A range I frequented had a Russian PPSh as a rental. One day they let me clean it. Amazing that something so simple and inexpensively made worked so well. Absolutely nothing to it.
It's not surprising that due to the simple construction the Austrian army was still using these for some of its paratrooper units in the early 2000s. (Also huge amounts of Soviet WW2 surplus Tokarev ammo donated to the newly formed army in the 1950ies didn't exactly hurt...) As a matter of fact, I am pretty sure they were only retired mid 2000s, because the supply of Tokarev ammo had finally dried up.
@@gregsochor Are you sure about that? The PPSh is equivalent to a fixed stock AK in size and weight, and has a high rate of fire with limited magazine cross-compatibility. It hardly seems suited for paratroopers. I also couldn’t find any sources or pictures to confirm it. Almost any other WW2 SMG, the M1 carbine, or the AUG adopted in the 70s, seem like a better choice.
I believe you meant the MP40 magazine is double stack, single feed. A single stack, double feed magazine would be quite strange. A lovely video as ever though Ian, thank you!
@@justforever96 as one of the first to reply, there were like 8 other comments talking about it. I didn't criticize Ian. And yes I know what humor is, do you know what bullying is? I didn't say anything unreasonable, but you decided to insult & condescend me.
German gunsmith: as you requested, we're going to make some PPSH-Mp40 hybrids. German soldier: Using the best of both designs, right? Gg: ... Gs: Using the best of both designs, RIGHT?
It came down to ammunition supplies I suspect. No point using ppsh magazines when your not producing tokarev ammo. Had the Russians been asked to do this they'd have used the mp40 with the ppsh magazine, admittedly after having had the soldiers who dared suggest the ppsh wasn't already perfect shot for treason.
@@cgi2002 Germany was producing Tokarev ammo, or close enough. The 7.63 Mauser was dimensionally identical to the 7.62 Tokarev, just with a slightly less powerful charge
@@salvadorsempere1701 That is beside the point. Ian made it quite clear that it was logistically impossible to create an MPi 40 that could take the longer Tokarev ammo. Mechanically, certainly, but from a production standpoint, not at all.
if there's one thing I've learned about guns through watching this series, its that Magazine design is WAAAY more important then us everyday plebs realize, the thing that exists in our brains to be the cool part of gun reload animations in video games actually has a ton of mechanical importance towards a guns successful use despite it having the least amount of moving parts.
I remember when I was a kid watching old war movies that I saw a belt fed machine gun then I got it in my head that a box style magazine would also get "eaten" by the gun. For video gamers I imagine a lot of kids think the ammunition magically get's teleported from one mag to another every time you reload with a partially empty magazine.
A example of how we just don't think about magazines despite their crucialness: the Box Magazines of the Lee Rifle that would become the famous SMLE of British military fame. Most people know that it took nearly twenty years to really perfect the practical and durable military rifle that was the SMLE (the Mark III finalized only in 1907 after initial work in 1886-87). Not so many catch how often the box magazine design was independently tweaked to resolve problems with durability, expense, and more. That little box was still causing problems even in the 1930s, but you'd never hear about it that because it was not as dramatic as problems like the charger feed system breaking on the Mark I Enfield rifles or the Metford sights being calibrated incorrectly.
@@burnsboysaresoldiers the glock mags are one of the worst mags in mass production today. They're so ubiquitous in use for non glock guns because everyone owns a glock, not because glock mags are their first pick
Reminds me that its about time I watched my all time favourite war movie again; Cross of Iron from 1977. Steiner (James Coburn), plus a few of his men, use looted PPSh-41s, though they use drum mags so not converted as the drum wouldn't fit if they were. Great film.
Hell yes. Great film with James Coburn at his shark-grinned best! And funnily enough for an adaption of a novel, it's in some ways (structure and pacing), better than the original. Full of great lines; "I believe God is a sadist, but probably doesn't even know it". Definitely time to watch it again!!
Ian had another video about a converted STEN that was a lend lease from Canada to China that ended up in Vietnam, captured by confused and angry Australians who had been shot by it. The conversion apparently is simpler than you think. If I remember correctly the only change the Chinese had to make to the STEN out of the box was to replace the barrels, a task they were able to do easily. I forget the video, but its a STEN one.
@@Hamun002 the M3 grease Gun also had a conversion kit from .45 acp to 9mm. Ive never seen a Greasgun fire 9mm but always been curious what the rate of fire was since the Bolt is the heaviest part of the Gun.
"The MP41 magazine was single-stack, double-feed..." Hm. That would really be an interesting, and totally impractical, gun. (The HK SL-8 civilian rifle based on the G-36 AFAIK has something like this, a single-stack magazine that was developed from the Mil-Spec G36 magazines - but this is deliberate to "demilitarise" it.)
@@ИнжирИнженеров Actually the "lethatlity" is pretty similar, one makes a bigger hole, other is faster, the difference in energy is not big at all. Tokarev cartridge was generally pretty damn good for SMG duty thanks to better ballistics, penetration with no increase in recoil.
Watched the video but I still don't get why the MP41(r) was a 'better' weapon (according to the Germans who designed/made it) , what is the advantage of that hodge podge weapon over the MP-40 ?
Am i the only one who immediately noticed that the PPSH-41 has a early upper with the early tangent rearsight but a late war lower with the reinforced extentions?
it's not realy interesting . mauser had a patent on double stack double feed magazines so other companies had to avoid it. Incase you're curious the Mauser patent was for the magazine on the full auto version of the C96 (aswell as the trenchcarbine from ww1 since the magazine of the former is based on the later)
@@herocommand That's what Ian said in the video for MP28, but I have checked the patent databases and now believe it's incorrect. There are two German patents on the M712 Schnellfeur and neither of them mentions a double-feed magazine which was almost definitely prior art by 1930 when the first one was filed (its English version is US1980874A, it mentions detachable magazine and its hold-open but not the feed type; the later one is just about the FCG). In fact Erma used double-feed mag with no problems in the same time period. The conventional explanation that is all over the literature is that Schmeisser simply lobbied German military (not unlikely with presents and bribes; maybe Haenel managers also had a hand in it) to require the usage of his patented mag design in the new SMG-which was not what Erma and other co-developers were wishing to do, but they had to
The Germans also had an adoption designation for plain captured PPsh-41s that were also fielded for military use and they were able to feed it without needing Soviet ammunition because 7.63 Mauser is dimensionally identical to 7.62 Tokarev and was still hot enough to run the gun reliably. So the Germans just produced 7.63 Mauser and fed their captured Soviet guns with it.
@@antiheldd.3081 Feeding two bullets from one stack simultaneously... "Ja, Hans, das ist working as intended, natürlich. Let us move to das Weltraumzaubereiclockworkgewehr-11." :D
Yeah they used whatever they could get. They not only needed to arm nearly their entire male population, but also millions of volunteers from other European nations. They sent arms to some of their allies too.
If you look at some of the footage of the German Volksturm marching in berlin,they are carrying an extraordinary assortment of weapons, one famous clip shows someone carrying a WW1 Lewis Gun.
It would be interesting to see a video talking about how many guns were captured by each side during the war, 10 000 subs of just one model alone sounds like a huge catch!
I have a PPSh BFONG(Blank Firing Only Non Gun) I use for WW2 reenacting. I fitted one of the Inter Ordinance reproduction magazine adapters to it and it runs fine with original MP-40 magazines.
