Forgotten Weapons: EM-2 (Janson Rifle)

[Kirk Freeman]

After WWII, a Polish engineer designed a forward thinking bullpup rifle in .280 British.

The rifle was well-liked but fell to the wayside with the post-war election of Churchill as PM who wanted to be in step with the Americans and the UK adopted the Mechanical Musket (FAL).

However, the EM-2 may be an evolutionary dead end in design, but it is still worthy of study.

My friend Ian gets up close and personal with an EM-2 (video at link): British EM-2 « Forgotten Weapons

 

[Miller Tyme]

Better infantry weapon than the FAL or the M14, if it had been introduced 15 years latter it would have given the AR a run for it's money, but alas it was just ahead of it's time.

 

[IndyDave1776]

I thought this would be a really cool thing to build and contacted the MoD in hopes of getting my paws on some prints. They didn't respond. I would have thought they at least would have told me to take a hike.

 

[Thor]

Sort of like the Garand bullpup that went nowhere...that would have made a positive improvement in the hedgerows.

Neat looking bit of history.

View attachment 30421
Garand and his bullpup...

 

[1911ly]

That's a really neat piece of history right there! Thanks for sharing Kirk.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Sure thing.

The Janson is one of my favorite evolutionary dead end weapons. (I mean how big of a gun nerd are you if you have favorite dead end guns?)

 

[IndyDave1776]

Sure thing.

The Janson is one of my favorite evolutionary dead end weapons. (I mean how big of a gun nerd are you if you have favorite dead end guns?)

You just have a keen eye for historical mistakes like consigning one of history's best combat rifles to the basement under the MoD.

 

[Jump62]

I think the real problem was the ammo rather than the rifle, if memory is working right now without a first cup of coffee, NATO was looking for a standard rifle round and the USA was pushing the 7.62 X 51. NATO commonality was the Holy Grail for years and still may be. My vote for dead end design was the Stoner 63 modular weapon system, a carbine, rifle, and light MG all by changing some parts . A weapon system like that would have made training easier. Gun Nerd.....I love it

Jump62

ps. thanks for the walk down memory lane

 

[BogWalker]

Sure thing.

The Janson is one of my favorite evolutionary dead end weapons. (I mean how big of a gun nerd are you if you have favorite dead end guns?)

My vote goes to the Gabbett-Fairfax Mars.

Back to topic, the EM-2 was more forward thinking than just the bullpup design. Look at the carry handle. Very reminiscent of what would later appear on the M16. I can't recall any other weapons before this one having such a design feature.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Cool rifle! Almost reminds me of a bull pup version of a Johnson rifle. They both have that "pregnant guppy" profile.

 

[IndyDave1776]

Cool rifle! Almost reminds me of a bull pup version of a Johnson rifle. They both have that "pregnant guppy" profile.

I hadn't thought of that. I suppose it is not equating the swell in the wood to fit one's hand on the EM-2 with the rotary magazine on the Johnson (as in, contrary to popular belief, the rotary magazine was not invented by Bill Ruger).

While we are at it, this is another gun that should have gone into production. At the beginning of the war, only Springfield Armory (the military facility, not the people who sell the XD) had the tooling to produce the Garand. By the end of the war, a couple of other manufacturers had joined in production. The result was a chronic lack of rifles available for the troops. The Johnson, by contrast, could be manufactured by most any machine shop in the country. I cannot say that it would have been the equal or better of the two overall. We will probably never know given that the army deliberately saw to it that the comparative trials were not fair in nature so as to protect their own design. What the Johnson could have done for the war effort would be to have placed semi-automatic rifles in the hands of the majority of our front-line troops even if it were not as durable as the Garand (which I am not accepting as undisputed fact given that the army made a point of not finding out the truth). It also had the advantage of loading the rotary magazine (10 rounds) through the side and could be loaded from a stripper clip past a loaded chamber so that the soldier could fire five rounds and then top off his magazine, which cannot be done with the Garand. Also missing is the 8th round 'ping' from ejecting the enbloc in the case of the Garand. Even if every accusation the army ordnance men made is true, my guess is that there are a lot of troops who would gladly have traded their '03 Springfields for Johnsons.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Johnsons saw limited use in WWII. My reading of history is that Army wanted to go with what it had in hand but I know the Senate stuck its nose in it before the war.

Worked for a guy who was with Brigade 2506 and trained with a Johson M1941. He liked it and had no complaints--about the rifle, but had lots of complaints about JFK's betrayal and weakness.

 

[IndyDave1776]

The best accounts I have encountered suggested that the Johnson should have been adopted as a secondary-issue weapon and most likely, given its ease of production, would have duplicated the secondary-issue adoption of the M1917 Enfield which saw the battlefields of WW I in greater numbers than the Springfield. All said and done, there was no reason for troops to be carrying Springfields into combat by the time we were putting boots on the ground in Europe or in the Pacific aside from official obstinacy.

