|
Partizan
Cartridges
Partizan
cartridges pre-1941
Partizan
cartridges pre-1941 with 0.50 gram of Sokol powder (or it's
predecessor), id est. 7.7 grains. Nominal muzzle velocity 860 fps.
Subsonic; better for suppressed rifles than supersonic "black
cartridge". Brass or copper-plated steel case with green code color:
1/3 of case length and the bullet were lacquered green, but sometimes
entire length of the case was lacquered green and the bullet was not
color-coded at all. These cartridges were and they are extremely rare
items, met in museums only. Russian swindlers are trying to sell the
common T-30 tracer cartridges as "partizanniy patronniy" to the western
collectors, but it is easy to identify the tracer cartridge: It's
powder charge fills the case. It does not tinkle in the cartridge.
Charge of the partisan cartridge fills about one third of powder space.
Faked "partisan cartridges" may be, however, reloaded with the reduced
charge afterwards.
Partizan
Cartridges Post 1941
Similar to
pre-41 loads but with color code: Green bullet tip (of a length just .2
inch) and primer annulus. These factory-loaded cartridges were
presumably never actually issued to the partisans. Not loaded in
quantity. Ultra-rare items ! Never seen today outside the museums. Once
again: Beware of the fakes & "fakirs" ! (This is an additional
knowledge to "ARCANE" series. Source of information: Philippe
Regenstreif; France. Black cartridges are, however, met in Finland only
!).
Since the Second World War we
have - actually - FORGOTTEN more useful knowledge than is OBTAINED
during the second half of 20th century. Re-inventing of some old
discoveries seems to be easy, but actually it is a toiling, like
gold-washing from the bottom-sand of a chilly stream - for the
life-size equestrian statue of the solid gold. And that Gold of the
Knowledge is not nugget-sized, but like a fine sand, scattered sparsely
on the bottom of that river.
Has this demented author truly forgotten to mention use of the
VIHTAVUORI's powder N 14 for reduced charge rifle loads since 1935 ?
Today the product number of this propellant is N 310, and in the Armed
Forces nomenclature also the " VRT Paukkupanosruuti", id est: "The
blank cartridge powder".
The first lots of N 14 were sold to the cartridge manufacturers. VPT,
or today's LAPUA-PATRIA loaded rifle blank cartridges - although these
were loaded also by the Army units and local Civil Guard units for
their own use. The Arms and Engineering Works of the Civil Guard,
S.A.K.O. Oy loaded primarily the pistol cartridges, charging presumably
the small caliber handgun cartridges with N 14 powder. (SAKO Oy has
abstained from delivery of any information to this author since
mid-1980s. His quotation may so be incorrect, but the possible error is
insignificant).
Many "Cat's Sneeze" handloads were presumably boosted with tiny charges
of the VRT N 14, also known as "PaPP" powder. VRT means Valtion Ruuti
Tehdas = the State-owned Powder Manufacture, built in 1926 to
Vihtavuori, Laukaa, Finland. Abbreviation "PaPP" is warded off, but
used by those social outcasts like this author. "Pap" is a nice and
short word of the special terminology, made known to handloaders
dedicated to an Arcene. (These monosyllable words are unable to trigger
the phone listening recorders of the P.I.G.s of the TaTuPo or KRiPo).
Handloading of the rifle cartridges has always - since those days of
Russian administration in 1809 to 1917 - been a hobby of some peculiar
persons. Outdoor hobbies like hunting or target shooting are accepted
with a narrow margin in Finland, but a handloader is still an
exceptional individualist even in some hunting associations.
There were actually - RISUM TENEATIS, AMICI ? - the constraint for use
of the factory-loaded ammo for moose hunting in the Finnish Game Act,
since 1962 until 1993, and for the whitetail-deer hunting since the
late 1960s, and, finally, for the bear hunting in some years before a
famed Thorough Amendment of the whole Game Legislature in 1993.
"THAT
CONTINUAL MENACE OF POACHING..!"
An interest in the reduced charge rifle loads may still bring the poor
handloader under suspicion: " A would-be POACHER ?!" if not: "A
potential ASSASSIN..??!" Handloading of the SUBSONIC rifle cartridges
is a yet more doubtful bustle. So it was in early and mid-1930s too.
Hazard of the poaching with the rifles of a Civil Guard was "found to
be imminent." All of the Guardsmen were not opulent and haughty
landowners, although the lampooning propaganda (written by Soviet and
Finnish communists or socialists; the REDs) has told since 1906 about
"the club of wealthy estate-owners and other aristocrats".
In the countries suffering from a High Hunting Culture belongs all the
game and all preserves to wealthiest minority of citizens or the
aristocracy. This Hunting Culture was once offered to Finnish hunters
by An Official Education or alternately by compulsions and refusals of
the Game Legislature. Use of a military rifle for hunting was strictly
banned, but after the published hints for production of the "Cat's
Sneeze" loads, the denial lost a sense: There was no more a loud
report, alerting the estate-owner or a game-keeper in the preserves of
the estate.
Nobody knows - especially today, 65 or more years later - whether these
suspicions were justified, or signs of a paranoia, but in the late year
1935 was made a plan to factory-load the cartridges for Civil Guard
with leaden bullets and as small charge as possible, for the target
practice ONLY. These cartridges were directed to keep behind the bolts
and bars in the depots of Civil Guard Districts. They were issued to
Guardsmen just before each practice or competition-shooting session,
and each of those possible surplus cartridges were cathered back to the
depot.
Empty cases were counted also and sent to the factory for reloading
Loose lead alloy 7.62 mm rifle bullets were never more offered for sale
to the handloaders. This dictation is valid STILL, ON THE EVE OF 21st
CENTURY !! Commercial Finnish bullet-casters are also reluctant to
yield bullets for the most popular calibers 7.62 mm and .30". Supply
and assortment of .45 ACP cast bullets is overflowing, although this
caliber is rare here, despite of increasing popularity of Practical
Handgun Shooting. Sales of the bullet moulds is, fortunately enough,
not YET banned..!!
NOT
SO NOVEL IDEA
In the Imperial Russia were loaded low-pressure 7.62 mm cartridges for
the preparatory training of Army recruits just before the First World
War. Lead bullets of them were made by an American patent with so
called "auto-lubrication" or "inside lubing". The round-nosed lead
alloy bullet was 15.2 mm in length (.60") but weighing mere 3.90 grams/
60.2 grains. The deep base cavity was filled with the lubricant wax
mixture.
There were four tiny crosswise apertures through the bullet skirt. When
the powder gasses pressurized that lubricant and melted it, the wax
& tallow mixture oozed out through the apertures, lubricating
the forcing cone and rifle bore more efficiently than any other "tidy"
lubing method. The powder charge was huge, compared with a weight of
the lead bullet: Nominally 0.78 gram/ 12 grains of smokeless "revolver
Piroksilin". The WW I ended production of these cartridges as well as
loading of the revolver cartridges with "inside lubed" bullets in U.S.A.
"Inside lubrication" is somewhat confusing term, meaning usually a lead
alloy bullet with the lube groove(s) hidden inside the cartridge case.
The U.M.C. Co. called their inside lubing revolver bullets as "Self
Lubricating" on the cartridge box labels.