@@coltpiecemaker Actually, blank adapted firearms are very finicky compared to firing live rounds. Everything has to be just right. Blank-adapting can be more of an art rather then a science. I've been doing it for over 20 years and it can be very challenging and frustrating at times.
I wonder if you could make this into a quick-change system. Make the magazine block lock in place using the PPSH mag catch, replace the picot pin with some kind of heavy duty pull pin. Then both could be removed and the barrel replaced with no tools. Admittedly idk how the PPSH mag catch works so idk if it's possible. There would also be no point in doing it now. But my bored engineering brain just wonders if it would be possible. It would make for a pretty solid survival rifle for a loner on the eastern front. Able to use any SMG ammo you find
Colt's CM901 is an AR-10 that has a magazine well insert that you can drop in, which allows you to swap the upper and change the buffer spring/weight to convert the rifle to 5.56 in less than 30 seconds.
@@nercksrule yes but there are several modern guns that can do that. The MDR has a similar insert and I believe just requires the bolt and barrel to be swapped. For something comparable in modern day I think it would need to be something that could take both AK and AR magazines, and I think that would be a much more difficult hot-swap lol
Goethe said that when comparing yourself to others, you tend to only see the qualities they have over you and automatically assume that they also have all your qualities as well. So you always feel inferior.
The main reason for the German adoption of firearms like these was that the Wehrmacht had a chronic shortage of small arms (particularly submachineguns) throughout the war. And conversion from the 7.62 x 25 mm Tokarev to the 9 mm Parabellum cartridge made sense because this was the standard pistol and submachinegun cartridge in the German armed services thereby simplifying logistics.
Then the USA had the same problem, if Thompson and Grease gun were made in similar numbers like MP 40 and Stg. They didn't have shortage, MG 34 was produced in bigger numbers than M 1919. Kar rifle also, bigger number than Garand. Soviets made 6 million PPSH's, and still used captured MP 40. Reason is that, if you capture thousands of enemy weapons, you would use them to bring additional firepower. Can you tell me from which book your info is coming from?
@@nikolagosaric3039 Nikola, the Wehrmacht was very well equipped at the beginning of the war -- the best of any major combatant. However, as the war dragged on, (especially from 1943 onward) staggering German battlefield losses particularly in the USSR resulted in chronic shortages of almost everything one could think of: men, gasoline, strategic metals (like aluminum), tanks, small arms, etc. This is talked about ad nauseum in many texts, but W. Darrin Weaver's "Desperate Measures" details specifically the acute small arms shortages Germany faced especially during latter half of the war and the measures used to equip a Volkssturm for the final defense of the German Reich. The U.S. really never had a shortage of anything and, in fact, had surpluses of men, equipment and material much of which they were able to ship to Allies, especially the Soviet Union. Some of the weapons captured by the Americans were undoubtedly used to fight the war, but many (if not most) small arms were prized by US GIs and most often taken back to the USA as souvenirs.
@@maxfaxdude There was no lack of aluminium since largest reserves with 250 000 000 tons were in Hungary and additional in Yugoslavia. Wehrmacht was not even close to being best equipped by 1939. since it started to build army from 1936. Add to that lack od foreign exchange. USA did not have need to mobilize as much men as they needed since Red army tied down most of Wehrmacht. So Wedemeyer's plan about 200 divisions was not out into effect. Even then USA started Braccero program to recruit Mexican workers. Also there was shortage of tungsten, it is mentioned in Zaloga's book. And at Kursk Luftwaffe flew more sorties than Red air force. Wehrmacht reached strength of 9,8 million by 1943. Out of that Heer was again on 3.1 million. So no, there was no shortage of everything.
Got 2 PPSH parts kits laying around was gonna build 1 in 7.62x25 as an original SBR and the other into one of these to keep it somewhat historical but still shooting 9mm
I own one of the adapters but not the barrel. Ive also heard that they used the 7.63×25mm Mauser but it was hard to obtain enough supplies of that cartridge.
A friend has a PPSH semi-auto kit gun with one of these adapters. Funnily enough, the barrel on IT is a machined down barrel from a semi-auto MP40 replica! History has cycles, apparently.
I can't be the only one who thought when Ian said "the best thing to do was put PPsh drum magazines onto an MP40" of the cursed and over powered weapon that was exactly that in world at war.
I tmakes sense that the Germans would do this conversion. They'd captured piles of these weapons. In addition, thousands of German troops were picking them up on the battlefield to replace their standard bolt action rifles. Why not standardize a perfectly good weapon already in widespread use?
I think it’s funny when people talk about the enemy’s gun being more reliable. The people saying this typically lack the same level of experience with it as their enemy does. You gotta think even if your gun jams a ton, all the enemy usually sees is you ducking behind cover. To them your gun is perfectly reliable compared to theirs.
there was a lot of german smgs being used by tankers, though I read an anicdote that one tried equipping an mg40 and almost got shot up by friendly troops out of instinct so ditched that
When I first learned about this thing I figured it was a late war implement made out of desperation. The logic being: "Hey we have a bunch of these captured PPSH's, why not convert them to use MP40 mags that so we can issue them to troops (particularly Volkstruum units) without having to worry about logistics (as much)? This can also save money/resources that it would take to make new submachine guns from scratch."
IIRC this wasn't a late war desperation move. I think in '42 when some of the huge stock of captured war booty from the entire Soviet armies that were defeated during Barbarossa started being moved back to Germany. The Germans were always interested/needed to absorb and reuse anything they captured. Starting with Czechoslovakia all the way to using captured Shermans in the final months of the war.
I think I read the Germans short loaded those MP 40 mags for better reliability. Not sure the Russian gun retains it's superiority, real or imagined with the loss of the Russian cartridge?
Dammit! Ian had me, i was like "that's a PPSH." Then Ian says it's German. And i am like WTF?!? How did i get that wrong. Only to find out it IS a PPSH. What a roller coaster ride, and only 30 seconds into the video.
Actually there is a difference between the MP-717(r) and the MP-41(r). The MP-41(r) as shown its an converted PPSH compadable with 9mm but the MP-717(r) are just regular PPSH just with the use of the 7.63x25 Mauser cartridge ,that is used in the C96 Broomhandle, which is nearly identical to the 7.62x25 Tokarev.
So they do some testing and find out that the best of both worlds would be an MP40 with PPSh drum (and/or stick) magazines... why exactly did they go on to build the worst of both worlds converting PPSh's to MP40 magazines? I feel like I missed something here.
I assume it had to do with how much easier it was to convert the PPSh to use MP40 mags, as well as how said mags were already in production, whereas converting an MP40 would take more work and retooled production to start making the drums, plus the ammo
Logisticals and maybe a way for someone to say that we tried it, didn't work, stop bothering us whit this low quality russian crap and let's get back to our own quality german equipment.
It's worth mentioning that drum magazines are very impractical compared to stick magazines. It's possible that after going over the possible benefits of equipping troops with new drum magazines, they reached the conclusion that it simply wasn't worth it. You have to create new parts for the drum to attach to the weapon, create new webbing for your infantry to carry the drums. Those new weapons with drum adapters are likely no longer able to take normal stick magazines without replacing parts, which wouldn't be possible in combat. Also, the weight of drum magazines can't be understated. 70 9mm rounds hanging off the end of a mp40 would make it very front heavy.
They had a bunch of captured PPSh-41 they wanted to convert to 9mm. They figured it was easier to use an existing 9mm mag than to covert the captured drums or make new drums. It is not meant to be a perfect SMG, it is a resource saving measure using captured guns. Also I read a German report that said the drum mag was such a signature of the Soviets that Germans using them were likely to be shot by their own side.
