Cut-away Browning 50 cal?

[fjruple]

We couldn't get our Canadian 7.62mm .30 Browninf to ruin successfully and neither could Canadian WO G C who was in the UK on other duties. He came over to help us get it sorted. Nope......... We just reverted to the more expensive option and used the .30's for a demo.

Peter-- I had the opportunity to speak to the designer of the US Navy MK21 Mod 0, The gentleman was in his late 80's and had been retired for 30 years from the US Naval Ordnance. During the Vietnam the US Navy experienced a shortage of 7.62mm NATO MGs as all of the M60s were going to the Army and Marines for ground combat. This left the other Naval forces with nothing but a shortage. But the navy still a large supply of .30 M1919A4s on hand from WWII and Korea. The US navy was looking for quick fix to supply a MG that fed 7.62mm NATO ammunition with the M13 metallic link. The US Navy evaluated the Canadian C1 7.62mm NATO Browning and found the gun to be "unsafe" since the redesign of the Browning permitted the last round to remain in the barrel if the gun was cleared by using the charging handle. This last round had to be physically removed with a screwdriver by pushing on the cartridge located in the T-slot of the breech bolt. The US Navy designed used the 7.62mm NATO with M13 links but the ammunition belt had to be inverted with the top of the links down to function in the gun. The US Navy rebuilt about 200 guns to the MK21 Mod 0 spec and most were deploy the US Naval Riverine forces in Vietnam. These guns were also found to be unsatisfactory as the ammunition belt had to be removed the cans and placed back in the can in a reverse fashion. The MK21 Mod 0 dies a quick death. Most were transfer to South Vietnam navy and those that remained in storage at Crane Naval Ordnance Depot were destroyed. They were declared obsolete when the M60s became more available. I am not aware any of these guns surviving. The Australian MoD may still have two MK21 Mod0's which they used for evaluation. The C1/C5A1 lasted into the 1990's while the MK21 Mod0 was out the US system by 1972.

Cheers

--fjruple