springfield cartridge adopted by U.S. armed forces in 1906. The ball, M1906 rounds had a muzzle velocity of 823 m/s (2,700 ft/s) and had a maximum terminal range of approximately 3,117 m (3,409 yd) and can be identified by their silver-colored bullets. The cupro-nickel alloy

609-751: A 11.3 grams (174 gr) spitzer full metal jacket bullet. Besides a pointed nose, the GP 11 bullet also had a boat tail to further lower the drag coefficient (C d ). The GP 11 projectile had a ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of 0.505 to 0.514 (ballistic coefficients are somewhat debatable) and had a maximum terminal range of approximately 5,500 m (6,015 yd) under Swiss chosen atmospheric conditions (altitude = 800 m (2,625 ft), air pressure = 649 mm (25.55 in) Hg, temperature = 7 °C (45 °F)) equaling ICAO Standard Atmosphere conditions at 653.2 m (2,143 ft) ( air density ρ = 1.150 kg/m ). At 780 m/s (2,559 ft/s) muzzle velocity

696-422: A 9.1 grams (140 gr) spitzer boat-tail D-projectile ( spetskula/torpedkula , “point/torpedo bullet”) fired at a muzzle velocity of 800 m/s (2,625 ft/s). In the 21st century, plastic-tipped bullets are a type of rifle bullet meant to confer the aerodynamic advantage of the spitzer bullet (for example, see very-low-drag bullet ) and the stopping power of a hollow-point bullet , by equipping

783-416: A French artist known as Renard invented a piece of ordnance that could be operated by one man and fired 90 shots a minute. Also in 1792, a French mechanic called Garnier invented a musket battery made up of 15 barrels capable of firing 300 shots in 2 minutes for a total rate of fire of 150 shots a minute or 10 shots per minute per barrel and of being operated by one man. In the early and mid-19th century,

870-411: A bipod and drum in the light machine gun role or a tripod and belt feed in the medium machine gun role. Machine guns usually have simple iron sights, though the use of optics is becoming more common. A common aiming system for direct fire is to alternate solid ("ball") rounds and tracer ammunition rounds (usually one tracer round for every four ball rounds), so shooters can see the trajectory and "walk"

957-407: A breech-loading volley gun , similar to the later mitrailleuse, was invented by a Frenchman called Du Perron which was worked by 3 or 4 men and capable of discharging 24 barrels 10 times a minute for a total rate of fire of 240 shots per minute. In 1776, a gun capable of charging and discharging itself 120 times 'by the motion of one hand only' in a minute was invented in England by an inventor from

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1044-431: A cartridge to overheat and detonate even when the trigger is not pulled, potentially leading to damage or causing the gun to cycle its action and keep firing until it has exhausted its ammunition supply or jammed; this is known as cooking off (as distinct from runaway fire where the sear fails to re-engage when the trigger is released). To guard against cook-offs occurring, some kind of cooling system or design element

1131-644: A class of military kinetic projectile weapons, machine guns are designed to be mainly used as infantry support weapons and generally used when attached to a bipod or tripod , a fixed mount or a heavy weapons platform for stability against recoils . Many machine guns also use belt feeding and open bolt operation, features not normally found on other infantry firearms. Machine guns can be further categorized as light machine guns , medium machine guns , heavy machine guns , general-purpose machine guns , and squad automatic weapons . Unlike semi-automatic firearms , which require one trigger pull per round fired,

1218-618: A common feed source. The continuous nature of the rotary action and its relative immunity to overheating allow for a very high cyclic rate of fire , often several thousand rounds per minute. Rotary guns are less prone to jamming than a gun operated by gas or recoil, as the external power source will eject misfired rounds with no further trouble; but this is not possible in the rare cases of self-powered rotary guns. Rotary designs are intrinsically comparatively bulky and expensive and are therefore generally used with large rounds, 20 mm in diameter or more, often referred to as Rotary cannon – though

1305-443: A full-power rifle cartridge from a closed bolt are called automatic rifles or battle rifles , while rifles that fire an intermediate cartridge are called assault rifles . Assault rifles are a compromise between the size and weight of a pistol-caliber submachine gun and a full-size battle rifle, firing intermediate cartridges and allowing semi-automatic and burst or full-automatic fire options (selective fire), sometimes with both of