*Almost* a sensible use of resources - cheap and easy to convert, using existing magazines. Except for being an addition to an already stressed logistics system.
@@nuraly78 9*19 have better ballistic at range than 7.62*25 When USSR was choosing it's pistol/SMG ammo back in early 20th century 9*19 won the trials and 7.62*25 was chosen due to production capabilities (attempt to use defect mosin riffle barrels for pistols and smgs)
@@nuraly78 9mm actually has more accuracy and better stopping power. Remember, 9mm parabellum is still used today and is the most common pistol caliber around the world.
*Slow facepalm* "They have a better magazine while we have a better gun, so we will make their gun with our magazine." If that isn't military logic in a nutshell i don't know what is.
I heard that the idea of this conversion turned out to be redundant because the Germans had captured a lot of Soviet ammunition, so they were free to use the original Soviet weapons.
"The enemy's gun was better" Funny how that works, when I played Counter Strike back in the day, the AK was for terrorists, the M4 was for the counter terrorists. I would always want the other side's weapon as it was better, regardless of which side I played... Same psychological effect combined with the placebo effect I guess.
I have an M91 Mosin that was converted to 8mm Mauser. Always wondered why Germany bothered converting existing rifles when they didn't offer any advantage over German designs.
It boils down to logistics. Instead of having to tool up and produce so many different calibres of ammunition for weapons captured that could create issues further down the line when trying to distribute them to different units at the front (who could have a hodgepodge of various firearms) it's far easier to keep the pool of the billions of cartridges the same as the standard issue weapons and just tool up some simple inserts/new barrels for weapons and ship them off as a one-time conversion.
Second line units got lots of refurbished or converted material from 1941/42 onwards, thus freeing up standard equipment for the frontline units. You have to make do with what you have. If Hans in Stalingrad needs a 98k, then let Gunther have the Mosin or Steyr in the Balkans.
@@justforever96 I literally answered why the converted them regardless of effectiveness or quality. They had them, needed to use them, easier to supply them with ammunition they're already producing.
Government cartridge conversions are rarely about about the quality of the rifles. They're about having enough rifles firing a standard cartridge. Most M91 conversions to 7.92 Mauser were made in Poland in the 1920s. The Poles had inherited a hodgepodge of Austro-Hungarian, French, German and Russian weapons and ammunition after WW1 and the Polish-Soviet War. The Poles didn't have enough Mauser 98s for all their troops, including reserves. So, as a stopgap, they converted M91s to 7.92x57mm so they could at least simplify their logistics ASAP.
Hey east front reenactor is here. One of the main reasone to use ppsh it's not because ppsh is better then mp, it's because ppsh better then k98k. Germany didn't have enough smg. They captured bunch of russians smg so why dont use it. Great video.
Hmm, I think the rationale behind this conversion is not that "the grass is greener and the SMGs are better on the other side", but that the Third Reich lacked literally EVERYTHING. Naturally, weapons were no exception. That's why they used almost all captured equipment - trucks, tanks, guns, cannons - giving them standardized names (for example, like here, renaming the PPSh-41 to MP-717(r)). And this caliber conversion was done (as I think) just to simplify logistics. After all, you don't have to worry about bringing in different kinds of ammo and magazines for units armed with trophy weapons if those weapons use the same ammunition as your domestically made weapons. But that's just my theory, I could be wrong.
I hope he was given the opportunity to test fire it. I would like to see how much of a difference the firearm displays in rate of fire and recoil impulses, if there even are any differences to be noted at all.
was the gun liked by the troops on the front? did it work reliably? was it a decent success? did it tell the troops on the field that the grass is in fact not as green on the other side as you may believe? i wanted to know more
The PPSH just had a flatter, faster and more powerful round with more range and a double feed mags. If after or before WW2 the Germans just kept with the 7.63x25 Mauser cartridge and maybe an oversized luger. Hot tok like SMG ammo in a MP40 would have been amazing. The 7.62x25 is still myfavorate pistol round although you can only get crudge conversions of PPSH types the 3 types of tok. Standard, CZ and Yugo are all amazing and I would take one any day over a 1911. When in uni a new production Zastava 7.62 tok was my carry gun at 21 with some wood grips and I managed to get 4 mags (hard to find) My uncle has and still has an ungodly amount of SMG tok ammo. I would carry it with one in the chamber and a full mag so 10 rounds of SMG tok ammo. At the range it would pass though both sides of pistol rated armour. Mine was new production with a slide safety so it was ok to carry it loaded. I put some lume dots on the sights and I got realy good at shooting it. It was a heavy lug of steel but since it was so flat it did not print much at all in the winter I would just have it in modified leather millsurp holster than held 2 spare mags. When it was during the summer I would carry a Bulgarian makarov with wood grips. I don't want to waste any tok ammo even though I have creates but a 9mm barrel works just fine in the tok mags. To this day I still dislike sticker fired pistols so I usualy carry some varient or clone of a CZ75 type with the P07 getting alot of carry time. I have ordered a CZ in 7.5FK and it's been in the store for over a year as I have had family matters in the UK but I can't wait to try it.
I am glad that someone has taken up this extremely interesting conversion about which very few details are known. However, not all German modifications to the weapon were listed.....E.g. one more support partition was welded in the front part of the shell, as the MP 40 barrel is much shorter. The front part of the muzzle of the compensator was also modified and above all all the original conversions were marked with a capital letter "D" always in a certain place of the "upper" I have no idea what this letter means, maybe it has something to do with the weapon workshops in KL Dachau, where supposedly these were supposed to be conversions made? Finally, I would like to mention a very little known fact. Not only did the Germans use adapters exclusively for MP 40 mags, but they also converted the original Soviet drum magazines by riveting a spacer sheet ring to the lid and welding new, longer feed lips. These original MP 41r conversions were assembled from various Soviet parts, designs and years but were always renumbered with the new German serial number. I recently posted a set of photos on Warrelics showing a completely original MP.41(r) relic excavated as one of many also in Austria, which has now been expertly restored and all the original and so far unknown details of this weapon are clearly visible. I dare say that 99% of what can be seen on the Internet does not correspond to reality and is fake. Anyway, thanks for this video, I'm glad someone is looking into this as well
Wow, really interesting! Ian, any chance that you can take it to the ranch and show some shooting with this part? Further more - if somebody is questioning his self, what does R in brackets mean - all all foreign pieces off equipment, including tanks and cars, have received German nomenclature, but the country of origin had to be shown by the first letter in brackets after the new ID
So at this point 7.63 mauser is still being produced and used in germany…… this could have had saved time by just throwing in a lighter recoil spring and shipping Mauser ammo to the eastern front so they could use captured soviet smgs….. granted the tokarev cartridge would still be better but change the soring and you could get the rate of fire with mauser ammo
They didn't need to change springs. 7.63x25mm worked fine in both Soviet pistols and SMGs. It's when you try and feed a Mauser C96 a steady diet of 7.62x25mm that you get problems.
Why did the Germans bother to modify the PPSh to use the 9x19mm cartridge when the 7.63×25mm Mauser cartridge was perfectly suitable for the PPSh? By the way, the 7.62×25mm Tokarev is a modification and adaptation of the German 7.63×25mm Mauser cartridge.
the MP717(R) is the designation name for the standard PPSh 41 just loaded with their surplus 7.63x25 mauser ammo also this MP41(R) is even rare cause is a very early production PPSh 41 with tangent rear sight
yeah the MP717 are unconverted PPSH41 germans didnt have whole lot if at all stock of 30 tokarev so they use 30 mauser they are just a PPSH41 with nazi marks on it thats it @@rouxgreasus
I dont think thats entirely the reason why they used soo many ppsh41 but Mainly because it's better than using a kar 98k especially in urban environments,trenches etc.
