Panic Submachinegun 1938

Poor little Ruralia bears neighbours rattling sabres during the 1930s. She realizes how out-dated her infantry small arms are.
Ruralian Coast Guard and anti-smuggling police have a variety of foreign-made pistols and sub machine guns , but some are wearing out . American, British, Czech, French, etc. factories either refuse to sell or charge ridiculously high prices.
Ruralian police have already decided to standardize on 9 x 19 mm Luger ammo.
The task is assigned to the Ruralian motorcycle factory who have a variety of modern casting, rolling, pressing, spot-welding, etc. tools. Coast Guard wants the shortest possible gun for boarding parties, while Ruralian infantry insist on a 19 inch barrel for range and accuracy. Ruralian infantry also insist on wooden or plastic or leather grips to prevent hands from freezing to guns during winters. They also want selective fire with decent first-round accuracy. Finally, it needs better reliability than a Sten gun (please ignore the miss-matched dates).
 
Easy. One panic SMG as requested.


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Ramontxo

Donor
There are three outstanding designs at the moment the Suomi, the Italian Beretta and the Czech ZK-383. None of them are the cheap equivalent to a sten or (even better) the Aussie Owen but these don't exist yet and any of the above would give Ruralian infantry a very very good submachine gun (at a price)
 
Contract Mr, George H. Lanchester To design an SMG for you based on an MP18 that you have managed to acquire! Tell Him to keep it light. cheap and simple.
 
There are three outstanding designs at the moment the Suomi, the Italian Beretta and the Czech ZK-383. None of them are the cheap equivalent to a sten or (even better) the Aussie Owen but these don't exist yet and any of the above would give Ruralian infantry a very very good submachine gun (at a price)
The Sten is basically the Bergman MP28 reduced to the bare minimum needed to make it work. It didn't need the resources of a major arsenal like Enfield to do the rework, any reasonably competent engineer could have done it, if given the job.
 
Messr's Major Reginald V. Shepherd and Harold Turpin have yet ITTL to put pen to paper, so hence my earlier post. The country needs to contract a designer or a company to design a gun for them.
 

marathag

Banned
Cheap?
Look this way
news.guns.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/nelsonslebman19113.jpg
nelsonslebman19113.jpg

The Lebman Gangster special.
But with a Browning Hipower, than 1911. Some had detachable shoulder stocks and extended magazines

Still not as cheap or as good as a ground up design like the Owen or M3 Grease gun, it's still cheap to modify existing semiauto handguns to SMGs
 
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The Erma EMP, MP 34, and MP 35 are all available for purchase and licensed production in 1938.
EMP has a nice foregrip for better accuracy and there's a cooling jacket. Its pretty decent.
MP 34 was an exceptional well made weapon, so its somewhat pricey. But its worth a hard stare and some consideration. My great-grandfather used one in WW2 as a lieutenant in a German-trained KMT division. My grandfather told me that he (my great-grandfather) like the gun because it was chambered in the common (in China) 7.63x25mm Mauser, had a bayonet lug (he fought in Shanghai), and it was selective fire. It also never jammed when my great-grandfather's life depended on it.
The MP 35 is cheaper than the MP 34 but it was still of good quality.
And they're all German designed but made in foreign countries cause of the Versailles treaty. And OTL, all 3 guns were exported around the world, with at least 10 countries using each gun.

Take your pick of the 3.
 

Ramontxo

Donor
The Sten is basically the Bergman MP28 reduced to the bare minimum needed to make it work. It didn't need the resources of a major arsenal like Enfield to do the rework, any reasonably competent engineer could have done it, if given the job.
Yes, but you know all Archimedes need to invent the Montgonflier balloon was to see some leaves burned in a bonfire. And yet he didn't apply his own principle and put a silk bag over a fire. I doubt a small rural country would by itself develop a new extremely simplified weapon
 
Don't think any Browning designed is available right now. 1921 Thompson's might be available to be built under license in 9mm
 

SwampTiger

Banned
If you have bicycle factories, you have steel tube, sheet steel and metal bending/braking(not breaking) machinery. Look to Italy for the Beretta M30 and M38. Adapt to a 7.25X25 or 9X25 cartridge with hammer fire and locked or closed breech operation. Use various barrel lengths and simplify construction.The result will be comparable to the others in weight and reliability.

Alternately, contact Pal Kiraly for his lever delayed design. Again, simplify production with tube and bent/stamped steel construction. This could evolve into a proto-assault weapon.
 
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Don't think any Browning designed is available right now. 1921 Thompson's might be available to be built under license in 9mm

They only made 15000 Thompson 1921/27/28 all in .45 all made by Colt under contract, they were very well made, high quality and therefore high cost guns so re-engineering it in 9mm would make it even more expensive, the UK were paying $300 a gun in 1940.

Pretty much all the pre-war SMG's were over-engineered with lots of machining and little stamping to be found so good luck finding a cheap one. The best around would probably be the Beretta 38A, the Italians would likely sell a licence and full tech package for hard cash.
 
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