1392-424: A given amount of heat, while at the same time they are also much better at shedding the excess, as the extra barrels provide a larger surface area from which to dissipate the unwanted thermal energy. In addition to that, they are in the nature of the design spun at very high speed during rapid fire, which has the benefit of producing enhanced air-cooling as a side-effect. In weapons where the round seats and fires at

1479-410: A lower drag coefficient (C d ) would decelerate less rapidly and therefore travel further. A lower drag coefficient also flattens the projectile's trajectory , making it more stable in flight and less susceptible to lateral drift caused by crosswinds. By retaining a higher impact velocity, bullets with high ballistic coefficients would retain more kinetic energy and be lethal at greater ranges. It

1566-563: A machine capable of firing 600 balls in a few minutes. In 1720, a French inventor called Philippe Vayringe invented a small cannon that could fire 16 shots in succession, which he demonstrated before the Duke of Lorraine. In 1737, it was mentioned that Jacob de Weinholtz, a Dane who was serving in the Portuguese army, had invented a cannon capable of firing 20 to 30 shots a minute though requiring 15 people to work it. The cannons were brought along with

1653-494: A machine gun is designed to continue firing for as long as the trigger is held down. Nowadays, the term is restricted to relatively heavy crew-served weapons , able to provide continuous or frequent bursts of automatic fire for as long as ammunition feeding is replete. Machine guns are used against infantry , low-flying aircraft , small boats and lightly/un armored land vehicles , and can provide suppressive fire (either directly or indirectly ) or enforce area denial over

1740-557: A maximum terminal range of approximately 5,500 m (6,015 yd) when fired from a Kulspruta m/36 machine gun. Sweden and Norway loaded their 6.5×55mm m/94 service ammunition with a 10.1 grams (156 gr) long round-nosed B-projectile ( trubbkula/ogivalkula , “blunt/ogive bullet”)) fired at a muzzle velocity of 725 m/s (2,379 ft/s) up to the early phase of World War II and Norwegian occupation by German in 1940. From 1941 onwards Sweden, which remained neutral during World War II, adopted m/41 service ammunition loaded with

1827-549: A minute of use. Because they become very hot, the great majority of designs fire from an open bolt , to permit air cooling from the breech between bursts. They also usually have either a barrel cooling system, slow-heating heavyweight barrel, or removable barrels which allow a hot barrel to be replaced. Although subdivided into " light ", " medium ", " heavy " or " general-purpose ", even the lightest machine guns tend to be substantially larger and heavier than standard infantry arms. Medium and heavy machine guns are either mounted on

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1914-496: A minute though the rate of fire was limited by the overheating of the barrel. In 1819, an American inventor from Baltimore designed a gun with 11 barrels that could fire 12 times in a minute for a total rate of fire of 132 shots a minute. In 1821, a muzzle-loading repeating cannon capable of firing 30 shots in 6 minutes or 5 shots per minute was demonstrated in England by the French-American "Fire King" Ivan Ivanitz Chabert. It

2001-793: A minute was invented by James Allis and presented to the Royal Society of England. In 1750, in Denmark, a Prussian known as Captain Steuben of the Train of Artillery invented a breech-loading cannon worked by 4 people and fed by paper cartridges capable of firing 24 times in a minute and demonstrated it to the King of Denmark along with some other high-ranking officials in the same year. In 1764, Frenchman Ange Goudar wrote in his work The Chinese Spy that he had assisted in Paris in

2088-415: A multi-shot weapon by a Palmer during this period appear to be referring to a somewhat more common Kalthoff repeater or Lorenzoni-system gun . Despite this, there is a reference in 1663 to at least the concept of a genuine automatic gun that was presented to Prince Rupert , though its type and method of operation are unknown. In 1708, it was reported from Constantinople that a French officer had invented

2175-455: A muzzle velocity of 628 m/s (2,060 ft/s). The new 1898 pattern 8×50mmR Lebel cartridge loaded with Desaleux's new lighter 12.8 grams (198 gr) Balle D brass mono-metal spitzer bullet achieved a muzzle velocity of 700 m/s (2,300 ft/s), providing a somewhat flatter trajectory and a greatly improved maximum effective range. Besides having a pointed nose section the Balle D