SAKO 110 A (OF LEAD)
Lead alloy bullet 7.62 mm
SAKO 110A (LYIJYÄ) was made with the swaging tools and dies of jacketed
7.65 mm LUGER bullets. The bullet base was convex - not concave - for
facilitation of the mechanical bullet seating. Dimensions of 110A (L)
bullets were similar to the contemporary 7.65 mm Luger bullet because
of the lead alloy used. It was an "eutectic alloy" of lead and
antimony: 90% Pb + 10% Sb. ( "Eutecticum" means the lowest melting
temperature of the metal alloy or "mixture".) The cylindrical bullet
blanks were presumably chopped from the cast lead alloy bar and fed
into a swaging (= cold moulding) die. There were no lubricating or
crimping grooves around the shank of 110A (L).
It was essential to keep the manufacturing costs as low as possible.
Today are even the cheapest .22 Short rimfire lead bullets "cannelured"
by knurling, if not plated with a copper alloy, but the early year 1936
was still an era of the Great Depression. Stinginess was a virtue.!
Because these bullets were swaged in the existing dies of jacketed
handgun bullets, they became too thin for the vast majority of 7.62 mm
Mosin & Nagant rifles issued to Guardsmen. Nominal bullet
diameter was mere 7.83 millimeters or .308". Bullet weight was 6.0
grams or 93 grains; the very best choice for the low-pressure target
practice cartridges.
DIP-LUBRICATION
A designer of bullet 110A
(L), Mr. NIILO TALVENHEIMO of SAKO Oy, was completed bullet drawings in
February 1936. He developed presumably also the method of bullet
lubrication, following the suit to lubing of all the outside-lubricated
bullets since 1857. Cartridges were charged with a powder and bulleted
with "dry" bullets. Then a bundle of them, placed in the holes of a
metal plate, hanging bullets downwards, was dipped into melted beeswax
& bovine tallow mixture to the case mouths. After 30 seconds
the bundle of 48 or 96 cartridges was lifted up above the lube pan, and
when the excessive lubricant was dripped down, the cartridges were
removed from hinging plate and they were moved to a more cool place.
Lubricant was solidified on the bullet points and penetrated into the
case neck, sealing the joint between the shell and bullet. This sealing
was beneficial, as the porous propellant powder may absorb the moisture
from an ambient air, or become too dry in the room temperature.
SHOOTING
EXPERIENCE
This author has shot in 1993
several low-pressure cartridges loaded in the late 1930s. Functioning
of them was perfect, and the accuracy was very satisfactory, despite of
the age of a CHATELLERAULT-made Mosin & Nagant rifle used (full
100 years) with the open iron sights, and already deteriorating
eyesight of the shooter. The charge of these cartridges was 0.6 gram
(9.3 grains) of N 14 powder. (Printed on the label of a cartridge box -
as usual).
Recoil was very mild and the reports were not much more noisy than
those of a .22 LR rifle loaded with CCI Stingers, despite of a
double-charge . Unfortunately we had not a chronograph with us, but
there were more than twenty eye-witnesses to look at that shooting with
some cartridges "which are never existed" according to their loaders.
SUBSTITUTE
OF A .22 RIMFIRE CARTRIDGE
.22 rimfire rifles were
otherwise fine and popular target practice and shooting contest arms
for Civil Guards, but in the mid-1930s they were underestimated class
of weaponry in actual fighting operations; including the
counter-insurrection commissions. All the .22 rimfire cartridges were
imports. In Finland was loading of .22 ammo started after the Second
World War. Imported cartridges were found to be expensive goods in the
country just recovering from the Depression.
Advantages of 7.62 mm "Matalapainepatruuna" were: The price was about
equal to that of .22 LR cartridge - or lower than a price of "GeCo"
Match Grade .22 LR, and possibility to shoot low-pressure cartridges
with a REAL military rifle on the short shooting ranges, in the
vicinity of settled area - or even indoors, in the galleries, during
the winter-time or rainy days.
It was possible to sustain an "acquaintance" with an issued real
military rifle, around the year - also by shooting of the live
cartridges without the loud "BOOM !", a painful "KICK" and all the
down-range hazards of full-power bullets. The first lot of MpP
cartridges was loaded to become substitute of a .22 LR cartridges (but
less noisy) for the target practice to 50 meters range outdoors or 10
to 25 meters ranges indoor.
A
"HOMEOPATIC" CHARGE
The General Staff of Civil
Guard ordered ca. half million rounds of MpP cartridges from SAKO Oy
soon after an approval of the bullet drawing. No more improvements of
swaging die were necessary, but a grinding of the existing swage
plunger to make a convex bullet base. SAKO Oy had not the production
line for rifle cartridge cases before the year 1937. Machinery of
S.A.T. (Suomen Ampumatarve Tehdas) was moved to Lapua after the
liquidation of S.A.T. and before the sales of the industrial area ,
including buildings in Riihimäki, to Civil Guards arms &
ammunition plant SAKO Oy in 30th September 1927. It was, however,
possible to load and reload rifle cartridges into the shells made by
other manufacturers, including those captured during the First Finnish
Independence War in 1918.
Use of the Russian 7.62 mm cartridges with a large primer was banned
since January 1st 1932 by the "A.H.O.I." = Aseen Hoito Ohjesääntö I" =
"Rules on Firearms Care, part I" but this refusal did not referred to
the use of primed or reprimed shells for blank cartridges, "Cat's
sneeze" loads, or "MpP" loads with reduced powder charges. Use of P-17,
L-917 and T-17 headstamped Russian factory-loaded 7.62 mm cartridges
was also found to be risky, as there were "booby-trap loads" among
them. Powder charge in the first lot of MpPs was "homeopatic": 300
milligrams or 0.30 gram / mere 4.6 grains of powder N 14, a.k.a. PaPP.
A levelled .7 CC dipper of VIHTAVUORI N 310 powder is about the correct
charge behind the cast bullet LEE 311-93-1R, which is the best
available substitute of SAKO 110A LYIJYÄ bullet, when cast from the
wheelweight lead alloy. Point shape of this cast bullet is more
expedient than that of original 110A lead bullet.
TOO
THIN FOR THE RUSSIAN RIFLING !
The first lot of
"Matalapainepatruuna" (MpP) cartridges was issued to the Civil Guard
Districts in the spring and early summer 1936. Finnish spring starts
usually in April and the summer in June, but in the Finnish Lapland are
the last skiing competitions usually in the Midsummer Night, 21st June
of each year..! Or most...
After the 1936 outdoors season shootings were the comments of users
collected from each Civil Guard District about the needed improvements
of low-pressure cartridges. Some riflemen were satisfied: Those
Guarsdmen wealthy enough to get a "Swiss grooved" barrel mounted to
their rifles at the own cost for shooting with Western-made match
bullets in the contests.
Majority of the Guardsmen had a Government Issue rifle, an original
Mosin & Nagant m/1891 with a Russian rifling and a long forcing
cone between the bore and cartridge chamber. Nominal bore diameter of
Western and Russian rifles is equal: 7.62 mm or .300" but the rifling
groove of the Russian (or originally Belgian) bore is at least 1½ times
as deep as that of Western bore; designed for the slow muzzle-velocity
paper-jacketed soft lead bullets of WESSON target rifles in 1879.
Caliber .308 is actually 120 years old in the time of writing, and it
was teenager when adopted to .30-40 KRAG & JÖRGENSEN military
rifle. Belgian bore dimensioning was designed ten years later for
shooting of contemporary jacketed military rifle bullets of Argentine
Mauser m/1889, used also in many other South-American countries and
Turkey. Russian bores had many times the groove diameter 7.90 mm
(peace-time maximum size) or 7.92 mm (war-time allowance added) but
some worn-out rifles might have a groove diameter as big as 7.95 mm..!
