The original MG3 with wooden furniture
The upgraded MG3R1
Designer: Arsenal Deimos
Designed: 1979 (Original), 2002 (R1)
Manufacturer: Arsenal Deimos, IFAM
Unit cost: 1500 NSD
Produced: 1981-2003 (Original), 2003- (R1)
Common Variants: MG3, MG3R1.
Weight: 7.9 kg
Length:1127mm
Barrel length: 628mm (24.72 in)
Cartridge: 7.7x54mm Arsenal Standard Anemonian
Action: Roller-delayed blowback
Rate of Fire: 900/600rpm
Muzzle velocity: 919 m/s (3,015 ft/s)
Effective range: 600 m (1,969 ft)
Feed system: Disintegrating metallic bullet link (120 round containers)
Sights: Rear receiver aperture sight and front hooded post.
Background and History
It is commonly understood that the Anemonian Armed Forces, throughout their long and bloody history, have always and inevitably made efforts to advance their technological prowess as far as conceivably possible within practical constraints through a combination of funding and the promotion of talent. And yet, one of the less known facts concerning the Armed Forces is the fact that, following the Anemonian Civil War, integrated machine guns at the squad level were not introduced until the 1970s, and not indigenously produced until ten years later.
The result of failings at the command level, it was widely perceived for almost twenty years, firstly due to cost restraints and later through the introduction of automatic battle rifles, that machine guns were an expense that was unnecessary due to the widespread utilisation of automatic and semi-automatic firearms across the Armed Forces; maintaining that such fire from infantrymen was enough to suppress enemy forces, and that machine guns would only lead to the needless waste of ammunition and thus do nothing but incur higher costs than necessary, the Anemonian command staff rejected the proponents of machine gun adoption and continued to fight against their widespread adoption in the Armed Forces tooth and nail. Between 1951 and the 1960s, the lack of any high intensity combat for the Armed Forces allowed their ideas to survive and indeed flourish; by the time war came in the late sixties, and their theories were disproven in the flames of war, it was too late.
The Inquisitorian Crisis was very much an infantry war, fought in terrain where vehicles had more than significant trouble making the most of their mobility. Here, Anemonian troops were to learn that the 7.7mm AR3, with its purposefully slowed rate of fire, nonetheless powerful recoil and small magazine capacity, was not sufficient as a squad suppressive weapon; faced with surplus 1940s era MG42s and 34s, Anemonian infantry were outclassed and outmatched. Not only were they fighting in unknown territory against determined enemies, they were unable to bring their weight of fire to bear through their inability to suppress the enemy effectively.
In 1972, the AR3/mod LA was produced as a stopgap measure to introduce some sort of sustained automatic weapon into the Armed Forces, initially issued with 30 round box magazines and later 100 round drums to greatly increase the weight of the average squad’s base of fire. It was a highly efficient weapon, but this was only from the point of view of an armed force that had never been equipped with a standard issue machine gun. By the time the 1980s came around, the Armed Forces required a new machine gun; for this, they turned once more to Arsenal Deimos.
At the heart of things, the MG3 was a modification of the AR3R1. Designed by the same design team that produced the mod LA, the weapon’s basic design derived from the Anemonian service rifle of the time in order to radically decrease production costs. Utilising the same basic operating system, the MG3 was designed to operate using a linked belt feed, and features such as a quick replaceable barrel (through a detachable portion of the lower handguard, along the lines of the MG42‘s replacement system except with a vertical rather than horizontal arrangement) and modified muzzle brake for recoil reduction were added to accommodate the fact that this weapon was no modified automatic rifle, but a purpose designed general purpose machine gun. Design procedures were finalised by 1979, and following a long period of testing and evaluation (longer than usual due to the Armed Forces’ desire to make the new GPMG a long term investment along the lines of the FN MAG popular amongst contemporary armies), the MG3 was formally adopted for service by the Anemonian Armed Forces in 1981.
