time to bring out the big guns

lets think of some big guns

the m2 browning is a big gun

weighs 80lbs

need a truck to move it around

or no how about an m61 vulcan

weighs 250lbs

need a fucking aircraft for that bad boy

hell yeah

heres a comparison between 50bmg and 20mm vulcan

heh heh heh

but we already talked about the browning

and were not talking about the m61 vulcan

were talking about a rifle that shoots an even bigger round

except this rifle only weighs 25lbs and is fired by a two man team

wait wut

this is the carl gustav m/42

and it shoots a special 20mm x 120mm cartridge

how can it do this clammy

how can it weigh less than a bucket of water

yet make you as strong as a fighter jet

through the magic of physics my friends

so its the beginning of wwii

everybody has tanks now

and sweden is like aw dang everybody has tanks now

what do we do

up to this point the idea for killing tanks as infantry was to use like

a rifle

except make it a really big rifle

the germans had taken their mauser rifle and literally just chambered it in a way bigger round and said ok this is for tanks now

and it kinda worked

but only barely

so by the time wwii came around that was barely adequate to handle anything remotely modern

and those that could weighed like 130lbs

so that wasnt gonna cut it anymore

well the swedish looked at this and theyre like

hang on

we invented the nobel peace prize in science

so they knew that every action has an equal and opposite reaction

when you shoot a little bullet forward super fast the rifle has the same amount of energy pushing back into your body

the swedes realized that you can make even smaller stuff go even faster backward than the projectile

so the back of this thing has a rocket nozzle

and the cartridge has like double too much powder

the mass of the extra expanding gas going backwards times the stupid fast speed at which its getting thrown backwards matches the total energy of the mass and speed of the projectile going forward

more or less

it ends up having not that much recoil

certainly not handheld 20 mm cannon recoil

because the recoil is balanced and exhausts out the back this is an early example of whats known as a recoilless rifle

although it still has a ton of blast in both directions lol

but the blast itself doesnt actually require the weapon to have any crazy reinforcement behind the cartridge

just um dont stand behind it ok

so the m82 actually only weighs 25lbs

no need for much of a locking system because most of the pressure is going forwards out the muzzle or backwards out the nozzle

and this 25lb weapon is able to throw a 1650gr projectile 3150fps

let me try to explain how crazy that is

go back to that early picture of the various rounds

see that 5.56 on the far left

that throws a 55gr projectile at 3150fps

well the m82 throws the equivalent mass of an entire 30rd magazine at the exact same speed all at the same instant

and yet it doesnt blow your shoulder away somehow through the magic of physics

and when that mach 3 quarter pounder hits it hits hard

its powerful enough that it might pierce a panzer iii out to 100 m

and this is from a shoulder fired rifle round

friggin crazy

and overall its a pretty simple weapon to operate

because honestly it doesnt have much other than a tube and a fire control system

see that big lever on the back by the nozzle

your loader cranks that open and the breech swings to the side

inside is the breech face which has two bean shaped holes in it

and you stuff the cartridge into the tube

the cartridge is weird for its huge brass to projectile dimensions

and in the base is actually just a fiberboard disc that blows out

the fire control is a super simple connecting rod that goes from the trigger to the back where it releases the firing pin

its got some simple iron sights or you could put a decent scope on it that has a bdc out to 1000 m

its pretty dang simple guys

sweden ordered like 3200 of these to be built but only 1000 were finished before the end of the war

and sweden didnt really see a bunch of antitank combat in wwii

plus by late war tanks were already becoming pretty resistent to the m82

so it didnt make much of an impact on wwii

but the swedish continued working on it

if you can fire a 20 mm projectile maybe you can do even more

and in fact its successor uses 84mm rounds that have all kinds of fancy stuff like laser guidance and are still used to this day

and the recoilless rifle concept became really big for all sorts of people

and i mean really big lol

so the m/42 did pretty well for itself

way to go sweden

special thanks to forgotten weapons and rock island auctions because info on these things is hard to find on the internet

pew pew

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