Loading a New Belt onto a Belt-Fed MG

How many belt-fed machine guns are like the Browning 50 cal. mg in that the cocking handle has to be pulled back twice after loading a new belt of ammo? I wouldn't have thought that it just the Browning 50 cal. that had this procedure and, likewise, I wouldn't have thought that all or most belt-fed mg's required this?

I thought up this "geekish question" after watching a 1940's made wartime film yesterday which showed a number of new ammo belts being loaded onto Browning 50 cal. MG's and then the cocking handle being pulled back twice before the weapon was ready to fire.

I was/am under the impression that the MG42 only required the cocking handle to be pulled back once after loading a new ammo belt?

Maybe it was to get rid of the 1st link after the round had been stripped from the linked belt to stop a possible jam of the pawl, just my illogical thought never had anything to do with a 50 BMG.

Most modern MG designs are similar to the MG-42 for the feed system and only require the cocking handle to be pulled back once (as that puts the bolt in the 'open' position which is ready to fire). I know this applies to the FN-Minimi and FN-MAG variants.

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Originally Posted by Flying10uk

the cocking handle has to be pulled back twice

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That's only if you load the gun from a closed cover. We didn't do that with the 1919A4s or .50, we opened the cover and placed the first round against the cartridge stops and the link stripper...closed the cover, and then one cock of the handle loaded the chamber.

As stated, the new guns are loaded from an open cover as well and strip a round directly into the chamber and fire it like the MG34/42 and the M60.

IIRC the first one was to pull the belt tight and get the pawl/extractor thingy to get hold of the first cartridge, the second was to chamber said cartridge while pawl/extractor thingy grabbed hold of the next cartridge. Or words to that effect.

"Loading was accomplished by inserting the pull tab on the ammunition belt from the left side of the gun - either metal links or metal tab on cloth belts - until the feeding pawl at the entrance of the feed way engaged the first round in the belt and held it in place. The cocking handle was then pulled back with the right hand, palm facing up (to protect the thumb from injury if the weapon fired unexpectedly, which could happen if the barrel was very hot), and then released. This advanced the first round of the belt in front of the bolt for the extractor/ejector on the bolt to grab the first cartridge. The cocking handle was then pulled and released a second time. This caused the extractor to remove the first cartridge from the belt and chamber it (load it into the barrel ready to fire). As the bolt slid forward into battery, the extractor engaged the next round on the now-advanced belt resting in the feedway, preparing to draw it from the belt in the next firing cycle. ..." Wikipedia M1919 Browning machine gun

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Originally Posted by Daan Kemp

IIRC the first one was to pull the belt tight and get the pawl/extractor thingy to get hold of the first cartridge, the second was to chamber said cartridge while pawl/extractor thingy grabbed hold of the next cartridge. Or words to that effect.

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That is correct...the original belts used a pull tab. We used the disintegrating belts after about 1970.

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Originally Posted by browningautorifle

.the original belts used a pull tab.

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Yes, the 1940's film did show this when loading a new belt.

Do disintegrating belts not normally have starter tabs?

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Originally Posted by Flying10uk

Do disintegrating belts not normally have starter tabs?

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No, our newer ones have a chrome link to find the first one in that dark mass but before they were all just same parkerized double/singles. No starters...

Jim, our belts had a metal leadin, just push it in and pull from the other side, a nice healthy click lets you know the first round is under the extractor.
Opening breech covers was not so easy in a crowded turret.

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Originally Posted by muffett.2008

our belts had a metal leadin

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Interesting, did you folk make them? Ours were IVI produced and the US issue dropped the lead tab too. Agreed about the turret deal, even after our Grizzly turret decreased in size to the Cadillac-Gage model we were still doing open cover loads with both .50 and 1919A4 (C-5). I don't remember seeing them when I was there in Australia in '77 either and we had a few M113s with the double turrets...but they were .30 cal guns, weren't they? The lead tabs were dropped by us when we changed from .30 cal to 7.62. That was about 1970.

We couldn't lift the covers in our Centurions except for an inch or so. So it had to be a doubler pull of the cocking handle. Our drills cganged slightly on our L3 guns that fired from the open bolt. On the second pull, where the round was dragged from the belt by the extractor and lowered down into the bolt, the modified cocking handle latch was lifted so that the bolt was pulled slightly to the rear, clear of the trigger.
How do I remember all this stuff.......? The old M1919 guns were a classic case of if it ain;t broke, don't fix it. In all my time as an Armourer, in tanks too (see the funny Centurion story further on somewhere.....) nobody ever understood why we changed - and complicated - the action of the trusty and well tried, from 1919 to 1966 - M1919 and came up with a rear sear L2A4 and 6. It wasn't even as though cook-offs were a problem. The OB reports at Warminster and Bovingdon did say that cook-offs were reported.......... in Korea. But the only known casualties were the Chinese Infantry. We didn't record those statistics.

