M-96 ammunition production rate

Ammunition Production During the 19 months of American Involvement in World War I



Note that in this time frame the United States manufactured 2,879,148,000 rounds of rifle and machine gun ammunition.

The image comes from a rather lengthy article on World War I statistics, which you can read here: http://net.lib.byu.edu/estu/wwi/memoir/docs/statistics/stats8on.htm Among the many interesting statistics, diagrams, and tables in the article, there is this interesting quote regarding small arms ammunition:

Small-Arms Ammunition

A-sufficient supply of small-arms ammunition has always been available to provide for troops in service. The complication due to the use of machine guns and automatic rifles of French caliber has been successfully met. To meet the special needs of the Air Service and of antiaircraft defense, new types of ammunition have been designed and produced, the purposes of which are indicated by their names---armor piercing, tracer, and incendiary. Before the end of the war American production of small arms ammunition amounted to approximately 3,500,00O,000 rounds, of which 1,800,000,000 were shipped overseas. In addition, 200,000,000 rounds were secured from the French and British.

In reading on WWI ammunition production, I also came across an interesting article on the "Doughboy's Rifle." I can't vouch for its veracity without doing more research than I have time for, but you're welcome to read up on it. The link is: http://www.worldwar1.com/dbc/dbrifle.htm

Just for fun, I did a bit of research to be able to come up with a bit more than a WAG on the subject of a standard ammo load for a WW1 rifleman. Mind you, I didn't find anything uniform for numbers. But the most common number I came up with was 100 rounds. It ranged from a low on the German side to about 90 rounds to a high on the British side of 150 rounds.

So the 180 figure I used in my previous post was way off. IIRC when I researched this for the earlier thread, standard loadout for a US Army rifleman is 220 rounds.

Equally significant for the discussion is how many days that ammo load will be used. My own guess is two to three days per month per rifleman in theatre averaged out. The figure of four was suggested which I think is comfortably on the safe side. Fallsfromtrees is right to point out that a lot of ammo gets used during an assault. But the rejoinder is that assaults are generally quite rare and the weeks on end when nothing is happening pushes the statistics in the other direction.

I would agree that the ammount of ammo being produced currently is not enough. However, it's early days and the numbers will go up. I think that when all's said and done, the ammo will be there when it is called for.

Don

n7axw wrote:Just for fun, I did a bit of research to be able to come up with a bit more than a WAG on the subject of a standard ammo load for a WW1 rifleman. Mind you, I didn't find anything uniform for numbers. But the most common number I came up with was 100 rounds. It ranged from a low on the German side to about 90 rounds to a high on the British side of 150 rounds.

So the 180 figure I used in my previous post was way off. IIRC when I researched this for the earlier thread, standard loadout for a US Army rifleman is 220 rounds.

Equally significant for the discussion is how many days that ammo load will be used. My own guess is two to three days per month per rifleman in theatre averaged out. The figure of four was suggested which I think is comfortably on the safe side. Fallsfromtrees is right to point out that a lot of ammo gets used during an assault. But the rejoinder is that assaults are generally quite rare and the weeks on end when nothing is happening pushes the statistics in the other direction.

I would agree that the ammount of ammo being produced currently is not enough. However, it's early days and the numbers will go up. I think that when all's said and done, the ammo will be there when it is called for.

Don

I could understand if ammo production is running low right now, while they set up the lines and get all the kinks out. That is understandable. My issue is that the *FUTURE* production levels for ammo which they are planning on and are building towards are way too low. 1.6 million rounds a month was not what they can produce in the near future. That was what they can make once all the planned ammo lines are up and going full out.

I think you mentioned 20,000 M-96s in service earlier in your figures. I think the number is going to be higher than that fairly quickly. They are talking about manufacturing over 120,000 M-96s a year. Even if it takes a few months to fully ramp up rifle production, they will blow past 20,000 within 6 months or so. And in addition, they are converting the older Mahndrayns to the trapdoor design. Once this is done, those rifles will also need cartridges. I think Charis is going to need lots more cartridges than what they are planning on making.

Henry Brown wrote:

n7axw wrote:Just for fun, I did a bit of research to be able to come up with a bit more than a WAG on the subject of a standard ammo load for a WW1 rifleman. Mind you, I didn't find anything uniform for numbers. But the most common number I came up with was 100 rounds. It ranged from a low on the German side to about 90 rounds to a high on the British side of 150 rounds.

So the 180 figure I used in my previous post was way off. IIRC when I researched this for the earlier thread, standard loadout for a US Army rifleman is 220 rounds.

Equally significant for the discussion is how many days that ammo load will be used. My own guess is two to three days per month per rifleman in theatre averaged out. The figure of four was suggested which I think is comfortably on the safe side. Fallsfromtrees is right to point out that a lot of ammo gets used during an assault. But the rejoinder is that assaults are generally quite rare and the weeks on end when nothing is happening pushes the statistics in the other direction.

I would agree that the ammount of ammo being produced currently is not enough. However, it's early days and the numbers will go up. I think that when all's said and done, the ammo will be there when it is called for.