The "hard-lead" bullet, good in .308" bore, was less suitable for the
bore with .311 - .312 -.313" groove diameter.
FIVE
SHOTS AND BRUSHING
The lead fouling of a bore
was predicted when the MpP cartridges were issued to the Civil Guard
Districts. There was a general instruction to brush the rifle bore with
a brass-bristled brush or "triple-zero steel wool" after each ten
shots. It was not sufficient care for many Russian rifles with
excessively wide and corroded bore. The powder gas blow-by could fill
the grooves with a molten lead alloy, and the bore friction could also
cause the lead fouling on the rifling lands. After just five to six
shots the shooting accuracy was all gone, if the bore was not cleaned
after each fifth shots.
Some old Guardsmen recalled languishing for the old BERDAN cartridges
with paper-patched lead bullets and that 1/4 inch thick wax plug behind
the bullet. Feedback from some Districts was: "Give to us LOOSE
BULLETS, resized primed SHELLS, and canned PaP POWDER!! We shall load
our own cartridges, and WE CAN DO IT CORRECTLY !!!"
The agreement between General Staff of Civil Guards and some wealthy,
arrogant owners of large preserves was, however, made to be ETERNAL.
Those "confounded poaching bullets" were never issued or sold to
handloaders in Finland.
SOMETHING
BORROWED FROM BERDAN CARTRIDGES
The story of SAKO 110A (L)
bullets or MpP cartridges was not yet ended. Just the 7.62 mm Finnish
"silent without silencer" factory loads were found to be unfit for the
Russian rifling. This author do not know, why the producers of MpP
cartridges never tried to use somewhat thicker bullets (dia. 7.95 mm
ahead of the case mouth) with at least one lube groove behind the
thickest "equator" of the bullet point and a short plug of a solid
lubricant in the case neck, behind the bullet base. This is not a
"wisdom after the event" ! All of these suggested improvements were
known in the late 1860s.
One of these old inventions was adopted: The compression bullet
functioning of the BERDAN rifle. Powder charge of 7.62 mm low-pressure
cartridge was DOUBLED to 600 mg or 0.6 gram or 9.6 grains of PaPP N 14
(VV N 310). Chamber pressure was still ca. half from the pressure of
"fighting cartridges" but high enough to set up the bullet SAKO 110A
(L) and expand it to fill the grooves of even the badly worn rifling.
Reach of the accurate shooting was extended to 100 meters or 150
meters, if the rifle barrel had a premium-quality bore - even the
Russian one. Now it was necessary to clean the bore after shooting of
40 to 60 shots, but something was lost: The "silent without silencer"
shooting was over. Next two lots of MpP cartridges were loaded with
either 0.5 gram / 7.7 grains or 0.6 gram charges of VRT N 14 PaPP
powder, depenting on the calorimetric energy of the powder-lot used.
Those powders, sold to cartridge loading factories, may be less uniform
than the "canister powders" for sale to the handloaders. Cartridge
manufactures have chronographs and pressure measuring equipment. They
can adjust the powder charge by increasing or decreasing the charge
weight, to get a desired muzzle velocity within the certain limits of
chamber pressure.
Handloader must rely on the uniformity of a "canister powder" and
published handloading data. Many handloaders have chronoraph but not
the pressure measuring test barrel, or a calorimeter. The VIHTAVUORI N
310 "canister powder" is ABOUT similar to the old N 14 PaPP, but made
still more carefully, to become more uniform, with minimal
lot-after-lot variations of energy and the rate of burning. The "bang"
and "kick" of low-pressure cartridges with doubled charge are not bad,
but the "silence without a silencer" is impossible to achieve if the
bullet velocity is supersonic or transsonic in the ambient air
temperature.
BALLISTICS:
STILL UNKNOWN !
Muzzle velocity of SAKO 110A
(L) bullet is impossible to find from any printed sources. "Classified
information ??" Presumably not.! The firearms chambered for 7.62 x 53 R
cartridges have simply so much varying bore dimensions that the bullet
velocities measured with a standard test barrel are valid just
accidentally. These cartridges were reloaded into many different cases:
Finnish (with VPT and SAT headstamps), captured Russian, British
(KYNOCH) and American shells, along with German cases. On the cartridge
box label was usually printed name of the case producer and a text: "Jo
useammin uudelleenladattu" = "Many times reloaded".
There were also three or four differend kinds of primers used. Only
constants were the shape and weight of the bullets, along with the lead
alloy used, and the powder charges 300 mg, 500 mg or 600 mg. It is
possible to say certainly that the bullet velocity of the very first
lot of MpMs was subsonic, and that of double-charged lots was
supersonic in the all imaginable weather conditions. In the experience
of this author, the "ballistic crack" or bullet flight noise was a
dominant shooting signature.
RIGIDLY
SUPERVISED ISSUE
Each and every Guardsman
possessed at least five full-powered rifle cartridges at home; the
"Rautaisannos" or an "Iron Ration" in the sealed cardboard box with the
name of the possessor written on it's lid. Most of Guardsmen had still
more cartridges, especially those who were interested in the
handloading. Most of handloads were 7.62 mm rifle cartridges, loaded to
the full power with rifle powder issued from stocks of the General
Staff by Districts.
Those low-pressure cartridges were "much more dangerous" despite of
their low energy: They were issued in the shooting range during
"rigidly supervised shooting sessions". Each and every excess cartridge
was collected back to the depot of District. Especially the youngest
Civil Guard Boys were sometimes searched after the shooting sessions
(or sometimes BEFORE them), as it was a suspicion that those yongsters
carry some empty cases to the shooting range and pilfer the MpP
cartridges for "some more sensible purposes" (read: "for hunting").
Number of empty shells of each shooter was counted, but because the
shells of MpP cartridges were not exclusively headstamped or
color-coded, it was easy to say: "Sorry; I have missed some shots" and
show as many empty cases as was the number of cartridges, issued by
shooting supervisor. "PUERI PUERILI SUNT..!"
MISUSED
FOR THE HUNTING ?
In all probability were MpP
cartridges misused for hunting or poaching, as well as the rifles of
Civil Guardsmen - despite of repeated severe reproaching announces from
the General Staff. Starving hungry was more strict commander than the
General Staff, and there was a lot of meat or venison in the backwoods
or fields.
One hilarity-arousing circular letter contained a sermon as follows:
"Once again The General Staff of The Civil Guards is constrained to
point out that All kinds of Hunting with the Low-pressure Cartridges is
strictly banned, because that kind of Mis-use is able to damage the
Glory of Civil Guards !"
A percentage of ca. 1½ million rounds of cartridges, loaded between the
early 1936 and the late 1939, was inevitably carried outside the
shooting ranges "for the some more sensible purposes". Those
one-and-half million MpP cartridges of three lots were presumably not
the last or only products of this kind. The loading records available
to this author simply ends to the October 1939.
Matalapainepatruuna luodilla SAKO 110A (LYIJYÄ) was loaded for the
Civil Guards only and exclusively. None of them were used in wars 1939
- '44. They were left outside the listing of the war-time ammunition
production. So the "grand total" number of these cartridges remains on
the "blank lines" of history until the end of this World...
