Back to Blog
Automaton gun7/14/2023 ![]() Standard open sights with tangent rear were installed on the barrel. A special bayonet was attached to the front of the steel heat-shield below the barrel. The curved box magazine held 25 rounds in two rows, and was detachable. The stock is made from wood, with semi-pistol grip and additional vertical foregrip in the front of the magazine. ![]() Trigger unit uses apivoting hammer to fire, and separate manual safety and fire selector levers are installed within the trigger guard. The barrel is fluted to save the weight and improve cooling. ![]() Those plates are allowed to tilt slightly down and up, locking and unlocking the bolt with special lugs. The bolt locking is achieved by two locking plates, located at either side of the breech. Machine gun version of the Fedorov Avtomatįedorov's "Avtomat" is short recoil operated, locked breech weapon which fires from closed bolt. ![]() Despite these flaws, it was a formidable and historically important weapon, and, ironically, its ballistic properties are very close to modern idea of "ideal" assault rifle and its ammunition. Its recoil-operated action was sensitive to fouling early production guns suffered from non-interchangeability of parts, including magazines disassembly and especially re-assembly was somewhat complicated. We shall note that Fedorov's Avtomat was not without flaws. Therefore BAR soon evolved into light machine gun, while Avtomat set the pattern for the whole new class of infantry weapons, which rose to its heights during late stages of WWII and especially afterwards. 30-06 ammunition used in BAR and 6,5x50SR used in Avtomat) and exactly twice as heavy compared to Fedorov's rifle. Initially BAR was intended to be used as assault rifle, with individual soldiers firing itfrom the shoulder or hip during assaults on enemy trenches however, Browning's rifle was almost twice as powerful (comparing muzzle energy of US. At the time of its peak usage (1918-1924) there was only one practical automatic rifle made in the world which fell into same tactical class was the Browning's BAR. Today this term is most often used for weapons, generally known as "assault rifles", and therefore Fedorov's "Avtomat" can be considered as one of the world's first practical assault rifles. Up until now "avtomat" is unofficial Russian term for automatic weapon. At the time, this term was used to designate any shoulder-fired automatic weapon, be that rifle or submachine gun. This name was apparently devised by Russian small arms expert Blagonravov during mid or late twenties. One important note must be made about the name of Fedorov rifle, which isuniversally known as "Avtomat" (automatic). The last conflict that saw action of Fedorov rifles was Winter war with Finland in 1940, when some Fedorov rifles were withdrawnfrom storage and issued to elite units of Red Army. Fedorov automatic rifles served with Russian and later with Red (soviet) Army through WWI, Civil war and until late twenties, when it was decided to retire all rifles and machine guns that used non-standard (other than 7,62x54R) ammunition, and Fedorov rifles wereput into reserve storage. It is interesting that at the time of initial orders Russian Army considered Fedorov automatic rifles as substitute light machine guns although in actual use Fedorov rifles were used as individual armament for infantry soldiers,exactly in the tactical niche of modern assault rifles. Inearly 1918 orders for Fedorov rifle were limited to 9 000 guns, but as result of turmoil of the revolution and following Civil war only 3 200 Fedorov rifles were manufactured in the city of Kovrov betveen 19, when production was finally stopped. In 1916 Weapons Committee of Russian Army decided that it is necessary to order at least 25 000 of Fedorov automatic rifles. This new ammunition was more compact that Russian 7,62x54R, better suited for automatic weapons (because of rimless cartridge) and has In 1912 the Rifle Commission of Russian Army decided to order 150 more Fedorov rifles for further trials, and in 1913 Fedorov submitted a prototype automatic rifle, chambered for his own experimental rimless cartridge of 6,5mm caliber. First Fedorov rifles entered trials in 1911. In this job Fedorov was supported by his apprentice V.Degtyarov (who latter became one of most important Soviet small arms designers of pre- WW2 generation). His first rifle was chambered for standard Russian 7,62x54R ammunition, held 5 rounds in fixed magazine and fired only semi-automatically. Fedorov of the Russian Imperial Army (later - a general of Soviet Army) started development of the self-loading rifle in 1906. Created in the Russian Empire in 1912, the Fedorov Avtomat was produced from 1916 to 1924, however, stored rifles were used in the World War II when the Soviet/ Russian Army was attacked by German forces.Ĭaptain V. The Fedorov Avtomat was the first assault rifle of the world.
0 Comments
Read More
Leave a Reply. |