In the year of 1930
British
army decided to organize a large comparative trials for a new light machine gun, which included weapons of both domestic and foreign origins. Those included: American Browning Automatic Rifle in .303 caliber,
French Darne LMG in same caliber, British Vickers-Berthier LMG,
Swiss KE-7 and
Danish Madsen LMG. The last entrant, which also was the only one chambered in non-standard caliber (7,92x57 Mauser rather than .303 British) was the Czechoslovak ZB-26 LMG. The ZB-26 was brought to attention of Small Arms Committee during the last minutes before trials by the British Military Attaché in
Czechoslovakia. First round of trials resulted in ZB-26 coming the first, and Vickers-Berthier second. As the Darne LMG came to late for these trials, it was included into the second stage of trials, which included Vickers-Berthier and an improved Czechoslovak ZGB-30 LMG in .303 British caliber. Final conclusion of the testingcommission was that “ZB gun is of such outstanding design, workmanship and materials as to warrant further serious consideration”. During 1932, the test ZB gun was brought back to Brno for further modifications, which eventually resulted in ZGB 32 light machine gun.According to British requirements, this weapon had a 30-round magazine(earlier prototypes had 20-round magazines) and receiver which could recoil against a special buffer – a feature that significantly decreased felt recoil of the gun. The ZGB 32 was tested, and this resulted in more requirements from the British side, including lower rate of fire and slightly abbreviated barrel. The modified ZGB 33 LMGwere tested in January 1934 with great success, and final trials between ZGB 34 (next improved model) and a heavy-barreled Vickers-Berthier were held in August 1934. The net result of this 50000-round endurance test was the recommendation of ZGB 34 for adoption by British army. The licensing arrangements with Československa Zbrojevka Brno permitted the manufacture of a new gun, designated as BREN (for Brno and Enfield), at Royal Small Arms factory in EnfieldLock. Production preparations were commenced late in 1934, and by early1935 all manufacturing documentation was converted from metric to inch scales. First Bren Mark 1 light machine gun left the Enfield factory in September 1937.
PM
Originally Posted by Luis Bren