THE
FINNISH ARMY MPP
Low-pressure cartridges,
caliber 7.62 x 53 R alias 7.62 mm MOSIN-NAGANT were loaded for Finnish
Army by VPT, which was not since the 2nd Finnish Independence War
(a.k.a. The Winter War 1939 - '40) only the LAPUAN PATRUUNATEHDAS but
also the CARTRIDGE PLANT of KANAVUORI, in the hollowed Chicken
Mountain, close to the town Jyväskylä. Because these cartridges are
supersonic in all imaginable weather conditions, and the bullets for
them are impossible to get, the short description is enough for the
readers of "ARCANE". (Both of them).
Bullet is hollow: just an empty jacket of a hollow-point rifle bullet
with a convex base (similar to the base of SPEER "PLINKER" or SAKO 110A
LYIJYÄ bullets). Point is almost closed. It is necessary to drill the
opening of it wider, if someone is trying to fill the bullet cavity
with some liquid with a thin 29 G or even a Micro-Fine 31 Gauge
injection needle. The mercury is possible to pour through 31 G needle.
Bullet weight is mere 3.45 grams/ 53.2 grains. Slightly more than the
weight of bore-sized spherical cast bullet of wheelweight lead alloy.
The charge was usually 800 milligrams/ 12.3 grains of VRT powder N 22,
alias VIHTAVUORI N 320; a porous tubular-kernelled single base
shotshell powder, used by this author for reduced charge handloading
tests since 1980, more than the other brands added together. Shooting
noise of these cartridges is just a little louder than noisiness of the
SAKO MpP with double charge. History and ballistics of this cartridge
are unknown to the author.
"BLACK
CARTRIDGES" AND "BLUE-NECKS"
These were somewhat failed
Soviet-Russian and Finnish 7.62 mm loads for rifles model 91/30 and
Finnish m/-39 with a silencer or suppressor S-40 or Finnish copies of
this apparatus. Finnish cartridge, known as the "S - ½-panospatruuna A
0230 siteissä" was a copy of Russian "Chorniy Patron." (Marked so on
the silencer jacket, below the engraved table for the sight
adjustments: "Do not shoot fighting cartridges ! Use only the black
cartridges !")
Finns copied, unfortunately, also the ballistics of Russian cartridges,
getting the supersonic muzzle velocity. With a silencer the nominal
velocity was ca. 430 meters per second, but without the muzzle can,
when shot from a shorter-barreled rifle m/-39, it could be 460 or even
480 m/s. Finnish nomenclature line means: "A semi-charge cartridge with
a pointed flat-based full-metal-jacketed bullet, officially adopted as
an infantry ammunition with a storage code number 0230, in the stripper
clips". So simple explanation.! ("sit" = "in clips" means on the
cartridge boxes the ammunitions for the bolt action rifles only ).
A 0230 was adopted officially in 20th February 1942. Half a million
rounds of cartridges were loaded before the summer 1942. Finnish
ballisticians were to a certain extent forced to copy ballistics of the
Russian predecessor, as there were many captured Russian suppressors in
hand along with the sight adjustment "tablitsa" engraved on the jacket.
Use of the high-quality bullets D-47 or D-166 was presumably
considered, but not allowed. "Befehl ist Befehl..!" (Germ: "Order is an
order !") There was an illusion that Finnish rangers needed urgently
the silenced rifles for the reconnaissance & ravage excursions
to the objectives behind Russian lines.
"RELOAD ME SUBSONICS
!"
The rangers did
not need the bolt action rifles at all, because captured TOKAREV
selfloader rifles were plentily available in 1942, and a SUOMI m/-31
submachine gun was actually less noisy than a "silenced" rifle with
SUPERsonic cartridges - either Russian or Finnish loads. The
world-famous ranger-chief LAURI A. TÖRNI (later known as LARRY A. THORNE in the U.S., alias STEVE KORNIE in the book
and movie "THE GREEN BERETS") - see also an appendix below - got a
"silenced" Mosin & Nagant m/91-30 for the battlefield test in
early November 1942.
He found soon this rifle more noisy and less accurate than were his
SUOMI subgun or Russian PPSha m/-41. But: "Befehl ist Befehl..!" Lauri
Törni went to the firearms workshop of his unit and commanded: "Reload
to me these cartridges less noisy ! Accuracy does not matter !" The
non-commissioned ordnance officer removed the bullets and charges from
the cartridges, unloaded some 7.65 mm LUGER cartridges, poured the
powder from them to 7.62 mm shells and re-seated the rifle bullets.
The rifle was now at least suppressed, if not silenced. The accuracy
was yet more poor, due to the construction of a Russian
"Sestoryetskogo-40" suppressor: Bullet was shot through two rubber
discs or "wipes". L.A. Törni estimated the maximum effective range to
be ca. 25 meters. In the actual military operation it was - fortunately
enough - less than ten meters.
THE
"BATTLE-FIELD TEST"
Somewhere "over there", far
behind Russian trenches, ambushed L. Törni and his rangers the Russian
truck, carrying soldiers. "POOH !" said the rifle. The bullet hit a
truck driver through the windshield. Truck stopped into the roadside.
Russian soldiers jumped down from the shed platform. They were superior
in numbers and very angry or scared. During the life-and-death struggle
Törni ran out his subsonic rifle cartridges. He broke his rifle on the
head of one assaulting Russian and continued the fighting with a pistol.
Each and every Russian became K.I.A. Some Finnish rangers were wounded
but able to carry out their commission and return to Finnish trenches.
Lauri Törni dumped remnants of his suppressed rifle into the swamp. The
rifle was broken to three pieces. It was listed as: "Destructed In
Action". This was the ONLY documented occurrence when some Finnish
ranger patrolman used a silenced rifle for the actual battle.
The ½-charged cartridges were shot with unsilenced rifles, usually to
the hunting of forest birds for the pot. "Blue-neck/ blue-ass"
cartridges are today extremely rare collector-items but those Russian
"Black rounds" are still more rare curiosities. This author do not
possess any of them, but just a powder-dipper made from an unused
blackened cartridge shell. It bears a headstamp: "KAYNOK-17" with
Cyrillic letters. (= KYNOCH 1917).
The Finnish ½-PPs were color coded with a 13 mm wide blue lacquer band
around the case neck, partially reaching on the bullet point and the
cartridge head lacquered entirely blue. This code color was also a
sealing of bullet and primer. N 14 powder - like all the porous powders
- is hygrascopic: It has a tendency to absorb the humidity from ambient
air, or became too dry in the warm place. Germans called their own
sealed cartridges as "Tropenpatronen" = "Tropical cartridges".
NOT
INTENTED FOR SILENCED RIFLES ?
Soviet-Russian rifle
suppressor or "GLUSHITEL S-40" was designed after the "Infamous War"
against Finland in 1939 - 40. (Finns call this same war as "105
Glorious Days" or "The Winter War"). First Russian suppressors were
captured in the late fall 1941 by Finns and in the early (20 days TOO
EARLY) winter by Germans. According to faint recalls of Winter War
veterans there were captured some "very old patinated Russian
cartridges with a deteriorated powder. Some foolhardy Finnish boys shot
some rounds of them. They
developed a very weak shot. Cases had early year stamps on their heads,
1916 or '17. We dumped those verdigrised cartridges to the hole of an
ice.."
So called "booby-trap cartridges" were loaded during the First World
War in Russia by the workers of ammunition plants. Some socialists were
infiltrated in 1917 to the manufactures of LUGANSKIY, TULSKIY and
PETROGRADSKIY PATRONNIY ZAVOD, especially to the rooms where the
machine gun belts were filled. They placed one explosive cartridge to
the each belt. Those cartridges were charged with a blasting cap Nr. 8
and dynamite. The plan was to wreck as many MAXIM guns of Imperial
Russian Army, as possible. Finns had a reason to be suspicious, if some
extraordinary ammunition were captured.