2262-658: A number of rapid-firing weapons appeared which offered multi-shot fire, mostly volley guns. Volley guns (such as the Mitrailleuse ) and double-barreled pistols relied on duplicating all parts of the gun, though the Nock gun used the otherwise-undesirable "chain fire" phenomenon (where multiple chambers are ignited at once) to propagate a spark from a single flintlock mechanism to multiple barrels. Pepperbox pistols also did away with needing multiple hammers but used multiple manually operated barrels. Revolvers further reduced this to only needing

2349-430: A pre-prepared cylinder and linked advancing the cylinder to cocking the hammer. However, these were still manually operated. In 1805, a British inventor from Northampton designed a cannon that would prime, load and fire itself 10 times a minute. In 1806, a Viennese copper engraver and mechanic known as Mr Putz invented a machine cannon that could load, fire and clean itself once every second or potentially up to 60 times

2436-402: A reasonable rate of fire and reliability. In contrast to the rotary format, such weapons have a single barrel and a recoil-operated carriage holding a revolving chamber with typically five chambers. As each round is fired, electrically, the carriage moves back rotating the chamber which also ejects the spent case, indexes the next live round to be fired with the barrel and loads the next round into

2523-462: A reduced rate of fire. Some designs – such as the many variants of the MG42 – are capable of rates of fire in excess of 1,200 rounds per minute. Motorized Gatling guns can achieve the fastest firing rates of all, partly because this format involves extra energy being injected into the system from outside, instead of depending on energy derived from the propellant contained within the cartridges, partly because

2610-598: A sector of land with grazing fire . They are commonly mounted on fast attack vehicles such as technicals to provide heavy mobile firepower, armored vehicles such as tanks for engaging targets too small to justify the use of the primary weaponry or too fast to effectively engage with it, and on aircraft as defensive armament or for strafing ground targets, though on fighter aircraft true machine guns have mostly been supplanted by large-caliber rotary guns. Some machine guns have in practice sustained fire almost continuously for hours; other automatic weapons overheat after less than

2697-489: A standard military rifle round (see Maximum effective rifle range ). The downrange performance tables above show the superior velocity retention of the Balle D compared with its Balle M predecessor Note: The air density ρ used to correlate these tables is unknown. In 1932, 8×50mmR Lebel Balle N ammunition was introduced, which featured a lead-cored, cupro-nickel-over-steel-jacketed, pointed boat-tail bullet weighing 15.0 g (232 grains). It had been designed to improve

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2784-414: A time when close. It was also claimed to be able to shoot 5 or 6 times before infantry came within musket range or cavalry within pistol range and with no more space between each shot than the time needed to prime a pistol, cock it and release the hammer as well as being nearly as manoeuvrable as cavalry. An alternative and heavier version was said to be able to throw grenades and it was also proposed to equip

2871-492: A tripod. The heavy machine gun is a term originating in World War I to describe heavyweight medium machine guns and persisted into World War II with Japanese Hotchkiss M1914 clones; today, however, it is used to refer to automatic weapons with a caliber of at least 12.7 mm (0.5 in), but less than 20 mm (0.8 in). A general-purpose machine gun is usually a lightweight medium machine gun that can either be used with

2958-436: A very light cannon that could fire from a single barrel 30 shots in 2 and a half minutes for a total rate of fire of 12 shots a minute. In 1711, a French lawyer called Barbuot presented to the parliament of Dijon a crank-operated 'war machine' made up of 10 carbine barrels and loaded via a 'drum' capable of firing in vollies. It was said to be accurate at 400 to 500 paces and to strike with enough force to pierce 2 or 3 men at

3045-559: Is a revolving arquebus , produced by Hans Stopler of Nuremberg in 1597. True repeating long arms were difficult to manufacture prior to the development of the unitary firearm cartridge; nevertheless, lever-action repeating rifles such as the Kalthoff repeater and Cookson repeater were made in small quantities in the 17th century. Perhaps the earliest examples of predecessors to the modern machine gun are to be found in East Asia. According to

