Somehow it so happened that here on VO there were no articles of mine about small arms for a long time. But this does not mean at all that work on this topic is not going on. It goes, but slowly, because I don't want to repeat myself, and finding new sources is not at all so easy. For example, there was an article about the Swedish machine gun "Knorr-Bremse" on the "Military Review". But it was in 2012 and it turned out to be very small in volume. Meanwhile, information from foreign sources allows us to consider this interesting sample of weapons in more detail. Yes, let's just say - the simplicity and elegance of our "tar" and the English "bren", the murderous rate of fire of the MG-42, this machine gun is not enough, but … it was also a weapon. After all, someone thought about it, calculated it, in their own way tried to ensure simplicity, reliability and manufacturability of production. Well, his story is quite unusual and interesting … Sometimes their performance characteristics are much more interesting, and looks more like a tangled detective story!
Swedish machine gun "Knorr-Bremse" m40 in the Army Museum in Stockholm.
According to Swedish weapons historians, the creators of this machine gun were two unknown engineers named Hans Lauf and Wendelin Pshikalla (not Prskala) in Germany, where the first prototype was manufactured by Knorr-Bremse AG, which was a large industrial company specializing in the production air brakes for trucks and rail vehicles.
The German army adopted this machine gun under the name MG 35/36, but it was released in small numbers. It is also unknown how he got to Sweden, but there he began to be produced by the Swedish Automatic Weapons (SAV) company, which was headed by Major Torsten Lindfors. Apart from the name of the company, nothing was known about her, even where her office and factories were located.
German sources say that the weapon was developed by Thorstein Lindfors in Sweden and that the patent was later acquired by Knorr-Bremse, which produced weapons for the German army.
The Swedes themselves consider the m40 machine gun a rather unfortunate model, which in the Swedish army was known under the funny name "Galloping iron bed", it threw it so much when firing. The Swedish National Guard was equipped with this weapon during the Second World War, but was quickly replaced by the Carl Gustaf Gun Factory m21 Kohl Browning machine gun.
Carl-Gustav machine gun m21 (Army Museum in Stockholm)
At first glance, the m40 machine gun is nothing more than a modification of the MG 35/36, or vice versa. But upon closer examination, it turns out that the differences between these types are so great that they should be considered as two completely different samples.
Above MG 35/36. Below is m40. The Germans have a double trigger, a longitudinally corrugated barrel and a carrying handle on the barrel. The Swedish model has a smooth barrel, a single-position trigger and a carrying handle on the gas pipe. The gas outlet mechanism, which consisted of two tubes, is interestingly made. (Museum of weapons of the firm "Carl Gustav").
It is clear from existing patent documents that the predecessor of the m40 was developed by Hans (or Hans, more in Swedish) Lauf. The patent was registered in Sweden with priority date November 22, 1933. The weapon was named LH 33.
Hans Lauf himself was the director of Magdeburg Werkzeugmaschinenfabrik AG, which was founded in 1892. He was a skilled technician who received a patent for an improved lathe in 1909. In 1923 he bought the bankrupt company Schweizerische Werkzeugmaschinenfabrik Oerlikon in Zurich. Then he sent his assistant Emil Georg Burle to Oerlikon to take over the management of this enterprise. Burle in 1914-1919 served in the cavalry and was subsequently employed by the Magdeburg company Werkzeugmaschinenfabrik AG.
Hans Lauf in 1924 managed to conclude a secret agreement with the German Reichswehr Arms Inspectorate that the German army would financially and financially support Lauf's projects abroad, since the Treaty of Versailles prohibited the development of any new types of weapons in Germany.
In the meantime, Magdeburg Werkzeugmaschienenfabrik AG bought Maschinenbau Seebach in 1924, which was declared bankrupt, after which the company was integrated into the Werkzeugmaschinenfabrik Oerlikon, headed by Emil Burle. Swiss documents show that since 1924 Hans Lauf was engaged in the development and production of weapons for the Werkzeugmaschinenfabrik Oerlikon and, most likely, it was at this enterprise that the prototype of the machine gun, designated LH 30, was developed. Work on it was carried out for about a year - from 1929 to 1930. …
On December 29, 1930, George Thomas, Chief of Staff of the Reichswehr Arms Inspectorate, wrote a note stating that Hans Lauf had fulfilled his obligations to develop weapons. George Thomas became a general in 1940, but, being an opponent of Nazism, he was arrested in 1944 and placed in a concentration camp. He was liberated in 1945 by the US Army, but died the following year due to poor health.