@William Walker my point is they didn't use the ppsh41 because it was better than the mp40 but instead to use it because it was a better weapon than the standard k98k
@@itsconnorstimeBecause the Germans never managed to make enough standard weapons and ammunition to meet their needs. In some cases it was easier to use existing production lines, throughout Occupied Europe, to make useful but non-standard ammo than it was to convert them to standard types.
I can remember when I was a kid reading Willi Heinrich's novel "Cross of Iron" when I was a boy; it was written in 1955 in German and translated a few years later. I think I read it in the mid-70s. In any case I remember being surprised, because Sgt. Steiner and his men think the Russian SMGs are better than their German guns. Interesting to see they actually converted some, and it would be interesting to hear why they didn't incorporate the design elements into guns they made later in the war, the StG 44 etc.
Could the Sphagin weapon still fire reliably even when cleaned to remove every trace of lubricant? Maybe that feature in the Russian winter was what made the Soviet weapon highly prized. It did not need lubricant that would freeze and lock the gun solid. What sort of chamber pressure difference is there between 7.62 Tokarev & a 9mm Parabellum round? The PPSH had a pretty fast fire rate of 900 rpm. Would that drop or increase?
@@NJPurling 7.63x25 Tokarev cartridge has a slightly higher approved piezo pressure than 9x19 Parabellum cartridge, but the difference is negligible 325 MPA vs. 305.5 MPa. The actual muzzle energy between the commercial variants of any cartridge vary wildly, especially with the much more popular 9x19. In common military use the Tokarev is slightly "hotter" though.
No joke i just finished playing the first Call of Duty game for the first time in like 15 years, and did think about how i'd seen a photo of a partisan modified mp-38 in 7.62 tokarev, but couldn't remember whether i'd heard of a 9mm PPSH. I had that thought sometime in the last 3 days. You are party to the algorithmic conspiracy against me Ian!!!
I’ve said it in other videos: but there’s a free to play FPS videogame that features this gun called “Enlisted”. I swear that either the designers hang out with Ian regularly or he secretly mind controls them… but there’re a TON of Forgotten Weapons in that game.
@@nonyabusinessinc meh, but Enlisted is available on all modern consoles and PC: so it’s good for us poors, but I do plan to eventually get either a PS5 or new PC to eventually play HLL as well: but imo, Enlisted’s squad command system and array of weaponry are both second to none.
@@nonyabusinessinc eh, HLL is not exactly doing great in either realism nor accuracy. Maybe compared to a typical cod or similar but definitely not accurate
A range I frequented had a Russian PPSh as a rental. One day they let me clean it. Amazing that something so simple and inexpensively made worked so well. Absolutely nothing to it.
It's not surprising that due to the simple construction the Austrian army was still using these for some of its paratrooper units in the early 2000s. (Also huge amounts of Soviet WW2 surplus Tokarev ammo donated to the newly formed army in the 1950ies didn't exactly hurt...) As a matter of fact, I am pretty sure they were only retired mid 2000s, because the supply of Tokarev ammo had finally dried up.
@@gregsochor Are you sure about that? The PPSh is equivalent to a fixed stock AK in size and weight, and has a high rate of fire with limited magazine cross-compatibility. It hardly seems suited for paratroopers. I also couldn’t find any sources or pictures to confirm it. Almost any other WW2 SMG, the M1 carbine, or the AUG adopted in the 70s, seem like a better choice.
Ww3 is also gonna bring out alot of cool weapons
@@gregsochor This was 20 something yrs ago. Their most popular rental gun because at the time Tokarev ammo was so cheap.
I got to shoot a Ppsh once and was stunned by how controllable and east to shoot it was.
I believe you meant the MP40 magazine is double stack, single feed. A single stack, double feed magazine would be quite strange.
A lovely video as ever though Ian, thank you!
My brain kind of skidded as well when I heard that. BIG blooper from Ian...I'm surprised he didn't catch it in the edit.
@@petesheppard1709 same LOL
As always, all of Ian's oopsies are corrected in the subtitles.
@@DonIgnacioA ahhhhh! Thanks.
No you are wrong and gun jesus is right
To everyone in the comments, he meant the MP40 and Sten had a double stack, single feed magazine. Google exists people.
@@justforever96 as one of the first to reply, there were like 8 other comments talking about it. I didn't criticize Ian. And yes I know what humor is, do you know what bullying is? I didn't say anything unreasonable, but you decided to insult & condescend me.
German gunsmith: as you requested, we're going to make some PPSH-Mp40 hybrids.
German soldier: Using the best of both designs, right?
Gg: ...
Gs: Using the best of both designs, RIGHT?
@William Walker knowing Ian it's because some documentation suggested exactly that reasoning.
It came down to ammunition supplies I suspect. No point using ppsh magazines when your not producing tokarev ammo. Had the Russians been asked to do this they'd have used the mp40 with the ppsh magazine, admittedly after having had the soldiers who dared suggest the ppsh wasn't already perfect shot for treason.
@@justforever96 Yeah captured so many Russian weapons cuz Russia was such a pathetic mess.
@@cgi2002 Germany was producing Tokarev ammo, or close enough. The 7.63 Mauser was dimensionally identical to the 7.62 Tokarev, just with a slightly less powerful charge
@@salvadorsempere1701 That is beside the point. Ian made it quite clear that it was logistically impossible to create an MPi 40 that could take the longer Tokarev ammo. Mechanically, certainly, but from a production standpoint, not at all.
if there's one thing I've learned about guns through watching this series, its that Magazine design is WAAAY more important then us everyday plebs realize, the thing that exists in our brains to be the cool part of gun reload animations in video games actually has a ton of mechanical importance towards a guns successful use despite it having the least amount of moving parts.
I remember when I was a kid watching old war movies that I saw a belt fed machine gun then I got it in my head that a box style magazine would also get "eaten" by the gun. For video gamers I imagine a lot of kids think the ammunition magically get's teleported from one mag to another every time you reload with a partially empty magazine.
Heck that's why the Glock is special. It's not the gun itself. Other guns meet and exceed it. Its the Glock magazine that is the secret sauce
A example of how we just don't think about magazines despite their crucialness: the Box Magazines of the Lee Rifle that would become the famous SMLE of British military fame. Most people know that it took nearly twenty years to really perfect the practical and durable military rifle that was the SMLE (the Mark III finalized only in 1907 after initial work in 1886-87). Not so many catch how often the box magazine design was independently tweaked to resolve problems with durability, expense, and more. That little box was still causing problems even in the 1930s, but you'd never hear about it that because it was not as dramatic as problems like the charger feed system breaking on the Mark I Enfield rifles or the Metford sights being calibrated incorrectly.
Yup. Think about how important feeding is to us, and you'll see why nature gave us a more complex mouth and throat than, uh, the end that "shoots."
@@burnsboysaresoldiers the glock mags are one of the worst mags in mass production today. They're so ubiquitous in use for non glock guns because everyone owns a glock, not because glock mags are their first pick
Reminds me that its about time I watched my all time favourite war movie again; Cross of Iron from 1977. Steiner (James Coburn), plus a few of his men, use looted PPSh-41s, though they use drum mags so not converted as the drum wouldn't fit if they were. Great film.
