Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Mustaine on July 19, 2006, 12:31:31 PM
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has anyone here been in actual combat?
here's why:
how many magazines do you carry going in for your rifle?
when ammo is dropped at the supply depot are the magazines filled already?
what exactly comes in an ammo box?
the reason I ask is i was out having a smoke thinking about "when we were soldiers" the movie and the helo dropping off ammo boxes. those flat wooden crates with rope handles on each end. is it just raw bullets packed in those or actual filled magazines ready to use? I know bullets aren't "light" so i was thinking how many does a typical combat soldier carry starting out? you can fire off 1000 rounds easily in a firefight I am guessing, and what does a mag hold? 30 rounds? thats 33 mags. that's got to be 50lbs or more.
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Carry as much as you can. You can never have enough.
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My brother in law told me when he was loaded out with his SAW he was carrying over 100 lbs. I'll see him this weekend and get a more specific answer to your question if it's not already done by then.
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In Vietnam, you filled your own magazines from a big box of bullets. 15-20 magazines of 18 bullets (weapon might jam if 19 or 20 rounds were loaded) was a standard load. Sometimes troops would carry up to 40 magazines.
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Originally posted by AquaShrimp
In Vietnam, you filled your own magazines from a big box of bullets. 15-20 magazines of 18 bullets (weapon might jam if 19 or 20 rounds were loaded) was a standard load. Sometimes troops would carry up to 40 magazines.
Filling the bigger magazines to the max will make the spring inside weaken and also increase the tendency for jam or along those lines. Had a Marine tell me that when we were cleaning M16's. Im pretty sure he knew what he was doing seeing he just got back from a tour in Iraq.
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usually the rounds come in cardboard boxs on stripper clips. The boxes are in cloth bandoleers and those are contained in metal ammo boxes which can be crated. You load your own mags. You take what you want to carry or what you are ordered to carry. rule of thumb is as much as reasonably possible especially if its a movement to contact.
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so in a firefight it may be where you are crouching and snapping rounds into a mag?! :O
jeebus with the advancement in technology and everything you'd think there would be no need for that. :huh
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You fill your mags up bfore you leave. But Im sure your "group" will bring along extra full mags. Depending on how long you will be out in the feild you might bring along a few ammo cans full of the individual rounds to refill your mags.
Automatic weapons such as .50 cals and M240 have their ammo come already together.
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Ammo redistribution is a normal task after a contact has ended. Some will have used a considerable amount of ammo and others not. Ammo is carried for replenishment in cases or boxes but it will not be already packed in magazines. That would make the ammo heavier and bulkier to transport, not a good situation. It's the individuals responsibility to top up his own ammo supply / mags and the NCO's responsibility to see that the individual does so.
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Originally posted by Maverick
Ammo redistribution is a normal task after a contact has ended. Some will have used a considerable amount of ammo and others not. Ammo is carried for replenishment in cases or boxes but it will not be already packed in magazines. That would make the ammo heavier and bulkier to transport, not a good situation. It's the individuals responsibility to top up his own ammo supply / mags and the NCO's responsibility to see that the individual does so.
Yup.
I meant by "your "group" will bring extra full magazines" by that each individual will carry more for himself.
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Originally posted by Mustaine
so in a firefight it may be where you are crouching and snapping rounds into a mag?
The strippers make that easier/faster than you might think.
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I guess I am just suprised that in 33 years I have never seen that issue brought up anywhere in my life. of course hollyweird would never show someone reloading in a war movie :lol
well you learn something every day. :aok
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Originally posted by Edbert1
The strippers make that easier/faster than you might think.
Dang straight! Never forget to bring your favorite stripper along to reload your mags! They do have other uses too when they are not busy reloading.
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Originally posted by rabbidrabbit
Dang straight! Never forget to bring your favorite stripper along to reload your mags! They do have other uses too when they are not busy reloading.
...and would that be helping you unload your gun?
:)
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Having just come home from Iraq, I can tell you that in the U.S. Army, the official standard basic issue is 7 (30 rd) magazines per soldier armed with a 5.56mm M16 varient (M4, M16A2, M16A4), for a total of 210 rds per soldier.
However, as others have pointed out, soldiers find a way to "acquire" as many as they think they will need, or can physically carry. I personally never left the FOB (Forward Operating Base) without at least 14 filled Magazines...twice the official basic load. Some were carried in pouches attached to my MOLLE (Load Bearing) gear, while others were carried in a ruck or other bag.
In addition to our personal basic loads, we carried 25-30 additional filled spare magazines in ammo cans on each of our vehicles, and several thousand rounds of additional "loose" ammo (also in cans) for reloading magazines.
Replacement ammo was issued to us in a variety of packaging depending upon what the ASPs (Ammo Supply Points) in our area had available.
In the familiar wooden cases, you almost always found the usual NATO metal or plastic cans, filled with either cardboard boxes of pre-filled 10 rd stripper clips in cloth bandoliers, or separate 20 rd cardboard boxes in bandoliers without strippers.
5.56mm Ball and Tracer was issued separately, and had to be mixed 1-in-5 and loaded into strippers and magazines by hand.
As we always loaded our own magazines, the strippers were preferred, but because of the demand, they were less likely to be issued. Most often we would receive 20 rd boxes that we would then load into re-cycled strippers ourselves for future convienience.
We also carried FRAGs, Colored SMOKE, Thermite, Flash-Bangs, and AT-4s.
Finally, on each of our vehicles we had several thousand rds of spare belted (disintegrating link) ammo for the vehicle mounted crew-served weapons, be it 7.62mm (M240b), .50cal (M2HB), or 40mm (Mk 19).