Soviet-Russian literature, in hand, is taciturn about the special 7.62
mm cartridges. Knowledge on them may be still classified ? Guessworks
of the author may be misdirected, but some knowledge is better than the
total ignorance. What says my friend, Mr. HARD-CORE HANDLOADER ?
< "NEVER more a history ! I needs nothing but a handloading data
!!" JESS; this author knows your wishes, but these cartridges were
SUPERsonic and this article try to teach how to handload SUBsonic rifle
cartridges.
The Russian cartridges with chemically blackened cartridges were
probably loaded for the elementary training of the "tyro riflemen" -
just like the Finnish Civil Guards MpP cartridges, or the Army
cartridges with hollow bullets and 800 milligrams charge of the shotgun
powder.
The "Operation Barbarossa" or German invasion to Soviet-Russia in June
22nd 1941 came as a lightning from the blue sky (although ADOLF HITLER
was written about a conquest war to East in his  book "MEIN KAMPF" already in 1925. No other
Allied leader but JOSIF V. STALIN was actually read this foreshadowing
book: "MY STRUGGLE"). Russians had a "Glushitel S-40" suppressor
designed and ready for the production, but SUITABLE SUBSONIC CARTRIDGES
WERE NOT YET !? Russians were constrained to use those inconvenient
"Black cartridges" in their suppressed rifles in the absence of
anything better, and when the suitable cartridges were evolved, the
suppressors were found to be unnecessary at all...
But why the Russians brought the elementary training cartridges to
Finland... to the country of proficient riflemen ? Russians didn't know
the truth about Finland. They knew just that what the herds of Finnish
communists were ready to tell: "Finland is a dictatorial country like
Germany, Italy or Spain. The majority of working-class youth is put in
the concentration camps. Just the sons of wealthy estate-owners and
aristocrates are taught to use of firearms in Civil Guard or Army. A
vast majority of Finnish people shall welcome the Red Army with sings
and flowers, as the liberators of the working class..!"
Russians had truly the illusion that these boys of Finnish working
class may become a supplement of Red Army, when released from the
concentration camps and trained to become the soldiers. The black
cartridges were intented for the preparatory training of the Finnish
Red Guard recruits. But the truth was ruthless: These working men's
sons were already trained warriors and in the Finnish trenches. The
sings came from the muzzles of their firearms and the flowers thrown on
the tanks of "liberators" became known as "MOLOTOV's COCTAIL."
RECYCLED CASES AND UNDERSIZED BULLETS
Finns used recycled "many
times reloaded" shells for SAKO MpP cartridges and at least once-shot
VPT cases for the Army low-pressure cartridges. The headstamp of
hollow-bulleted cartridges were four concentric arched lines like
parenthesis () covering the original headstamp, which could be "VPT
39...44" on the cartridges loaded in 1958. Russian black cartridges
were also reloaded. But why into the British or American "Anglishkiy
Zakaz" cases ? The metallurgical explanation is simple and plausible:
The chemicals used for blackening of the shells were more
quickly-acting, and they made a more lasting black color on the Western
brass (72% Cu + 28% Zn) than on the Russian brass (67% Cu + 33% Zn),
used also in Germany since the last years of WW I as "K 67" alloy.
Still one Arcane: A recipe of the Brass Blackening Mixture:
Mix in the enamelled, stone-ware or stainless steel kettle:
2 parts by weight COPPER SULPHATE (Copper vitriol)
2 p.b.w. SODIUM THIOSULPHATE
1 p.b.w. WINE STONE (Cream of tartar; Potassium bi-tartrate)
40 p.b.w. SWEET WATER (preferably distilled).
Heat the mixture boiling. Add the cases. Cook them until the color is
glossy black through the colors: rose-red > blue > bluish
black. Cases must be carefully degreased before blackening: No
"master's fingerprints" are allowed ! Chemicals used are not the strong
poisons, but the mixture is not suitable for seasoning of the
celebration punch: It may cause a condition called as the
"hyper-emesis", when used internally: "per os" !
Russian cartridges were loaded with bullets "Lyohkaya Pulya obr.
1908/10 goda" or pointed flat-based (actually hollow-based) balls of
year's 1908 pattern with a shallow broad crimp-groove, weighing 9.6
grams or 148.1 grains Avoirdupois. (Nominal or allowed maximum weight
was 9.65 grams or 148.9 grains, but the actual wt. was usually minimum
allowed). Jacket was of plated mild steel.
Maximum diameter of these projectiles measured by the author is 7.80 mm
or .307". They are undersized even for the Western .308" bores !! An
absurd choice for the cartridges of the rifles, equipped with silencer
like SYESTORYECHKIY-40, with two 25 mm (later 15 mm) thick solid rubber
"shoot through" discs a.k.a. the wipes.
FACTORY-LOADED
PARTIZAN CARTRIDGES
According to the most fresh
source of information (arrived at this author in 16th April 1999), the
copy of a French magazine "L'AMATEUR D'ARMES", told about
factory-loaded SUBSONIC cartridges for the rifles with a suppressor.
All the knowledge this far has been that all of these rifle cartrdges
were handloads with pistol bullets. The table engraved on jackets of
S-40 suppressors and their Finnish copies was calculated for the
Russian or Finnish 9.6 grams L or S bullets with a muzzle velocity ca.
450 meters per second or 1476 fps.
According to PHILIPPE REGENSTREIF those factory-loaded "munition pour
armes à silencieux dite PARTISAN" were loaded like previous black
cartridges but with 0.50 gram charges of the nitrocellulose powder, to
get a muzzle velocity "subsonique 262 m/sec." Seems to be correct !
This author has advised handloaders of subsonic 7.62 mm M & N
cartridges "Try first ½ gram of VIHTAVUORI's N 310 or N 320 and a
bullet with weight ca. 150 grains." No handloader has complained of
"misinformation". Color code of pre-1941 subsonic cartridges was: The
bullet and a third of case neck, along with the case head, were
lacquered green. Post-1941 loads had just 5 millimeters length of
bullet point (tip ?) and the primer (annulus ?) lacquered green. There
was a possibility of mix-up, because the Russian tracer cartridges were
also coded with a green bullet tips since 1930.
According to Philippe Regenstreif there are a lot of fake "Partizan
cartridges" for sale to the collectors in Russia. This author is unable
to say, whether the factory loads were ever fell into the hands of real
partizans. If the pre-1941 loads actually existed more than half a year
before the German "Operation Barbarossa", they were test-samples of
cartridge designers: Presumably not for sale to the casual tourist as
"a rare collector item". The warning re fakes is well-founded. Notre
merci, Philippe !
The Partizan Movement was actually established in Soviet-Russia during
the Spanish Civil War 1936 - '39 but it was abolished by the order of
Supreme Police Chief LAVRENTIY BERIYA after the notorious
non-aggression pact between Germany and Russia in 23rd August 1939. All
the stocks of firearms, munitions, explosives, provisions and wireless
means of communication, hidden on the forests and swamps along the
foretold German attack routes, were exhausted just before the
"Operation Barbarossa" of Germans.
