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I had just the opposite experience with the 14. When I first used it, I was about 5'6"/130 lbs. Our instructor told us to fire three round bursts and start with a clean target. Fire one burst, aiming at the lower left corner of the target. Watch what direction the rounds "climbed." Each person was a bit different, based on height and strength. Do that a couple times to get an idea where the second and third rounds would go, then always aim so your second round would hit close to dead center. After a while, we could all get the second rounds within a couple inches (or closer) of the bulls-eye every time and our three round groups even started getting closer together. I was "lucky" I wasn't very strong as most of my "climb" was vertical. About half the time, I could put three rounds in the targets' 1) right hip, 2) right/center torso, and 3) left shoulder. (This was as seen from the targets' PoV, as if they were enemies facing me, as the muzzle climbed up and to my right.) I would get two of three in the target, the remainder of the time.
At the time I was back from a partial tour in Vietnam, as a crew chief/ door gunner, I was pretty familiar with MG techniques .
I was firing from the prone, no bipod. I just wasn't impressed by it's abilities on full auto.
But maybe it was just me.
I remember thinking if I had that a few months before in the chopper, I'd have left it on semi-auto.
You can hear the "ping" because you're wearing hearing protection (at the gun range).
When the Garand was used in combat (WWII, Korea, etc.), hearing protection was not being used (by either side), so everyone on the field was as deaf as a doorknob.
Ok, but we're your ears ringing from prolinged gunfire exchange, occasional mortar and grenade reports?
The point being: in combat, no one is going to hear a "ping". The adrenalin alone has the blood thundering in the ears, add to that, the eardrum's deadening from the repeated rifle report (yours and the others nearby) and you'd be hard pressed to hear the Hindenburg go up in flames behind you.
Don't take my word (or the other guys here) for it, ask an older vet next time to you meet one.
Maybe that would be a good source of information and maybe not, but that opens an entirely new line of discussion that is a bit off topic here. Remember the rifle muskets that had multiple loads in them that were found after Civil War battles? How much shooting do you suppose the owner of that gun did? There were surveys after WW2 that suggested similar things were happening with soldiers that were not carrying fully automatic weapons.
In my opinion, the worst characteristic of the M1 Garand is that most of the operating mechanism is exposed but needs to be kept heavily lubricated to function properly.
The product-improved Garand (M14) corrected a few faults but also introduced some new ones to keep people happy.
- Ivan.
Produce them so fast that by 1944 it's the universal bang stick of the Allies. Hand them out with the rations along with bucket loads of ammo.
Should the Garand be full auto like the AVS-36?
Should it have been stripper clip fed like an SKS?
Should it have a detachable box magazine like a M14?
I like the RSC-1918 and feel the design choices are a bit better perhaps.
Reverse engineer the STG44. You're going to have to have an intermediate cartridge like the 6.5 Arisaka already mentioned so start from scratch and end up with something like the 6.5 Grendel or 6mm ARC. Better for urban warfare than the Garand and still good out to 500 meters.