Volgin's mistake: what is the rate of fire of the German submachine gun MP-40

Article by Alexander Grigorievich Volgin “Shooting weapon" in the May issue of the journal "Science and Life" for 1984 aroused considerable interest among fans of the corresponding weapons. In particular, she encouraged many to continue to deepen their knowledge, plunging into the world of books by V.G. Fedorov and A.A. Blagonravova.

Meanwhile, there was a nuance in the aforementioned work, which caused a lot of controversy among fans of small arms. We are talking about Volgin's statement that the German MP-40 submachine gun of World War II had a low rate of fire - only 350 rpm.

Some experts explained this by the presence of a pneumatic damper in the design of the MP-40, which was allegedly intended to reduce the rate of fire. In fact, the function of this part was to soften the impact of the bolt on the butt plate and did not affect the rate of fire.

At the same time, for many years after this article, various publications of domestic publications indicated the same indicators as Volgin's.

At the same time, the foreign press wrote about 450, and in some cases even up to 500 rounds per minute.

However, if you open Wikipedia right now and look at the rate of fire parameter in the description of the MP-40, you can see 540-600 rounds per minute.

As a matter of fact, approximately the same indicator was obtained in the course of a simple experiment from the author of the Pravda Zhizn channel, who calculated the rate of fire of a German submachine gun from YouTube videos using simple calculations.

Comments

[Lemur2023]

How about how. As I remember this article. My brother-in-law and I discussed her in the kitchen with beer

[Ezekiel 25-17]

Good: 540 - 600 rounds per minute, for close, trench combat will go: Further: MP - 40 has never been used as the main weapon of the infantry; they were armed with officers, non-commissioned officers and specialists. This is not a PPSh.

[vovochkarzhevsky]

This is not a PPSh.

So PPSh is a very controversial submachine gun. It's like an underdeveloped machine.

[your1970]

Mmmm ... what's the charm of discussing an article 30 years ago, if all the performance characteristics from German sources are in the public domain?
Moreover, during the war, the "Guide to Captured Weapons" was published - in which there were performance characteristics from German documents

[Uncle_Misha]

Who is interested in weapons, look for reports from our shooting range. There are interesting details that are not in popular articles.

[Maks1995]

E... what is this? who cares about this now?
Compared to the polished cheers, "Knutov: APU is in vain rejoicing at Storm Shadow missiles - remember the fate of HIMARS" next

[bunta]

The damper "softens the blow", which means it reduces the shutter speed, which means it reduces the rate of fire. The conclusion "this detail" still serves to reduce the rate of fire.

[Illanatol]

Quote: vovochkarzhevsky

So PPSh is a very controversial submachine gun. It's like an underdeveloped machine.

What is the controversy? Cartridge - pistol, no change? 7.62X25 mm. So it's a submachine gun.
Automatic / assault rifle - a weapon chambered for an intermediate cartridge (usually a shortened and weakened rifle).

[MBRSS]

Why wasn't the experiment described? Or is the article purely an advertisement for the YouTube channel?

[Foul skeptic]

"Revelations" are certainly good, but the MP-38 really had a rate of fire of 400 rounds per minute. This is a side effect of the mentioned pneumatic damper. It is quite possible that the figure of 350 rounds / min appeared in the magazine as a result of describing a particular sample, where the holes in the buffer tubes through which air flowed out were simply clogged.

[Alexey Alekseev_5]

By the way, when shooting, it was not recommended to hold on to the magazine. The MP, which was promoted to the point of impossibility, in addition to other shortcomings, had the ability to spontaneously disconnect the magazine when shooting.

[JPD]

Very interesting discussion ... 1984 article. Very relevant, right on the topic of the day ....