Boyes anti-tank rifle

Woftam · Post by **Woftam** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 1:22 am

I recall a bloke who owned one in Australia posting that every time he pulled the trigger it was $AUD13.00 up in smoke. That was a few years back, so it's likley more. There was on for sale recently - can't recall the asking price but I think around the $AUD5,000 mark.

Wouldnt mind a crack at one myself - just for the experience.

dogbolt · Post by **dogbolt** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 4:57 am

Met some friends at a private machine gun shoot held annually in the US.

I tried shooting a Boyes back 1998. It was rechambered to .50 BMG and it was still very unpleasant to shoot compared to a Mcmillan .50 b/a rifle that I tried the following year. Have also tried a Barrett semi-auto a couple of years ago; was OK sounded like an M16 when fired - all springs twanging away inside.

Have put 100 rounds through an M2 Browning - now that was fun!!

Only in America....

Aughnanure · Post by **Aughnanure** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 6:16 am

Not only in America, although I take your point.

I once ran a course on the ,50 Browning and we fired 1,000s of rounds....

Tom-May · Post by **Tom-May** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 11:49 am

The mention of Carl Gustavs on the previous page reminds me of an incident in the early 1970s.

I maintain that I have fired a Carl Gustav in .22",

I mentioned this a few years back and I was greeted with howls of derisive laughter .

If I recall it was at a Cadet 'Annual Camp'. We were visiting the Mercian Depot and they had an indoor range (.22) with a multilayer paper 'movie screen' target area. A film was projected on the screen, the sound of the shot stopped the projector and a light behind the screen showed the 'fall of shot', the light went out, one of the paper screens moved, blocking the light path and the film restarted.

As I recall, they had a series of weapons in sub-calibre including a Carl Gustav (presumably this was a lot cheaper for teaching the new bods to aim than full bore projectiles)

Has anyone else come across this before or am I really going Ga-ga?

Tom

24626151 · Post by **24626151** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 12:14 pm

Tom-May wrote:The mention of Carl Gustavs on the previous page reminds me of an incident in the early 1970s.

I maintain that I have fired a Carl Gustav in .22",

I mentioned this a few years back and I was greeted with howls of derisive laughter .

If I recall it was at a Cadet 'Annual Camp'. We were visiting the Mercian Depot and they had an indoor range (.22) with a multilayer paper 'movie screen' target area. A film was projected on the screen, the sound of the shot stopped the projector and a light behind the screen showed the 'fall of shot', the light went out, one of the paper screens moved, blocking the light path and the film restarted.
As I recall, they had a series of weapons in sub-calibre including a Carl Gustav (presumably this was a lot cheaper for teaching the new bods to aim than full bore projectiles)

Has anyone else come across this before or am I really going Ga-ga?

Tom

Tom that may have been the 6.5 sub calibre indoor device. In addition a special blank round could be fitted and it simulated the backblast. We used it on the cinerange at Shornecliffe in 1981 during training. The 84mm was unchanged what was used was a converted round which had a berrel in place of the fuse, the ranges were fun with the screen stopping at a gunshot for 5 seconds then the rolls of paper moved and the film restarted!

Tom-May · Post by **Tom-May** » Sat Feb 24, 2007 4:41 am

"...Tom that may have been the 6.5 sub calibre indoor device. In addition a special blank round could be fitted and it simulated the backblast.."

Hi,

Thanks for that.

I'm glad my memory wasn't that bad.

I don't remember a back-blast, but if they used a seperate blank round it's possible that these weren't being used for our visit. Then again, it was more than thirty five years ago (then again maybe my memory IS that bad

)

Those cineranges were fun weren't they (I'd never seen one before).

That's when I realised what the humour of my cadet unit was like.

We'd always been taught to aim low and with the cinema target I saw how low everyone (myself included) was aiming - Shall I simply say that, from our shooting, there would have been few direct fatalities, but a marked drop in the next generation of the enemy population

.

Tom.

Post by **DuncaninFrance** » Sat Feb 24, 2007 6:41 am

Yes I REMEMBER that, Ouch! We did our firing at Lydd while on annual camp at Shorncliffe.

You needed a clear 30 meters behind you to prevent anyone from getting charred but what they didn't tell you was that the No:2, who after loading knelt down on the firers right, was caught up in a vacuum when the weapon was fired. This usually raised his bonedome and smacked it back down with some force - at the same time sucking his balls from the normal position and sticking them in his ears for a split second!

What a bit of kit!

Aughnanure · Post by **Aughnanure** » Sat Feb 24, 2007 2:04 pm

I can happily say that I never fired one, nor got within more than nterested spectator distance of one.

I was amazed at the concept, how the hell would the safety area be maintained in battle?

Boyes anti-tank rifle

Backblast!