Don

I could understand if ammo production is running low right now, while they set up the lines and get all the kinks out. That is understandable. My issue is that the *FUTURE* production levels for ammo which they are planning on and are building towards are way too low. 1.6 million rounds a month was not what they can produce in the near future. That was what they can make once all the planned ammo lines are up and going full out.

I think you mentioned 20,000 M-96s in service earlier in your figures. I think the number is going to be higher than that fairly quickly. They are talking about manufacturing over 120,000 M-96s a year. Even if it takes a few months to fully ramp up rifle production, they will blow past 20,000 within 6 months or so. And in addition, they are converting the older Mahndrayns to the trapdoor design. Once this is done, those rifles will also need cartridges. I think Charis is going to need lots more cartridges than what they are planning on making.

All I am really saying here, Henry, is that those adjustments will be made. Also bear in mind that off stage people other than Howsmyn will be contracted to produce ammo. They are not gonna sit back and let the troops run out of ammo!

Don

Rommel would not have laughed.

fallsfromtrees wrote:

Henry Brown wrote:This is going to be an awkward memo.

To Duke Eastshare:

New recruits needed to conduct target practice as part of their training. Due to this, we were forced to divert your army's monthly ration of cartridges. As a result, we ask that you refrain from combat operations till next month.

Sincerely,

Cayleb Ahrmahk

Or the guys on the line saying to the other side - we're going to have to stop now - we won't have any more ammo until next month.

If I'm calculating right, 220 rounds of the .45 cal ammo they are using is going to weigh in the range of 25 pounds or more and be quite bulky. Today's firepower needs are why we went to the 5.56 in the first place over much better performing calibers. (I still think a 6mm Grendal sort of round would be a better idea, but that would add significantly to weight when carrying a lot of rounds.)

n7axw wrote:Just for fun, I did a bit of research to be able to come up with a bit more than a WAG on the subject of a standard ammo load for a WW1 rifleman. Mind you, I didn't find anything uniform for numbers. But the most common number I came up with was 100 rounds. It ranged from a low on the German side to about 90 rounds to a high on the British side of 150 rounds.

So the 180 figure I used in my previous post was way off. IIRC when I researched this for the earlier thread, standard loadout for a US Army rifleman is 220 rounds.

Equally significant for the discussion is how many days that ammo load will be used. My own guess is two to three days per month per rifleman in theatre averaged out. The figure of four was suggested which I think is comfortably on the safe side. Fallsfromtrees is right to point out that a lot of ammo gets used during an assault. But the rejoinder is that assaults are generally quite rare and the weeks on end when nothing is happening pushes the statistics in the other direction.

I would agree that the ammount of ammo being produced currently is not enough. However, it's early days and the numbers will go up. I think that when all's said and done, the ammo will be there when it is called for.

Don

Henry Brown wrote:This is going to be an awkward memo.

To Duke Eastshare:

New recruits needed to conduct target practice as part of their training. Due to this, we were forced to divert your army's monthly ration of cartridges. As a result, we ask that you refrain from combat operations till next month.

Sincerely,

Cayleb Ahrmahk

fallsfromtrees wrote:Or the guys on the line saying to the other side - we're going to have to stop now - we won't have any more ammo until next month.

jgnfld wrote:Rommel would not have laughed.

And I don't think Eastshare will either.

no. either way, you need a primer to fire the cartridge

it's making these that's the bottleneck in the process

jmbm wrote:

From LAMA p 447 US hardcover:
"There's no point producing them faster than that just yet because the cartridge filling machinery developed a glitch we hadn't expected an we're still putting the fix for it into place."

From LAMA p 447 US hardcover:
"We won't be able to increase much beyond that-assuming we have to- until we can produce the primer compounds in sufficient quantity."

Could it be they are talking about smokeless cartridges only ?. In that case they would still have M96 black powder cartridges available. The fact they mention "producing primer compounds in sufficient quantity" might support that. They have been manufacturing black powder for some time but are just starting smokeless production now.

brass can be recovered. in fact, since you really don't want the spent cartridges rolling under your boots, in a static position it usually will be collected and tossed someplace it's out of the way.

reloading industrial quantities of ammo, however, is an industrial operation, which would mean shipping all that brass someplace it can be done. not impossible, don't know if it would be viewed as practical. more likely, post-war the scrap dealers will have a field day. or several, depending on how many locations have cartridge piles. [did anybody mention that war is an incredibly wasteful activity?]

the real problem seems to be the availability of primers, not cases, and recycling the latter won't make any difference to that.

da bear wrote:Cant they reload and reuse most of the brass? Isn't he talking about brass production, not powder and primer?

The reuse of brass would increase stockpiles. and policing of brass can be done in many situations, tho certainly not all.

jgnfld wrote:If I'm calculating right, 220 rounds of the .45 cal ammo they are using is going to weigh in the range of 25 pounds or more and be quite bulky. Today's firepower needs are why we went to the 5.56 in the first place over much better performing calibers. (I still think a 6mm Grendal sort of round would be a better idea, but that would add significantly to weight when carrying a lot of rounds.)

I think you're fairly close on weight. According to the cartridge dimensions RFC gave for the .45 cal M-96 round, it seems to be fairly similar to the historical .45/70 Government cartridge. Which is still available. Shipping weight for 100 rounds of .45/70 is around 12.5 pounds.