👍 Great cast there.
Hell yes. Great film with James Coburn at his shark-grinned best! And funnily enough for an adaption of a novel, it's in some ways (structure and pacing), better than the original. Full of great lines; "I believe God is a sadist, but probably doesn't even know it". Definitely time to watch it again!!
Too bad they ran out of money for the ending though.
Absolutely cracking war film👍
One of the best..."I'll show you where the Iron Crosses grow"...
I wonder how the rate of fire and recoil are affected by the change from 7.62x25 to 9x19.
Ian had another video about a converted STEN that was a lend lease from Canada to China that ended up in Vietnam, captured by confused and angry Australians who had been shot by it.
The conversion apparently is simpler than you think. If I remember correctly the only change the Chinese had to make to the STEN out of the box was to replace the barrels, a task they were able to do easily.
I forget the video, but its a STEN one.
It'll have About 20% less rearward energy in 9mm
@@Hamun002 the M3 grease Gun also had a conversion kit from .45 acp to 9mm. Ive never seen a Greasgun fire 9mm but always been curious what the rate of fire was since the Bolt is the heaviest part of the Gun.
@@agoogleaccount2861 but is it in the same rpm as a non-converted PPSH?
@@noahboat580 nah ..it'd be slower firing than the 7.62 I'd think
"The MP41 magazine was single-stack, double-feed..."
Hm. That would really be an interesting, and totally impractical, gun.
(The HK SL-8 civilian rifle based on the G-36 AFAIK has something like this, a single-stack magazine that was developed from the Mil-Spec G36 magazines - but this is deliberate to "demilitarise" it.)
Gonna say it: I like the HL SL-8. And as far as I know, it can't accept the G36 magazine without modifications.
I caught that too. haha
@@ianfinrir8724 Depends on SL-8. There were couple versions of them. I have early one SL-8 which accepts G36 mags without problem.
Once again, Ian gets to live out all our fancies and handle another unique forgotten weapon. One wonders if the rate of fire was comparable.
I thought the same, bolt is unchanged isn't it so I guess so
@@marcraygun6290 probably altered a little by the different cartridge pressure
@@alinaqi9862 maybe not because 9x19 is lower pressure than 7.62x25
@@ИнжирИнженеров Actually the "lethatlity" is pretty similar, one makes a bigger hole, other is faster, the difference in energy is not big at all. Tokarev cartridge was generally pretty damn good for SMG duty thanks to better ballistics, penetration with no increase in recoil.
Watched the video but I still don't get why the MP41(r) was a 'better' weapon (according to the Germans who designed/made it) , what is the advantage of that hodge podge weapon over the MP-40 ?
For ppl wondering about the rear sights. That is an early production sights. Which is really cool too see, especially when it's converted to fire 9MM.
There’s a few different variants of Ppsh but the Soviet’s never designated the differences, much like the T34s.
One of the things i love about running a gun channel is getting amazing opportunities to see incredible pieces like this, from all around the world
Am i the only one who immediately noticed that the PPSH-41 has a early upper with the early tangent rearsight but a late war lower with the reinforced extentions?
Well it'd make sense if it was a wierd parts kit, which it is
Ian's next book is going to be about the MP40 magazine and its patent issues 👍
Now I really want to know what the patent issues are. I suspect it's the Bergman MP18/21 and Hugo Schmiesser at the heart of the matter.
it's not realy interesting . mauser had a patent on double stack double feed magazines so other companies had to avoid it. Incase you're curious the Mauser patent was for the magazine on the full auto version of the C96 (aswell as the trenchcarbine from ww1 since the magazine of the former is based on the later)
@@herocommand That's what Ian said in the video for MP28, but I have checked the patent databases and now believe it's incorrect. There are two German patents on the M712 Schnellfeur and neither of them mentions a double-feed magazine which was almost definitely prior art by 1930 when the first one was filed (its English version is US1980874A, it mentions detachable magazine and its hold-open but not the feed type; the later one is just about the FCG). In fact Erma used double-feed mag with no problems in the same time period.
The conventional explanation that is all over the literature is that Schmeisser simply lobbied German military (not unlikely with presents and bribes; maybe Haenel managers also had a hand in it) to require the usage of his patented mag design in the new SMG-which was not what Erma and other co-developers were wishing to do, but they had to
@@ain92ru That sounds very Third Reich 🤦🏻♂️
The Germans also had an adoption designation for plain captured PPsh-41s that were also fielded for military use and they were able to feed it without needing Soviet ammunition because 7.63 Mauser is dimensionally identical to 7.62 Tokarev and was still hot enough to run the gun reliably. So the Germans just produced 7.63 Mauser and fed their captured Soviet guns with it.
1:31 wait a moment... "single-stack double-feed"? Shouldn't that be the other way around?
"German science is the world's finest" Don't question it :)
I wondered what that would look like, maybe like someone who skips legday?
@@antiheldd.3081 Feeding two bullets from one stack simultaneously... "Ja, Hans, das ist working as intended, natürlich. Let us move to das Weltraumzaubereiclockworkgewehr-11." :D
The other way around? Like double-feed single-stack?
@@antiheldd.3081 "Of course! Don't you know how science works?" Hitler (probably)
Its gutting that its so rare, cause a ppsh in 9x19 would be a dream range toy
I’d rock one of those in 7.62 Tok for home defense any day-especially with the Suomi drum 😎
5:29 go home bolt you are free
I always found it interesting how the Germans used all of the equipment that they captured.
Yeah they used whatever they could get. They not only needed to arm nearly their entire male population, but also millions of volunteers from other European nations. They sent arms to some of their allies too.
"Waste not, want not."
I imagine it was by necessity at some point. The Allies kept blowing up all of their factories.
Their whole military was a total mess of random equipment from all over the place, from the beginning of the war, so they were used to it :)
If you look at some of the footage of the German Volksturm marching in berlin,they are carrying an extraordinary assortment of weapons, one famous clip shows someone carrying a WW1 Lewis Gun.
It would be interesting to see a video talking about how many guns were captured by each side during the war, 10 000 subs of just one model alone sounds like a huge catch!
I have a PPSh BFONG(Blank Firing Only Non Gun) I use for WW2 reenacting. I fitted one of the Inter Ordinance reproduction magazine adapters to it and it runs fine with original MP-40 magazines.
That's neat. Given that it only fires blanks, no changes are needed for the barrel, so it makes sense that it runs.
@@coltpiecemaker Actually, blank adapted firearms are very finicky compared to firing live rounds. Everything has to be just right. Blank-adapting can be more of an art rather then a science. I've been doing it for over 20 years and it can be very challenging and frustrating at times.
@@johnmcdonald587 Huh, interesting. All the more strange then!
I have the same one as well!
I wonder if you could make this into a quick-change system. Make the magazine block lock in place using the PPSH mag catch, replace the picot pin with some kind of heavy duty pull pin. Then both could be removed and the barrel replaced with no tools. Admittedly idk how the PPSH mag catch works so idk if it's possible. There would also be no point in doing it now. But my bored engineering brain just wonders if it would be possible. It would make for a pretty solid survival rifle for a loner on the eastern front. Able to use any SMG ammo you find
I've seen as such. It was 3 caliber setup
Colt's CM901 is an AR-10 that has a magazine well insert that you can drop in, which allows you to swap the upper and change the buffer spring/weight to convert the rifle to 5.56 in less than 30 seconds.
