Just imagine how terrifying it would be to be on the receiving end of this in the mid 40's. Pitch dark at night and you hear a echoed crack in the distance and the person beside you just drops and you can't see more than 15 yards in front of you
seriously though... there'd be no explanation as to how the hell the enemy is capable of making these shots. This must have been a serious moral killer, i'd imagine they thought the Americans possessed some sort of magical ability to see in the dark (which they did).
@@commander_cody841 they took massive creative liberties with the hellriegal seeing as it never actually saw combat and was meant to be operated by two people
You are spoiling us with these daily videos! (BTW I'm annoyed at some of these commenters implying these are "commercials" for RIA. Most of what you've shown are esoteric collectables, not only out of financial range of many gun enthusiasts, but very rare stuff we'd never see except in a book, or untouchable in a glass case. Your up close and detailed presentations are great for all of us that enjoy firearms, especially those unique ones so rarely encountered. It's nice RIA has allowed this to be shared.)
Agreed. This is as close as most of us will come. Even if RIA do benefit, would people rather not have had the chance to see such things? I really love this thing. Horribly impractical by today's standards, but I really love seeing the beginnings of technology. Functional works of historical art.... Beautiful! I suppose by the time I'm worm food, you'll just pop in a contact lens for night vision.
I watch every morning. Since this is as close I will probably ever get to a lot of these firearms ive only read about, I appreciate it. I had never seen a video of a .276 Pederson until yesterday. Make sure and let us know what they sold for. Out of curiosity, where would someone get a complete government kit to sell in the first place?
brenton adams A lot of US military trials rifles were sold as surplus on the civilian commercial market after the testing was done, back in the day. This is how all the Savage .45 pistols wound up in priviate hands, for example, along with all the different types of trials repeating rifles from the 1870s-1890s (Remington-Keene, Remington-Lee, Chaffee-Reese, Winchester-Hotchkiss, etc).
Do you think you'll ever get a chance to look at the German counterpart of this contraption? I think it was named the ZG 1229 Vampir and was used with the Stg 44.
Indeed ! And it would be lovely if we could somehow ( I realize this might not be entirely possible) To see what it looks like through that scope.. Somehow.. ^^
On of the earlier Wolfenstein video games had a mission where you used that gun. I remember it was quite unusual and funny since you were running in complete darkness and popping Nazi's who couldn't see you coming. The range in the video game was pretty much 75 yards so in retrospect it was actually quite realistic.
Im late, anyways i didn't expecting the weapon to be real, not the rifle but the scope itself! I was expecting it to be some wacky Nazi wunderwaffe but nope it was allied 😭 kinda dissapointed
I'd take that over a radio or a flamethrower. Imagine if you could set up on some hill somewhere and snipe enemy moving around in the darkness... Could keep you and your buddies safe at night.
Ian, today I purchased the carrying chest for one of these scopes - its in fantastic shape (besides missing the scope itself) and mine was made A DAY before the one presented here (6-22-1951). Great video, thanks for all the info!
I like to think in the future someone will be sitting at a table with an IMI TAR21 or some other modern rifle talking about how interesting of a collectible it is.
Ah yes. The dpms oracle. At the time when this rifle was more prevalent there were many conflicting accounts when it came to quality and reliability. Many of the old timers I have had the privilege of talking to say that it was "a piece of shit", however some others consider it to have been on of the greatest AR pattern rifles for the money at the time, which was around $400-$600. Now a days these pieces of history can't be had for less than $1000-2000
What a great old game! Ive played through single player sooo many times, thousands of hours in MP in RTCW and the upgraded, free standalone MP only version Wolfenstein:ET. Now feel like playing it, no idea where my disk is though! Wonder if its on steam?
I’m curious if this was ever explored and developed as a signaling light for the navy. Seems like that would be a more effective use of it at the time. Ships have endless power supply and being able to speak to one another during both blacked out and radio silence could have helped night time convoys significantly.
