[central_va]

During the Korean War my Dad traded with a tanker his NCO issued M-1 carbine for a grease gun. He said the grease gun was devastating at close range, easy to control on full auto, and NEVER needed to be cleaned.

He said there were two kinds of soldiers, ones who liked cleaning their weapons and those that hated it. He fell into the later category.

[Future Snake Eater]

During the Korean War my Dad traded with a tanker his NCO issued M-1 carbine for a grease gun.

Man, talk about a different time. Just try "trading" your rifle these days. Pretty sure leadership would just hang the offender from the nearest tree.

[DMZFrank]

I was a tank commander on a M48A3 tank with the 77th Armor in Vietnam on the DMZ. OEM equipment was 2 M3A1 SMG’s per tank. The M3 was one of the finest and most reliable weapons I ever used. I dropped it in mud with the ejection port cover open, to see if it would still work. I scooped the mud out of the chamber with my little finger so that rounds could enter it. I did nothing else. The thing went thru two magazines of continuous 30 round bursts, ejecting mud along with cartridge cases. It was practically self cleaning!!

The bolt ran along two guide rods that were located in holes at the back of the stamped and welded receiver amd by a clipped on trunnion plate in the front. That and the very low cyclic rate of fire (450-500 rpm) contributed to it’s smoothness and controllability. It was ridiculously easy to maintain and repair. I think that penny for penny, it was one of the best SMG’s ever designed. I could easily keep every round of a 30 round burst on a man sized target at 50 yards.

The only weakness was the mag, being a double row single feed position type. I cured that by pressing two mag springs together and stuffing them into the magazine tube. It NEVER failed to run perfectly with that setup. Zero stoppages.