The MG3 saw extensive service. In areas like Asakura, it was used in many capacities, from a squad level automatic weapon to a tripod-mounted HMG and anti-aircraft weapon, and its ability to lay down lethal, accurate and high intensity automatic fire made it a greatly loved and appreciated weapon within the Army. This was so much so that in 2003, the Crown Army opted to put the MG3 through a service life extension program rather than replace it with an off-the-shelf 21st century alternative; parts of the cooling system and gas redirection were altered and rails were added (amongst other things); this new production variant of the MG3 was named the MG3R1 and replaced the MG3 on the production lines from 2003 onwards. Still a high performance, well designed general purpose machine gun, the MG3R1 is a one-of-its-kind weapon in the modern world; retaining the design ethos of an age gone by, its service life extension revisions have managed not only to give it 21st century flexibility, but performance and abilities that rival and surpass most purpose designed 21st century weapons of its kind.
Design
A General Purpose Machine Gun, the MG3R1 is chambered in the long serving, powerful and highly effective 7.7x54mm Arsenal Standard Anemonian cartridge. Originally developed to provide the Anemonian Armed Forces with a highly effective jack-of-all-trades, it has since been joined in the squad-support role by the AR9 Squad Support Weapon; it is, by all standards, highly effective in every role into which it is pushed, providing a stable and effective base from which to lay down high intensity 7.7mm fire for lethal effect on any battlefield.
In order to maximise its battlefield effectiveness, the MG3R1’s construction has been aimed towards two particular objectives; robustness and the good distribution of purposefully restricted weight. To achieve this (certain materials were slightly modified in later production version of the AR3R1), fibreglass and lightweight metal alloys (with steel used in areas such as the barrel, where higher heat resistance is required). Initially, the composition of the fibreglass used was 20% glass fibres in the polymers; however, later production variants increased this to 30%. This was a result of two things; firstly, early production versions of the AR5 rifle had begun to develop cracks through intensive use, which forced Anemonian weapons designers to add weight to their fibreglass composition in order to increase the service life of such parts; however, even if Arsenal Deimos itself had opted to choose 20% glass composition fibreglass out of a design rationale, the decision to adopt 30% glass composition fibreglass taken by IFAM in the production of the AR8 and later AR9 systems would have forced Arsenal Deimos to adopt it in cost-cutting interests. The utilisation of fibreglass greatly increased the resistance of the weapon to hard impact and increased its service life, utilising a highly durable and heat resistant material that perfectly suited the high stress placed upon such components in a machine gun like the MG3. Furthermore, in order to accommodate additional stress and shocks, metal alloys (lightweight steel compositions) are employed to reinforce the barrel assembly, providing a casing around the barrel that, amongst other things, absorbs much of the shocks and forces produced by the firing of the weapon, thus distributing recoil forces across the weapon effectively in a manner that greatly increases the MG3R1’s service life.
Disassembly is another key feature of the MG3R1; unlike the original MG3, a quick access detachable barrel system is not provided. By disengaging a lock system in front of the handguard, the barrel and muzzle brake assembly can be removed by pulling them out of the front of the weapon, but advances in heat dissipation techniques made during the transition from the MG3 to the R1 mostly removed the need for the battlefield use of this unwieldy process. Basic field stripping of the weapon is performed by removing the locking latch between the receiver assembly and handguard, unlocking and removing the bipod and gas-block/forward sights (in that order) before removing the barrel and then the handguard.
The operation and internal workings of the MG3 are what truly mark it out from the competition in every respect. Adopting the roller delayed blowback system employed by the IFAM AR3, the MG3R1's system of operation ensures relative mechanical simplicity (which allows for the easy identification of faults and replacement of parts in the field, vital for weapons like machine guns which are put through long periods of intensive use), thus adding to the weapon's overall field usability. Furthermore, the delayed nature of the blowback system (wherein the recoil forces are both delayed and dampened by the operating mechanism) allows the MG3R1 to greatly decrease the recoil forces generated by the powerful 7.7mm round, giving it a unique combination of factors that contribute towards the MG3R1's unique battlefield usability through ease of maintenance and high performance in use.