Germans had them on tanks too, passive and active systems. Anyway the panthers could be seen if they turned on the infrared light so instead they mounted giant infrared searchlights on sdkfz 251 halftracks and worked in teams for search and destroy. The halftracks were illuminating the targets from long range and the panthers used the passive IR to shoot them down from another position. They saw limited use but had a VERY effective kill rate.
This blows me away. I’m astounded we even *had* IR tech in the field that early in the 20th century. And not only did it work, it worked well enough to deploy and be somewhat effective. This is incredible and I can not believe it sold for so little. It’s like a science fiction weapon, but it has all the earmarks of Uncle Sam. Can you believe the spare lightbulb still even exists this many years later?
+VonGrav if you ever are in london go to the royal war museum, not only do they have the whole scope working that you can look through, you can also go inside actual ww2 to about vietnam era fighting vehicles
thank you ian for the wonderful videos although I live in England and don't own any guns I find your work informative and entertaining.as I suffer fro a heart condition and are largely housebound your programmes are a constant joy to me was the m3 night sight weapon the one used by THRUSH in the tv show Man from UNCLE.Thank you for your wonderful work.
But the weight matters. To think that was a huge incandescent bulb with a thick-ass filter over it. Today you can probably get more IR out of a flashlight that can fit in your pocket and costs 20 bucks. Oh and that battery lol, probably a lead acid battery back pack. I love seeing the rugged military construction though.
***** Hence why Ian explained how it's use was almost exclusively in defensive positions. To raise the alarm when a night attack was coming and to pick off approaching enemies. Movement and weight were not a factor there.
I'm just impressed they had that tech way back to almost WW2! I thought it wouldn't have been until Korea or so! It had to be big, battery and bulb technology were quite primitive in those days.
Im pretty sure this is what my grandma built during ww2. She always told us stories of some top secret night scope she worked in a factory building and this fits her description!
There has been one of these on a table at the Wanenmacher gun show every single year for most of my adult life. I've always stopped to look at it, every single year. Now I know so much more about it. Thanks!
If further proof is needed, it may (not even remotely) surprise you to know that Ian was formally consulted by Dice while Battlefield 1 was in development. He is even in the credits.
There was also a rubber scope eye piece on the end of the weapon to seal the green light illumination of the imaging system. The scope gave a pretty ghost-like view with some lag. We still got to fam-fire them in the pre-Vietnam days during US Marine Infantry training when I went through at Camp Pendleton.
Celebrate that maybe, possibly finally being done, at some point, in the next year or two, provided biden/kamala doesn’t decide to ruin the surpreme court
I saw M3 carbine in a magazine that i purchased back in 2008, and it stated that M3 carbines used in Battle of Okinawa caused almost 30% of Japanese casualties from small arms fire. Do you think it is true?
Somebody posted a link to a compilative "NVG history" down in the comments, and the claim it contains says "30% of the casualties suffered by small arms _in the first week of the Okinawa campaign_". Wiki says the land fighting lasted 81 days. (Though I don't know that part of history and can't say how the battle's intensity progressed.)
I just discovered this video. Have been going through your older ones. I really love this. Never heard of this set up before. Thanks for doing these videos for us!!
Modern ones are far, far more effective though - and don't require the battery backpack!
9 лет назад+3
+Forgotten Weapons do they run on a single AA? I really have no clue. But I know my security camera requires 5v atmost 2.5amps (power supply rating, so just divide that by half) to run 1. PCB-cam and 2. PCB-led and 3. infrared LEDs to infrared-light across the street to neighbor. I actuallly dont know the distance of my camera because it was angled down.
Try seeing something 75yds away clearly enough to be able to take a shot with a small infrared LED though.... Not only was that scope from a time where batteries were not small, bulbs were not efficient, but on top of that they needed very powerful projectors to be of any use (imagine the kind of lamp you'd need to see something that far away clearly enough). Makes me think those night vision rifles were sorely needed for a 30+lbs kit to be considered ready to be fielded. Also I think infrared has not been so popular with armies for decades. Original Russian PSO-1 scopes (the ones that came with the Dragunov) from the sixties already included special coating that would shine when illuminated by infrared. This did not require any batteries, as the coating "recharged" by being exposed to sunlight during the day. These scopes used batteries though (for reticle illumination). So the guy with the powerful infrared projector would be as visible as a lighthouse to most people on the opposing side (especially their designated marksmen).
