Sten Mark VI sub machine gun

riggerrob

It always struck me silly to see photos of Canadian infantrymen trotting towards the enemy while holding their Sten, Bren and Lee-Enfield weapons at the point-of-balance. This puts their fingers a few inches away from the trigger, a disaster if ambushed.
Perhaps this dilemma could be solved by a fictitious Sten Mark VI SMG that balances around the trigger. I am not clear if balance requires the magazine in the pistol grip (ala Uzi) or in a bull-pup configuration (between the trigger and the butt-stock).
Sten Mark VI's construction would revolve around a single large tube (ala Sten Mark III) that extends all the way from the muzzle to the butt-plate. To simplify supply, Sten Mark VI would use the same 9 mm ammunition, 30-round magazines and spike bayonet as earlier Stens. The spike bayonet is primarily for house-clearing.

The breech-block would probably have to over-lap the rear of the barrel (ala Uzi), in an effort to shorten the trigger mechanism. Since the overall length would only be 17 or 19 inches, there would be no need for a folding or removable butt-stock, but you would need finger-guards similar to the finger-guards on FG 42 fore-stock. We also might want to consider a trigger-guard that looks more like Steyr-AUG, big enough to accommodate winter mittens.
Speaking of winter mittens, Sten Mark VI needs enough wooden overlays to prevent fingers from freezing to bare steel.
Speaking of trigger mechanism, Sten Mark VI definitely needs a dedicated safety lever, maybe like the pivoting selector lever in the FG42.
Finally, Sten Mark VI needs a flip-up ejector-port cover to reduce dust in the chamber.
 

Cryhavoc101

riggerrob said:
It always struck me silly to see photos of Canadian infantrymen trotting towards the enemy while holding their Sten, Bren and Lee-Enfield weapons at the point-of-balance. This puts their fingers a few inches away from the trigger, a disaster if ambushed.
Perhaps this dilemma could be solved by a fictitious Sten Mark VI SMG that balances around the trigger. I am not clear if balance requires the magazine in the pistol grip (ala Uzi) or in a bull-pup configuration (between the trigger and the butt-stock).
Sten Mark VI's construction would revolve around a single large tube (ala Sten Mark III) that extends all the way from the muzzle to the butt-plate. To simplify supply, Sten Mark VI would use the same 9 mm ammunition, 30-round magazines and spike bayonet as earlier Stens. The spike bayonet is primarily for house-clearing.

The breech-block would probably have to over-lap the rear of the barrel (ala Uzi), in an effort to shorten the trigger mechanism. Since the overall length would only be 17 or 19 inches, there would be no need for a folding or removable butt-stock, but you would need finger-guards similar to the finger-guards on FG 42 fore-stock. We also might want to consider a trigger-guard that looks more like Steyr-AUG, big enough to accommodate winter mittens.
Speaking of winter mittens, Sten Mark VI needs enough wooden overlays to prevent fingers from freezing to bare steel.
Speaking of trigger mechanism, Sten Mark VI definitely needs a dedicated safety lever, maybe like the pivoting selector lever in the FG42.
Finally, Sten Mark VI needs a flip-up ejector-port cover to reduce dust in the chamber.
Click to expand...

I will just leave this here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sterling_submachine_gun
 

scottrich

Cost, cost cost-it was $9 per gun-that's why they didn't bother.

However, if they would improve the bolt/safety and quality of the magazine, it would be better. My dream Sten would be .357 magnum(came out in 35/36) with a burst fire only.
 

riggerrob

Sterling

I have fired thousands of rounds through Sterlings, but found them un-necessarily long and complicated. The side-mounted magazine makes them awkward for tankers to carry. Something that laid flat (e.g. pistol grip and magazine parallel) would make an SMG easier to stow in a vehicle.
 

kessock

riggerrob said:
I have fired thousands of rounds through Sterlings, but found them un-necessarily long and complicated. The side-mounted magazine makes them awkward for tankers to carry. Something that laid flat (e.g. pistol grip and magazine parallel) would make an SMG easier to stow in a vehicle.
Click to expand...

I found them the height of simplicity though the folding butt stock took a bit of practice to fire with. The side mag was a design feature so you could get as close as possible to the ground when firing from the prone. You would be sticking your head and shoulders up quite a bit with a 30 round bottom fed magazine. It did have a habit of catching on every single thing imaginable in a vehicle though. I just used the ten round mag normally to cut down on the awkwardness. Still in my top two weapons to fire though.
 