 

[Bigtanker]

I think the real problem was the ammo rather than the rifle, if memory is working right now without a first cup of coffee, NATO was looking for a standard rifle round and the USA was pushing the 7.62 X 51. NATO commonality was the Holy Grail for years and still may be. My vote for dead end design was the Stoner 63 modular weapon system, a carbine, rifle, and light MG all by changing some parts . A weapon system like that would have made training easier. Gun Nerd.....I love it

Jump62

ps. thanks for the walk down memory lane

That there is a quality post!!!!!

Welcome to INGO.

As for the topic on hand, Gun Stories on the Outdoor Channel with Joe Mantegna just had a entire show on the Bull Pup Design. There was a 1903 Springfield bolt action bull pup designed by George Patton.

The original bulpup has been traced to Thorneycroft carbine - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Wow... that 1903 bull pup is just bizarre looking! Seems like it would have been awfully awkward to work the bolt with the rifle shouldered. By the time you had the bolt all the way back, it would extend at least to, if not beyond your shoulder.

 

[Jump62]

Thanks BigTanker, I think what killed the EM-2 was the "Battle of the Ammo" being fought by NATO governments and the .280 round was a key factor to the weapons success not the Bullpup design. I thought the OP topic was

From Kirk Freeman:

The rifle was well-liked but fell to the wayside with the post-war election of Churchill as PM who wanted to be in step with the Americans and the UK adopted the Mechanical Musket (FAL).

However, the EM-2 may be an evolutionary dead end in design, but it is still worthy of study.

During this period of time there was a great deal of dead end weapons from our British friends, 32 pounder AT gun at 10 tons weight, Conqueror tank with a whole 65km range, and the Malkara at missile at 206 pounds weight and needed a 1 1/2 to truck to act as launcher/carrier. Back to the EM-2 looking at the bolt and operating rod it looks like an upside down FG-42 or smallish M-60 part but I still contend it was the round ( .280 ) that was the real revolutionary feature not the Bullpup design that many go ga-ga over. This would make a great book topic of dead end weapons systems of the 50s/60s/70s me thinks. T.S.R 2 anyone?
Jump62
aka Paul

 

[IndyDave1776]

Thanks BigTanker, I think what killed the EM-2 was the "Battle of the Ammo" being fought by NATO governments and the .280 round was a key factor to the weapons success not the Bullpup design. I thought the OP topic was

From Kirk Freeman:

The rifle was well-liked but fell to the wayside with the post-war election of Churchill as PM who wanted to be in step with the Americans and the UK adopted the Mechanical Musket (FAL).

However, the EM-2 may be an evolutionary dead end in design, but it is still worthy of study.

During this period of time there was a great deal of dead end weapons from our British friends, 32 pounder AT gun at 10 tons weight, Conqueror tank with a whole 65km range, and the Malkara at missile at 206 pounds weight and needed a 1 1/2 to truck to act as launcher/carrier. Back to the EM-2 looking at the bolt and operating rod it looks like an upside down FG-42 or smallish M-60 part but I still contend it was the round ( .280 ) that was the real revolutionary feature not the Bullpup design that many go ga-ga over. This would make a great book topic of dead end weapons systems of the 50s/60s/70s me thinks. T.S.R 2 anyone?
Jump62
aka Paul

I agree completely regarding the significance of the .280 round as opposed to the rifle itself. The British has been enamored with the concept since getting their asses handed to them (in actual combat while eventually winning the war through attrition of supplies) in the Anglo-Boer War, largely due to the ballistic superiority of the 7x57 Mauser over the .303 British. They had developed a long-action .276 cartridge for the P-14 Enfield which was intended to be the new service rifle. Then came war, the tooling for the P-14 was modified to make a .303 rifle, and we modified it to .30/06 for ourselves, and with a glut of .303 Enfields of assorted varieties, the Brits couldn't get the new rifle past the politicians, especially after paying for the war effort. Fast forward to the EM-2. After studying the Sturmgewer concept, the British Army once again had an opportunity to re-imagine the flat-shooting ~7mm in form of the short .280 Enfield which was suitable for an intermediate-power select-fire weapon. Incidentally, I recall the .280 also being tested in the FAL. Unfortunately, Churchill's politics and US Army conservatism resulted in the adoption of a round which is unsuitable for a select-fire rifle (unless the enemy has taken up positions on the moon, where you will be aiming by your third shot).

What I don't understand is why the British developed that POS they have been using for 30 years when they could have produced the EM-2 in 5.56 and saved themselves a truckload of grief.

 

[Thor]

It probably has to do with what was mentioned in the video...lots of machining would have made it difficult to manufacture in numbers affordably.

 

[indy1919a4]

Per the Patton Bull pup, One of my favorite Bul pups, I have see people almost come to blows over that claim that Patton did the design... Its one of those cool stories that... Well Damn it just sounds so good, one so wants it to be true..

There was a guy who had one that posted some detail photos on a board a few years back

Surplusrifle Forum ? View topic - M1903 bullpup

But like so many wonderful stories of history, the lack of documentation does rear its ugly head.. And to add to that.. You know if you were able to fit one of the
1903 Air Service Rifle (Trench) magazines to that gun it would look more like a real modern bullpup.

 

[BogWalker]

That links makes me sad in several ways indy1919a4. One is that they didn't find any more information, and two is that the man who owns the rifle seems to have very little grasp of how monumental it is.