+rpnct Excellent points. Some items loose their relevant perspective over time as we forget what was considered standard and acceptable. One needs only look to the last 10yrs of flashlights to see this. No one heard of Lumens or 18650 batteries and comparatively the 3D Mag w Zenon bulb of 10yrs ago is only as powerful as the little 65lm 1AAA key ring jobs of today. But if you consider night vision in 1943 it was revolutionary, most people never heard of the concept till Vietnam and it didn't really appear in movies and pop culture till the '80s. It would be the equivalent to finding out something like the Seals using a Lightsabre to kill BinLaden, yet never hearing of a Lightsabre for another 25-30yrs
Ive gotten to see one of these scopes at a forearm and aircraft collection facility in Florida. Its gigantic and when I first saw it I thought it was either a giant long range light or a strobe light, I never knew it was an infrared until now, Thankyou.
I heard, years ago, that the IR illumination from these was about the equivalent to a 2 D cell flashlight for light in the visible spectrum. That seems consistent with the advertised maximum effective range of 75-120 yards.
I was in the USMC 1958 - 1962 while stationed on Okinawa 1960 I was in crew served weapons we had 2 of these and did use them a couple times it was bulky with the back pack on and completely out of balance we had know members of our squad walk towards us at night If I remember right we could recognise someone at maybe 50 yards never out to 100 yards or beyond.
I remember seeing this in one of the Wolfenstein games (The one released in 2001) and I was thinking it was a completely made up weapon, When I read up on it I was surprised it actually existed! I have been fascinated with it ever since. That would be a great piece of history to own but the price would be so obscene in the auction house it would be nigh impossible to acquire.... I would love to see how well this thing works compared to the NVG's I had in the Army.
It was in Return to Castle Wolfenstein, which was released in 2001, as the Snooper Rifle (possibly a reference to the actual weapons nickname the "Snooper").
GrOuNdZeRo7777 The germans started work on a inferred night vision device in 1936. The ZG 1229, code named Vampire. It was used by troopers called "Snippers" for night operations. Most where fitted to STG 44 rifles late in WWII. You can pickup a Russian NVG Model PPN-2 for $300 from Apex gun parts. It is a lighter weight version.
@@avshutsach Sure, if you want it to be functional and completely disregard its speculative value as a history piece. Why not replicate it with more modern and efficient technology if you want something like this that actually works?
@@DannyBoy-jy1kq well yess because once you're done with an assignment, you are forced to go back to the menu and get another assignment. A total of 6 times for each piece of the gun...
What a great video! Actually got a hold of a few of these as "destroyed surplus" and was kinda hoping I could take a few with damaged parts and recombine them into a functional IR scope, but it sounds like it would be quite the project...
@@herrboritooriginal9670 hä? Ist das irgendwie geschrieben wurden? Sarkasmus im allgemeinen ist im Internet oft schwer zu erkennen. Es bringt eigentlich überhaupt nichts, außer für denjenigen der es benutzt, der fühlt sich nämlich ganz toll.
I find myself remembering as a kid how many of these I have passed on buying not because of their price (which was not much at All) but because of their vast weight, Ah to have the knowledge I have now back then!!
@@TheWoodsman661 shit id do a tank ride for $15 so long as its a good ride around town and I can dress as a ww2 paratrooper who just landed in Normandy and hopped on the back of a Sherman that is advancing.
I absolutely love your videos. I want to sincerely thank you for showing and talking about these firearms in such detail. I've watched a ton of your videos and love the historical value of the weapons you feature. Most people do videos on new guns, but I'm way more interested in old weapons. I discovered your channel through watching TBF TV. I'm also about to buy a Swiss K31 because of one of your videos as well. Anyway, keep up the awesome videos!
