Cool Forgotten Weapons Merch! shop.bbtv.com/collections/forg... Only a few dozen of these are in private hands in the US, and they are an extremely advanced design for WWII. Theme music by Dylan Benson - dbproductioncompany.webs.com
"this is worth more than my worldly posessions combined, but I want to show you the bipod, which is very fragile" I didn't realize this channel had dangerous stunts.
+Forgotten Weapons Hi, I'm doing a detailed 3d model of that rifle, can you tell me how the gas regulator screw is done? From videos I think that is not threaded and it can't travel crosswise, but how regulates gases? Has it holes? I'm going crazy Thanks
Marcus Payne Usually Ian will post the auction price in the video descrption, This one sold for $260,000 US currency I imagine. so where I am from this sold for $338,000 Can. Amazing really...
German paratroopers: "So is the new weapon we are getting issued gonna be a scoped rifle, a semiauto rifle or a machine gun?" Rheinmetall/Krieghoff: "Yes"
@@halthammerzeit ...or harsh language ...double irony that the other side won't understand a thing of what your hurling at them Although,....: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-prDoDPIpX4E.html
+TAOFLEDERMAUS ID Software blew that game big time, what could have been a fun to play, slightly realistic WW2-themed shooter ended up as yet another Quake-style lame game full of bullshit monsters, as if the Nazis weren't terrifying enough. I almost cried when that super-cool, fun to shoot rifle, introduced in the game not two levels earlier, was "superseded" by fantastic weapons like the "Venom Gun" or that electric lightning gun - don't even bother to remember the name - ruining it all.
+ilyriandevil Bosses and hard-to-kill enemies are a thing of the past. Right now I don't play shooters anymore but I'd prefer enemies that are smart, fast, stealthy and damn' annoying rather than one stupid behemoth that takes tons of ammo to destroy. Something like the Ninja Girls in Half-Life.
I agree, but would like to mention a terrific magazine that I used to get. Small Arms Review, they would go into even more detail of the manufacture and everything. Fascinating read for the machine fan, the anthropologist and the business minded.
Military: We need it to be semi and full auto, Gun Designer: Ok, assault rifle. M: Light and short, GD: Carbine then, fine. M: With a bi-pod , GD: A very very light machine gun?... M: And a scope, GD: ... M: And a bayonet. GD: Come On!
And yet the designers did damned well for the time they had..... German gun designers were some of the finest in the world and when this was going on the cartridge was barley 100 years old..... Just as we took Powered flight from Kitty Hawk to Moch one in less than 50 years.....
@@PhilipFear German Army was the best and well ahead of it's time. It took effort of whole world including resistance forces on occupied territory to stop them.
This was really interesting for me personally. I'm not a gun owner or something but the technical part is somehow fascinating. What made this personal for me is that my grandfather, who unfortunately is deceased by now, was involved in WWII. He was a young soldier during the final days of WWII, and one of the few stories i was able to extract from him was that during the last days of the battle of Berlin he had a fancy paratrooper rifle. I never got out of him which one it was exactly but i always assumed it was a FG-42. What led me to that assumption was that he was Lufwaffe personnel and got pulled out of pilot training to fight in the last few engagements of the war. He had been a Flakhelper in Vienna and to avoid beeing drafted into the Wehrmacht in 44 he voluteered for the Luftwaffe. He had started his pilot training but never finished and was sent into the fray. After escaping the Ruhrkessel he was thrown into the Battle of the Seelow Heights and withdrew from there to Berlin. Somewhere inbetween the Battle of the Seelow Heights and the Battle of Berlin he picked up that gun (I don't know from where) and when he got injured in Berlin by shrapnel he was put into the military emergency facility in the Krolloper. Upon entering the field hospital he was ordered by an officer to hand in the gun. By the time his wounds had been bandaged and he was sent out again the gun was gone. Probably taken by some other soldier that got sent back into the fight. I can only assume that it was a FG 42, but since he always stressed that it was a very special and advanced weapon, and he was Luftwaffe personnel, and he was always including that in his story, whereas he did't much speak about other small details of his experiences it led me to that conclusion. He also always stressed that while ther german weapons where sleek, well enineered and fantastic in theory they lacked the robustness of the russian weapons. He would always say that it was a fantastic gun but once some dirt got into it it was just jamming or having other problems, while you could drop the russian weapons into a pool of mud, pull em out and start shooting without problems. Seeing this fragile weapon in this video it reminded me a lot of his story. Sorry for the wall of text.
