Fg42?

[Erwin]

Obviously someone important had a good reason to think that this frist version was a good idea. Be interesting to know why.

[Lethaface]

To enable shooting down while hanging from a parachute.

[MikeyD]

The story goes the U.S. M60 MG is basically a full auto FG42 with a MG42 ammo feed. Another big-bullet shoulder-fired bipod-mount gun. I recall the M60s problems were legendary, I wonder how its issue compare with FG42's issues.

[John Kettler]

MikeyD,

I always thought of the M60 as a roughly halved cyclic rate MG-42. At ~23 lbs, it's certainly way heavier than the FG-42 at 9 lbs, therefore much more controllable.

Lethaface,

If the objective were to hose down the LZ for suppressive purposes while twisting about on a single point of suspension harness that might be reasonable. Unfortunately for your notion, the Germans jumped without such weapons, which were on the end of the drop in special canisters. I believe the British nightmare was of German parachutists blazing away on the way down with Schmeissers?

Regards,

John Kettler

[TheBlackHand]

From "German Automatic Weapons of World War II" by Robert Bruce:

Firing the FG42

The compact dimensions, excellent balance, and superior pointing characteristics of the FG42 combine to produce a weapon that can easily be employed in the semi-automatic mode by virtually any solder trained in marksmanship fundamentals. From the prone, bipod-supported position the rifle is steady, and provides a good platform for medium range marksmanship using the flip-up post and aperture metallic sights, or the x4 power sniper scope.

In a prone position without bipod, the rifleman's eye is at the correct height for both the flip-up and optical sights when cheek pressure is maintained on the buttstock. The top lip of the buttstock anchors it comfortably against the shoulder in just the right position. Remembering that the rifle is 2lbs heavier than the Kar98k, it has more than sufficient recoil-absorbing mass to give it good stability at slow to moderate rates of fire.

Again, owing to it's balance and the angle of the grip (FG42/1), the FG42 is a superior performer for snap-shooting from the hip and at a crouch. This was important to fulfilling it's role as a replacement for the machine pistol in urban and woodland close combat. However, when the muzzle is brought down to waist level and the rifle is fired while standing, the effect of the fireball and the extreme sonic/shock wave set up by the powerful cartridge add up to significant discomfort levels for the shooter.

Fully automatic fire with the FG42 should be limited to extreme emergencies only. The high cyclic rate of over 750rpm, the relatively light weight of the package, and the high powered cartridge combine to disperse the projectiles wildly before reaching the target area. Given it's stated role as a replacement for the sub-machine gun, the rifle and the light machine gun, this is a serious defect. Also, since the barrel is quite light and short it tends to overheat quickly, with resultant loss of accuracy.

The dispersion problem is minimized by firing short bursts from the bipod support, but even then we experienced problems. The flimsy sheet steel bipod has no real lock, so it tends to rock backward with the recoil and even to collapse. This was overcome by concentrating on keeping a steady forward pressure on the gun - but who needs this sort of distraction in the middle of a firefight? Fully automatic fire from kneeling, crouching, and hipshot positions was only marginally effective except at short range.

[MikeyD]

The flimsy sheet steel bipod has no real lock, so it tends to rock backward with the recoil and even to collapse.

Hmmm, the initial production gun (in-game) has the bipod at the center and it does fold forward. That would tend to collapse with strong rearward recoil, I suppose. The later model had the bipod at the barrel end, folding back. That arrangement should correct the problem of bipod collapsing on recoil.

the effect of the fireball and the extreme sonic/shock wave set up by the powerful cartridge...

Another interesting change with the later model. They switched from a cylindrical saltshaker-holed flash suppressor(?) to an accordion-fold shaped flash suppressor with holes only on the forward side facing away from the firer. So apparently the Germans were aware of the guns shortcomings and were taking steps to correct.

[Erwin]

"To enable shooting down while hanging from a parachute."

The grip angle is completely the wrong way round for that. You would want the grip almost vertical to shoot down. It actually looks like it's designed so you could shoot UP!

[Michael Emrys]

It actually looks like it's designed so you could shoot UP!

Look at it. It is at approximately the same angle as the hand grip for the trigger hand of almost any rifle then in service. That may not have been a good idea for a weapon being used full auto, but single shot, how would it have been more awkward than a Garand?

Michael

[Lethaface]

"To enable shooting down while hanging from a parachute."