My grandfather talked about how they used them- They would creep through the jungle at night, the guy with the night vision in the center with the rest of the men on either side in a line. If the guy with night vision started shooting they would all shoot, blindly ahead. The way he described it, it sounded like that was actually effective.
7:28 they probably used the spot light in short bursts to reduce battery consumption. For example, if a sentry heard something outside of his post and he wanted a quick check. There’s no reason to waste the battery by having it permanently on when there’s no shooting.
It occurs to me that an additional function of the spot light could have been invisible morse signaling that also happens to be radio silent. A squad of soldiers equipped with this technology could coordinate ambushes without brodcasting it. So long as the enemy doesn't have infrared vision.
Cool I just commented earlier that I'd expect this to show up at some point with a cool night map (Which sounds like it'll be Okinawa in the) Pacific theatre. Didn't know someone had already found hints of it.
Another reason that the M1 Carbine (.30 cal ~20 round box magazine fed semi-automatic carbine) works better here than the springfield or M1 Garand is because it's fed from the bottom with a box magazine instead of being clip fed from the top where the huge night vision optic system is. You can't use a gun very well that feeds from the top because the optic is in the way and you'd have to move it further forward to get it out of the way of the feeding and extraction mechanisms which both makes it less easy to see into while using AND puts a ton of weight further forwards making it much harder to hold and raise up for shooting.
These M3s showed up in 1964 in the Man From UNCLE TV series. There they were referred to as the THRUSH carbine. They had IF night vision which looked like it was just some prop made for the show.
It still annoys me when people say infra red when they mean thermal imaging. Infra red still needs needs a light source to work. One of my old girlfriend's uncle was a photographer and he showed me how to use infra red film and flash setup to take black and white pictures of things at night without the subject's knowledge. He used the technique to get pictures of night workers at a car manufacuring plant all sleeping on the job for a national newspaper. Good old British Leyland of the seventies.
I was wondering why you and the gun are so high up in the shot at the start of the video, and then I realized it's probably so that the RIA logo is more visible. Seems like a small price to pay for access to such a variety of firearms. Love the videos!
My great uncle got to use one in WWII. After the war he was telling his friends and family about them. They all treated him like he was lying. Then he noticed that other Vets weren't talking about the IR scopes. He figured that he did not get the "don't talk about this" speech that the other guys in the unit received. And did not talk about it again for decades.
It does use a transformer, but it also has a vibrator to generate an AC signal from the battery. Here’s a Wikipedia description of the principle. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vibrator_(electronic)
Here’s a link to a description of image intensifier tubes. It has a fair amount of detail on the one used in the M3. www.photonics.com/Articles/Image_Intensification_The_Technology_of_Night/a25144
First time I saw this weapon was in the movie 'The Omega Man' w/ Charlton Heston… The M3 was in the movie but the best look you get at the IR gear was when it was mounted onto a BAR.
TroopperFoFo I actually saw a picture of one mounted to a BAR. Don't know backstory, but soldiers dressed in early Cold War era uniforms. Possibly some field improv.
As early as late 1940 early 1941 the German Luftwaffe (prior to the introduction of radar equipment) had similar 'active' night vision equipment called 'Spanner Anlage' installed on a limited number of night fighters. While it worked as a proof of concept, the limited effective range of the IR light and scope made if of little practical use in the night fighting business. Over time similar systems found their way to vehicles and armour, and ultimately (assault/sniper) rifles.
+Scott McKelvey True... but the resistance of wire/cables has remained fairly constant (regarding surface area etc.), that's not to say advances haven't been made :)
+Scott McKelvey Having worked as an electronics tech at a university working on kit from the 50's to present day. Voltage never really make much difference to the size of the cables as even fairly basic insulators will protect from high voltages if there is a path of lower resistance i.e. metal of the wire. Large current is what requires large cables as the resistance in the cable causes large currents to heat up the wire which causes the insulation to fail. Use a thicker wire and you reduce the resistance which stops the wire from overheating.