Both my "Opas" survived the eastern front as well and all i inherited is a freakin screwdriver and a black tie!! :( why didnt they store a few rare weapons .. so sad
@Craig Scott at the time this video was released this gun was actually worth more than its weight in gold as the value of 4.38kg of gold back then was worth only 180,000 dollars . one that Ian reviewed slightly earlier went for 242,000 USD .. god im bored lol
@@12lb.toothbrush11 Wow. I’m sure you’ve seen the docs where these guys are surrendering and throwing their weapons in a pile. I wonder how many of these and all the other cool ww2 weapons where just thrown into scrap? Heart breaking.
it sold for nearly 300kusd so not surprising xD Plus they were an actual miracle of engineering and lightyears ahead of their time with the design. Crazy to think they managed to make a gun to all those specifications that worked in full auto with such a high power cartridge. Obviously with it being so precisely engineered it had reliability issues, unlike russian weapons which were crude but durable, but it's still one of my favourite guns of all time, and usually one of the best guns in games which feature it. A classic piece of german engineering and a technical marvel, whether you like guns or not, everyone has to admire that.
This thing is like The Mother of all battle rifles.. It's kinda hard to contemplate just how ahead of it's time this rifle was considering it was both a semiauto battle rifle AND a light machinegun with optics utilized like an Acoq this day and age. And considering that the 8x57IS full power German military ammo is punchier than the mil-spec 147gr .30-06 or a 7,62x51 NATO it is remarkable how slender and almost fragile this rifle is. The 8x57IS 198gr fmjbt Wehrmacht sS-round is comparable to 200gr full house .30-06 hunting loads in ft.lbs and this weapon spewed them out in full auto withstanding the beating.
Indeed, hell it also has the AR-Style buffer-tube in the stock :) - this is seriously a great gun and it is sad that there well not be faithfull (meaning FULL-AUTO!) repros made of this because governments everywhere like breaking the laws (like that "...shall not be infringed..." in that ammendment! Seriously, any regulation is an infringement, despite the fact that the lawyers seem to disagree with that!) :(
@@dreamingflurry2729 Im pro gun but i think most people would agree keeping a convicted violent felon from purchasing a firearm is not an infringement, and its also a regulation. Ill fight the arbitrary ATF classifications all day long but there is SOME room for regulation. Also you mention that "governments everywhere" like violating the 2nd amendment... well every government but the American government is well within their legal right to do that, other countries arent beholden to the American constitution.
@@greybayles7955 "Violent felon", I guess so. Problem there is it's all felonies and they pass those suckers out like 🍬. Heck, in some states if you have to go to drug/alcohol treatment, they use that to take your rights. That means DUI's, small drug offenses and almost anytime you get in trouble for almost anything. Probation will almost always (maybe always) come with a required drug/alcohol accessment and those who do the accessing make their living off giving everyone some level of group counciling or the other.
It is a transferable machine gun, an NFA item. All transferable full auto items are from before the 1986 ban, therefore there is a set number for transferable items, so supply and demand. Example a select fire M16 transferable rifle, although not much different from a standard AR lower, can run in the $10,000+ range, simple supply and demand. With this FG-42, being a war pick up and an already rare rifle the price of this rifle does not surprise me at all. Owning such a priceless piece of history is a privilege that few of us commoners can afford, and with the current laws in place the price is inflated because of the set number of select fire weapons available in the U.S.
