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Originally Posted by AntEater
Maybe the M240 is different, but the Bundeswehr and many others still use the MG3, which is basically an MG42 adapted to NATO caliber.
I handled it myself during basic training (navy has to do the "green stuff" as well), but was glad not to be assigned machine gunner of my squad, as the thing weighs three times as much as a G3.
I'm not a weapons expert, but interested in weapons history (if I would live in the US I'd collect historical military arms), the simplicity of the thing fascinated me.
Somehow you could tell that this was a weapon that was designed by soldiers in wartime for war, not for some defense bidding process.
Shooting the MG3 was an experience, was more precise than I thought, even with me aiming it, and the ammo was certainly gone very quickly.
Even if the MG3 has a "NATO brake" (Bundeswehr urband legend) reducing rate of fire.
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The M240G medium machine gun is an adaption of the earlier M60 machine gun,, which is directly patterned off of the MG42. The M240 was intended to be a lighter replacement for that weapon, using plastic furnishings and thinner steel, but the functionality is essentially the same. Still, both weapons share much in common with the MG42.
I only got to fire a G3 once, but I must say, if the weapon has any faults it is that it is a bit
too fast and a bit
too accurate. A proper machine-gun burst needs to spread out a bit , imo, to achieve the effect of a long-range shotgun blast. It does no good to hit a single target with 8 rounds when 1 will do the trick.
In American weapons, the lower rate of fire helps achieve this aim because the recoil forces you off-target a litte bit. With the G3, I practically had to wiggle the barrel to spread the rounds out. I exaggerate, all I had to do was loosen my tight grip on the weapon,something which comes from years of training with "bumpier" weapons. Overall, an excellent medium automatic rifle, though.