You learn something new every day. i knew the Germans had experimental night vision called vampyir or something like that. but i never knew the US had a production version of IR tech at the time.
For me this channel fills the void that the history channel left when they changed the direction of their programming
Don't forget the swamp crab logging fisherman who also owns a pawn store
+tonyblitz1 When I was a kid, we called it 'ANN'. The "All Nazi Network".
+tehsma Ah yes, we called it the Hitler channel.
Tv is on a decline, big time.
+tonyblitz1 To be fair, I heard a big part of that was the History channel losing access to the Smithsonian museum and their archives.
"Professionals have standards."
**Magnum Force begins to play**
Yeah mate, I use a infrared scope for dayloight snoipin
"Be polite."
"Be efficient."
"Kill everyone, you've met"
Just imagine how terrifying it would be to be on the receiving end of this in the mid 40's. Pitch dark at night and you hear a echoed crack in the distance and the person beside you just drops and you can't see more than 15 yards in front of you
A tad intimidating for sure.
seriously though... there'd be no explanation as to how the hell the enemy is capable of making these shots. This must have been a serious moral killer, i'd imagine they thought the Americans possessed some sort of magical ability to see in the dark (which they did).
@@Budabaii When an infrared light shines on you, you can feel it. It's a warm feeling on the side the light is hitting.
And then the guy just goes wanker in a aussie voice while waving his hand at you
@@AmishGangsta404 you get warm before you get cold
Battfield: Releases a cool gun
Me: No way that’s real
Forgotten Weapons: Actually....
Righttt that’s how I felt about the hellriegel
@@commander_cody841 they took massive creative liberties with the hellriegal seeing as it never actually saw combat and was meant to be operated by two people
@@zh2266 true but still the fact that the gun still got some respect, plus it was a dope addition because no other game has is that I know of
Except there’s always that one dickhead that sprints around with it hip firing
@@SkorpzOfficial why do I randomly find your comments on every video I watch
You are spoiling us with these daily videos!
(BTW I'm annoyed at some of these commenters implying these are "commercials" for RIA. Most of what you've shown are esoteric collectables, not only out of financial range of many gun enthusiasts, but very rare stuff we'd never see except in a book, or untouchable in a glass case. Your up close and detailed presentations are great for all of us that enjoy firearms, especially those unique ones so rarely encountered. It's nice RIA has allowed this to be shared.)
Glad you understand, and appreciate the videos!
Agreed. This is as close as most of us will come.
Even if RIA do benefit, would people rather not have had the chance to see such things?
I really love this thing. Horribly impractical by today's standards, but I really love seeing the beginnings of technology. Functional works of historical art.... Beautiful!
I suppose by the time I'm worm food, you'll just pop in a contact lens for night vision.
I watch every morning. Since this is as close I will probably ever get to a lot of these firearms ive only read about, I appreciate it. I had never seen a video of a .276 Pederson until yesterday. Make sure and let us know what they sold for.
Out of curiosity, where would someone get a complete government kit to sell in the first place?
brenton adams
A lot of US military trials rifles were sold as surplus on the civilian commercial market after the testing was done, back in the day. This is how all the Savage .45 pistols wound up in priviate hands, for example, along with all the different types of trials repeating rifles from the 1870s-1890s (Remington-Keene, Remington-Lee, Chaffee-Reese, Winchester-Hotchkiss, etc).
Ah the good old days...
Looks like some wacky weapon in a Fallout game
Huh iwas thinking the same thing (i think it would have fit int the 1st or 2nd though)
This weapon was actually in return to castle wolfenstein
@@ekoeko2346
Yep, the beautiful M3 'Snooper' that we rarely got to use.
It was a zombie killer in the movie "The Omega Man."
@@FlamingRobzilla it was BAR
Do you think you'll ever get a chance to look at the German counterpart of this contraption? I think it was named the ZG 1229 Vampir and was used with the Stg 44.
