Breda Mod.30 (6.5 mm)
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Contents
Description
The 6.5 mm Breda Mod.30 is an Italian-designed light machine gun that saw action in World War II and was widely used by the Italian military. The weapon was widely used by Italian forces in the early stages of World War II, particularly in the North African campaign, where it was used both as a light machine gun and an anti-aircraft weapon.
Vehicles equipped with this weapon
General info
The Breda Mod.30 was designed in 1930 by the Breda company and is chambered for the 6.5x52 mm cartridge. It features a distinctive cooling shroud around the barrel and a top-mounted box magazine that holds up to 20 rounds of ammunition. It has a cyclic rate of fire of around 500 rounds per minute, and the standard barrel length is 23 inches. The weapon is air-cooled and can be fired from a bipod or a tripod mount.
Available ammunition
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Comparison with analogues
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Usage in battles
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Pros and cons
Pros:
- High rate of fire
- Short reload time
- Easy to aim and very accurate
Cons:
- Short ammo belt
- Abysmal damage against armoured targets, often failing to damage them at all
History
Italian light machine gun development by the Breda Company began shortly after World War I. The Breda Mod. 5C was developed in 1924 as a replacement for an earlier medium machine gun the SIA Mod. 1918. The design was adapted to serve as a light machine gun in the Breda 5G the first such weapon in the service of the Regio Escertio (Royal Italian Army). Breda would continue to develop however and eventually, they created the Breda 30 which was adopted in 1930[1].
Often called a light machine gun, the Regio Escertio designated it an automatic rifle reflecting its low rate of fire compared to contemporary light machine guns[2]. First seeing action during the 1935 Second Italo-Ethiopian War, the Breda Mod.30 was the most produced infantry support weapon for the Regio Escertio during World War II. Italy issued the weapon with around 24 for each battalion. The guns notably saw action in North Africa and the Balkans during the war[3]. The weapon is a truly unusual design for either type of weapon, particularly with the action and loading procedure. The action was a recoil-operated design where a central nut was used as the load-bearing component instead of the receiver. The nut holds the bold and barrel which all recoil backward when the gun first fires before the nut hits an "H" shaped block and unlocks the components allowing the bolt to travel backward under recoil. The guns were fed by a 20-round box magazine, but like the magazines of contemporary bolt-action rifles, they were fixed to the gun and only detachable for cleaning. The guns were instead reloaded by swiveling the magazine out and loading a 20-round charger clip, and then locking the magazine back in place[2].
The Breda Mod.30 is infamous for its unreliable design with the defects being most obvious in the deserts of North Africa. The first problem being was that the 6.5mm cartridge was underpowered. The magazine design also led to significant problems lowering the practical rate of fire of the gun to be on par with a semi-automatic weapon, and the magazine was open-sided. This feature was intended to allow the ammunition handler to see how much ammunition was left in the magazine but invited into the action[2]. This problem was made even worse as the fixed magazine meant that the entire gun was useless if it got damaged. The action used in addition to being complex required the rounds to be oiled through an internal oilier to prevent them from getting ripped apart. The oiled rounds made the problem of dirt fouling the action even worse[3]. The gun had other ways where the operation could wrong including riding the bolt home (holding onto the charging handle during forward travel) would cause the bolt to not hit with enough force to lock the action into battery, and the dust cover had to be manually opened before firing, and the barrels are known to rattle[2]. The weapon was also heavy weighing 22 pounds but lacked a carrying handle[3].
Despite all of its faults, The Breda Mod.30 was widely used by the Regio Escertio during World War II simply because it was what the Italians had to fill the light machine gun role[1]. The Italians even mounted it on their motorcycles even though it precluded having a dedicated loader. After the September 1943 Armistice, a significant number of weapons fell into German hands. They designated the guns the MG 009(i).
Media
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See also
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- reference to the article about the variant of the cannon/machine gun;
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External links
References
| Naval machine guns | |
|---|---|
| USA | |
| 7.62 mm | M73 |
| 12.7 mm | AN-M2 |
| Germany | |
| 7.62 mm | MG-3 |
| 7.92 mm | MG08 pattern 1908 · MG15 · MG34 |
| 13.2 mm | Hotchkiss |
| 15 mm | MG M38(t) |
| USSR | |
| 7.62 mm | Maxim |
| 12.7 mm | DShK |
| 14.5 mm | KPV |
| Britain | |
| 7.62 mm | FN MAG |
| 7.7 mm | Lewis 1916 · Vickers GO No.5 |
| 12.7 mm | Vickers Mk.V |
| Japan | |
| 6.5 mm | Maxim · Type 38 pattern 1907 |
| 7.7 mm | Type 89 · Type 92 |
| 13.2 mm | Type 93 |
| Italy | |
| 6.5 mm | Breda Mod.30 · Fiat Model 26 |
| 12.7 mm | Breda-SAFAT |
| 13.2 mm | Breda Model 31 |
| France | |
| 7.7 mm | Darne M1922 |
| 7.92 mm | Hotchkiss pattern 1914 |
| 13.2 mm | Browning · Model 1929 Hotchkiss |
