The soldiers are operating a Guidetti grenade launcher (Model 1915), a weapon made from shortened older rifles.
The design used an obsolete rifle as its basis. The barrel and butt were both cut down, but the action was still there, along with the back half of the barrel. The rifle was loaded with a special blank cartridge and a grenade placed in the cylinder or cup (just to the right of the soldier’s head in the photo). There was an arming or safety pin in the grenade’s fuze which was pulled before the rifle was fired. throwing the grenade up to about 200 metres, hopefully detonating on impact.
The essential bits of the device were the converted rifle and the cylinder or cup at its muzzle. The rest of it was just a tripod frame to hold those, give the gunner a seat and facilitate aiming. It would also have helped with recoil, which must have been brutal. If you look closely, you can make out a large coil spring wrapped around the cylinder; this also helped with recoil. thanks to u/dopealope47
Amplidyne on
Publicity shot?
Nice clean uniforms and boots, and a mud free trench.
Was the launcher used much in action?
2 Comments
The soldiers are operating a Guidetti grenade launcher (Model 1915), a weapon made from shortened older rifles.
The design used an obsolete rifle as its basis. The barrel and butt were both cut down, but the action was still there, along with the back half of the barrel. The rifle was loaded with a special blank cartridge and a grenade placed in the cylinder or cup (just to the right of the soldier’s head in the photo). There was an arming or safety pin in the grenade’s fuze which was pulled before the rifle was fired. throwing the grenade up to about 200 metres, hopefully detonating on impact.
The essential bits of the device were the converted rifle and the cylinder or cup at its muzzle. The rest of it was just a tripod frame to hold those, give the gunner a seat and facilitate aiming. It would also have helped with recoil, which must have been brutal. If you look closely, you can make out a large coil spring wrapped around the cylinder; this also helped with recoil. thanks to u/dopealope47
Publicity shot?
Nice clean uniforms and boots, and a mud free trench.
Was the launcher used much in action?