Machine Gun Terminology - LMG, MMG, SAW, LSW, HMG, GPMG
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Published 2017-12-29
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Today we will look at the various different categories of machine guns - what makes them, why they exist, and what their place in military history is. Specifically...
Automatic Rifle: Shoulder or hip fired, limited magazine capacity, minimal sustained fire capacity. Examples: M1918 BAR, Chauchat.
LMG: Magazine fed, rifle caliber, bipod fired. Examples: Bren, Madsen, Lewis.
HMG: Belt fed, usually water cooled, minimal portability, fired from tripod only. Examples: Maxim, Vickers, Hotchkiss 1914. Evolved into guns of caliber 12.7mm - 20mm, like the M2 and DShK.
MMG: Air cooled, tripod fired only, belt fed. Examples: Browning 1919A4, SG-43.
GPMG: Bipod or tripod fired, belt fed, rifle caliber, quick-change barrel. Examples: MG42, PKM, M240.
SAW/LSW: Intermediate caliber, magazine fed, bipod fired. Examples: L86A1, FN Minimi, RPK.
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All Comments (21)
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The Chauchat wasn't an automatic rifle it was a specially made gun for jam clearing practice
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Fun fact about the German MG 08/15 (mentioned at 23:35): it was so common that "08/15" now means "average, uninteresting, bland" in German and I still hear that phrase a lot here in Vienna! Most people aren't aware of where it originally came from though.
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Americans: "Acuracy is more important then volume of fire for suppression" Germans: * Angry MG42 noises *
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There is a common misunderstanding about .50BMG regarding use against personnel. The urban legend is that it is a war crime to shoot personnel with it because it is intended for anti-material/anti-armor purposes. One of the common things you would hear old vets say is, "Aim for their metal belt buckles because they count as armor/equipment." This is actually not true though. There is nothing characteristically about .50BMG that would prevent it from legal use against a person according to The Hague. Some speculate that the origin of such legends stem from Infantry command instructing soldiers to not use .50BMG on personnel in order to conserve limited ammunition supplies during Vietnam. It would suck to run out of anti-material ammo in deep combat and then have to deal with a fortified emplacement. Of course, if you stop and actually think about it, the legend doesn't make any practical sense at all anyway. Are we meant to believe that use of mortars, conventional artillery shells and air dropped bombs are totally fine on personnel but .50BMG is just too much maiming and undue injury?
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LSW - also known as Long Silly Weapon.
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PKM is Ivan's favorite conceal carry.
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I'd consider the outliers to be MMGs. They can be used both as HMGs and vaguely like LMGs, and don't necessarily have the upsides or downsides of either.
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"Guns only fired effectively from their mounts" John Basilone intensifies
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It really is good to be explained all the little details in that jungle of abbreviations and differences that people normally are not aware of.
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obligatory "LMG, MOUNTED AND LOADED"
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I've been trying to create an item sorting lexicon for an rpg my friends and I have been working on. There are many different weapons to consider, and the nomenclature available is confusing as hell. Your videos have helped me considerably.
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Which begs the age old question: is a mortar small arms or artillery?
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ian is a proper bloke. everything always looks very neat and squared away in the background but covered in about 5 inches of dust. just like my house!
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This is one for the support players...
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Cool video. Best explanation of MG classes I've heard. 23:38 And seeing Ian shooting a maxim gun from the hip in a German helmet was priceless.
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1919A6 ... the heavy light machine gun.
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When I joined the army in 1994 I started firing machine guns with the M60. After making it to my permanent duty station in FT.Lewis WA we switched to the M240B machine gun and the quick changed barrel was one of the greatest things about that gun. I was in a machine gun squad and part of a 3 man gun squad. Later while close to my discharge date in 1998 I was a M249 gunner before becoming a team leader with the M4. Great thing about being in the infantry
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Am I the only one disappointed that there wasn’t even a passing mention of the M60?
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I would just like to thank whoever does the captions, they are excellent. If Youtube has taught me anything it is that good transcription is invaluable, and that despite all of Google’s computing power, auto-generated captions are still effectively impossible. This channel is so good at what it does it makes me weep for all the rest.