THE
REPEATED ERROR
The Finns took "L" bullet as
a pattern: Finnish bullet S-30, weighing 9.6 grams, was presumably
slightly more fit for the groove diameter 7.90 of the Russian rifling
than was the Russian L-1908 bullet, but the sight re-adjustment table
engraved on the suppressor jacket was ridiculous ! Maximum range was
300 meters ! The actual maximum shooting distance with a suppressor
might be some 50 meters.
The only known Finnish user of a suppressed rifle with S-40, L. A.
Törni, estimated it to be ca. 25 meters, but in his "battle-field test"
it was less than 10 meters. The charge of N 14 powder was about ten
Avoirdupois grains or 0.65 gram. With the bullet VPT D-166 (weight 13.0
grams/200.6 grains) is this load O.K. = certainly subsonic. There was
DEFINITIVELY some information-link break between highly competent
ballisticians (like EINO MUUKKONEN of VPT) and those authoritative
Finnish Army General Staff officers, who were ordered VPT to repeat the
error of Russians, adoptment of a supersonic load for a silenced rifles
despite of the well-known existence of those many subsonic alternatives.
SUCCESS IN GERMANY
The suppressor S-40 dates
from Germany and WW I era. The German "copy" of this Russian
"invention" was so actually not a copy. The greatest Russian
inventions, like a spark-telegraph and wireless telephone of POPOV, the
helicopter of SIKORSKY and an "Ikonoscope" television camera of
ZVORYKIN were invented by the Imperial Era Russians or Russian exiles
in the West. The most successful swindler of the history , an
Academician LYSENKO, was an "Archetype of HOMO SOVIETICUS"...
(Mentioned as an other extreme).
Germans could use the supp ressors
similar to S-40 even for the sniping, because the MAUSER m/-98 k rifles
had very uniform bore dimensions and the bullet diameters closely
matching with them. A German manufacture FINOWER INDUSTRIE G.m.b.H.
loaded the famed "NAHPATRONEN" (= Close Range Cartridges) for the
suppressed 8 mm Mauser rifles since the early 1943.
Finower GmbH was known as the loader of Match-Grade 8 mm cartridges and
many other special loads. The Nahpatronen were loaded into steel cases,
lacquered bright grass-green from the head to the mouth. Bullet was
lead-cored, with a copper-plated iron jacket, shape "sS" or a pointed
boat-tail, weight 12.75 grams (nominally) or 196.7 grains Avdps.
 The powder
charge was 0.55 gram of Nz. Pl. P. RP. 1.5 x 1.5 x 0.75. (Finnish
readers: Please, do not tell this "Arcane" to personnel of VIHTAVUORI
Oy..! They may stop the production of the N 320 powder just as they
ended the yielding of those lovely primers Nr. 28, when some gunwriter
told about the misuse of them as "the Poor Man's Pressure Gauges" in
the early 1980s). The average muzzle velocity of Finower Nahpatronen
bullets was the even 300 meters per second - presumably from a
test-barrel without a silencer. Bullet velocity with a suppressor was
subsonic in all the weather conditions, with some exceptions: The
Antarctic or Siberian winter.
Once again "pillerit Saksan oli parhaita" (= " German pills were the
very best drugs") as a remedy of the "Socialismus Incurabilis"
malady..! The headstamp of Finower is "cg".
A
RUSSIAN IMPROVISATION
The Russian best known
"Partizanskiy Patronniy" ("partizan cartridges"; so called by Germans)
were a confused assortment of 7.62 mm Mosin & Nagant ammo.
Soviet-Russian arms & munition literature (in hand or reach of
author) do not know existing of them. German research institutes, DEVA
in Altenbeken and institute of Ulm, were sometimes examined some
captured "partizan cartridges" with the short round-nosed bullets; all
of them handloaded: There were new bullets in old cases or vice versa.
Sometimes the bullets were removed from handgun cartridges with a pair
of pliers. Sometimes the rifle cartridges were taken apart with
similarly brutal methods for the re-charging and seating of less heavy
bullet.
Partizan handloads had some common features: Short round-point HANDGUN
bullets, reduced charges of fast-burning (handgun or shotgun) powder
and the green code-color on the cases. Sometimes the case was lacquered
or painted (SIC !) entirely green, imitating German practice. Some
other cartridges had just the head colored green.
The author is writing the word "partizan" by Russian way, as the
"partisan" means an "active party member". Most of Russian partizans
were, of course, communists or the members of a communist youth
association KOMSOMOL. There were, however, much more peoples willing to
join the partizans. The jews, threatened with "A Holocaust" or "The
Decisive Solution of a Jew Problem", were the most eager ethnic
minority.
The occupation was foud to be the threat and not a liberation: Germans
started their oppression too early, and they directed it to most of the
Soviet citizens. They lost soon many potential friends like a majority
of Ukrainians (= congenital enemies of Russians and the Socialism) who
formated soon their own partizan units. In the summer 1941 they were
welcomed Germans as the liberators, as the Imperial Germany was
assisted them to establish an independent Ukraine during and after the
First World War, but the honeymoon was over very soon.
BACKWOODS CARTRIDGE
MANUFACTURES
"Who loaded these
partizan cartridges ?" asks Mr. Hard-Core Handloader.
>Some individuals like you !! Handloading was not an uncommon
hobby in the Soviet-Russia. (A surprising statement ?) Hunting was a
popular pastime even during the regime of J.V. STALIN. No rifled
firearms were allowed to the possession of a common people, but
reloading of the shotgun shells - usually into the "everlasting" brass
cases - was a familiar bustling to the many Russians and Ukrainians,
living under the German occupation. If somebody is able to handload the
shotshells into brass cases with a smokeless powder (this author
isn't), he/she is a prominent handloader of the rifle cartridges too...
The powders used were well-known; usually the revolver Piroksilin or
"SOKOL" shotgun powder (or it's predecessor).
Cartridges were loaded usually in the remote "backwoods manufactures".
Germans were rulers in the streets and fields. Primeval forests were
horrible regions to the army of occupation. To the partizans the forest
was a friend, a home, and a shelter - "the Partizan Country". Many
urban would-be partizans, especially jews (accustomed to the sweet life
in some metropolis) could never learn to "live like some sweaty
lumberjack or a sooty charcoal-pit burner." The Darwinian natural
selection removed those snobs very soon from the gangs of partizans.
Some scientists were, however, very profitable friends of the
resistance movement. Unlike those Communist Party officials, they
learned soon to live in the primitive conditions. Presumably just they
designed and loaded the partizan cartridges. Those men and women are
still unknown - unlike the celebrated ammunition designers, YELISAROV,
SYEMIN and some other "Heros/Heroines of the Socialistic Work" who made
their mark in the cosy laboratories - by copying some foreign
inventions.
BUT WHO
PAID FOR THE BULLETS ?
Presumably the most usual
bullet of 7.62 mm partizan cartridges was a Russian 7.62 mm TOKAREV
ball, sometimes new, but many times pulled from a handgun or submachine
gun cartridge 7.62 x 25 mm Tokarev or MAUSER. Bullet diameter was 7.83
mm (.308") and weight 5.5 grams/ ca. 85 grains. Jacket was usually of
mild steel, plated with cupro-nickel (silvery) or copper; sometimes the
copper alloy "Tombak" or Gilding metal (red brass). 7.63 mm Mauser
bullets were usually pulled from the old cartridges. Mauser C-96
pistols were common warfare tools during the Russian Civil War 1918 -
ca. '23 and the war-surplus cartridges were not difficult to find from
Ukraine or domiciles of the Cossacks.