Thx for you comment :)
Yes please! I immediately had to think of it when I saw this video
Indeed ! And it would be lovely if we could somehow ( I realize this might not be entirely possible) To see what it looks like through that scope.. Somehow.. ^^
Which one is earlier
@@sargera1 the German one
US Marines still trained on them in 1963 when I went through the infantry course. Thanks for showing it, still remember the green glow.
was it the same bulky battery pack?!
On of the earlier Wolfenstein video games had a mission where you used that gun. I remember it was quite unusual and funny since you were running in complete darkness and popping Nazi's who couldn't see you coming. The range in the video game was pretty much 75 yards so in retrospect it was actually quite realistic.
Im late, anyways i didn't expecting the weapon to be real, not the rifle but the scope itself! I was expecting it to be some wacky Nazi wunderwaffe but nope it was allied 😭 kinda dissapointed
Imagine the look on a poor G.I.'s face when they handed him on of those to lug around.
I would assume it’s better than a radio at the time
However, imagine the look on that GI’s face when they looked down the scope at night for the first time.
Imagine the look on that G.I.'s face when they took it from him...
Until he capped the first enemy soldier who didn't even see him...
I'd take that over a radio or a flamethrower. Imagine if you could set up on some hill somewhere and snipe enemy moving around in the darkness... Could keep you and your buddies safe at night.
“Snipin’s a good job mate”
Challenging work, outta doors, I’ll guarantee you won’t hungry
nice stolen comment
@@yeetedbeans9378 i dont remember stealing it, and anyway, its from a famous vid so its obvious that someone will make a similiar comment
@@numbers4851 cuz at the end of the day, long as there's still two people left on the earth, someone is gonna want someone dead
Play world war heroes in mobile
Ian, today I purchased the carrying chest for one of these scopes - its in fantastic shape (besides missing the scope itself) and mine was made A DAY before the one presented here (6-22-1951). Great video, thanks for all the info!
I like to think in the future someone will be sitting at a table with an IMI TAR21 or some other modern rifle talking about how interesting of a collectible it is.
+Jordan Caleb I can picture it : "This MetalStorm belonged to my granddad, and at the time it was already obsolete so he used it for varminting...".
And here is one of the original AK47s, it is not like the modern day KC38s we see today
Ah yes. The dpms oracle. At the time when this rifle was more prevalent there were many conflicting accounts when it came to quality and reliability. Many of the old timers I have had the privilege of talking to say that it was "a piece of shit", however some others consider it to have been on of the greatest AR pattern rifles for the money at the time, which was around $400-$600. Now a days these pieces of history can't be had for less than $1000-2000
That's life with everything
“Now this right here is a hi point pistol originating in the 2000s”
Well, we have all heard of "Steampunk". This would be a real life example of "Dieselpunk". (WWII era Steampunk)
I demand reichpunk
@@Hongobogologomo i bet you do buddy
i bet you do...
that's a lot a punks
no, don't call it WWII steampunk, it's very cringey
dieselpunk has the vibe of WWI, WWII, and Cold War eras. far more superior
Nuclear punk> all others
That was the snooper rifle from return to castle wholfenstein
Hell yeah. Love that game.
lol yeah loved that game think ill play it right now actually
What a great old game! Ive played through single player sooo many times, thousands of hours in MP in RTCW and the upgraded, free standalone MP only version Wolfenstein:ET. Now feel like playing it, no idea where my disk is though! Wonder if its on steam?
Late reply, lol.
ET is free to download, I still play it daily with a group. RTCW can be found on steam.
Do they make special rifles for snoopers now? Whatever next?
I’m curious if this was ever explored and developed as a signaling light for the navy. Seems like that would be a more effective use of it at the time. Ships have endless power supply and being able to speak to one another during both blacked out and radio silence could have helped night time convoys significantly.
This is the coolest. most unique world war 2 weapon system I've ever seen.
The Germans had basically the same setup for the Stg 44. It was called the ZG 1229 Vampir.