@@nercksrule yes but there are several modern guns that can do that. The MDR has a similar insert and I believe just requires the bolt and barrel to be swapped. For something comparable in modern day I think it would need to be something that could take both AK and AR magazines, and I think that would be a much more difficult hot-swap lol
Goethe said that when comparing yourself to others, you tend to only see the qualities they have over you and automatically assume that they also have all your qualities as well. So you always feel inferior.
A brand new off the presses Forgotten Weapons video. Perfect way to begin the day ❤
Where as, I am downloading it to watch when I get up and get ready for work tonight. 😉
I love doing that.
We have to take care of this planet because is where Ian McCollum lives.
The main reason for the German adoption of firearms like these was that the Wehrmacht had a chronic shortage of small arms (particularly submachineguns) throughout the war. And conversion from the 7.62 x 25 mm Tokarev to the 9 mm Parabellum cartridge made sense because this was the standard pistol and submachinegun cartridge in the German armed services thereby simplifying logistics.
Then the USA had the same problem, if Thompson and Grease gun were made in similar numbers like MP 40 and Stg.
They didn't have shortage, MG 34 was produced in bigger numbers than M 1919. Kar rifle also, bigger number than Garand.
Soviets made 6 million PPSH's, and still used captured MP 40.
Reason is that, if you capture thousands of enemy weapons, you would use them to bring additional firepower. Can you tell me from which book your info is coming from?
@@nikolagosaric3039 Nikola, the Wehrmacht was very well equipped at the beginning of the war -- the best of any major combatant. However, as the war dragged on, (especially from 1943 onward) staggering German battlefield losses particularly in the USSR resulted in chronic shortages of almost everything one could think of: men, gasoline, strategic metals (like aluminum), tanks, small arms, etc. This is talked about ad nauseum in many texts, but W. Darrin Weaver's "Desperate Measures" details specifically the acute small arms shortages Germany faced especially during latter half of the war and the measures used to equip a Volkssturm for the final defense of the German Reich. The U.S. really never had a shortage of anything and, in fact, had surpluses of men, equipment and material much of which they were able to ship to Allies, especially the Soviet Union. Some of the weapons captured by the Americans were undoubtedly used to fight the war, but many (if not most) small arms were prized by US GIs and most often taken back to the USA as souvenirs.
@@maxfaxdude There was no lack of aluminium since largest reserves with 250 000 000 tons were in Hungary and additional in Yugoslavia. Wehrmacht was not even close to being best equipped by 1939. since it started to build army from 1936. Add to that lack od foreign exchange.
USA did not have need to mobilize as much men as they needed since Red army tied down most of Wehrmacht. So Wedemeyer's plan about 200 divisions was not out into effect. Even then USA started Braccero program to recruit Mexican workers.
Also there was shortage of tungsten, it is mentioned in Zaloga's book.
And at Kursk Luftwaffe flew more sorties than Red air force.
Wehrmacht reached strength of 9,8 million by 1943.
Out of that Heer was again on 3.1 million.
So no, there was no shortage of everything.
Got 2 PPSH parts kits laying around was gonna build 1 in 7.62x25 as an original SBR and the other into one of these to keep it somewhat historical but still shooting 9mm
Most likely this conversion was more viable for production cost and resources. Otherwise the MP40-PPSh magazine would have been made instead.
Cool piece of history. Never knew that conversion ever existed.
I own one of the adapters but not the barrel. Ive also heard that they used the 7.63×25mm Mauser but it was hard to obtain enough supplies of that cartridge.
A friend has a PPSH semi-auto kit gun with one of these adapters. Funnily enough, the barrel on IT is a machined down barrel from a semi-auto MP40 replica!
History has cycles, apparently.
I can't be the only one who thought when Ian said "the best thing to do was put PPsh drum magazines onto an MP40" of the cursed and over powered weapon that was exactly that in world at war.
I tmakes sense that the Germans would do this conversion. They'd captured piles of these weapons. In addition, thousands of German troops were picking them up on the battlefield to replace their standard bolt action rifles. Why not standardize a perfectly good weapon already in widespread use?
Except they had 7.63 mauser round in the system already. It is compatible with pssh so no need for the conversion
Who makes the reproductions? Id love to try and get my hands on one.
Now this makes me wonder if the Germans made any MP40s with the PPSH style of magazine.
I think it’s funny when people talk about the enemy’s gun being more reliable. The people saying this typically lack the same level of experience with it as their enemy does.
You gotta think even if your gun jams a ton, all the enemy usually sees is you ducking behind cover. To them your gun is perfectly reliable compared to theirs.
there was a lot of german smgs being used by tankers, though I read an anicdote that one tried equipping an mg40 and almost got shot up by friendly troops out of instinct so ditched that
1:32 pretty sure it’s double stack, single feed @Forgotten Weapons Ian? 😄
Interesting video, thanks.
I am assuming the single stack double feed comment was in error. I know the Germans liked their compliacted machines but sheesh.
When I first learned about this thing I figured it was a late war implement made out of desperation. The logic being: "Hey we have a bunch of these captured PPSH's, why not convert them to use MP40 mags that so we can issue them to troops (particularly Volkstruum units) without having to worry about logistics (as much)? This can also save money/resources that it would take to make new submachine guns from scratch."
IIRC this wasn't a late war desperation move. I think in '42 when some of the huge stock of captured war booty from the entire Soviet armies that were defeated during Barbarossa started being moved back to Germany.
The Germans were always interested/needed to absorb and reuse anything they captured. Starting with Czechoslovakia all the way to using captured Shermans in the final months of the war.
Thanks for the Video ,Had no idea of the conversion
I think I read the Germans short loaded those MP 40 mags for better reliability. Not sure the Russian gun retains it's superiority, real or imagined with the loss of the Russian cartridge?
Dammit! Ian had me, i was like "that's a PPSH." Then Ian says it's German. And i am like WTF?!? How did i get that wrong. Only to find out it IS a PPSH. What a roller coaster ride, and only 30 seconds into the video.
I’ve been looking forward to this video. I always thought this conversion was fascinating
There is literally a photo of a German soldier in Stalingrad with this converted rifle. A little piece of forgotten history.
The PPSh was a cool rifle, but not as good as it could have been. It could have been the AK :)
Actually there is a difference between the MP-717(r) and the MP-41(r). The MP-41(r) as shown its an converted PPSH compadable with 9mm but the MP-717(r) are just regular PPSH just with the use of the 7.63x25 Mauser cartridge ,that is used in the C96 Broomhandle, which is nearly identical to the 7.62x25 Tokarev.
So they do some testing and find out that the best of both worlds would be an MP40 with PPSh drum (and/or stick) magazines...
why exactly did they go on to build the worst of both worlds converting PPSh's to MP40 magazines? I feel like I missed something here.
I assume it had to do with how much easier it was to convert the PPSh to use MP40 mags, as well as how said mags were already in production, whereas converting an MP40 would take more work and retooled production to start making the drums, plus the ammo
Logisticals and maybe a way for someone to say that we tried it, didn't work, stop bothering us whit this low quality russian crap and let's get back to our own quality german equipment.
It's worth mentioning that drum magazines are very impractical compared to stick magazines. It's possible that after going over the possible benefits of equipping troops with new drum magazines, they reached the conclusion that it simply wasn't worth it.
You have to create new parts for the drum to attach to the weapon, create new webbing for your infantry to carry the drums. Those new weapons with drum adapters are likely no longer able to take normal stick magazines without replacing parts, which wouldn't be possible in combat.