Meanwhile, Emil Burle in 1929 gradually acquired part of the shares in the Werkzeugmaschinenfabrik Oerlikon company, and from 1936 he was its sole owner and president until his death in 1958. Arms production gradually concentrated around the production of 20mm anti-aircraft guns, which were sold in large quantities around the world.
But they did not forget about the machine guns either. The next machine gun model, designated LH 33, was patented in many countries based on the Swedish priority date of November 22, 1933. Most of the patents were registered in Stockholm, but there were also patents in Canada and the United States.
In 1933, Hans Lauf came into contact with patent engineer Ivar Steck at the Stockholm Patent Office. It seems that Lauf's cooperation with Burele ended after he became the head of the Oerlikon company, or that Lauf wanted to mislead the authorities because of the ban on the development of German weapons, and therefore decided to obtain patents in Sweden. Aircraft designer Hugo Junkers also worked in Sweden …
The LH 33 was handcrafted and designed for the Swedish 6.5x55mm rounds. According to the Swedish Army Ammunition Unit (KATD), no tests have been carried out with the LH33 in Sweden. The Swedish army was at this time equipped with light machine guns of the m21 type (Kg m21) of the Colt Browning type. In 1918, 7,571 machine guns were in service, including 500 units produced in 1918 under license from Colt Firearms Incorporated in Hartford, Connecticut, USA. Then the m21 received a replaceable barrel and was put into service under the designation m37.
Page from the m40 machine gun service manual.
But then in the spring of 1935 an important event happened: German Chancellor Adolf Hitler unilaterally canceled the Versailles Treaty, and now the development of new types of weapons and their production could no longer be hidden. Hans Lauf immediately became director of Knorr-Bremse AG in Berlin-Lichtenberg and bought the patent model LH35 in 1935. The following year, he presented the German army with an improved model of the LH36, which was put into service under the designation MG 35/36. Its caliber was traditional for Germany - 7, 92 mm, but the military rejected the new machine gun almost immediately in favor of the much more advanced MG 34. The main reason was that the MG 35/36 had a lower rate of fire, only about 480 shots. / min. But the production of MG 34 was also insufficient to cover the needs of the army for weapons, since from 1935 to 1939 it increased from 10 to 103 divisions. For this reason, Waffen Fabrik Steyr in 1939 signed a contract for the production of 500 copies of the MG 35/36. Further improvements were made in the same year and patented by Wendelin Pshikalla, who was one of the designers at Knorr Bremse AG. Over time, MG34 machine guns, and then MG42, appeared in a sufficient number and the MG 35/36 was considered obsolete. But when the war broke out in Europe on September 1, 1939, the Swedish industry faced a serious problem. There were only two weapons manufacturers in Sweden at the time, namely GF in-state in Eskilstuna and Husqvarna Weapon Factory AB (HVA). Meanwhile, the German invasion of Denmark and Norway followed, and even in the winter of 1939-1940. Sweden has sold or provided large quantities of weapons to Finland. Now it turns out that more than 100,000 Swedish soldiers have practically nothing to arm!
Thorstein Lindfors saw all these difficulties and managed to interest the Swedish Ministry of Defense with a new version of the LH 33 type machine gun under the designation LH40. The order was 8000 machine guns, while the production of 400 m37 machine guns per month was clearly not enough for its quick implementation. On October 1, 1940, only 1726 of them were made and another 4984 were ordered, but it was unrealistic to fulfill this order. Meanwhile, the LH40 machine gun was cheaper and more convenient for production. It could be produced in addition to the current production at the Carl Gustaf Gun plant, which had high-performance rifled barrels up to 1,300 pieces per month. It took 36 operations to make the barrel, which took only about two hours. This made it possible to make barrels both for themselves and for a possible new weapons manufacturer.