Over-regulation is crony capitalism. The '86 FOPA creates an artificial market monopoly. Rich only club, government screwing over less affluent people. Repeal the Firearm Owner's Protection Act of 1986.
There is footage of German paratroopers on RU-vid - since they were the first operational paratrooper units in existence the harnesses they used look pretty primitive by today's standards (or even by Allied paratrooper standards) - there'd be ONE strap attaching them to the chute, and their arms were hanging free rather than holding on to the shrouds. Apparently they were trained to flail their arms around in order to keep their balance during the descent. No wonder they dropped their rifles separately during the Crete operation. Note that current US paratroopers use long straps attached to their rifles, which dangle a feet below and land first, along with other heavy equipment - this allows for a softer landing for the actual man, and allows each man to jump with a much heavier load.
A beautiful specimen. Firearms design has always captured my imagination, ever since I was a kid. And what I appreciate about these videos is how you guys tell the story of the development and design of each gun.
What are you, a fucking comedian? What did else did the Allies have at the end of this war(2 years after this one came out) that was as revolutionary as this? Peter Senich' ''The German Assault Rifle'' book agrees with me and for a reason. The M60 'Pig' came out in the 57 and took heavily from the FG-42. How is that not being ahead of its time? By years, not months. Fully automatic weapons weren't common at all outside heavy MG's or light SMG's and then the Germans came around with the STG-44 and FG-42 and really changed the state of the infantry firearms for ever. To say this wasn't far ahead of its time is ridicilous and there is no way anyone with even a bit of knowledge on the issue agrees with you. There is a reason Ian sings its praises.
Nico By "peter senich agrees with me" lmao I'm here for comic relief? Its ok for you to disagree buddy. But its not logical that a gun plagued with issues is somehow far ahead of its time. No german rifle at the time was more controversial and needed revision for the design and manufacturing process. The design itself was advanced, but I would never choose it over a practical weapon and neither did the germans.
Such a gorgeous weapon. Such an out-of-place weapon for its time too! No wonder that derivatives of German wartime technology became the small arms of armies for the following 50 years.
Well the FG-42 itself borrowed its operating system from that used in the Lewis light machine gun, there aren't many firearms that don't borrow from a predecessor, from any nation.
ThorstenTheViking There's nothing 'out of place' about this gun. Just a normal WW2 gun. If it's out of place,they should be rail attachment for scope,grenade launcher,laser point & everything. It should compatable with all types of bullet ranging from 9mm to 40mm. The gun should also shoot laser,electric shock,corrosive bullet & athrax. Now that's my definition of 'out of place'. (Sarcasm)
Which arms do you think were derivatives of the german small arms. The U.S. and soviet small arms development were independent from German weapons, at most the genereal idea of another intermediate cartridge is what came out of looking at the stg 44. The soviet machine guns and american ones of the next few decades were derivatives of those countries ww2 weapons, with minimal outside influence. Im not as familiar with post war western european arms, were they the arms you speak of?
Just came across your channel and I love it! Especially love the technical and historical info you provide to the viewer. Definitely have a subscriber in me!
I got to shoot one back in 1974-75 and this is my favorite gun from WWII by far! Slick fast and accurate. By far the best gun in WWII. Thank goodness not made in mass. I love the BAR the rise was horrible.
Thanks so much for this video. I am digitally modelling one of these rifles for my client at a Canadian military museum, after which it will be 3D printed. The detail you put into this video will allow me to create a higher level of authenticity than I would have been able to do otherwise. Cheers.
I've handled a few functional replicas. These rifles are absolutely outstanding pieces of engineering that are exemplary examples of human engineering and intuition. These fuckers are 100 years ahead of their time. Sure the material quality isn't as great, but a modern version with modern quality standards is by far one of the finest firearms around. If you want to shoot a .308 with less recoil than a 7.62x39 with complete handling, this is it.