The grip angle is completely the wrong way round for that. You would want the grip almost vertical to shoot down. It actually looks like it's designed so you could shoot UP!

Actually I read it somewhere on the interwebs after looking in this thread a few days ago, couldn't think of any other reason for this strange looking decision so posted it as the answer.

Might be just a rumor

[MikeyD]

My guess on the strange pistol grip? Only a guess. FG42 was saddled with a host of impossible-to-reconcile specs that they somehow managed to mostly meet. I bet one stringent spec was max dimensions. If you look at the angled grip its exactly in line with the bottom of the butt stock. I bet they angled the grip to shave a couple inches off the dimensions to meet the spec for the gun. If you look at the revised later version (in the pict with the M60) the pistol grip extends well below the bottom of the wood butt stock but the wood butt stock isn't so tall as the stamped metal version.

[Erwin]

Michael: If the grip is the same angle as the Garand and was to be used in the same way, that's a good argument. But, I thought it was designed to be an auto support weapon - and we can see in the other MG pics that their grips are at a completely different angle. Was this gun at lot before the Stg44 (ie: an experimental predecessor)?

[YankeeDog]

Michael: If the grip is the same angle as the Garand and was to be used in the same way, that's a good argument. But, I thought it was designed to be an auto support weapon - and we can see in the other MG pics that their grips are at a completely different angle. Was this gun at lot before the Stg44 (ie: an experimental predecessor)?

The design of the early FG42 grip has always been a mystery to me; unfortunately I can't offer any insight was to why, at least initially, this configuration was thought to be a good idea. Clearly, the designers changed their minds fairly quickly.

The development of the FG42 and MP43/Stg44 were roughly coincident, and AFAIK there was very little, if any, interchange of ideas between the two programs. The Heer favored a weapon using the new 7.92x33mm, but the Luftwaffe wanted a weapon that used the full-power 7.92x57mm cartridge. So both were developed in parallel. The German arms industry in WWII was something of a many-headed Hydra, with different heads often working independently on similar projects. Not the most efficient way of doing things. Also bear in mind that the project that eventually became the Stg44 initially had to be hidden from Hitler because he had forbidden the development of small arms that used a new caliber of ammunition (other than 7.92x57mm and 9x19mm).

The goal of the FG42 was indeed to create a weapon that could be simultaneously Battle Rifle, SMG, and Light Support Weapon. As is so often the case, though, what they ended up with was in many ways Jack of All Trades, but master of none.

In order to understand the design of the FG42, you need to understand the problems it was intended to solve. The early war German Parachute harness was unusual in that it was designed to land the paratooper in a body-forward position, so that he would immediately fall to his knees on contact with the ground and then execute a forward roll to soften the impact. This is in contrast to the Allied harness designs, which landed the paratrooper more or less upright, after which the paratrooper was supposed to roll to the side.

As a para-landing technique, the German system was good enough. It did give the paratrooper better visibility of the ground he was heading towards as he landed. However, it also placed severe restrictions on what the paratrooper could carry with him on the jump. As a result, early-war FJ were very lightly armed even by paratrooper standards. Many early-war FJ jumped with only a pistol and a few grenades on their person. Heavier weapons like MGs were supposed to be retrieved from airdropped cylinders.

Experiences on Crete especially showed this was a flawed tactic -- paratroopers were often separated from the equipment cylinders by considerable distances during the drops, and many FJ on Crete got murdered by long-range MG and rifle fire before they found their support weapon canisters and could fight back effectively.

So work began on a weapon that was (a) small enough for a FJ to carry on his person on an airdrop, but ( effective enough at medium to long range to give FJ a fighting chance in ranged firefights, until they could retrieve supply drops containing heavier weapons.

So... was the FG42 designed to be an "auto support weapon"? IMHO, not exactly. I think the best way to describe it is that it was designed to be a compact battle rifle that could be carried by paratroops in an airdrop. Secondarily, it was designed to fill in as an "auto support weapon" until heavier weapons could be retrieved. I think the Germans knew it was no MG42, and they never intended it to fill this role, long term.

Of course, as things turned out, high losses to the FJ in the early war caused Hitler to prohibit further combat drops by FJ, and as a result the original impetus for development became largely moot. Regardless, the FG42 is a pretty remarkable weapon, ahead of its time in many ways. It's far from perfect -- like many German designs, it's unnecessarily complex and suffered from reliability problems. But it certainly advanced the state of the art in firearms design.