1918 BAR

I just happened to come across this picture of a Model 1918 Browning Automatic Rifle, the BAR.

It might be just me, but it sure looks like a gas operated shotgun... and the design looks both modular and simple, unlike a lot of Browning's designs, which often tended toward complex and fiddly. The first drawing is obviously simplified, though.

Parts kits exist, but they seem to run in the $2-2.5K range. It might be possible to fabricate a workalike, though.

The Swedes built a variant with a pistol grip, in 6.5x55. They also had a belt fed one. Lots of stuff about the Swedish variants here: The light machineguns of Sweden

Hmm, the FN-D was a BAR variant... it used a pistol grip and a quick-detach barrel.

There's a guy on gunbroker selling what he claims are copies of the original receiver blueprints for the BAR for $28.

from world.guns.ru:

Technical description.

The BAR M1918 is a gas operated, magazine fed, air cooled weapon. It used the gas piston, located under the barrel, and the bolt with tilting locking lug, that was raised to lock into the roof of the receiver. This lug was linked to the operating rod via the swinging link, much like in the earlier Berthier system. The BAR always fired from the open bolt to avoid cook-offs. The return spring was located around the gas piston under the barrel, so it was prone to overheating and lost its temper during the prolonged fire sessions, resulting in jams and stoppages. This issue was somewhat cured in M1918A1 with introduction of the heat shield between the barrel and the spring, located inside the forend.

The receiver was a machined piece of steel, and the gun was fed from the detachable 20 rounds box magazines. Barrel was fitted with flash hiders of different types, and, since the M1818A1, the wooden buttstock was also fitted with the hinged buttplate. The latter production models of M1918A2 were also fitted with carrying handle.

TRX
11-11-2010

I've read Hatcher's "Book of the Garand" about the development and adoption of the Garand rifle. The old arsenal politics had a lot to do with it, I think... but the Garand was expensive, complex, and frankly, a bit Rube Goldberg. According to Hatcher much of the problem was getting a workable gas system - they really wanted a muzzle cap and pull-rod setup for some reason, and then they tried just about everything else - "primer setback", greased or waxed brass, etc. But they'd already had a better system in the BAR. A downsized BAR would have given them a simpler, cheaper rifle with a big detachable box magazine instead of the Garand's clips.

My bogometer stayed pegged through most of Hatcher's book, but the BAR is proof they knew a better way, and all of the "problems" had already been satisfactorily solved.

TRX
12-11-2010

Hm. I finally got around to searching on the MAG-58, and after a couple of hours, I finally decided that 95% of all modern "light machine guns" seem to be either BAR or MG-42 variants. Doesn't seem to matter whether they feed from a box or a belt, what caliber they come in, what country made them, or what modifications (styling, more likely) were made, when you look at the breech and operating mechanism, it comes down to one of those two in the end.

There were some others, of course, back in the day, but in the 1950s most countries went to the BAR or MG-42 designs, as far as I can tell.

TRX
01-01-2011

Every now and then I search the web for more information on the 1918 and some of the foreign variants that have been mentioned, but there's frustratingly little out there about them. On the other hand, there are many entire forums and web sites devoted to information and building the 1919 and the MG43.

Any search with "Browning BAR" is so polluted with hunting rifle hits as to be useless.

Are the BARs really that rare and unpopular?

TRX
01-04-2011

Originally Posted by sjohnson
TRX, here's a tip on searching:

Thanks! That got me a few hits I'd missed before. It seems there's a lot more out there about the FN-D, and I found some forums where people mentioned building them from the kits that sometimes pop up on GB.

It's still odd how little information there is out there in comparison to the 1919, or even things like the Goryunov. Of course, parts don't seem to be nearly as common as those, either...