3132-546: Is different from Wikidata All set index articles Spitzer (bullet) The type which was developed for military purposes in the late 19th and early 20th century and was a major design improvement compared to earlier rounder or flatter-tipped bullets in terms of range and accuracy etc. Its introduction, along with long-range volley sights for service rifles changed, military doctrines. Area targets at ranges up to 1,420–2,606 m (1,550–2,850 yd) could be subject to rifle fire. With improvements in machine guns at

3219-488: Is generally believed to be 15 kilogram-meters (147 J / 108 ft⋅lbf). Spitzer bullets greatly increased the lethality of the battlefields of World War I . Before, during and after World War I, militaries adopted even more aerodynamically refined spitzer projectiles by combining a pointed nose with a slightly tapered base at the rear, a so called boat tail , which further reduced drag in flight. These projectiles were known as spitzer boat-tail bullets which increased

3306-888: Is locked into the chamber. Almost all machine guns have a "safety" sear, which simply keeps the trigger from engaging. The first successful machine-gun designs were developed in the mid-19th century. The key characteristic of modern machine guns, their relatively high rate of fire and more importantly mechanical loading, first appeared in the Model 1862 Gatling gun , which was adopted by the United States Navy . These weapons were still powered by hand; however, this changed with Hiram Maxim 's idea of harnessing recoil energy to power reloading in his Maxim machine gun . Dr. Gatling also experimented with electric-motor-powered models; as discussed above, this externally powered machine reloading has seen use in modern weapons as well. While technical use of

3393-619: Is required. Early machine guns were often water-cooled and while this technology was very effective, (and was indeed one of the sources of the notorious efficiency of machine guns during the First World War ), the water jackets also added considerable weight to an already bulky design; they were also vulnerable to the enemies' bullets themselves. Armour could be provided, and in WW I the Germans in particular often did this; but this added yet more weight to

3480-543: Is the recoil actuated type, which uses the gun's recoil energy for the same purpose. Machine guns, such as the M2 Browning and MG42 , are of this second kind. A cam, lever or actuator absorbs part of the energy of the recoil to operate the gun mechanism. An externally actuated weapon uses an external power source, such as an electric motor or hand crank, to move its mechanism through the firing sequence. Modern weapons of this type are often referred to as Gatling guns , after

3567-664: The schweres Spitzgeschoß (“heavy spitzer”) or Geschoß s.S. ). This 12.8 grams (198 gr) full metal jacket spitzer boat-tail projectile had a ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of 0.557 to 0.593 (ballistic coefficients are somewhat debatable) and was loaded in the s.S. Patrone . At 760 m/s (2,493 ft/s) muzzle velocity the s.S. Patrone had a maximum terminal range of approximately 4,700 m (5,140 yd) and retained supersonic velocity up to and past 1,000 m (1,100 yd) (V 1000 ≈ Mach 1.07) under ICAO Standard Atmosphere conditions at sea level ( air density ρ = 1.225 kg/m ). From its 1914 introduction

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3654-423: The .303 British Mark VII cartridge variant loaded with an 11.3 grams (174 gr) flat base spitzer bullet that had a ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of approximately 0.467. The .303 British Mark VII cartridge had a muzzle velocity of 744 m/s (2,441 ft/s) and a maximum terminal range of approximately 2,743 m (3,000 yd). In 1911, Switzerland adopted the 7.5×55mm GP 11 cartridge loaded with

3741-438: The 8×63mm patron m/32 loaded with 14.2 g (219 gr) spitzer bullets with a boat tail fired at a muzzle velocity of 760 m/s (2,493 ft/s) bullets. The 8×63mm patron m/32 ammunition was not developed as general service ammunition but for anti-aircraft and indirect fire and had an effective range of approximately 3,600 m (3,937 yd) on which the impact energy was 20 kilogram-meters (196 J / 145 ft⋅lbf), and

3828-408: The Balle D bullet retained supersonic velocity up to and past 800 m (870 yd) (V 800 ≈ Mach 1.13) under ICAO Standard Atmosphere conditions at sea level ( air density ρ = 1.225 kg/m ) and had a maximum terminal range of approximately 4,400 m (4,812 yd). Even by 21st century standards, 800 m (870 yd) typical effective supersonic range is regarded as normal for