None of this is unique to Iraq, as this is the way the U.S. Army has done it for all of my 26 years of service, and from what I've read or heard from those who came before me, that's the way it's been done since at least the 2nd World War.
There's nothing glamorous about Warfare, it's an ugly, dirty, miserable, business.
God Bless the USA!
CptA
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Originally posted by BlueJ1
Filling the bigger magazines to the max will make the spring inside weaken and also increase the tendency for jam or along those lines. Had a Marine tell me that when we were cleaning M16's. Im pretty sure he knew what he was doing seeing he just got back from a tour in Iraq.
In Vietnam, you filled your own magazines from a big box of bullets. 15-20 magazines of 18 bullets (weapon might jam if 19 or 20 rounds were loaded) was a standard load. Sometimes troops would carry up to 40 magazines.
Myth. You could fill the magazine to max capacity and not have problems. But the problems came when you didn't do things you were supposed to do.
You were supposed to clean the magazine as well as the gun. But if you remount the spring or the traveler wrong, you lose 1 or 2 bullets worth of capacity.
You were also supposed to keep your magazines unloaded. It wasn't the max capacity that weakened the spring, it was the constant compression. Leaving your bullets in 24/7 will weaken the spring after a couple of days. But even taking out the bullets over night every other or third day will keep the magazine in top condition with no residual wear or tear.
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I wasnt about to correct him.
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I have read approximately 500 first hand accounts of American marines and infantrymen in Vietnam.
The issue of the magazine springs has come up many times in the accounts I have read. Even with 30 round banana magazines, only 27 rounds would be loaded.
Yeah, we all know about the powder change in the M-16 causing jamming problems. But did you know:
-A round left in the chamber overnight could swell due to humidity and jam the rifle.
-The gas return port in the M-16 was of such small diameter that a droplet of water could clog it due to the adhesive properties of water.
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According to my BIL
SAW 4 mags
9 mm 3 clips
Army Standard is 7 30 round M16 clips
Kpot = 5 lbs
Add in body armor etc
its about 180 lbs
If you're not carrying a SAW you drop about 30 lbs
M16 weighs about 8.79 lbs with clip
when ammo is dropped at the supply depot are the magazines filled already? no and ammo doesn't come from supply
what exactly comes in an ammo box? Ammunition.. depends on what it's a box of
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Originally posted by AquaShrimp
-The gas return port in the M-16 was of such small diameter that a droplet of water could clog it due to the adhesive properties of water.
:rofl
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Originally posted by AquaShrimp
I have read approximately 500 first hand accounts of American marines and infantrymen in Vietnam.
The issue of the magazine springs has come up many times in the accounts I have read. Even with 30 round banana magazines, only 27 rounds would be loaded.
Exactly like I said. It would be better to load 27 rounds in a magazine for any mag you do instead of worrying if you put the mag back together correctly. Or even if someone else put the magazine back together correctly.
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Originally posted by AquaShrimp
-A round left in the chamber overnight could swell due to humidity and jam the rifle.
-The gas return port in the M-16 was of such small diameter that a droplet of water could clog it due to the adhesive properties of water.
These both sound like bs to me.
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I was "in" from 83 to 96, did my first 4 in the SF, the rest in "3rd shop" maint Co's. I was in electronics, but the way it worked was every one covered any job that came in, (the tranny packed it in on my Duce, in KS, and all I got was a wrecker, a TM, an engine can, and my squad dogs. it took us about two hrs longer then the motor maggots avg time) Of note was all the times we would go through testing small arms magazines. The most common fault was bad springs, followed by bent cases. and in GW1, I carried 6 ammo pouches om my LBE, 3 mags per pouch and one in the bang stick. (BTW don't ever tape two mags together, yer just begging for a jam) In positional defence, (perimeter fox hole stuff) the day guys would spend all day loading, and the night guys would usually shoot it all up, one time there must have been 60+ mags on the firing step. last note, mags loaded by other troops can be an adventure..... one night I had a mag that was all tracer..... can ya say Star Wars?
Gunns
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CptA is correct and what he says is accurate.
I have loaded my mags to 25 rounds each ever since I was unable to chamber from a 30 round mag that had gotten dusty. No problem since. Lesson learned.
Firefights are the rare exception rather than the norm and nobody unloads their mags when "not in use". Short loading them by a couple will keep the spring healthy enough to work fine when you need it to.
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Originally posted by gunnss
last note, mags loaded by other troops can be an adventure..... one night I had a mag that was all tracer..... can ya say Star Wars?
Gunns
:rofl I'd love to have seen that!
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Not if you were the one firing. Tracers work both ways. :noid
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Good story.
I was up at Fort Drum for a 2 week bootcamp the program Im in had. I was staff. I was assigned Sea Bee duty. We were replacing decks to the building that date back to before Vietnam. How do I know this? We found porn mags dated in the 60's. We found them hidden EVERYWHERE. Anyways, we were taking these decks apart and having fun doing it. I was working on this deck alone when I took all the top boards off. I found stashed under the deck a ton of ammo cans. All were extremely rusted. Some had holes in them and Im pretty sure they were M16 rounds. MP's showed up, bunch of base brass. Lucky thing the sledge hammer didnt go through the deck and into one of those cans or into some of the loose ammo. I doub t anything would have happened. But still...
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Well what did you do with all the porn magazines??????
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Originally posted by Maverick
Well what did you do with all the porn magazines??????
Threw em out and replaced them with our own. They were covered in lead paint dust, abestos, and....umm...other substances, maybe some agent oarnge.