Maxim aluminium belts usable in a Vickers?

[bobt]

Posted this over on Subguns.com but thought you folks might know more about this then they might.

I have an 8mm aluminium (Brit spelling) belt for the Maxim. Was told it will work just fine in a 8mm Vickers, no modifications needed on either gun or belt. Is this true?

The belts look to be easily repairable, the link halves seem to be identical. Or am I missing something?

It also looks like all it would take to make new belts is the starter tabs, connecting springs and a whole lot of link halves. Heck the link halves could be made out of heat resistant plastic, one mold should do it. Or the halves could be stamped from brass, aluminium, steel??

What sort of service life do yo get from the aluminium belts?

Are steel belts any better (for use in the 8mm Vickers)?

[missingsomething]

I have an 8mm Turk converted Vickers Gun. Aluminium belts work fine. No mods needed as long as the gun has a 8mm lock and feedblock. Links are clamshell with a spring holding them together. The halfs are the same. I use a .30 cal bore brush in a drill press and cleaned the insides of the belt.
I have a bunch of belts and with a part belt I made some 50 rnd and 100 rnd belts and used leather pieces to make replica tabs. The remainder I use for spares or repair damaged pieces.

Steel belts are sturdier but I would think harder on the feed block. I use the aluminium as I dont have a steel belt. I have had no problems or signs of wear so far.....

just my 2 cents....

[bobt]

Thanks for the reply missingsomething!

We took the 8mm Turkish Vickers (Erb sideplate) out today to try out the aluminium 8mm Maxim belts I purchased from IMA. The belts are in pretty good shape, came rolled up, tied with twine. As a consequence a few of the inner links were corroded beyond repair by the acid in the leather starter tabs.

I simply removed the linking springs and used the good halves to make a few complete positions making the belt about three rounds shorter than the 250. Had to discard a few of the starter tabs as they are hoplessly curled up and corroded.

We loaded two belts with Romanian 74 vintage ammo. First belt had a few failures to feed and one double feed jam but mostly ran ok. The second belt fired 100%, no problems. We then reloaded a belt with Yugo 8mm (50's vintage with the hard primers) and it had quite a few failures to fire (primer was struck but no bang). Reinserting the "dud" rounds into the belt and they fired fine second time through.

Lastly we ran a belt of Yugo loaded into a green .303 Australian cloth belt (43 vintage) with brass tabs. Had a few more failures to fire that went bang on a second whack.

We like the Maxim belt very much, easy to load by hand, easily repairable. We are even thinking of making a 500 round belt for those times when you want to boil the water quickly.

All in all we had a great time and are now fans of the Maxim 8mm aluminium belts.

[missingsomething]

Glad to hear they work for you ;D


Brand New... so to speak..... belts.....


Tab corrosion and corroded link halfs




Replica replacement tabs... ;D

[bobt]

Where did you get the replacement starter tabs? They look great!

I was thinking of making replacement starter tabs from brass stock a la cloth belt style, just drill the holes for the spring.

Yours looks to be easier.

[missingsomething]

I made them.
I took pieces of link halves and hammered them flat. I then cut them down and rounded the edges, leaving one side with the holes (Like in the above pictures, I used damaged halves to do this). I then went to a local leather maker and got some leather strips in the size and length I wanted and I also got some brass rivets from him (most were scrap pieces so they didn't cost much). I trimmed the leather and used the pre-flatened and cut link halves and drilled holes. I then attached them with the rivets and VOILA....... new usable starter tabs.