As a result, a group of industrialists on June 21, 1940 organized the company AB Emge (Reg No. 39 440), which was supposed to be engaged in the production of new weapons. One of these people was Torstein Lindfors. The authorized capital of the company was 200,000 Swedish kronor. AB Emge is equivalent to the letters MG, i.e. Machine Gun. Erik Hjalmar Lindström was appointed executive director, but it was Major Thorstein Lindfors who was in charge of marketing. On June 29, 1940, AB Emge received a contract for 2,500 m40 machine guns for delivery from January to May 1941 in the amount of 500 pieces per month. The contract price was 1,002, 24 SEK for the machine gun, of which CG GF received 54 SEK for the barrel and sights. On 23 September 1940 AB Emge was renamed to Industri AB Svenska Automatvapen (SAV). Field trials were carried out in the Harjedalens infantry regiment, and they began on January 28, 1941. But it soon became clear that the machine gun has many technical problems, although it showed better results in shooting accuracy than the m37. On June 16, 1941, new comparative tests were carried out with the m37 and m40, this time in the southern parts of Sweden. The test results showed that the m40 is not yet suitable for mass production. However, on August 21, 1941, it was reported that mass production of 2500 m40s had begun, and that final delivery would be completed in December 1941. Then it turned out that SAV is not a real manufacturer, but buys parts from different suppliers, and only assembles itself. It was not even known where exactly its assembly shops are located!
The competitor to the m40 is the Carl-Gustav m21-m37 machine gun (Kulsprutegevar KG m21-m37). (Army Museum in Stockholm)
On January 1, 1942, it was reported that 2,111 machine guns were produced out of the 2,625 ordered. This was part of the already 1940 ordered 2500 guns. The price has now dropped to 772, 20 CZK apiece, as the investment in the production line has already been paid for. On June 4, 1942, another contract was signed for 2,300 machine guns, which were to be delivered during September 1942 - June 1943 at 250 pieces per month. At the same time, it was decided that the already delivered 2,625 machine guns should be returned to the SAV plant for alteration of cartridges with iron casings instead of brass ones. This work was completed in December 1942. The delivery of a new series of 2,300 units was somewhat delayed, but completed in September 1943. A total of 4,926 units of this type of weapon were delivered, including for reasons unknown, in addition to the treaty agreement. In 1944, training began for Danish and Norwegian troops, which in Sweden were called police units. They received the m40, but the Danes were so unhappy with their weapons that they demanded to be exchanged for the m37. The Norwegians showed great tolerance and the m40, under the designation MG40, was adopted, after which it was purchased in the amount of 480 copies. The total production volume amounted to 5406 pcs.
There is also unverified information that 500 examples of MG 35/36 1939 were manufactured by Steyr for the Waffen-SS. In 1939, the Waffen-SS was still a small organization and the German army was unwilling to supply it with standard MG34 machine guns. These machine guns were produced according to the German standard 7.92x57 mm, while all Swedish machine guns had 6.5x55 mm cartridges.
As for the "technology", it should be noted that the m40 could only shoot with automatic fire and did not have an interpreter for firing single shots. However, it was possible to make single shots, as on the M / 45 submachine gun, by briefly pulling the trigger. The carry handle and bipod were attached to the cylinder of the gas piston above the barrel! In principle, this is a good solution for automatics with a gas vent mechanism, because the closer the barrel is to the trigger, the more accurately such a weapon shoots.
The model based on the LH 33 had a double trigger (for single and automatic fire), similar to that adopted on the MG34, but then it was abandoned for the sake of simplicity. The M / 40 used box magazines for 20 or 25 rounds like the m21 and m37 (BAR), inserted from the left side. And, apparently, the experience of their use led to the fact that they were used on several of the last German assault rifles, in particular, "Fallschirmjaergewhr 42".
It should be noted that the experimental sample LH33 was light and simple, but not reliable enough machine gun. The air-cooled barrel was made permanent, but with a gas regulator. Shooting was carried out from an open bolt. The barrel was locked by tilting the rear of the bolt down. Cartridge: 6, 5 mm M / 94. Bullet speed: 745 m / sec. Rate of fire 480 rounds / min. Barrel length: 685 mm. Overall length: 1257 mm. Weight: 8, 5 kg. Sight notch: 200-1200 m.