Rate of fire is another factor that was taken into consideration during the design process for this weapon. As the weapon was originally envisaged as a squad support weapon at a very basic, infantry assault level as well as a general purpose machine gun, the high calibre used by the weapon led designers to believe that a controllable rate of fire for use in general infantry service would not be sufficient for use as a GPMG (and vice versa). The solution was found by introducing a variable rate of fire; by introducing a knob on the left side of the weapon in front of the safety selector which controlled rate of fire (12 o'clock was 600rpm, while 9 o'clock was 900rpm), the designers were able to allow the weapon to alternate between active infantry combat and infantry support. The mechanical control of the rate of fire was achieved by setting the locks to affect the delay imposed upon the retracting bolt carrier by the rollers; in this way, infantry using the MG3 were able to easily alternate between the controlled fire rate of the AR3R1 rifle to the much higher natural fire rate of the MG3 for support purposes. With the introduction of the AR8/AR9 SSWs as dedicated light machine guns in the Anemonian Armed Forces, the need for this variable rate of fire was mostly removed; however, citing the costs of redesigning the weapon and added flexibility as reasons, the design team refrained from removing it in more recent production variants of the weapon.
As this weapon is a machine-gun, factors which didn't come into play during the designing of the AR3R1 were considered in depth by its designers. These factors were simple; the control of the recoil forces that would be generated by extended 7.7mm automatic fire, and the heat problems that would also be caused. During the progression from the Mod LA to the MG3, and from the MG3 to the MG3R1, the design team incorporated and improved various different techniques and design aspects that resulted in the creation of a highly effective set of mechanisms designed to deal with and almost eradicate the two major problems faced by a high calibre machine gun. In terms of recoil management, two approaches were taken to reduce it; firstly, the dampening of recoil forces in the ergonomic arrangement of the weapon, and the redirection of gases. The former was achieved through the employment of a hydraulic buffer in the stock, and a buffer unit in the redesigned bipod that both managed to add a great degree of controllability to the MG3R1. Gas dissipation, on the other hand, was not achieved through dampening but through redirection; the muzzle brake was designed in an extensive trial and error process to redirect the high pressure gases generated by the firing of the weapon in a fashion that would act sufficiently against recoil forces but not so much as to produce excessive counter-recoil. Heat management in the MG3R1 was greatly different to that of the MG3; where the MG3 relied upon quick change barrels to cope with any heat related issues, the MG3R1 was designed with a more permanent, long term solution to such issues in mind. As such, the barrel of the MG3R1 is encased by a steel cooling jacket; with a very open handguard that allows for rapid air transfer, the MG3R1 directs cool air through perforations at the back of the cooling jacket and makes this cool air exit the weapon at the point at which the barrel emerges from the handguard; in this way, by forcibly cooling the handguard-encased portion of the MG3R1 and redirecting remaining heat along the exposed barrel and muzzle brake (as well as through the metal of the cooling jacket and out of the handguard slits), the weight of the cooling assembly is kept down while nonetheless providing an alternative to multiple quick change barrels that is highly reliable and effective in practice through the utilisation of a simple, tried and tested design.
The feed used in the MG3R1 is a disintegrating metallic link, purpose designed for the 7.7mm round as the MG3 was the first weapon to use it. The disintegration is employed so as to minimise the effect had by the spent links once they pass through the weapon on gunners, by removing them from the equation entirely; though non-disintegrating links are certainly less wasteful, the retention and re-usage of spent links in training exercises, on top of the clear advantages of disintegrating links, mean that the Anemonian Armed Forces are able to minimise wastefulness while maximising combat efficiency by putting practical, battlefield necessities first. Usually, these linked belts are employed in 120 round containers; the container is fixed to the bottom of the receiver assembly, in front of the trigger unit, and ammunition is fed through the left side of the receiver while spent cartridges and links are ejected out of the port on the right hand side. The container itself began as a sheet metal box with the initial production variants issued with the MG3; with the advent of the MG3R1, however, the sheet metal was replaced by lighter fibreglass, reinforced in areas by metal instead to keep down the weight of the weapon.