3:00 While the design was provided by Stange of Rheinmetall-Borsig, Krieghoff -- then located in "Gun-Asgard" Suhl/Thuringia (see: Haenel, Merkel, Sauer & Sohn etc.pp.) -- did the entire manufacturing, since Rheinmetall had bigger fish to fry during the war. So it's quite natural that those guys came up with improvement suggestions. Should you actaully be able to make a trip to Germany, *thou must do a pilgrimage to Suhl in Thuringia and meet some of the old gunsmith-masters and let them show you the vault of the museum.* They have guns as far back as muskets from the 30 year war made for Wallenstein's army.
I was seriously interested in wishing I could buy this and always would So glad you got to shoot it and film it Hell of a rifle Everything the m14 wishes it was
I was going to ask what the spring loaded doors were before watching further in the video, and then it was explained. I can always trust Forgotten Weapons to give a thorough look through some absolutely incredible firearms!
incredible... i've seen this video a couple of times and this is the first time i've ever realised the absolute genius of having the cartridge case itself contribute to controlling the pressure in the chamber by forming a gas seal as it is intentionally deformed by design during firing. I'm not sure that property was designed into casings intentionally, but the fact he realised it was possible and utilised the active process to contribute to the mechanical capabilities of the mechanism is nearly as big a mental leap as recycling the gas to rechamber, in my opinion.
please mr. rich guy, let Ian do a video with this thing. whats the point of buying a gun worth more then a moderately sized house if not to show it off?
Preservation, history, museums, etc etc Any firearm has a limited life before critical components break and this one seems all original, I'd rather see it stay that way.
Ahh, sarcasm. If this remark applies in any way to the comment I was making about the structural integrity of the gun and limited life let me know please... I don't think it does, just a failed troll...
Shit i shoot my k98 s/42 and it was over$ 1000 rifle 419 of 5000 made it was made in 1936 has both republic and nazi stamps and works like it was built 20 yrs ago it came out of a collectors cache
Man, I love that... errr... rifle. It is probably even my WWII weapons favorite. Looks both really manly and sci-fi-ish. And there isn't a lot of accurate info on this one out there, too, so you, sir, definitely deserve a medal for that one alone, not even talking about other reviews for even more obscure weapons. You do a great job and I absolutely love your uploads, so I am seriously considering joining that Patreon thing as soon as I get my own financial balance to be positive.
+Stevo2o6 Favourite one to use, top of the tower on train station, no mercy mod on, all the perks of full auto with the benefits of a sniper rifle, damn, miss that... lol
I'm impressed by this gun. It is a closed and open bolt system in one weapon. Haven't seen this on any other weapon so far. Inventions like this let me feel that i'm glad to be German. HAHA.
E stands for "Einzelschuss" (einzel= single; schuss= shot) or "Einzelfeuer" (feuer = fire) while the D stands for Dauerfeuer (literally continous fire; automatic) I really enjoy your videos Ian! Are you planning on doing another disassembly video in the near future?
I would like to do a new disassembly video on an FG42, since my last one was done with an SD camera (Fallschirmjager FG-42 Rifle). If I could find one to disassemble that I could also fire on video, so much the better! But it's all a question of finding access to one, given the very small number of them around.
Forgotten Weapons If you ever get to Europe (especially Belgium, Czech Republic, Sweden or Norway) again, try to contact some of the WWII weapon collector clubs, the originals in a functional condition are around in private hands.
claus2427 It's extremely rare to find one that's still in firing condition in Belgium though and even if you were able to find someone who owns one that hasn't been demilitarised, you wouldn't be allowed to fire it in Belgium since the collector's permit required to own one (which is in itself rather uncommon) only allows for the weapon to fire a single shot per year to proof that it's still in firing condition. There is also not single civilian shooting range which allows full-auto firing. -Yes our laws are ridiculous-
If the bolt was closed when you switched the selector lever, no - it would operate normally. If the bolt was open when you changed the lever, the first trigger pull would close the bolt and you would have to pull it a second time to fire the first semiauto shot. After that, it would work normally (or so I'm told).
