Cases and Enfields and lube - Oh my!

[slamfire1]

As I have stated before, grease and oilers were designed out of small arms. However the historical record shows that there were successful semiauto and full automatic mechanisms that required oil or grease to function.

The Pedersen Rifle

Pg 208; “Cerasine wax is the lubricant used on Filmkote and Keenkot .22 Long Rifle bullets. Being one of the most inert if not the most inert wax there is, it does not have much tendency to pick up grit. These bullets are lubricated by a process patented by Mr. Pedersen, the designer of the .276 Pedersen automatic rifle that was under test by the Ordnance Department a few years ago. In general the process consists of dissolving the proper amount of cerasine wax in heated carbon tetrachloride and with the solution held at the exact temperature necessary, the bullets are dipped. The time they remain in the solution is very important for if removed too quickly the coating of wax will ot only be too heavy but it will chip off easily. It is quite a trick to do even with the proper temperature control and entirely impracticable without special facilities. When the bullets are removed the tetrachloride volatilizes out leaving a thin and almost imperceptible film of wax on the bullet.

The Pedersen automatic rifle operated on the delayed blow-back principle and did not function too well with dry cartridge cases, especially if the cases were hard and did not stretch much, as the setback of the case was necessary to good functioning. As a dry case normally grips the chamber walls, Mr. Pedersen developed this method for lubricating the entire cartridge with cerasine. The thin coating left by his process was not noticeable, did not pick up dirt readily and the chamber heat caused the wax to melt, affording perfect lubrication and certain functioning. The use of this wax in such a thin coating on Cal. .22 bullets offers a good example of its excellent lubrication properties.

Handloader’s Manual, Major Earl Naramore, Small Arms Technical Publishing, 1937

UK World War II Naval 20 mm Polsten cannon.

“The moment of cap strike is critical for advanced primer ignition systems. If it occurs too early the case may be burst; if it occurs too late both the weapon and the case may be damaged. This is less of a problem when low powered ammunition is used but special design features have to be included in weapons firing high velocity rounds. Some of these precautions are best illustrated by the UK World War II Naval 20 mm Polsten cannon…. Firstly, the ammunition was lubricated with grease so the round could move freely in the chamber even when pressure was high. Secondly, the base of the cartridge case and the front of the breech block were made small enough to fit inside the hooded chamber. The round was thus fully supported for far longer than in a system using a conventional chamber and the addition time for safe movement of the case helped to reduce the weight of the breech block to about 18 kg. It would have weighted over 200 kg if the weapon had operated on the simple blow-back system……

Brassey’s “Small Arms and Cannons”, Smith and Haslam.

Japanese M92 Heavy Machine Gun used an oiler. So did the Type 11 and M96 Light machine guns.

Of course oilers and grease went out the door after WWII and the wide spread adoption of gas lubrication. I found this discussion of the origins of gas lubrication on this site:

Gunwriters' Questions and Answers, Part 13.

Example given: Subsequent manager of FIAT company, Giovanni Agnelli, designed a machine gun with a simple construction and a "too much too early" improvement: Fluted chamber (or powder gas lubrication of chambered cartridge), already BEFORE the First World War and several years before introduction of Villar Perosa. Chambers of many Italian machine guns with delayed blowback actions were lubricated with oil for prevention of case breaks. (Idea of lubed chamber was invention of German Andreas Wilhelm Schwarzlose, who designed a first practical machine gun with delayed blowback action in about 1900. Cartridges of earlier Austrian Karl Salvator & Dormus "Skoda" machine gun were also dipped in oil before they were dropped into a gravitation-feed charger of the gun, which was not yet a practical weapon).

APPENDIX: Adoptment of the fluted chamber until 1960's.

Pre-1914: Giovanni Agnelli, Italy. S.I.A. machine gun.

Ca. 1930: Boris G. Shpitalniy & Komarichky, Soviet-Russia.
ShKAS rapid-firing aircraft machine gun.

Ca. 1939: Fyodor V. Tokarev, Soviet-Russia. Self-loading rifle SVT 40. (Just the case-neck space of chamber is fluted).

1944 -45: Illenberger, Jungermann, Staehle & Vorgrimler, Germany. Last assault rifle prototypes Mauser "Geraet 06 H" (without a gas-piston action) and assault rifle "StG 45 (M)".

Ca. 1948: Ludwig Vorgrimler, Spain. (Formerly in France since 1945 until ca. 1947). CETME assault rifle
Ca. 1950: Ludwig Vorgrimler, France. AAT 52 machine gun. (Delayed blowback action was a pre-WW II design of Hungarian Pál Kiraly. Also adopted to FAMAS assault rifle).

Ca. 1956: Schweizerische Industrie Gesellschaft/ Neuhausen, Switzerland. S.I.G. - SG 57 assault rifle.

Ca. 1958: Heckler & Koch GmbH, West-Germany. Modification of CETME rifle (G3). Since 1959 until today: Many pistols, rifles, machine guns, submachine guns and machine cannon..

The Germans even float 9mm cases because they don't want breech friction. Breech friction is bad in any semiautomatic mechanism because all semiautomatic mechanisms fail with excessive breech friction.




As to the pronouncement of the Explosives Safety Group, I find them no more credible than the pronouncements of the Saudi Arabian Court which sentenced Lebanese television psychic Ali Sibat to death for witchcraft. SAUDI ARABIA: Kingdom steps up hunt for 'witches' and 'black magicians' | Babylon Beyond | Los Angeles Times

They are both acting on myth and legend.