Tallil2long

Well, within broad limits, the exact quality of the individual firearms weren't the determining factor for defeating the enemy army in modern mass warfare. The crew-served weapons -- MGs, artillery pieces, etc -- were more important. And most critical of all were the organizational structures that coordinated the efforts of all the weapon systems, and the doctrine to ensure best application of their efforts.

In this situation, what you needed was a weapon that was merely "good enough", and that could be produced in large enough numbers to ensure that everyone was properly equipped.

The Sten was good enough, and it was cheap enough to turn out in the required quantities. If you try to improve it too much, you get a better weapon, which isn't critical, and one which is significantly more expensive to make, which could be a critical fault.
 

kessock

Tallil2long said:
Well, within broad limits, the exact quality of the individual firearms weren't the determining factor for defeating the enemy army in modern mass warfare. The crew-served weapons -- MGs, artillery pieces, etc -- were more important. And most critical of all were the organizational structures that coordinated the efforts of all the weapon systems, and the doctrine to ensure best application of their efforts.

In this situation, what you needed was a weapon that was merely "good enough", and that could be produced in large enough numbers to ensure that everyone was properly equipped.

The Sten was good enough, and it was cheap enough to turn out in the required quantities. If you try to improve it too much, you get a better weapon, which isn't critical, and one which is significantly more expensive to make, which could be a critical fault.
Click to expand...
Unless you're the one having to use it; then it becomes a bit more important.:D
 

riggerrob

So the challenge is first to improve the safety/selector switch without increasing the number of expensive precision parts.
The second challenge is improving balance and portability.
 

Cryhavoc101

IMO - either the Sterling SMG or the Aussie Owen's both in 'Hot' 9mm x 19

Both are nicely balanced - accurate (for SMGs), robust, reliable and certainly for the Sterling - light with a very good magazine

Both weapons were available in 1944 (although the small number of Sterling's used in NWE had Sten mags) and had a good rep - with the Owen's being the best SMG of the war (if not the ugliest).

In fact it should have been a contender to replace the Sten as soon as the British industry recovered from the initial smg panic in 1940
 

riggerrob

We can agree that Sterling had the best magazines.
Owen may have been the most reliable of the Sten lineage and it was probably the best jungle-fighter.
But Owen was too bulky for tankers.
The challenge is to combine the best features of various SMGs in the most reliable and compact package (for tankers) while keeping the cost within Sten guidelines.
 
Driftless

Driftless

Donor
Dumb question: can you make a successful double-stack magazine for the Sten or Sterling? (idk the right term - but one where there are essentially two staggered columns of cartidges in the same magazine? - 20 cartridges in the length normally occupied by 11 or 12 in a single column). That might allivieate some of the tight space storage problems for tankers and the like.
 

Tallil2long

Driftless said:
Dumb question: can you make a successful double-stack magazine for the Sten or Sterling? (idk the right term - but one where there are essentially two staggered columns of cartidges in the same magazine? - 20 cartridges in the length normally occupied by 11 or 12 in a single column). That might allivieate some of the tight space storage problems for tankers and the like.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure the Sten mag was double stack, although it merged into a single column at the top to simplify feeding, exactly like the MP38.
 

kessock

Driftless said:
Dumb question: can you make a successful double-stack magazine for the Sten or Sterling? (idk the right term - but one where there are essentially two staggered columns of cartidges in the same magazine? - 20 cartridges in the length normally occupied by 11 or 12 in a single column). That might allivieate some of the tight space storage problems for tankers and the like.
Click to expand...
The Sterling did. Canadian ones also had a 10 round double stack mag that was about 4-5 Inches long which made it handy.
 

Cryhavoc101

Its only been relatively recently (10 years?) that Drum mags have become reliable enough for the rough and tumble of front line / regular field use.

And even then they are not officially allowed in many armed forces.

The Commando's ditched the Thompsons drum mag fairly quickly due to its lack of reliability and the noise it made (it rattled like a big rattle full of bullets) making it a liability when troops are trying to be sneaky. So they settled for the 20 round mags.

Also troops quickly found that once you had exhausted the drum mag it was difficult to stow.
 
Driftless

Driftless

Donor
Tallil2long said:
Now, come up with a practical 50-70 round helical mag for the WW2 Sten, then I'll call you a genius!
Click to expand...

Glory is fading quickly from my grasp here.....

Poking around a little, I came across a 1938 Argentine Hafdasa SMG. How about a mash-up of that with Sten? Both guns were made out bent sheet metal, but the Argentine's had a 50 round box magazine that apparently worked pretty well. At that point in time the Brit's & Argentine's got on pretty well, correct?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafdasa_C-4
 
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