In terms of ironsights, the sights used by the MG3 present a clear improvement over those of the AR3. Unlike the AR3R1, the MG3 was not designed with point shooting in mind; as such, the two-stage differing diameter rear diopter arrangement used in the AR3 was dropped in favour of a simpler, single diopter unit, attached to the Rail Interface System on the flat top of the upper receiver. The diameter of the rear diopter was increased, both to reflect the fact that this was an automatic weapon and to increase target acquisition speeds. Furthermore this, together with modifications made to the front post, slightly heightened the aiming profile of the MG3R1 in comparison to the AR3R1, helping to permit a more comfortable shooting position. Both the rear and front posts are foldable, in order to permit use with optics, and the windage dials on the rear diopter have been enlarged in comparison to those of the AR3R1 to improve their accessibility and usability in battlefield conditions. Photo-luminescent highlights are used on the central prong of the front post and the ghost ring of the rear diopter to permit the effective use of ironsights in night combat; though the MG3R1 is generally used with combat optics in more recent times, the retention of effective ironsights is seen to be vital in modern Anemonian combat doctrine due to their infallibility in comparison to electronic systems. When in use with optics, the MG3R1's role as a medium range weapon means that it is almost always employed with the ICO-M combat gunsight.
Ergonomically, the MG3R1 is a very simple weapon. Refraining from using the gimmicks so commonly found on modern weapons, the MG3 concentrates on striking a balance between mechanical simplicity and combat effectiveness in its ergonomic layout. The pistol grip of the weapon, constructed out of fibreglass, is textured to increase grip; this allows it to be used over long durations of time in high intensity combat without fear of inadvertently losing the weapon to a momentary lack of concentration and sweat. The wide trigger guard of the AR3R1 was retained due to its size and consequent ability to accommodate gloved fingers. Similarly, the slide selector used by the AR3R1 is retained on the MG3R1; in this case, automatic is left at the end to allow gunners to quickly shift to automatic fire without thinking by pushing the slide selector until it cannot be pushed any further, with semi-automatic left in the middle in the event that it is required; the selector switch itself is textured to increase grip and thus usability. It's unusual placement has drawn criticism; however, its can be cycled using nothing but the thumb and index finger (the slide selector is ambidextrous); as such, it can be completely operated from a firing position, giving it an edge over most contemporary selector arrangements. The charging handle is located slightly forwards; ambidextrous, as well as being textured and molded to maximise usability, it is position so as to permit easy access and cycling from a standard firing position. In terms of grip, the MG3R1 is problematic in that the handguard arrangement creates a great degree of heat dissipation from the vents in the guard itself, making it impossible to use as a place for the right hand to grip. Two options exist; firstly, as the bipod is fixed in position by a lock (on the actual attachment mechanism, which is disengaged by twisting is), the bipod itself can be used when folded as a rigid handguard. Secondly, however, the MG3R1 comes with a foldable carrying handle which can be locked in position; the rubber grip ensures maximum usability, greatly increasing the MG3R1's effectiveness when fired from the hip. Finally, the stock itself features two innovative aspects of design; firstly, the hydraulic buffer and rubber buttstock absorb recoil forces before transferring them to the gunner's shoulder, making the weapon far more comfortable to fire, and if the hydraulic buffer and butt assembly are removed, an adjustable weight system exists within the MG3R1's butt in order to allow individual gunner to customise the weight balance and distribution of their weapon to their specifications.
Overall, the MG3 is no normal machine gun. Beginning its career as a high performance weapon, the MG3R1 upgrade built upon this without hesitation, wholly redesigning the recoil management, weight distribution, heat dissipation, ergonomic qualities and logistical viability of the MG3 platform in a number of highly innovative and striking ways to create a uniquely effective, powerful and usable general purpose machine gun for the 21st century; from squad support to anti-aircraft fire, the Arsenal Deimos MG3R1 7.7mm General Purpose Machine Gun will easily rival and surpass its purpose designed compatriots from the 21st century through a combination of highly effective design and even more effective upgrades that not only give the MG3R1 a lease of life well beyond most, but combat effectiveness that outstrips its modern competitors with ease.