Deleted member 1487
If mass production is the concern, then it is hard to beat the gun posted earlier by Wimble:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...mg-with-1943-technology.427716/#post-15785762
Best possible SMG with 1943 technology?
- Thread starter riggerrob
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- 1943 best of lot smg
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...mg-with-1943-technology.427716/#post-15785762
Yes Swedish K and PPS-43 are both ideal examples of that era's best of breed.
It wouldn't be too hard to make a POD where Uzi Gal designs a .45 caliber submachine gun. Maybe he doesn't go to prison in 1943. Uzi Gal gets his hands on a Thompson and modifies it.
I was thinking why not make a .45 caliber Sten gun?
Deleted member 1487
Because the .45 was a rather poor caliber for an SMG and the M3 Grease gun, which was effectively the .45 cal Sten, sucked. Anything over 50m was going to be tough to hit, while it bleed velocity quickly.
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Agreed!
I have fired the version made by Smith & Wesson.
Apparently, Sweden embargoed weapons sales to the USA during the war in Viet Nam (1966). The US Navy asked S & W to reverse-engineer the " Swedish K" SMG.
S&W M76 SMGs were issued to CIA, SEALS and other "too covert to discuss" units who enjoyed the "Swedish K's" simplicity, reliability and ability to fire immediately after emerging from water.
Along a similar logic, Madsen M50 is the "cutest" .... of early post-WW2 SMGs that were possible with 1943 technology.
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Wimble Toot
Banned
I fired one in the Republic of Ireland a looooong time ago, just as the Irish Armed Forces were phasing it out in favour of the Steyr AUG (which is also the best bullpup assault rifle I've ever fired, not that there was fierce competition for that title.)
The M/45 had controllable cyclic rate, but high enough to chuck a reasonable volume of lead in the direction of the other guy. Better than the L2A3 Sterling, IMO, which was a bit 'spray and pray' in untrained hands.
And it had a bayonet attachment! As indeed, did the L2.
Which is why I added it to be in 9x25 Mauser Export. You can cope with the extra power with a stronger recoil spring and replacing the slow rate mass block with a steel sheet covered lead one to increase resistance and bolt mass. No need to a lever delay as used in the WM 43 either.
I had no problem with the L2A3 as long as you got the rude and licentious to actually use the shoulder stock and sights.
M1928 Tommy Guns had decent sights, and I've found that yes, at 200 yards could reliable hit the NRA standard target in semiauto mode
This is the trouble with all 'best' threads. Best at what? The best SMGs as weapons use much machining like the ZK 323. The best to produce in quantity will use copious simple stampings and foldings like the PPS-43.
I have to strenuously disagree. If a shooter is trying to engage individual targets over 50 meters with a sub-machine gun it is fault of the weapon's user, not the weapon. Sub-machine guns are not, in any way, simply pistol caliber assault weapons. They are close contact, high volume firepower.
The muzzle velocity of a .45 APC out of the standard Uzi's 10 inch barrel is 900-1370 fps giving it, with a FMJ between 175 and 230 grains, a Taylor KO figure of 13-15, along with a wound channel wide enough to be lethal without any expansion (important since the only available load is a FMJ). The Tokarev has a much high velocity, meaning it over penetrates, much less bullet weight at 85 grains, and, thanks to the over penetration and resultant failure to deposit all the energy INTO the target, winds up with a Taylor KO of 6. Simple put the .45 out of a 10 inch barrel has between two and three times the practical killing power of a 7.63mm.
Sub guns are designed to clear room/bunkers/trench sections, in short they are designed purely to kill what you hit in a small, often confined space. If you want to kill out to 200 yards, with a secondary but less than ideal room clearance, get a carbine in something like .270 Winchester with select fire mode.
Common sense would indicate best means most suited for military service because that's what SMGs are designed for. No army would have any interest in an expensive machined SMG by the 1940s.
