Breda Modello 30

Societa Italiana Ernesto Breda per Costruzioni Meccaniche (Breda Meccanica Bresciana) · Machine Gun · Out Of Production · 1930

Also known as: Fucile Mitragliatore Breda modello 30, FM Breda 30, Breda 30, Breda M30, Mitragliatrice Breda Mod. 30, M30

Overview

The Fucile Mitragliatore Breda modello 30 was the standard squad light machine gun of the Italian Royal Army throughout the Second Italo-Ethiopian War, the Spanish Civil War, and the Second World War. Designed by Alfredo Scotti and the Breda engineering team at Brescia, the weapon operated on a delayed blowback principle using a rotating, screw-threaded breech that held the bolt locked for a fraction of a second after firing before unscrewing and cycling rearward - a mechanically ingenious system whose weak primary extraction forced the adoption of one of the most infamous features in 20th-century firearms design: an onboard oil pump that squirted a metered dose of lubricant onto every cartridge as it entered the chamber. The Breda 30 was fed from a fixed 20-round magazine permanently hinged to the right side of the receiver; rather than being swapped out like a conventional detachable box magazine, the magazine was unlatched, swung forward on its hinge, and reloaded in place from above using Mannlicher-style 6.5mm Carcano stripper clips. In the dust of Libya, Ethiopia, the Western Desert, and the Russian steppe, oiled cartridges acted as magnets for every grain of sand and grit the environment could offer, reducing the weapon to a single-shot rifle within minutes of engagement. Chambered primarily in the underpowered 6.5x52mm Carcano round, with limited production in 7.35x51mm Carcano and export variants in 7.92x57mm Mauser for Chinese Nationalist and Portuguese contracts, the Breda 30 combined a sluggish 475 rpm cyclic rate, a fixed magazine that could not be swapped if damaged, and a lubrication scheme that guaranteed stoppages to produce what historians routinely rank among the two or three worst light machine guns ever issued in significant numbers by a major industrial power. Approximately 30,000 Breda 30s were manufactured between 1930 and 1945, and despite their reputation the Italian Army was never able to replace them at scale - they remained in front-line service until the final days of the Italian Social Republic in 1945.

Specifications

Weight (empty)10320 g (364.0 oz)
Weight (loaded)10700 g (377.4 oz)
Overall Length1230 mm (48.43")
Barrel Length520 mm (20.47")
Action TypeBlowback
Firing MechanismHammer Fired
Trigger TypeFull Auto Only
Magazine Capacity20 rounds
Magazine TypeDetachable Box
Muzzle Velocity610 m/s (2001 fps)
Muzzle Energy1954 J (1441 ft·lbf)
Effective Range600 m (656 yd)
Maximum Range1500 m (1640 yd)
Rate of Fire475 rpm
Barrel RiflingRight Hand
Rifling Twist203 mm (7.99")
Number of Grooves4
Frame MaterialSteel
Barrel MaterialSteel
Stock MaterialWalnut
FinishBlued

Calibers

Features

Variants

Service history

Operators

Conflicts

Production

Estimated total produced: 30,000 · Production years: 1930-1945

Approximately 30,000 Breda Modello 30 light machine guns were produced at Breda plants in Brescia and Rome across all chamberings. Chinese Nationalist contracts in 7.92x57mm Mauser are estimated at several thousand units delivered before the Italian-Japanese rapprochement of the late 1930s ended further exports. Portuguese contracts in 7.92mm accounted for additional export production. Surviving examples reached Paraguay and Bolivia through the interwar arms trade and saw limited postwar use in South America.

Origin

Country of origin: Italy

Designer: Alfredo Scotti / Breda engineering team

Discontinued: 1945

Notes

The Breda 30's mechanical quirks compounded each other in ways that were catastrophic under field conditions. The fixed 20-round magazine, hinged to swing out to the right of the receiver and reloaded with 6.5mm Carcano stripper clips, could not be replaced in the field if its feed lips were bent or dented - a routine occurrence in combat that rendered the entire weapon a single-shot rifle. The lubrication pump, drawing oil from a small onboard reservoir, was necessary to overcome the weak primary extraction of the screw-threaded delayed blowback action: without the oil film, cartridges stuck in the chamber and ruptured. With the oil, every speck of airborne grit became abrasive paste on the cartridge surface, jamming the action and scoring the chamber. Italian troops in North Africa quickly learned that the Breda 30 was nearly unserviceable in desert conditions, and those fighting in Russia found that the oil froze at winter temperatures. The cyclic rate of approximately 475 rpm was barely above that of a period bolt-action rifleman's aimed fire. The 6.5mm Carcano cartridge, while accurate at range, lacked the terminal authority or suppressive volume of contemporaries such as the ZB vz. 26, Bren, or MG 34. Designer Alfredo Scotti's later work on the Scotti-Isotta-Fraschini Model X produced a markedly more reliable weapon, but Italian industrial constraints during wartime made large-scale replacement of the Breda 30 impossible, and production continued at Brescia and Rome until the end of the war.

Background

Italian soldiers nicknamed the Breda 30 the 'fucile mitragliatore disgraziato' - roughly 'the wretched machine gun' - and its onboard oil pump was the source of its misery: every cartridge was squirted with lubricant a split second before chambering to compensate for the screw-threaded breech's weak primary extraction, and in the dust of Libya, Ethiopia, and the Western Desert the oiled rounds became flypaper for sand, reducing the weapon to a single-shot rifle within minutes. The fixed 20-round magazine was permanently hinged to the right side of the receiver and had to be loaded in place using 6.5mm Carcano stripper clips - a uniquely impractical design that made a bent feed lip in combat mean the entire weapon was combat-lost, since the magazine could not simply be swapped for a spare.