Also, the weight of drum magazines can't be understated.
70 9mm rounds hanging off the end of a mp40 would make it very front heavy.
They had a bunch of captured PPSh-41 they wanted to convert to 9mm. They figured it was easier to use an existing 9mm mag than to covert the captured drums or make new drums. It is not meant to be a perfect SMG, it is a resource saving measure using captured guns.
Also I read a German report that said the drum mag was such a signature of the Soviets that Germans using them were likely to be shot by their own side.
Fan of the PPSH, But I’d take the MP-40 over it in my kit any day of the week.
Did the legitimate conversions get any new German markings on them when the conversion was done?
Good old Beutewaffen.
*Almost* a sensible use of resources - cheap and easy to convert, using existing magazines. Except for being an addition to an already stressed logistics system.
It can`t just be me but I really really want to see an MP40 with a working drum magazine.....
My Grandfather had a ppsh and said it was really good on close range.
It is also better than mp-40 in longer distances due to ballistics of 7,62×25
@@nuraly78 PPSh also had a single fire mode, while the MP-40 could only do full auto. This would make firing at a distance easier on a PPSh.
@@DawidKov why would anyone switch to single on ppsh?
@@nuraly78 9*19 have better ballistic at range than 7.62*25
When USSR was choosing it's pistol/SMG ammo back in early 20th century 9*19 won the trials and 7.62*25 was chosen due to production capabilities (attempt to use defect mosin riffle barrels for pistols and smgs)
@@nuraly78 9mm actually has more accuracy and better stopping power. Remember, 9mm parabellum is still used today and is the most common pistol caliber around the world.
*Slow facepalm* "They have a better magazine while we have a better gun, so we will make their gun with our magazine." If that isn't military logic in a nutshell i don't know what is.
I heard that the idea of this conversion turned out to be redundant because the Germans had captured a lot of Soviet ammunition, so they were free to use the original Soviet weapons.
"The enemy's gun was better"
Funny how that works, when I played Counter Strike back in the day, the AK was for terrorists, the M4 was for the counter terrorists.
I would always want the other side's weapon as it was better, regardless of which side I played...
Same psychological effect combined with the placebo effect I guess.
I had no idea they existed.. How awesome
Germans really like converting everyone’s stuff, they Frankenstein’ed the Sten aswell with the MP3008
keep looking ian there are lots of partisan weapons from the patriotic war...
I have an M91 Mosin that was converted to 8mm Mauser. Always wondered why Germany bothered converting existing rifles when they didn't offer any advantage over German designs.
It boils down to logistics. Instead of having to tool up and produce so many different calibres of ammunition for weapons captured that could create issues further down the line when trying to distribute them to different units at the front (who could have a hodgepodge of various firearms) it's far easier to keep the pool of the billions of cartridges the same as the standard issue weapons and just tool up some simple inserts/new barrels for weapons and ship them off as a one-time conversion.
Second line units got lots of refurbished or converted material from 1941/42 onwards, thus freeing up standard equipment for the frontline units. You have to make do with what you have. If Hans in Stalingrad needs a 98k, then let Gunther have the Mosin or Steyr in the Balkans.
@@justforever96 I literally answered why the converted them regardless of effectiveness or quality. They had them, needed to use them, easier to supply them with ammunition they're already producing.
Mosins modified for 7.92x57 were used by the Polish in the pre-war period, perhaps this is one of them
Government cartridge conversions are rarely about about the quality of the rifles. They're about having enough rifles firing a standard cartridge.
Most M91 conversions to 7.92 Mauser were made in Poland in the 1920s. The Poles had inherited a hodgepodge of Austro-Hungarian, French, German and Russian weapons and ammunition after WW1 and the Polish-Soviet War. The Poles didn't have enough Mauser 98s for all their troops, including reserves. So, as a stopgap, they converted M91s to 7.92x57mm so they could at least simplify their logistics ASAP.
Pronounced “Peh-peh-sheh” (ППШ), not “paw-pu-shaw”. Otherwise an excellent review.
Hey east front reenactor is here. One of the main reasone to use ppsh it's not because ppsh is better then mp, it's because ppsh better then k98k. Germany didn't have enough smg. They captured bunch of russians smg so why dont use it. Great video.
I'm gonna call this the Pappa Smurf
Can MP-41(r) fire Russian 7.65mm with its barrel though inaccurate?
Hmm, I think the rationale behind this conversion is not that "the grass is greener and the SMGs are better on the other side", but that the Third Reich lacked literally EVERYTHING. Naturally, weapons were no exception. That's why they used almost all captured equipment - trucks, tanks, guns, cannons - giving them standardized names (for example, like here, renaming the PPSh-41 to MP-717(r)).
And this caliber conversion was done (as I think) just to simplify logistics. After all, you don't have to worry about bringing in different kinds of ammo and magazines for units armed with trophy weapons if those weapons use the same ammunition as your domestically made weapons.
But that's just my theory, I could be wrong.
They need a soviet magazine and a German gun
They got a German magazine and soviet gun
Army logic
Boy, did I get excited when I saw the notification pop up. The simplicity of the conversion is quite un-german in nature.
So call of duty Vanguard customization wasn’t all fiction.
I hope he was given the opportunity to test fire it. I would like to see how much of a difference the firearm displays in rate of fire and recoil impulses, if there even are any differences to be noted at all.
Ian you made a small mistake in description of the mp40 magazine, single stack dubbel feed?
It's insane how little needed to be changed to convert this gun.
was the gun liked by the troops on the front?
did it work reliably? was it a decent success? did it tell the troops on the field that the grass is in fact not as green on the other side as you may believe?
i wanted to know more
Hands up if you love Forgotten Weapons!! 🙌
The difference in design philosophy illustrated by the barrel profiles says it all. Thanks for the content.
It is early modification of PPSh-41, before 1943 year.
So, if that had an original Russian barrel, was it a display only gun?
The PPSH just had a flatter, faster and more powerful round with more range and a double feed mags.
If after or before WW2 the Germans just kept with the 7.63x25 Mauser cartridge and maybe an oversized luger.
Hot tok like SMG ammo in a MP40 would have been amazing.
The 7.62x25 is still myfavorate pistol round although you can only get crudge conversions of PPSH types the 3 types of tok. Standard, CZ and Yugo are all amazing and I would take one any day over a 1911.
When in uni a new production Zastava 7.62 tok was my carry gun at 21 with some wood grips and I managed to get 4 mags (hard to find)
My uncle has and still has an ungodly amount of SMG tok ammo.
I would carry it with one in the chamber and a full mag so 10 rounds of SMG tok ammo.
At the range it would pass though both sides of pistol rated armour.
Mine was new production with a slide safety so it was ok to carry it loaded.
I put some lume dots on the sights and I got realy good at shooting it.
It was a heavy lug of steel but since it was so flat it did not print much at all in the winter I would just have it in modified leather millsurp holster than held 2 spare mags.
When it was during the summer I would carry a Bulgarian makarov with wood grips.
I don't want to waste any tok ammo even though I have creates but a 9mm barrel works just fine in the tok mags.
To this day I still dislike sticker fired pistols so I usualy carry some varient or clone of a CZ75 type with the P07 getting alot of carry time.
I have ordered a CZ in 7.5FK and it's been in the store for over a year as I have had family matters in the UK but I can't wait to try it.