3915-456: The Nordenfelt gun . The first known ancestors of multi-shot weapons were medieval organ guns . An early example of an attempt at the mechanisation of one of these would be an 'engine of war' produced in the mid-1570s in England capable of firing from 160 to 320 shots 4, 8, 12 or 24 bullets at a time at a rate of fire up to roughly 3 times the rate of fire of the typical arquebusier of the day. It

4002-559: The Spitzer Cross is named Leo Spitzer (1887–1960), Austrian linguist Lyman Spitzer (1914–1997), American theoretical physicist and mountaineer Moritz Spitzer , scholar who gave his name to the Spitzer Manuscript Robert Spitzer (priest) (born 1952), American Jesuit priest and president of Gonzaga University (1998–2009) Robert R. Spitzer (1922–2019), American agricultural researcher and president of

4089-551: The s.S. Patrone was mainly issued for aerial combat and as of 1918 in the later stages of World War I to infantry machine gunners. Fifteen years after World War I the S Patrone was phased out and the s.S. Patrone became the standard issue ball ammunition for the German military. In 1906, United States ordnance authorities arranged to purchase the production license for the Spitzgeschoß bullet design from Gleinich. Now referred to as

4176-519: The surname Spitzer . If an internal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change that link by adding the person's given name (s) to the link. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spitzer&oldid=1176257613 " Categories : Surnames German-language surnames Surnames of Jewish origin Hidden categories: Articles with short description Short description

4263-608: The California State Assembly (2002–2008) Šime Spitzer (1892–1941), Croatian Zionist Simon Spitzer (1826–1887), Austrian mathematician Walter Spitzer (1937–2006), Canadian epidemiologist and professor See also [ edit ] All pages with titles containing Spitzer Spitzer Space Telescope Spitz (disambiguation) Rudolf Lothar (born Rudolf Lothar Spitzer, 1865–1943), Hungarian-born Austrian writer, playwright, critic and essayist [REDACTED] Surname list This page lists people with

4350-526: The M/88's propellant compression and excessive barrel (grooves) wear problems, the German ordnance authority began to prefer spitzer bullets by 1898. A new aerodynamic bullet, the Spitzgeschoß or Geschoß S. , credited to the independent ballistician Arthur Gleinich, was tested in 1902 and officially adopted on 3 April 1903. After several shape revisions it entered mass production in 1904. The Spitzgeschoß nose

4437-555: The Milwaukee School of Engineering (1977–1991) Robert Spitzer (political scientist) (born 1953), American political scientist Robert Spitzer (psychiatrist) (1932–2015), American psychiatrist Toba Spitzer , American rabbi and president of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association (2007–2009) Todd Spitzer (born 1960), district attorney of Orange County, California, since 2019 and member of

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4524-658: The Wu-Pei-Chih, a booklet examining Chinese military equipment produced during the first quarter of the 17th century, the Chinese army had in its arsenal the 'Po-Tzu Lien-Chu-P'ao' or 'string-of-100-bullets cannon'. This was a repeating cannon fed by a hopper containing balls which fired its charges sequentially. The way it worked was similar to the Perkins steam gun of 1824 or the Beningfield electrolysis gun of 1845 only slow-burning gunpowder

4611-461: The basis of size; those using shotgun cartridges are almost always referred to as automatic shotguns . The term personal defense weapon (PDW) is sometimes applied to weapons firing dedicated armor-piercing rounds which would otherwise be regarded as machine pistols or SMGs, but it is not particularly strongly defined and has historically been used to describe a range of weapons from ordinary SMGs to compact assault rifles. Selective-fire rifles firing

4698-406: The chamber. The action is very similar to that of the revolver pistols common in the 19th and 20th centuries, giving this type of weapon its name. A Chain gun is a specific, patented type of Revolver cannon, the name, in this case, deriving from its driving mechanism. As noted above, firing a machine gun for prolonged periods produces large amounts of heat. In a worst-case scenario, this may cause

4785-538: The county of Westmoreland. In 1777, Philadelphia gunsmith Joseph Belton offered the Continental Congress a "new improved gun" , which was capable of firing up to twenty shots in five seconds; unlike older repeaters using complex lever-action mechanisms, it used a simpler system of superposed loads , and was loaded with a single large paper cartridge . Congress requested that Belton modify 100 flintlock muskets to fire eight shots in this manner, but rescinded