That gun is the total package. I'm amazed at how versatile the design is. When I was a kid I kept reading about how impressive the design was, thought it was cool but didn't entirely understand it. Now after reading more about how guns work I can truly appreciate this fine piece.
This rifle was one of the top piece in our local WWII museum in The Netherlands. Sadly it was stolen recently in a trend that saw several museums stripped of valuable war memorabilia. They are presumed never to be seen again
Regarding muzzle brakes, I understand that the reason the holes on a brake were always upward was to not only prevent blowdown into dust from spoiling aim of a shooter, but was also to prevent the enemy from seeing dust clouds in the area of the shooter, and thus firing back.
Yep. Actual assault rifles are a very real thing. The first, of course, being the literal "Sturmgewehr", also in WW2. But 99.9% of all rifles in civilian hands in the USA are NOT assault rifles, because of the select fire requirement they do not meet. All criteria must be met to be considered an actual assault rifle; select fire, intermediate cartridge and removable magazine.
It lightened up my day when getting one of these in call if duty, so accurate yet light. I know it's just a game but it clearly was the best weapon available.
Trivia: Star Wars blasters ARE german weapons! The blasters used in the early movies are remodeled german weapons. Han Solo pistol is a Luger. Stormtrooper rifles are MG34, i think.
+xDog .SoldieRx for example in wikipedia you type Blasters (Star Wars) you can see that the stormtroopers blasters are made of Sterling submachine guns
***** Yup, but i don't expect he had much time left, he was in a very critical condition, he probably died a few days after getting here (yes i'm from Argentina).
Except for Superchargers. Way behind and this was rather important. Their espionage was totally shit as well. Every single agent the sent to the UK was caught then either turned as double agent or shot.
***** The Nazis lost because they wasted too much time murdering innocent civilians and attempting to utterly humiliate Stalin instead of ignoring Stalingrad (for the most part) and seizing all of Russia's oil reserves and railway infrastructure. In fact their advance across Russia in general was also artificially slowed, punctuated as it was with ethnic cleansing of it's towns and villages. Dick Fageroni is also correct AFAIK on the technical side, though Wehrmacht soldiers were indeed incredibly well trained, particularly it's peerless tank crews. Of course once America got involved the outcome was a forgone conclusion but the Nazis could have won before then.
I don’t know about the FG 42, but Star Wars blasters are based on real firearms, what you guys might be thinking of is the MG34 being the base for the heavy blaster seen in portions of the movies www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2015/10/20/the-real-world-small-arms-that-inspired-the-weapons-of-star-wars/%3foutputType=amp There’s an article with a few examples, and recently the Mandalorian series has featured more augmented real world firearms
@@RhythnPrince yep they used m34 an this german ww2 semiauto pistol i forgot the name coz its ugly c96 or somthing is the blaster from hans solo with a scope taped on it they are all real guns with some silly stuff on it i think the small blaster things they use is a sterling sub gun
Fascinating gun. I am very sure I've never seen anything similat to it before. Though going by the description it doesn't sound very surprising that it wasn't produced in large numbers.
Always been one of my favorite weapons. In video games i have only seen them in Return To Castle Wolfenstein or by using the FällschirmJägers in Company Of Heroes.
The "D" ;-) most likely stands for "Dauerfeuer", which would roughly translate to "permanent or continuing fire". Or, more accurately, automatic fire. For special units this gun was fantastic. But for the average soldier? Too complicated, too fragile, probably a bitch to clean and most likely too expensive to produce in huge quantities.
Question for anyone more knowledgeable than I am - how do *forward* facing muzzle brakes counter recoil? Gas venting forwards would push the gun backwards.... in the same direction as the normal recoil wouldn't it?
Just my guess but it's more like venting the gas so the gas ISN'T creating any force. My reasoning is that's why there's heaps of holes, the Rhodesian halbeck device has only one or so holes for directing the force.
