Really interesting... some remnants of these experiments turned up at the Stratford, CT show in the early 1980s, including two receivers without logo, just a large X scratched in the heel. Asking price was $10K. I passed because there was almost no chance of ever completing them into a rifle.
I once had a Garand that had been built into a "sorta" BM59 clone. I can't remember who made the receiver, but it had a .308 18 inch "Tanker Garand" barrel and furniture (with a screw on brake) and took M14 magazines. The stock was essentially a modified M1 stock with a relief cut (as the M14) to "rock" the magazine in. I have no idea why I sold it, but I wish I hadn't.
Gained some firsthand insight into the rate of fire of a Garand with the disconnector inop. A pal picked one up with what turned out to be a loose trigger group (stock had been over sanded). First pull of the trigger produced a mag dump with ping most rapido-speedo. Luckily, he managed to maintain control of the rifle. Impressive, it was.
Gained some firsthand insight into the rate of fire of a Garand with the disconnector inop.
Be about 750 RPM I should think. I've seen a piece of footage from WW2 that had two separate shots of GIs firing M1s on auto. Unmistakable...showed a bit of muzzle rise as well...
There was a gas trap M1 rifle serial number 7114 that was secretly sent to England in May 1939 for examination and
conversion to a full auto machine rifle. British code name was Y.S.L. (Yankee Self loader). Billy Pyle's book "The Gas
Trap Garand" shows all the photos plus the British drawings of the full auto parts used for the conversion to full auto.
This rifle is in the MoD Pattern Room collection
He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose
There are no great men, only great challenges that ordinary men are forced by circumstances to meet.
It was a seminal source on Gas Trap research back in the early 1980s... I examined it at the invitation of Herb Woodend, the guy in charge back then shortly after they moved the collection from London to Nottingham. We were on the way to visit our daughter in Johannesburg and could not fly direct because of the boycott. Took the Concorde, what a hoot... on the way home we arrived in NY 30 minutes before we left London