The Mauser Gewehr 98 (Mauser rifle, model of 1898) was quite possibly the most influential firearm ever built in the last 250 years. It revolutionized warfare, it changed all concepts of firearms, and today, a large number of weapons are based on it (anything using a bolt). While back in those days, bolts were cycled manually (the original bolt-action was also a Mauser design), but they had a few problems. They lacked locking strength, so they couldn't use powerful ammo, they were accurate, more accurate than any previous rifle, and, when using comparable calibers, faster. However, with this Mauser rifle, Peter Paul and Wilhelm added a nice little feature, lugs. Lugs give a bolt lock strength, plus, they tighten the seal of the breech. This led to the next big innovation, when in 1904, the world's first spitzer cartridge was adopted. The Germans put it out, and it was far superior to blunt cartridges ballistically, plus, they bore far greater penetration. The rifle used 7.92MM Mauser rounds, which were all metal casing, using very precise standards of machining for the barrel headspace (Point where the bullet locks into the barrel for firing) and this weapon was incredibly accurate. Overall, it changed everything. It was superior to every rifle in the field but 1, the Springfield. The springfield really was the mauser, but with superior .30_06 rounds (thirty-o-six) that were notably more accurate, but, they both outstripped the Mosin and Lee-Metford and Lee-Enfield rifles, as well as the Italian Mannlicher rifles by a huge margin. Every weapon an army uses today, has, in some form, a derivative of this weapon. All modern weapons use a bolt to cycle the action and lock the breech, whether automatically or manually, and the designs originated with this rifle. The concept of a lug locked bolt was a new concept, changing designs forever, even the M16, SA80 and FA-MAS rifles use rotated bolt. Overall, a discussion on such a weapon would be nice, as it's a personal favorite of mine, and I think of it as a revolutionary design.

Does it make a good cup O' tea too? :D

Wow! That's alot of data. [img]graemlins/hehe.gif[/img]

I must say I know nothing on the issue, but it is an interesting read. :D

Actually, English machinegunners would fire their machineguns, and then use the boiled water from the cooling tank to make tea.

Now that's a multi-purpose weapon!

LOL

<font color="#00ccff">Discovery Channel pretty much said the same thing [img]smile.gif[/img] </font>

Cool, you sure know a lot about that gun, you in any way realted job wise to history or weaponry like?

The Mauser bolt action is one of the finest ever designed in the history of gun making.

Nice post,whilst I don't know too much about German guns, being an Englishman I know a hell of alot about tea, so I thought this link might be interesting as it combines the two.

http://www.widerview.com/gg2065.html

Also Obliv as someone who knows alot about guns and the like, I'd be interested to hear your view on the Russian siege. What do you think they should have done.

The Germans should never have started. But, assuming they had already, they should have put more emphasis on clamping parts of St. Petersburg, and then locking the parts they gained so tight that the Russians' collective balls would be aching. Also, they had a medium power cartridge in development from the 30's, they should have put more emphasis on getting the new weapons ahead, and to the front. Honestly, I think it was a losing plan from day 1. The Semi-Auto rifle project had been finished by the Russians and Americans, but not the Germans, who didn't have something useful until 1943 (The Walther model K41, or G41, was an awful weapon, and is in no way related to the K43 other than the fact that it is semi auto and uses 8MM mauser rounds), where the Russians had even recognized the realities of the battlefield, and by 1944, when they managed to finish the closing of the wound that Stalin put in their command and logistics, I believe at least 25% of their troops were using SKS rifles, the remaining 75% were mostly Mosin-Nagant bolt actions, as well as some SVT Semi automatics, the SVT wasn't mass-produced due to the complexity of the weapon. Well, we can't derail any existing variables, so we'll assume that we're at the outset of the siege. I say, roll up with some Paris guns, and shell the place to dust. However, no one had that much explosives, Stalingrad was, after all, a big city, even if the Paris Gun could dismantle a modern steel mill in one shot. I don't think there was any way they could have won, except to have struck earlier, like in 1939, then there would have been less preparation, they would have been flying German flags in Moscow in 3 months at the most. So, in summary, there is no alternate path circumstance, no 'what if' to consider under the current umbrella. To create one, so many things must be changed so as to create a different questioning entirely. You'd then be asking, if the circumstances of the Russian siege had been different, how would they have engineered it then? Difficult to say.