Evening star., 1943-09-04
Merit Of New Carbine
Proved by Tests in
SiciIian Campaign
BY HOWARD w. BLAKESLEE
Associated Press Science Edltnr

carbine, deadly, light in weight
equal to the famed Garand rife in
speed of fire.
The gun met its major test in
the Sicilian campaign and It's story
was released yesterday.
The carbine weighs little more
than half as much as the Garand,
Is only three feet long, and each
of its Is shots is fired with only a
pull of the trigger 1t can be fired
with one hand, like a pistol, If nee
essary.
But it is not designed to replace
the Garand: it is new weapon for
paratroopers, rangers and other
shock troops and for the so per cent
OF American soldiers-engineer
signal corpsmen, officers, and the
hke-who previously did not carry
rifles.
The new bullet is 80 caliber
slightly less than one third of an
inch in diameter. Bullet and cart
ridge were specified by the Ord
nance Department, and the gun was
built around this cartridge, as Is
always the case in gun making.
Faster Than Jap Rifle.
The job of making the cartridge
was given to the Winchester Re-
peating Arms Co here, a division of
the Western Cartridge Co. The
specifications were an effective
range of 300 yards, muzzle velocity
of about 1000 feet per second. This
is not as fast as standard 80 cali
Der Government ammunition, but
is about 500 feet faster than the
ammunition used in the japanese
Arisaka rife
Next the Army asked gun in
ventors to tackle the problem of a
weapon to shoot the cartridge, and
six leading designers participated.
The Winchester company was not
at first among them. but when sam
pie guns were submitted in June.
1912. Winchester made some Sug-
gestions and the Ordnance Depart
ment then asked Winchester also to
work on model The company
made model gun in 13 days, be-
ginning August l. One of the parts
for this gun was borrowed from a
peacetime sporting rife
On August 13 the carbine fred
It's first clip. Ordnance Depart
ment experts and Gen. Courtney
Hodges, chief of infantry, liked it.
He asked for finished model for
competitive tests on September IS.
That allowed exactly one month
for the job. Winchester gun makers
began working around the clock.
Thousands of precision operations
were involved to produce the 63
parts
On Friday night, September H2.
three DAYS to the good, a single gun
was completed. But it failed to fire
satisfactorily. On Saturday morn
ing, word came that the competi-
ton had been advanced one dav.
That left them "a hours to discover
and remedy the defect. This took
much of Saturday.
The engineers decided that the
trouble was in tiny opening. sixty
thousandths of an inch in diameter.
located in the barrel, about inches
from the chamber of the gun. 1t
draws off little of the gas gen.
Grated by the propellant smokeless
powder which fires the gun. The
tiny stream of withdrawn gas elects
the used cartridge and automatic
ally reloads the gun.
The hole had to be enlarged. As
this was being done, the drill broke
Of inside the hole Not until 10
O'Clock Saturday night, with the
deadllne next day down at Aber-
deen, Md, was the bit removed and
the hole completed with new drill.
The enlargement was thirteen
thousandths of an inch.
On the testing range here. the
revised gun fired 300 shots as fast
as cartridge clips could be fed to
the breech. At that time the clips
were 20 cartridges each.
Chosen at Aberdeen.
At Aberdeen, in competition with
six other guns, the carbine was the
unanimous choice of the Army
Board of Judges. A few changes
were ordered. such as reducing the
magazine from 20 to IS cartridge
capacity, and the gun went almost
Immediately into production.
1t had been designed and pro-
duced in a month and a half, as
against 20 years taken to develop
the Garand. Winchester officials,
however, give Garand the credit.
because the Garand made the great
est transition in the history of small!
arms. The Garand proved the sue
cess of the semiautomatic principle,
firing with only the pull of trigger.
A soldier armed with the new
earbine can carry more than twice
as much ammunition as a soldier
using either Garand or a SPRING
field. This is because the cartridges
weigh only about half as much.
Garand comparative figures are
not available. But, compared with
Springfield and allowing for the
nehter weight of the carbine, a
soldier carrying the latter, and
toting no greater weight than
Springfield and ammunition COM
bined, can carry 400 cartridges. as
against l60 for the Springfield.
The carbine is said to be one of
the best night-fghting weapons, be-
cause 1t has minimum muzzle
Hash. A soldier can dismont and
reassemble it within two minutes.
His only tools are the rim of the
mead OF carbine cartridge, serving
as makeshift screw driver. and
small rod which is one of the car
bine's parts.
CI0 nnnind orvontior