Picture of the day

[Dark Alley Dan]

 

[*lawrence]

Paratroopers of the French Foreign Legion are patrolling as part of Operation Sentinelle.

 

[Dark Alley Dan]

Neat how the AR system has become the right arm of democracy. Pretty good for a sixty-year-old design.

Even the French have partially abandoned their wonderfully bent sense of firearms design in favour of Mr. Stoner's baby...

 

[Rod B]

CF 104 Starfighter & F4 Phantom.

 

[grelmar]

You can't keep a good Maxim down. And when in doubt, add more Maxim. Dual and triple "Anti-Shahed" mounts for the M1910 in Ukraine:








In WWII, the Soviets fielded thousands of quad-mount M1910's for mobile AA. The Shaheds are low and slow enough that old school ShorAD still has a place. Which says as much about the weakness of the Shahed as it does about the enduring value of the Maxim.

As much as the press keep banging on about drones being "the future" of warfare, I personally believe that they're an interesting and effective tool in this particular conflict, and some of the other conflicts currently going on around the world. The fact you can counter 21st century "Wunderwaffe" with 19th century technology makes me think they're more of a moment in time, rather than a paradigm shift.

Drones are the big killer, right now, but not only are the Americans, British, French, China, etc., developing new drones based on what we're seeing in Ukraine, they're also all developing counter drone systems. A good sensor and targeting system mated to a powered mechanical pintle mounted minigun, think CiWS for ground pounders, is easily doable with off the shelf components for relatively cheap. I can't see the "drone threat" being much of a drone threat against an advanced adversary.

 

[recce]

Paratroopers of the French Foreign Legion are patrolling as part of Operation Sentinelle.
View attachment 1067079

It looks like there's a chamber flag sticking out of the ejection port, the bolt carrier is partially rearward and you can see the bolt head.

 

[Dark Alley Dan]

If you can, find a copy of Hiram Maxim's autobiography. Smellie (God rest his soul) recommended that one to me. Ol' Hiram was a man of his time. He was a stranger to modesty, casually racist, but unquestionably very smart and mechanically capable. He'd doubtless be pleased that his contribution to industrial murder is still rattling away in 2026.

Borrowed duds:
Captains S.A. Mooney I.C. Stewart, Forward Observation Officers attached to the British 6th Airborne Division, photographed at Greven, Germany on 5 April 1945.

Hey, good kit is good kit.

 

[*lawrence]

 

[Dark Alley Dan]

Didn't know Japan operated a fully tracked prime mover, but here's the Type 98 Ro-Ke:

Under new management:

1983 built. Here's one in use as a tractor in 1957 in New Guinea:

 

[Desert_Fox]

If you can, find a copy of Hiram Maxim's autobiography. Smellie (God rest his soul) recommended that one to me. Ol' Hiram was a man of his time. He was a stranger to modesty, casually racist, but unquestionably very smart and mechanically capable. He'd doubtless be pleased that his contribution to industrial murder is still rattling away in 2026.

Borrowed duds:
Captains S.A. Mooney I.C. Stewart, Forward Observation Officers attached to the British 6th Airborne Division, photographed at Greven, Germany on 5 April 1945.

Hey, good kit is good kit.

Sumpfmuster winter coats. One of my favorite camo patterns. Still use it and variations of it today.

 

[grelmar]

If you can, find a copy of Hiram Maxim's autobiography. Smellie (God rest his soul) recommended that one to me. Ol' Hiram was a man of his time. He was a stranger to modesty, casually racist, but unquestionably very smart and mechanically capable. He'd doubtless be pleased that his contribution to industrial murder is still rattling away in 2026.

The lantern of wisdom noticeably dimmed when Smellie left us. Someone with more time than I have at my disposal, would do the world a service by aggregating the collective knowledge he left on this and other forums.

It occurred to me that a book of that vintage should be available somewhere in digital format. It is, but it took a bit of finding. A friend of mine commented on the current state of the internet (he probably stole the quote, but he gave it to me, so Karel gets the credit), "We had the Library of Alexandria at our fingertips. But we burned it to the ground and replaced it with a bunch of booths for carny show hucksters with their hands out for two bits a peek to see cobbled up skeletons of mermaids, bearded ladies, and marionettes posing as fortune tellers."

Anyway... "My Life: Hiram S. Maxim"

https://archive.org/details/mylifehiram00maxirich/mode/2up

 

[hondroid]

It looks like there's a chamber flag sticking out of the ejection port, the bolt carrier is partially rearward and you can see the bolt head.

Israeli troops in open carry on city streets use the same chamber flags to show loaded, not ready (condition 2).

 

[SigWig]

^they use it as a charging handle, no?

 

[bearhunter]

It looks like there's a chamber flag sticking out of the ejection port, the bolt carrier is partially rearward and you can see the bolt head.

I see a brand name or a rack numberer strip of duratape the holo sight. There is a "cocking handle" on the bolt I haven't seen before.

 

[recce]

Israeli troops in open carry on city streets use the same chamber flags to show loaded, not ready (condition 2).

Didn't know that, thanks.

 

[hondroid]

^they use it as a charging handle, no?

No. Still have to #### the action to chamber a round. Using the charging handle as normal in gross motor fashion so it’s natural.

 

[hondroid]

I see a brand name on the holo sight.

That looks like old school dymo tape with either a rack number or a serial number on it.

 

[Dark Alley Dan]

"My Life: Hiram S. Maxim"

https://archive.org/details/mylifehiram00maxirich/mode/2up

No shortage of irony, considering the material and Mr. Maxim's attitude toward black people, swarthy types, the Chinese, etc, that the scanned book should come Ex Libris the University of California at Berkley.