4872-519: The fire into the target, and direct the fire of other soldiers . Many heavy machine guns , such as the Browning M2 .50 BMG machine gun, are accurate enough to engage targets at great distances. During the Vietnam War , Carlos Hathcock set the record for a long-distance shot at 7,382 ft (2,250 m) with a .50 caliber heavy machine gun he had equipped with a telescopic sight . This led to

4959-568: The guns. Air-cooled machine guns often feature quick-change barrels (often carried by a crew member), passive cooling fins, or in some designs forced-air cooling, such as that employed by the Lewis Gun . Advances in metallurgy and the use of special composites in barrel liners have allowed for greater heat absorption and dissipation during firing. The higher the rate of fire, the more often barrels must be changed and allowed to cool. To minimize this, most air-cooled guns are fired only in short bursts or at

5046-967: The hollow-point cavity and tip with a plastic ballistic tip (compare ballistic cap ). This plastic tip stays rigid during trajectory, giving the hollow-point similar aerodynamic properties to a spitzer projectile, but is crushed upon impact, allowing the hollow-point to petal out as per design. Machine gun A machine gun ( MG ) is a fully automatic and rifled firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges . Other automatic firearms such as automatic shotguns and automatic rifles (including assault rifles and battle rifles ) are typically designed more for firing short bursts rather than continuous firepower and are not considered true machine guns. Submachine guns fire handgun cartridges rather than rifle cartridges, therefore they are not considered machine guns, while automatic firearms of 20 mm (0.79 in) caliber or more are classified as autocannons rather than machine guns. As

5133-507: The introduction of .50 caliber anti-materiel sniper rifles , such as the Barrett M82 . Other automatic weapons are subdivided into several categories based on the size of the bullet used, whether the cartridge is fired from a closed bolt or an open bolt , and whether the action used is locked or is some form of blowback . Fully automatic firearms using pistol-caliber ammunition are called machine pistols or submachine guns largely on

5220-591: The inventions mentioned in the book, it is uncertain if it was ever built. It is sometimes claimed (i.e. in George Morgan Chinn's the Machine Gun ) that in 1663 the first mention of the automatic principle of machine guns was in a paper presented to the Royal Society of England by Palmer, an Englishman who described a volley gun capable of being operated by either recoil or gas. However, no one has been able to find this paper in recent times and all references to

5307-524: The latter presents. Many machine guns are of the locked breech type, and follow this cycle: The operation is basically the same for all locked breech automatic firearms, regardless of the means of activating these mechanisms. There are also multi-chambered formats, such as revolver cannon , and some types, such as the Schwarzlose machine gun etc., that do not lock the breech but instead use some type of delayed blowback . Most modern machine guns are of

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5394-510: The locking type, and of these, most utilize the principle of gas-operated reloading , which taps off some of the propellant gas from the fired cartridge, using its mechanical pressure to unlock the bolt and cycle the action. The first of these was invented by the French brothers Claire, who patented a gas operated rifle, which included a gas cylinder, in 1892. The Russian PK machine gun is a more modern example. Another efficient and widely used format

5481-581: The long-range performance of the issued Hotchkiss Mle 1914 machine guns . In Germany the Gewehr-Prüfungskommission (G.P.K.) (Rifle Testing Commission) was responsible for improving the accuracy and performance of the 1888 pattern military M/88 ammunition and Germany's weapons chambered for M/88 Rundkopfgeschoss (“round head bulet”) ammunition like the Gewehr 1888 . During a late 19th and early 20th century improvement program tasked with remedying

5568-438: The machine with a bellows for clearing smoke that built up during firing. Another early revolving gun was created by James Puckle , a London lawyer, who patented what he called "The Puckle Gun " on May 15, 1718. It was a design for a manually operated 1.25 in. (32 mm) caliber, flintlock cannon with a revolver cylinder able to fire 6–11 rounds before reloading by swapping out the cylinder, intended for use on ships . It

5655-419: The maximum effective range and long range performance of the full metal jacket flat based spitzer bullet designs they used. The useful maximum effective range is defined by the maximum range of a small-arms projectile while still maintaining the minimum kinetic energy required to put unprotected personnel out of action, which is generally believed to be 15 kilogram-meters (147 J / 108 ft⋅lbf). In 1913,

