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In a last hopeful attempt to get a rifle adopted and produced for the US military, John Pedersen designed his own copy of the M1 Garand rifle in the late 1930s (approximately 1939). His toggle-locked rifles had been irreversibly rejected, and the Garand rifle fully adopted by 1936. Pedersen’s exact reasons for making a copy of it are not recorded anywhere I can find, but he did make a number of small changes to the design.
Two series of Pedersen Garand rifles were made, first the GX and second the GY. Only 10-12 of each were ever made, so they are extraordinarily rare today. They all show some detail differences form the M1 in stock design, sight design, etc. However, a persistent question had long been, what differentiated the GX from the GY? When I had the opportunity to examine one of each type side by side, I knew I would have a chance to determine that answer.
The meaningful differences are twofold: clips and gas system. The later GY rifle uses a standard M1 Garand clip, while the earlier GX rifle uses a distinct Pedersen-designed clip. Whether Pedersen was unable to obtain Garand clips to design around or if he thought he could make a better clip is unknown, but by the time the rifles were actually tested in 1943 it must have been clear that if they did not use a standard clip, logistics would immediately rule out their potential adoption.
The gas system difference mirrors a change that the Garand underwent as well. The early GX rifle was originally made as a gas trap style of action, in which the rifled barrel ends just shy of the muzzle, leaving an unrifled and minutely larger bore with a large hole to capture gas pressure just before the bullet exits. This was believed to prevent problems with wear and accuracy caused by drilling a gas port in the barrel itself (the German military also believed this to be a problem, as one can see from their Gewehr 41 development requirements). However, this system instead led to reliability problems, and by 1940 the M1 Garand had been converted to use a normal gas port. The later GY Pedersen had the same change to its manufacture, and the early gas trap GX in this video was retrofitted to that system.
http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons
At Forgotten Weapons I think the most interesting guns out there are the most obscure ones. I try to search out experimental and prototype weapons and show you how they work, in addition to more conventional guns that you may not have heard of before. You’re much more likely to find a video on the Cei Rigotti or Webley-Fosbery here than an AR or Glock. So, do you want to learn about something new today? Then stick around!
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