I am glad that someone has taken up this extremely interesting conversion about which very few details are known. However, not all German modifications to the weapon were listed.....E.g. one more support partition was welded in the front part of the shell, as the MP 40 barrel is much shorter. The front part of the muzzle of the compensator was also modified and above all all the original conversions were marked with a capital letter "D" always in a certain place of the "upper" I have no idea what this letter means, maybe it has something to do with the weapon workshops in KL Dachau, where supposedly these were supposed to be conversions made? Finally, I would like to mention a very little known fact. Not only did the Germans use adapters exclusively for MP 40 mags, but they also converted the original Soviet drum magazines by riveting a spacer sheet ring to the lid and welding new, longer feed lips. These original MP 41r conversions were assembled from various Soviet parts, designs and years but were always renumbered with the new German serial number. I recently posted a set of photos on Warrelics showing a completely original MP.41(r) relic excavated as one of many also in Austria, which has now been expertly restored and all the original and so far unknown details of this weapon are clearly visible. I dare say that 99% of what can be seen on the Internet does not correspond to reality and is fake. Anyway, thanks for this video, I'm glad someone is looking into this as well
I did read a report that said that 4000 converted barrels were shipped to a German division for them to carry out the conversions in the field.
just one question: were they take 10000 ppsh in 41?? Cause in rkka they in masses only from end42-43. Thats more interesting thing than other.
Wow, really interesting!
Ian, any chance that you can take it to the ranch and show some shooting with this part?
Further more - if somebody is questioning his self, what does R in brackets mean -
all all foreign pieces off equipment, including tanks and cars, have received German nomenclature, but the country of origin had to be shown by the first letter in brackets after the new ID
So at this point 7.63 mauser is still being produced and used in germany…… this could have had saved time by just throwing in a lighter recoil spring and shipping Mauser ammo to the eastern front so they could use captured soviet smgs….. granted the tokarev cartridge would still be better but change the soring and you could get the rate of fire with mauser ammo
They didn't need to change springs. 7.63x25mm worked fine in both Soviet pistols and SMGs.
It's when you try and feed a Mauser C96 a steady diet of 7.62x25mm that you get problems.
Why did the Germans bother to modify the PPSh to use the 9x19mm cartridge when the 7.63×25mm Mauser cartridge was perfectly suitable for the PPSh?
By the way, the 7.62×25mm Tokarev is a modification and adaptation of the German 7.63×25mm Mauser cartridge.
Because the 9x19mm was their standard pistol cartridge
1:30
Don't you mean "double stack, single feed"? And I thought the Sten used the same magazine as the MP40.
...single stack, double feed??? 🙂
the MP717(R) is the designation name for the standard PPSh 41 just loaded with their surplus 7.63x25 mauser ammo
also this MP41(R) is even rare cause is a very early production PPSh 41 with tangent rear sight
wouldn't 7.63 mess up the rifling of the PPSh? Considering that the Mauser is about 0.01 mm bigger than the Tokarev
@@rouxgreasus seem like no because otherwise Germans would've not issue it I think also the TT pistol can shoot 7,63×25 Mauser no problem
@@222TripleJinteresting
yeah the MP717 are unconverted PPSH41 germans didnt have whole lot if at all stock of 30 tokarev so they use 30 mauser they are just a PPSH41 with nazi marks on it thats it @@rouxgreasus
1:31 "Single stack double feed magazine". That one is new to me, care to explain how it works? 🤣😂🤣
Cool gun. Ian if I remember right you like the browning auto 5
I dont think thats entirely the reason why they used soo many ppsh41 but Mainly because it's better than using a kar 98k especially in urban environments,trenches etc.
@William Walker my point is they didn't use the ppsh41 because it was better than the mp40 but instead to use it because it was a better weapon than the standard k98k
@@ErichHiller44 Still probably thought it was better in terms of mag count (if its drum mag), and firerate (better for suppression and CQC)
Interesting PPSH - Early production upper with late production lower, with German's conversion...
Did the Germans ever issue 7.63 Mauser for captured PPshs? I seen a few references to this but it smells like Fuddlore.
7,63 was already an obsolete. 9mm was adopted before the war.
@@XtreeM_FaiLmakes sense, why bother mass producing an obsolete cartridge for an enemy’s weapon?
@@itsconnorstime And top of that 7,63 Mauser is less powerfull that the 7,62 Tokarev.
@@itsconnorstimeBecause the Germans never managed to make enough standard weapons and ammunition to meet their needs.
In some cases it was easier to use existing production lines, throughout Occupied Europe, to make useful but non-standard ammo than it was to convert them to standard types.
I can remember when I was a kid reading Willi Heinrich's novel "Cross of Iron" when I was a boy; it was written in 1955 in German and translated a few years later. I think I read it in the mid-70s. In any case I remember being surprised, because Sgt. Steiner and his men think the Russian SMGs are better than their German guns. Interesting to see they actually converted some, and it would be interesting to hear why they didn't incorporate the design elements into guns they made later in the war, the StG 44 etc.
Could the Sphagin weapon still fire reliably even when cleaned to remove every trace of lubricant? Maybe that feature in the Russian winter was what made the Soviet weapon highly prized. It did not need lubricant that would freeze and lock the gun solid.
What sort of chamber pressure difference is there between 7.62 Tokarev & a 9mm Parabellum round? The PPSH had a pretty fast fire rate of 900 rpm. Would that drop or increase?
Is that the famous "Steiner counter attack" Steiner?
@@NJPurling 7.63x25 Tokarev cartridge has a slightly higher approved piezo pressure than 9x19 Parabellum cartridge, but the difference is negligible 325 MPA vs. 305.5 MPa. The actual muzzle energy between the commercial variants of any cartridge vary wildly, especially with the much more popular 9x19. In common military use the Tokarev is slightly "hotter" though.
All they had to do was make an MP40 variant with a double feed, double stack mag
When exactly did the PPsh appear on the battlefield? The earliest dates I can find are the battle of Moscow in late 1941.
PPd was used in Finland.
war is the mother of all conversions.
need a Glock magwell adaptor ;)
Single stack double feed 🤔. That is an interesting concept to imagine
I thought they modified them to shoot the 9mm round because they had captured a ton of them but didn't have enough 7.62mm pistol ammunition for them.
The Wehrmacht used 7.63mm Mauser in Soviet pistols and SMGs.
No joke i just finished playing the first Call of Duty game for the first time in like 15 years, and did think about how i'd seen a photo of a partisan modified mp-38 in 7.62 tokarev, but couldn't remember whether i'd heard of a 9mm PPSH. I had that thought sometime in the last 3 days. You are party to the algorithmic conspiracy against me Ian!!!
I’ve said it in other videos: but there’s a free to play FPS videogame that features this gun called “Enlisted”.
I swear that either the designers hang out with Ian regularly or he secretly mind controls them… but there’re a TON of Forgotten Weapons in that game.
Hell let loose is better, worth the cost if you want WWII realism and accuracy.
It's actually not featured in Enlisted yet. MP717(r) is, MP41(r) is currently available only in the editor.
@@nonyabusinessinc meh, but Enlisted is available on all modern consoles and PC: so it’s good for us poors, but I do plan to eventually get either a PS5 or new PC to eventually play HLL as well: but imo, Enlisted’s squad command system and array of weaponry are both second to none.
@@nonyabusinessinc eh, HLL is not exactly doing great in either realism nor accuracy. Maybe compared to a typical cod or similar but definitely not accurate
@@TylerMcL3more fair, HLL is really best on PC. I've heard console isn't the same experience.