Deleted member 1487
OP's standard...plus PPSH41/43s were regularly used effectively at 100m or even more. Same with the MP40. Turns out the 9mm or 7.62 Tokarev were better rounds than the .45 for SMGs. Just because the .45 couldn't keep pace with the use the rest were able to doesn't mean that they were faulty SMGs, rather the .45 SMGs of WW2 were just grossly under-ranged compared to the competition. The .45 caliber bullet was designed as a hand gun cartridge for achieving one shot kills at under 50m, which is great performance for that role, it's just inappropriate for SMGs beyond WW1 trench sweeping or clearing a room. It faced a number of complaints:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thompson_submachine_gun
If you can hit with the .45 at it's optimal combat range, it is very lethal, the problem is hitting in combat when you're limited to handgun ranges and the enemy can reliablely hit you at double your effective range.
In terms of the Tokarev, 1 hit center mass at 100m was considered lethal by the Soviets, with more being required for longer ranges. The bullet construction meant that unless you're at 50m you're not overpenetrating usually, while if you're at that range the Tokarev is going to have about 6-12 buddies overpenetrating with it, which will be lethal.
Again as always the issue is achieving hits at normal combat ranges, which 50m was generally not, which makes it PDW that is more effective than a pistol at the same range or if you can get close enough to score hits, like when clearing a room.
There is a reason the .45 is not used by militaries in virtually any case anymore, while the 9mm is. Law Enforcement however finds it very useful given that they usually are going to use it at under 50m (more like 10m or less) and need 1 shot kills without over-penetration. Same with the MP5, which is pretty ideal for specialized LE use, as it's closed bolt and resulting accuracy are extremely necessary for their needs, while high volume fire is not, but is needed in say WW2 combat and why military SMGs used open bolt designs so the gun didn't heat up too quickly and get rounds cooking off.
Thompsons were. Not SMGs in general. The M3 was primarily designed as a PDW.
Killing out to 150m was done by the MP40 and PPSH's, as they had the accuracy and residual momentum to kill at that range. During WW2 SMGs were used as assault weapons to an enemy down or kill them with saturation fire; the Finns and for a time the Soviets actually used them as SAWs, while the Soviets did treat them as assault rifles with shorter range. As Project SALVO and other post-war studies demonstrated short bursts of 3-5 rounds from low recoil weapons were far more likely to achieve hits even at 100m than a high powered rifle, which actually made weapons like 9mm and 7.62mm SMGs more effective killers than just about any weapon but for the STG44 because they were more likely to actually hit the target.
Sure, with careful aim, semi-auto fire, and a non-moving target at a range (not combat conditions), you can get hits with it. Good luck in combat on automatic; vets complained about not being able to hit with any reliability above 50m in WW2. That's part of the reason the spec for the M3 was limited to accuracy measures at 50m, because they understood that getting more than that was not happening. That is also why use was limited to close range situations, while the Soviets could use theirs at much longer ranges and expect to get hits, while the MP40 fell in between in terms of accuracy and range.
I thought you were saying that it was already in that.
You sure about the changes making it able to handle the extra power? Why couldn't that simply be applied to the Danuvia 43M then? Also, wouldn't lead deform under that sort of pressure?
You also have to consider the importance of penetration because in combat people get behind cover whenever possible. 45acp just do not have the penetration of 9mm and falls far short of 7.62 Tokarev.
This video is in Serbian but the performance comparison between 9mm, 7.62 Tok and 357 magnum (which is more powerful than 9x25 Mauser) is worth seeing. 7.62 Tok was basically the 5.7x28 and 4.6x30 of its time.
This video is in Serbian but the performance comparison between 9mm, 7.62 Tok and 357 magnum (which is more powerful than 9x25 Mauser) is worth seeing. 7.62 Tok was basically the 5.7x28 and 4.6x30 of its time.
So the round is not accurate at range over 50 meters, yet someone states that, in fact, based on their personal experience, it can be accurate against individual man size targets out to 200 meters (which is more credit than I gave it frankly). The response to that is "well, on a range". Precisely where are other weapons tested for accuracy? Ya.