5742-430: The next round can be inserted simultaneously with or before the ejection of the previous cartridge case, and partly because this design intrinsically deals with the unwanted heat very efficiently – effectively quick-changing the barrel and chamber after every shot. The multiple guns that comprise a Gatling being a much larger bulk of metal than other, single-barreled guns, they are thus much slower to rise in temperature for

5829-413: The order when Belton's price proved too high. In 1779, a machine made up of 21 musket barrels worked by 3 men was produced by a British inventor called William Wilson Wright which he claimed could be fired 3 times quicker than a single man could load and fire a musket 3 times. In 1788, a Swiss soldier invented a machine worked by 10 men capable of discharging 300 balls in 3 minutes. Also in 1788, it

5916-498: The ordnance authorities of the Kingdom of Spain issued a redesigned 7×57mm Mauser cartridge ( 7mm Cartucho para Mauser Tipo S ). It was loaded with a 9 grams (138.9 gr) spitzer bullet fired at a muzzle velocity of 850 m/s (2,789 ft/s) with 3,251 J (2,398 ft⋅lbf) muzzle energy from a 589 mm (23.2 in) long barrel. It had a maximum terminal range of 3,700 m (4,050 yd). In 1932, Sweden introduced

6003-413: The original inventor (not only of the well-known hand-cranked 19th century proto-machine gun, but also of the first electrically powered version). They have several barrels each with an associated chamber and action on a rotating carousel and a system of cams that load, cock, and fire each mechanism progressively as it rotates through the sequence; essentially each barrel is a separate bolt-action rifle using

6090-408: The proofing of a 'great gun' capable of firing 60 times in a minute. In 1773, another cannon capable of firing 23 or 24 times in a minute and cleaning itself after every shot was invented by Thomas Desaguliers . In 1775, it was mentioned that in England two large cannons invented by an unidentified matross at Woolwich had achieved a rate of fire of 59 shots in 59 and a half seconds. Also in 1775,

6177-521: The rifle-calibre Minigun is an exception to this. Whereas such weapons are highly reliable and formidably effective, one drawback is that the weight and size of the power source and driving mechanism makes them usually impractical for use outside of a vehicle or aircraft mount. Revolver cannons , such as the Mauser MK 213 , were developed in World War II by the Germans to provide high-caliber cannons with

6264-406: The same time, mechanical timing is essential for operator safety, to prevent the round from firing before it is seated properly. Machine guns are controlled by one or more mechanical sears. When a sear is in place, it effectively stops the bolt at some point in its range of motion. Some sears stop the bolt when it is locked to the rear. Other sears stop the firing pin from going forward after the round

6351-564: The standard GP 11 ball spitzer bullet retained supersonic velocity up to 800 m (870 yd) (V 800 ≈ Mach 1.1) under ICAO Standard Atmosphere conditions at sea level ( air density ρ = 1.225 kg/m ). The GP 11 bullet set off the militaries of countries like Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom at the onset of and after World War I to develop and field similar full metal jacket boat tail spitzer bullets to improve

6438-538: The term "machine gun" has varied, the modern definition used by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers' Institute of America is "a fully automatic firearm that loads, fires and ejects continuously when the trigger is held to the rear until the ammunition is exhausted or pressure on the trigger is released." This definition excludes most early manually operated repeating arms the Gatling gun and such as volley guns like

6525-584: The terminal maximum ranges of fully-powered rifle cartridges to between 4,115 and 5,500 m (4,500 and 6,010 yd). The name "spitzer" is an anglicized form of the German word Spitzgeschoss , literally meaning "pointed projectile". From the mid to late 19th century, European military research had started to examine how to maximise available small arms muzzle velocity through improved projectile design. Stronger metal casings were being used to contain cartridge propellants, making small arms more powerful but not any more accurate. Designers knew that bullets with

6612-428: The turn of the 20th century, the addition of clinometers meant that fixed machine gun squads could deliver plunging fire or indirect fire at more than 3,000 m (3,280 yd). The indirect firing method exploits the maximal effective range , that is defined by the maximum range of a small-arms projectile while still maintaining the minimum kinetic energy required to put unprotected personnel out of action, which

