DID MG34 and accessories, all metal construction, 1/6th scale MG42 Machine Gun Unlike the Americans, the German Army did not employ light, medium or heavy machine guns in World War II. Instead they standardized on two machine guns, one being Maschinengewehr (machine gun) 34 (MG 34), originally designed in the 1930’s, was the first general-purpose machine-gun. It could be used by infantry as a light machine-gun in a mobile attack or as a medium machine-gun in defensive, emplacement role with sustained fire. It was a high-quality weapon, expensive to manufacture and required three-man crews when used by infantry in an assault. The latter model, MG42 had an extremely rapid rate of fire. When used by mobile units, the MG 42 was mounted on a bipod. For defensive position, the MG-42 could be mounted on the MG-Lafatte (a tripod with a periscope sight). This mount took the recoil of the gun, allowing the shooter to sweep a large area with sustained fire. Another tri-pod mounting allowed the gun to be used for anti-aircraft use. The MG34/42 is air cooled and fitted with a quick-change barrel (crews switched out barrels when the gun over-heated). The barrel, once off the weapon, could be cooled by simply being thrown in water or snow. They often carried several spare barrels. |
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| When used without the Tripod |
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