The Vickers Machine Gun is a British-made medium machine gun from the early 20th Century. It was the Long-Range weapon of Lawrence of Arabia.
Characteristics[]
- Weight: 33 lbs to 50.7 lbs based on the amount of gear attached
- Length: 43.31 in
- Barrel Length: 28.35 in
- Cartridge: .303 British
- Action: Recoil with gas boost
- Rate of Fire: 450 to 500 rounds/min
- Muzzle Velocity: 2,440 ft/sec
- Effective Range: 2,187 yards
- Maximum Range: 4,500 yards
- Feed System: 250-round canvas belt
- Cooling System: 1.17 gallons of water in evaporative cooling system. In a pinch, urine could also be used, but this is damaging to the gun.
Uses[]
The Vickers machine gun was based on the successful Maxim gun of the late 19th Century. It was formally adopted by the British Army on November 26, 1912, and although it was still in short supply when World War I broke out, it became the heavy machine gun of choice for the British. The weapon had a reputation for great solidity and reliability. However, the weapon required a crew of at least two to operate it (one firing and a second feeding the ammunition) and took up to eight men total to move the weapon, its ammunition, and spare parts to the battlefield. It lost popularity during the Vietnam War, when new air-cooled machinegun designs were being battletested. Air-cooled guns did not require the heavy gallons of water that would weigh down a squad of men.
Trivia[]
- WWI began with many armies on all sides not realizing that Machine Guns effectively ended Napoleonic Tactics due to their massive rate of fire. Generals estimated poorly that if their line was within 50 meters of the enemy, then they could charge at them within 20 seconds and fight them at close combat. It was very common for these generals to be men who witnessed Napoleonic Tactics or never actually fought in the front lines; and so they were oblivious to the new technology.
- The Vickers machine gun is one of the only two weapons of season 3 that had it's amount of kills in the simulation revealed. It managed 7,544 kills in the simulation. The other was the Gatling Gun, the weapon it went up against. During the testing of the Vickers against 18 targets, it jammed once after killing one target, so the edge in the long-ranged weapons face-off went to the Gatling.
- The Vickers machine gun is the third machine gun to jam during a test: the first two were the M60 and the PKM in the second season. Followed by the Bren Light Machine Gun from season three.