6699-494: Was adopted by the German Army and Navy in 1903 and had a maximum terminal range of approximately 3,700 m (4,050 yd). The combination of increased muzzle velocity and improved bullet aerodynamics provided a much flatter bullet trajectory, which increased the probability of hitting an individual target at most typical combat distances. At the onset of World War I, Germany developed an aerodynamically further refined bullet,

6786-662: Was also claimed that the gun could be reloaded 'as often as you like' and fired no matter the weather though the English government never adopted the weapon despite testing being carried out at the Tower of London . The first firearms to have the ability to fire multiple shots from a single barrel without a full manual reload were revolvers made in Europe in the late 1500s. One is a shoulder-gun-length weapon made in Nuremberg, Germany, circa 1580. Another

6873-406: Was also the first military rifle projectile that had a boat tail – a streamlined tapered base – to further minimize air resistance in flight. The 1898 pattern 8×50mmR Lebel Balle D spitzer nose profile combined with the boat tail resulted in a ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of 0.568 to 0.581 (ballistic coefficients are somewhat debatable). Fired at 700 m/s (2,300 ft/s) muzzle velocity

6960-421: Was an innovative service cartridge design, since it was the first military cartridge to use single-base smokeless, nitrocellulose based, ( Poudre B ) gunpowder as developed by Paul Vieille in 1884. The original 1886 pattern 8×50mmR Lebel was loaded with a 15.0 grams (231 gr) cupro-nickel-jacketed lead-cored flat-nosed wadcutter -style Balle M bullet designed by lieutenant colonel Nicolas Lebel achieving

7047-404: Was externally pointed like the French design and its shape was patented , but the full metal jacket Spitzgeschoß differed internally. The Gewehr-Prüfungskommission program resulted in the S Patrone or 7.92×57mm Mauser cartridge, which was loaded with a relatively lightweight 9.9 grams (153 gr) spitzer bullet with a slightly increased diameter of 8.2 mm (0.323 in) that had

7134-579: Was found to foul the bore quickly. In 1908, the Russian Empire adopted a new 7.62×54mmR service round variant loaded with the "L" 9.61-gram (148.3 gr) Лёгкая Пуля ( Lyogkhaya pulya , "Light Bullet") spitzer bullet that had a ballistic coefficient (G1 BC) of approximately 0.338. The 7.62×54mmR M1908 Type L cartridge had a muzzle velocity of 865 m/s (2,838 ft/s). In 1910, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland officially adopted

7221-455: Was one of the earliest weapons to be referred to as a machine gun, being called such in 1722, though its operation does not match the modern usage of the term. According to Puckle, it was able to fire round bullets at Christians and square bullets at Turks . However, it was a commercial failure and was not adopted or produced in any meaningful quantity. In 1729, a report was written in France on

7308-413: Was reported that a Prussian officer had invented a gun capable of firing 400 balls one after the other. In 1790, a former officer in the French military known as Joseph-François-Louis Grobert invented a 'ballistic machine' or 'pyroballistic machine' with multiple barrels operated by 4 men and a continuous rotational movement capable of firing 360 rifle shots a minute in a variety of calibers. In 1792,

7395-545: Was these requirements that drove military thinking in the years prior to the First World War. The spitzer bullet design was first introduced in 1898 as the Balle D by the French Army . The Balle D bullet was designed by Captain Georges Raymond Desaleux, in order to improve the ballistic performance of the existing French 8×50mmR Lebel service cartridge of 1886. The original 1886 pattern 8×50mmR Lebel cartridge

7482-556: Was used as the propelling force in place of steam or the gases produced by electrolysis. Another repeating gun was produced by a Chinese commoner, Dai Zi, in the late 17th century. This weapon was also hopper-fed and never went into mass production. In 1655, a way of loading, aiming and shooting up to 6 wall muskets 60 times in a minute for a total rate of fire of 360 shots per minute was mentioned in The Century of Inventions by Edward Somerset, 2nd Marquess of Worcester , though, like all

7569-420: Was worked by a "wheel" fed by paper cartridges from a store attached to the cannon and ignited using a match from a match-holder somewhere else on the cannon. In 1825 an Italian book attempting to catalogue all topographic features of all known countries on Earth mentioned that in France there were 'mechanical rifles' used to defend warehouses that were capable of firing 120 shots without reloading. In 1828,

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