Some partizan cartridges were bulleted with the brand-new or "mint"
7.65 mm LUGER bullets. They were not captured from Germans, as this
caliber was not officially adopted for the use of Wehrmacht or SS.
Analysis of the jacket metal ("melkhyor" or cupro-nickel) told to the
Germans about British and American origin of these projectiles. The
"Internazionale Judentum" was paid for these bullets, embarked to Red
Russia by the convoys to Murmansk and Archangelsk, and forwarded by the
air lift to partizans of the Russian regions occupied by Germans. The
author is unable to think of more logical explanation ! If some reader
has a better knowledge, he/she may feel free to tell..!!
The plot, how to evade U.S.A. legislature against the export of war
material to the foreign belligerents, is known as "Lend & Lease
System"; presumably an idea of U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, HENRY
MORGENTHAU. President FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT was already (in the late
1941) no more responsible for his actions but fully tractable by his
Main Counsellor.
THE
CLEVER INNOVATIONS
The Russian
partizan cartridges were loaded with the charges of "hot" powders,
reduced enough to give subsonic muzzle velocity for 7.62/7.63 mm
bullets and the Western 7.65 Luger bullet, weighing six grams. The
exact Avoirdupois weights of British bullets was 92 grains and the
American bullets weighed 93 grains. This trifling difference guided the
Germans to analyze the jacket metals and find out the manufacturers of
these projectiles captured from K.I.A. or arrested partizans (which
were "hung by the neck until death"; sooner - or female ones - later).
The powder charges gave muzzle velocities ca. 250 to 270 meters per
second from the old Mosin & Nagant rifles with a barrel length
800 millimeters. Suppressors were unnecessary. The noise of a shot was
mild, like a snap of a dry sprig broken under the boot sole. Many or
most of the partizan handloads had some kind of over-powder wad to set
the pinch of powder close to the case bottom, reach of a priming flash.
This wadding was sometimes just a piece of a pulp paper from the
"PRAVDA" newspaper, crumpled and rammed on the powder charge. Cotton
was also a popular wad material. Sometimes it was carded to a fluffy
swab, filling whole free space in the case but cotton wadding might
also be impregnated chemically to become self-consuming like the German
tinder, presumably for use in the suppressed rifles. Chemicals used
were potassium or lead nitrate, or similar oxidizers. Some most
miserable fabrications had a reduced charge of usual rifle powder (ca.
one gram/ 15½ grains) topped with a rammed cotton wad, impregnated with
the moistened black powder.
RISUM
TENEATIS, AMICI ?
Germans factory-loaded
similar cartridges without a wadding at all, using the one gram charge
of usual square-flake rifle powder. These products of MÄRKISCHES
WALTZWERK had also an inherently inaccurate S.m.E. bullet with a mild
steel core. All the German "Nahpatronen" were not of Finower quality,
despite of similar color code: Entirely green case. The case headstamp
of MWW is "eej".
Some Russian loaders were bound the powder charge close to the case
bottom with a "crust" of nitrocellulose lacquer; a dissolved powder.
They were presumably sprayed a solvent like acetone or ether-alcohol
into the charged cartridges with a perfume sprayer. (Just a short puff:
Excessively moistened charge could took several weeks to become dry
enough for the seating of a bullet. Solvent could also deteriorate the
primer pellet). The clever scientists or inventors were in very truth
more useful persons in the partizan camps than the "politruks" or
"commissars" of The Party.
7.62-MM
"HUNTING CARTRIDGES"
Russian "Ohothichye
Patronniy" were factory-loaded ammo of a late Second World War, also a
species of 7.62 mm Mosin & Nagant cartridges still more or less
unknown in the West. At least two variations of these "Hunting
Cartridges" were actually issued to the professional hunters, employees
of the Soviet State, privileged to possess the rifled firearms. Before
The Great Patriotic War those rifles were 6 mm or 7 mm muzzleloaders
(SIC !). Production of .22 rimfire rifles and cartridges was started in
the Soviet-Russia sometimes in late 1950s 7.62-mm "Ohotnichye"
cartridges were packed in the boxes of 20 rounds with the labels like
those of "commercial" cartridges. They were, however, never exported
outside the Communist Block countries - even to the "pink" Finland.
War-time "hunting cartridges" were developed presumably ... (hand of
this author is always somewhat hesitant to write those DAMNED words
"presumably" or "probably", but there is simply not yet a reliable
information available from "The Country of a Red Dimness," although the
Socialism fell there in 1991) ... along with the evolution of a Mosin
& Nagant carbine model 1944. The folding bayonet of this
carbine was a "more useful piece of the equipment" than a suppressor
with a nice & easy mounting possibility on the muzzle. It took
about three seconds to mount or dismount a suppressor S-40 of a rifle
model -91/-30; usually fitting also to an original Mosin &
Nagant 1891. This option was lost. But the valiant fighters of the Red
Army: "ended always their assaults with a hand-to-hand combat with
their spike bayonets," according to the Soviet War Doctrine - written
in 18th century...!
THE
POCKET PISTOL BALLISTICS
Due to the short barrel
length of M/44 carbine and a "silent without suppressor" demand of
cartridges, the designers of "Ohotnichye Patronniy" were constrained to
adopt some major improvements of bullet shape and the other ways to get
as uniform chamber pressure as possible. Bullet of the original
"Hunting Cartridge" was dimensioned ultimately to be bore-sealing; 0.20
millimeters thicker than a "LYOHKAYA PULYA obr. 1908 goda" or the L
bullet. That diameter 8.0 mm went around the equator of a hemispherical
bullet point at ca. 2 millimeters ahead of the case mouth. The bullet
was actually "heeled" like a .22 rimfire bullet, but the diameter of
it's cylindrical rear end wasn't much less than the maximum point
diameter. It was 7.88 to 7.92 millimeters, but somewhat less just
behind the case mouth.
Bullets were crimped by the "Yelizarov's method" like projectiles of so
called ShKAS cartridges, loaded for the 7.62 mm aircraft machine guns
with a cyclic rate of 1800 to 2000 rounds per minute from a single
barrel. The bullet weight was, according to Czechian VLADISLAV BADALIK,
4.7 or 4.8 grams and the weight of a powder charge was 1/10 from the
projectile weight; id est 0.47 gram of smokeless "SOKOL" shotgun
powder. The nominal muzzle velocity from a carbine barrel was 290
meters per second (the ballistics similar to 7.65 x 17 mm Browning or
.32 A.C.P.) but from the more long barrel of Mosin & Nagant
-91/-30 ca. 270 m/s and from the still more long model 1891 barrel 250
to 270 m/s.
JACKETED
AND PLATED ?
The original jacket material
may remain a mystery until the end of this world. Most of the cartridge
researchers NEVER remember the direction: KEEP ALWAYS THE LITTLE MAGNET
IN YOUR POCKET ! An example given on the experience of this author: The
shotshell head "ferrulé" is called as the "brass" and it looks like
brass, but on the modern shotshells it is actually of iron or mild
steel, plated with brass - or zinc-plated and "yellow passivated" with
a hot bichromate brine. These coatings are able to delude the eye, but
not the magnet. The "nickel jacketed" bullets are also usually (but not
always) just iron jacketed projectiles, plated with nickel or
cupro-nickel. The eye is also unable to find that mild steel or iron
below the plating of copper or Gilding Metal, but the magnet clings
easily on the jacket.