Browning M1919A4 and A6, the work of a master.
Browning L3 A4 and 6, the work of Biffo the Bear

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Originally Posted by Peter Laidler

Browning M1919A4 and A6, the work of a master.

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You got that right. When we changed from the 1919A4 to the C1,C4, C5 models the games began. The first was barrel change and a couple parts in feed. After that, the bandages. For ever major mod there's what Peter? Eight or ten minor mods? You can't change one simple thing, so why didn't we just buy the MAG58? Because we're cheap.

Got that Jim. We could never get our C-7.62mm spec Browning to function more than a few rounds.

As for the .50 with the quick-change barrel....... Words fail me. I used to tell the trouble shooters. I used to tell the trouble shooters that the original gun worked on good basic physics. The modified guns FAIL due to bad basic physics in the form of metallurgy.. Dolf Goldsmith spent an hour telling them too............

Was there never a need to change the barrels on the air versions of the Browning 50 cal MG as used on B17 and other aircraft? I've never heard of the barrels being changed on air versions. Was the airflow, in flight, over the barrel sufficient to cool it?

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Originally Posted by Peter Laidler

As for the .50 with the quick-change barrel

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Ours were painful too, old guns with new parts. The FN guns worked great and everyone thought we could do the same. They had new made guns with FN made ammo specially produced for the job. We had neither. As soon as they took my headspace and timing gauges, we were hooped.

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Originally Posted by Flying10uk

change the barrels on the air versions of the Browning 50 cal MG

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Those guns only had a limited amount of ammo when they went up and would never exceed the guns capabilities while in flight. No ammo resupply, like us on the ground. We could just keep bringing ammo until the gun melts. Up there they only had a few hundred per gun or a thousand...not very much. The barrel was new on takeoff and gun would be completely overhauled upon landing. No barrel changes needed. The internals of the guns were a bit different too. Some of the externals differed as well.

And it gets downright chilly at 20-plus thousand feet in an um-pressurized aircraft. Five hundred rounds of the big Fifty, fired in controlled bursts in such drafty conditions is not likely to cause issues of metallurgical failure in such circumstances.

At sea-level, assaulting Tarawa in the tropics? Who cares about barrel-life?

The LVT 4 carried a 20mm Polsten with a drum feed and a couple of . 30 cal BMGs. If they survived the crossing of the coral shelf and the drive up the beach, it was a miracle of sorts.

Pulling up the belt in .30 and .50 cal in the T50 Turret was a fight in itself, the narrow finger channel did not give much room for mistakes, one slip ad the belt would cheerfully rattle back down into the ammo box.
Hence the metal lead in tab, once started you simply pulled the tab along the slot, if you needed to stop, you just raised the tab to the vertical position, this allowed tabs on it's base to lock in to the feed chute, even so, the unwary would still here the death rattle of the belt snaking back.

Prior to these we still had the old cloth belt, always able to clear a stoppage by giving the belt a good yank.

For some strange reason, I have both feed chutes in my back shed, not sure why, maybe planned to modify them......just don't remember, too long ago.

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Originally Posted by browningautorifle

when they went up

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I think they had a different rate of fire for the air mounted 50 BMG weapons as the footage I've seen on them operating with ground troops the cyclic rate of the air ones seems allot higher.

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Originally Posted by Bruce_in_Oz

fired in controlled bursts

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They had to be controlled in the aircraft as there was no resupply coming.

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Originally Posted by browningautorifle

Interesting, did you folk make them? Ours were IVI produced and the US issue dropped the lead tab too. Agreed about the turret deal, even after our Grizzly turret decreased in size to the Cadillac-Gage model we were still doing open cover loads with both .50 and 1919A4 (C-5). I don't remember seeing them when I was there in Australia in '77 either and we had a few M113s with the double turrets...but they were .30 cal guns, weren't they? The lead tabs were dropped by us when we changed from .30 cal to 7.62. That was about 1970.

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Jim-- I lot of it depends on the manufacturer and the countries' military specifications. I know the US manufactured .30 caliber linked ammunition came with a metal start tab as manufactured. In a tank mounted M37 .30 caliber Browning, the starter tab had it be removed in order to load the weapon as the starter tab would not pass through link chute on the gun. The US manufactured millions of rounds of linked and cloth belted .30 caliber ammunition for the Browning .30 caliber series of MGs. We had so much of the stuff it lasted through the Vietnam war. Until recently the CMP was breaking down Mg belts to reload the ammunition into 8 round enbloc clicks for the M1 rifle. Additionally I know that the German DM6 7.62mm NATO ammunition belts also came with a starter tab.

South Africa wise, the 7,62 Brownings in the armour never stopped working, the MAG similarly. Ben 7,62 as an interim was less successful but still worked until there were sufficient MAGs.

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Originally Posted by Daan Kemp

the 7,62 Brownings in the armour never stopped working,

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I could keep our working but that's not user friendly. When we went to the C6(mag) they were completely user friendly. If you have to be a skilled tech or have special talent, it escapes the rifleman user.