15 April 2010

Tools of War: The M240 machine gun




The M240 is a belt-fed, gas-operated medium machine gun. It is the replacement for the M60 machine gun as the US military's general purpose machine gun. The M240 is highly regarded by its users as being an extremely reliable and effective weapon. It has a quick-change barrel, which also automatically sets headspace and timing. It is also fairly easy to clean for a machine gun.

There are several different versions of the M240. The infantry version, seen above, is the M240B. The M240C is the right-hand feed version, for use on the Bradley (a design flaw of the Bradley, IMHO, as there is no commonality with other M240's on the battlefield). The M240D and M240H are designed to be mounted on aircraft.

Common Characteristics
  • Gas operated
  • Fixed head-space and timing
  • 26,000 mean round between failure (MRBF)
  • Maximum range 3725 meters
  • Tracer burnout 900 meters
  • Cyclic rate of fire:
    Single port: 550 - 650 RMP
    3 Port - operator adjustable 750 - 950 RPM
  • Muzzle velocity 2800 ft/sec
  • SLAP ammunition capable

And here's today's moment-of-cyclic-zen....



By: Steve

3 comments:

Thug 5 said...

A sweet machine gun, but nothing in comparison to the badassery of the ol' M60. . .

truthseekerz said...

M60 was Highly regarded as garbage~

Anonymous said...

a m60 is hardly junk, carried one my whole carrier. many freinds and myself owe our lives to the hog.