The alternatives of jacket/plating of war-time "Ohotnichye" bullets
are: Solid mild steel; electroplated. Solid brass. Lead alloy; plated.
Mild steel-jacketed; plated. Lead alloy; copper/Gilding Metal-jacketed.
Brass-jacketed. Solid iron; plated & passivated to look like
the brass. Which one ? Nobody knows - or is inclined to tell !!
TRIVIALS ABOUT THE JACKETS AND PLATINGS
The original bullets were
intented for the use in war. They were full-metal jacketed, if not of a
solid metal other than the un-plated lead. Post-WW II Russian hunting
cartridges had the half-jacketed bullets with a lead core, according to
P. Regenstreif. Jacket material was brass (if not the mild steel,
brass-plated or zinc-plated & passivated..? The magnet-test was
once again neglected.?)
The Swedish NORMA cartridge plant produced in the mid-1980s full-metal
jacketed 9.3 mm bullets with the mild-steel zinc-plated &
passivated jackets. They were very fine projectiles for the subsonic
9.3 x 74 R handloads designed by this author. Germans made also use of
the zinc-plated mild steel jacketed bullets for 7.9 x 57 mm JS
cartridges with a success during WW II but the cadmium electroplating
is a best process, if the very most consistent muzzle velocities are
needed for the jacketed projectiles or plated lead bullets with the
reduced charges. Cadmium-plating is, however, somewhat problematic
process due to the environmental activists, until those zealots are
eliminated physically until the total extinction - all simultaneously
in all countries.
SOMETHING
OLD; SOMETHING NEW...
An interesting new method is
a tumbler coating with the powdered Molybdenium Bisulphide; a
well-known admixture of the grease lubricants or a dry lubricant
itself. MoS 2 lubrication of the Gilding metal jacketed bullets may
allow the use of over-sized projectiles in the suppressed firearms
without the enhanced bore fouling, and so rise the chamber pressure
even when the very small powder charges are used along with the light
bullets.
The Russian Hunting Cartridges bullets are very exemplary, being
HEELED. The oversized portion of the bullet point MUST be at the front
of cartridge case mouth, because it is impossible to squeeze (say) 8.23
mm bullet into the .308 case neck, chamber this cartridge, to shoot it
and to survive or even escape without physical injury and a wrecked
rifle.
THE
WISDOM OF TINY CHARGES
("REPETITIO EST MATER STUDIORUM !")
Not only the handloading
economy but also the POWDER GAS VOLUME, AS SMALL AS PRACTICABLE, was an
aim of the Finnish, Russian and German designers of the cartridges for
suppressor-equipped military rifles. Those "Gartridges, Guards" were,
of course, loaded still earlier in many countries before the existing
of the first practicable suppressors. Amongst the many American .30-03
and .30-06 Guards cartridges was a very interesting combination of
LAFLIN & RAND's "dust BULLSEYE" pistol powder and a "New
Springfield" bullet, weighing 150 grains. (It was truly new in 1907).
Powder charge was 8½ grains/ 0.55 gram, developing the nominal muzzle
velocity 1200 feet per second, i.e. 366 meters per second.
Supersonic, of course, but after the short flight it was subsonic. The
inventor of first mass-produced "silencers", HIRAM PERCY MAXIM, used
these and still more reduced loads for test-shootings with suppressed
rifle model 1903. The dust-Bullseye powder was a punching waste of
disc-kernelled "INFALLIBLE SHOTGUN POWDER" production. Kernels of
Bullseye were very small in size and triangle or ace of
diamonds-shaped. These round-flake powders are made like cookies by
rolling or extruding the gelatinized powder "dough" to a thin sheet.
The tiny powder discs are then cut from this sheet just like the
cookies or ginger breads. Discs may be perforated or cup-shaped.
A century ago it was possible to get this waste material free or at
nominal price from the HERCULES DYNAMITE And POWDER PLANT, if some
daring reloader of revolver cartridges was diligent enough to sweep the
floor behind the powder screening machines and shovel the punching
waste into his bag. In 1898 the firm LAFLIN & RAND bought most
of this waste and canned it for sale all'round the U.S.A.
"Those were THE days, my friends..!!"
There were not yet too many
handloaders, daring enough to use smokeless powders for the handgun
cartridges. They called this punching waste of an "Infallible" as a
"Bullseye powder", because the very mild loads of it were able to throw
the bullets in the bullseye of a target. To the Finnish readers:
"Bullseye" on suomeksi "napakymppi" tai ainakin osuma
pistooli-koulutaulun mustaan disipliini-ammunnoissa.
In 1904 the popularity of a dust-Bullseye was increased so much that
the punch-waste could no more meet the demand. Hercules re-named the
"Infallible" powder as "Bullseye". The good old dust-Bullseye was soon
never more available, because that punch-waste was re-gelatinized and
rolled once again to sheets for punching of the new disc-Bullseye.
Revolver cartridge handloaders were angry, because the needed charges
of a new disc-kernelled powder were ca. 25% heavier than those of
original "dust powder", which was easy to ignite and burned away
entirely before the bullet of an usual revolver target-load was jumped
from the cylinder to the barrel. A price reduction of disc-Bullseye was
enough to calm the hard feelings down: Not many handloaders declined to
the use of a sooty black powder or the mixtures like "KING's
SEMI-SMOKELESS".
The Bullseye powder is a kind of BALLISTITE, or a double-base powder
with a high percentage of nitroglycerol. It developes a moderate volume
of powder gasses, but a very high contemporary burning temperature,
which is able to expand that gas volume according to the Law of
AVOGADRO or the more accurate Equation of van der WAALS. The
double-base powders are good for the cartridges of those firearms with
a suppressor able to COOL the powder gasses efficiently.
The another kind of powders fit for handloading of the subsonic rifle
cartridges are the porous nitrocellulose powders or single-base powders
for handguns or shotshells. Many of them are burning by the
"MENDELEYEV's Principle", having less than the needed percentage of
oxygen to burn the carbon of cellulose for developing of carbon dioxide
(CO 2) but just enough for production of carbon monoxide (CO) and
un-burned hydrogen.
The carbon dioxide is a thick and heavy gas. Carbon monoxide and
especially the hydrogen are more light and expansive or "elastic"
gasses. They are able to occupy the same volume than the gasses of
burned double-base powders even when heated to the considerably lower
chamber and bore temperature. The most famed military rifle cartridges
with reduced charges were loaded with the single-base powders: The very
best German Finower Nahpatronen. The Finnish MpP and ½-PP cartridges.
The Russian Black Cartridges, Partizan loads (including the possible
factory-loads) and 7.62-mm Hunting Cartridges with at least three kinds
of bullets.
This badly demented author forgot, of course, to mention that third
variation with a spherical lead alloy bullet; 8.0 mm in diameter.
Author has shot more than a hundred 8.0 mm soft-lead sphericals from a
.308 Win. rifle, achieving a very satisfactory accuracy to a hundred
meters..! His eye was still keen, hands were steady and a LEUPOLD
scope-sight with 24 x magnification might also assist...).
Why the Europeans preferred those nitrocellulose powders like PaPP,
Sokol, revolver Pyroxyline or Nz.Pl.P.P.Rp. Sorte 33 ? > We have
a scourge, a season known as a WINTER. During that winter we may have a
FROST in the Northern Europe. In the January 1999 there were 51.5
degrees Centigrade of cold in Finnish Lapland. The double-base powders
may produce very nasty surprises in the cold climate, especially when
the charge is "marginal."
|
