You’re right, of course. We got distracted talking about rifles. * Are *there any popular pistol rounds that are so tapered as to require a curved mag? All the pistol calibers I’m familiar with are cylindrical.
Yeah, but who’d want to use a Tommygun unless you can use the drum magazine? That’s the whole point! And you can scream that the dirty coppers will never take you alive while you fire it. Try that with a straight magazine and the cops will laugh at you.
I’m no expert on machine guns so CMIIW but common sense tells me that in a combat situation you would never try to insert a curved magazine improperly i.e., have it turned the wrong way and have to flip it.
My own preference is to use the magazine well. My hand would typically be gripped right where the o-ring that keeps the handguard together, and the magazine well meet. It’s part of the lower receiver, so it doesn’t put any stress on the magazine itself. I think that’s what you’re seeing in most of those pictures.
Just curious to know why the cops would laugh at you if you’re using a straight mag.
I mean, the bullets are still gonna be flying no matter what sort of mag.
:: Cagney voice:: “you dirty rat, copper”
The advantage of the drum is that is holds a lot more bullets. So you can spray all day from that model T window, instead of having to change mags every 5 seconds. Unless you’re a Hollywood villain, of course, in which case you can spray all day with a six-shooter :p.
According to Wiki, straight mags for trench brooms came in 20 and 30 rounds versions, while drums were either 50 or 100 bullets apiece. A hundred .45 bullets. Jesus. If anything’s still standing after that little shindig, you’re probably being chased by the Saint of Killers.
Or you’re a cop from Tennessee. Or New York. Or you are an Irish gangster. Or work for LAPD.
“The cops fired hundreds of rounds. They didn’t even hit the Suburban.” - Ron White
I’ve fired several of the old-school WWII submachine guns (Sten, Thompson, MP-40, M3), and none of them had a curved magazine. All had straight magazines.
I always thought the reasons that assault rifles have curved-ish magazines is so that on a 30-rounder, that the magazine didn’t stick ridiculously down below the pistol grip, which would make it hard to fire from a prone position.
With rimless cartridges, there’s nothing stopping you from having straight magazines- look at the M14, the 20 round mags for the M16/M4, etc…
And really… if you’re not using the handguard, why not just get a gangster grip installed up front, like the CQB M4s have? I have to figure that if you could just hold it by the magazine or magazine well, nobody’d bother with installing them.
I read all three links and I don’t get it. The targets in those cases weren’t left standing after the shootings; that’s the point.
Not the third one. All O’Banion’s men managed to kill was an innocent bystander.
Badly constructed joke written on the fly.
I thought the MP5 used a rifle round?
MP5
9mm pistol round.
Also variants that chamber the 10mm and .40 S&W
However, that’s offset by the fact that the drum is pretty damn heavy. I’ve got a 50-round drum and several 30-round stick mags for my Thompson, and the stick mags are a lot more comfortable to use while shooting. With the drum, it’s like having a lead weight on the front of the gun. I can’t even imagine what the 100-round drum would be like.
Ah, thanks.
For the same reason they’d laugh at you if you were wearing a straw hat instead of a silk fedora. Or white shoes after Labor Day.
When dealing with the fashion police there’s no such thing as too big a magazine. Although with the recession and all some seem to be cutting back.
Drums in general tend to be less reliable than stick magazines, so I suspect that was the primary motivator in using the stick mags in the military Thompsons.
Also, where would you carry spares - in your backpack? And how would you share ammo with a squadmate?
Yes, as my Dad said, they were “fiddly”, and “fiddly” is a very bad thing in combat.