Troops acknowledge that hitting a specific target with full auto isn't possible (100% agree, which is why troops these days are trained to fire two-three round bursts or weapons are limited to 3 round burst) so accuracy isn't import at 50 meters or more. Which is it, accuracy out a couple hundred meter is important, or it is not important? Quite literally can not have it both ways.
Modern forces use the 9mm? Sure they do. The 9mm ammo available today is very much NOT the 9mm available even 20 years ago, much less 70+ years back. Modern 9mm is hotter than .357 Mag if the right load is chosen.
Law enforcement also used JHP. That massively increases the lethality of any cartridge while also eliminating most over penetration issues. There are loads available, sometimes exclusively to LEO, that transform the 9mm into something its designers and users never even dreamed of.
The .45 is not a perfect round, IMO no such round exists simply because different tasks require different weapons.
All this said, given the option, it seems better to go with a round that will knock down and kill the other guy when the weapon is used inside its performance envelope, rather than just piss him off.
Deleted member 1487
Really? Someone said they hit a target at the range one time on semi-automatic and suddenly that trumps all the combat reports of veterans that had trouble hitting people in combat at greater than 50m? Are you going to argue that range accuracy is the same thing as combat accuracy, especially if we are talking about it's used as an automatic?
The entire point of an SMG is automatic firing to saturate and target to get a hit, not fire on semi-auto at a range where you can take your time aim against a large target not seeking cover or shooting back. On automatic or burst fire the low velocity of the .45 in the Thompson made it controllable, which was great for short ranged shooting quickly, but makes ranged shooting significantly less accurate, especially in combat when you need to take snap shots against cover seeking targets and don't have the luxury of aiming for a white at a range against a standard man sized target in white (i.e. not double over in camo seeking cover). Frankly I'm surprised someone like you is going to make that argument. I mean again, the Thompson was designed as a trench broom to get quick kills at close range thanks to be a WW1 design, while WW2 designs were updated and used for more roles than just a close ranged assault weapon.
There are more loads now, everything of course has changed, but even with that technological update the .45 did not come along for the ride with the military except in a handful of cases. BTW in 1940 they were already make a 9mm load as hot as the .357:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9×25mm_Mauser
Sure, but there are a lot of dead folks from WW2 that took an SMG hit of 9mm or 7.62mm out of an SMG. The point of WW2 SMGs was to get hits with enough on target to take him out, which when fired from a longer barreled military SMG would do that job as effectively as a modern pistol round even without HPs. You may need more to put them totally out of the fight, but that is the point of bursts.
And again over penetration was an issue at close range, but at those sorts of ranges a person 9 out of 10 isn't getting hit just once with an SMG burst.
Indeed. All I'm arguing is that for a 1943 SMG the 9mm or Tokarev had more versatility in range and roles which would make either the choice for the best possible SMG.
In that case why not just use an M1 Carbine or Garand? Having a heavy round isn't useful if you don't hit the enemy or the enemy can hit you first because of greater accuracy and range. Catching a 9mm or 7.62 burst is going to put you out of the fight just the same as a .45.
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FDF studied the effectiveness of various war- and post-war era small arms, and concluded that the Suomi KP/-31 firing 9x19mm Sako or VPT custom-made ammo had standard effective combat range of c. 100m. With this ammo, I'd nominate the KP m/44 as a plausible candidate for the best compromise of firepower, accuracy and suitability for mass production.
Deleted member 1487
I actually totally agree with this last statement, only difference is I would have an M2 carbine (select fire) in the .270-.280 caliber range. The Soviets made a ton of SMG because they could, not because they were better than actual full power rifles.
I didn't suggest that because the thread is best SMG using 1943 tech. That was, is, and will remain, IMO something that looks and functions very much like a CZ 25 or an Uzi. It can be in 9mm, it will be a decent weapon, but will be, IMO, sub-optimal for the role that a SMG is designed for and that the Red Army used to great effect in urban environments.