Roland Deschain true. i was surprised to see a few pics on google a few years ago. i couldnt believe it at the time.
Germans had them on tanks too, passive and active systems. Anyway the panthers could be seen if they turned on the infrared light so instead they mounted giant infrared searchlights on sdkfz 251 halftracks and worked in teams for search and destroy. The halftracks were illuminating the targets from long range and the panthers used the passive IR to shoot them down from another position. They saw limited use but had a VERY effective kill rate.
@@predattak That's basically all the advanced, late-war stuff Germany made. Pretty dang awesome, but too little, too late.
No it’s the Nazi space fortress
"Thanks for standin' still, mate!"
Do you know what kind of batteries these use? Lead acid?
Yup, lead-acid.
Yup and you could probably easily retrofit 6v modern SLA batteries and improve the wiring and it'd probably still work.
Lol they won't use a lithium ion battery, back then
@@deepankar94 They used silver-zinc on Apollo LEM
@@deepankar94 Where do you think the tech came from, pill bill
This blows me away. I’m astounded we even *had* IR tech in the field that early in the 20th century. And not only did it work, it worked well enough to deploy and be somewhat effective. This is incredible and I can not believe it sold for so little. It’s like a science fiction weapon, but it has all the earmarks of Uncle Sam.
Can you believe the spare lightbulb still even exists this many years later?
One day I hope u get to see a STG44 with Vampir scope :3
+VonGrav if you ever are in london go to the royal war museum, not only do they have the whole scope working that you can look through, you can also go inside actual ww2 to about vietnam era fighting vehicles
@@Yourantsally is that the Imperial War Museum or is is there an actual Royal War Museum
There is one at the royal armouries in leeds as well if my memory serves me right
Who else thinks this looks like sniper’s gun from TF2?
me
only the scope though the rest of this rifle looks nothing like it
@@andytan2412 if the rifle was bolt action and a higher caliber then it would but I think the wood furniture is also pretty darn close.
with that big scope tho😂
"Yeah that seems about right"
thank you ian for the wonderful videos although I live in England and don't own any guns I find your work informative and entertaining.as I suffer fro a heart condition and are largely housebound your programmes are a constant joy to me was the m3 night sight weapon the one used by THRUSH in the tv show Man from UNCLE.Thank you for your wonderful work.
Mick Kemp Showing our age, I was thinking the same thing.lol
Early infrared optics are fascinating but I always laugh when I look at them.
They look hilariously silly.
looks don't matter at night since it's dark ;)
But the weight matters. To think that was a huge incandescent bulb with a thick-ass filter over it. Today you can probably get more IR out of a flashlight that can fit in your pocket and costs 20 bucks. Oh and that battery lol, probably a lead acid battery back pack. I love seeing the rugged military construction though.
***** Hence why Ian explained how it's use was almost exclusively in defensive positions. To raise the alarm when a night attack was coming and to pick off approaching enemies. Movement and weight were not a factor there.
I'm just impressed they had that tech way back to almost WW2! I thought it wouldn't have been until Korea or so! It had to be big, battery and bulb technology were quite primitive in those days.
Im pretty sure this is what my grandma built during ww2. She always told us stories of some top secret night scope she worked in a factory building and this fits her description!
No doubt.
There has been one of these on a table at the Wanenmacher gun show every single year for most of my adult life. I've always stopped to look at it, every single year. Now I know so much more about it. Thanks!
This managed to arrive in the last update in battlefield v
I remember seeing photos of this in our Collier's Encyclopedia growing up. Nice to see the details. Great video as always
this is proof this dice watches forgotten weapons
If further proof is needed, it may (not even remotely) surprise you to know that Ian was formally consulted by Dice while Battlefield 1 was in development. He is even in the credits.
There was also a rubber scope eye piece on the end of the weapon to seal the green light illumination of the imaging system. The scope gave a pretty ghost-like view with some lag. We still got to fam-fire them in the pre-Vietnam days during US Marine Infantry training when I went through at Camp Pendleton.
Obviously the detachable pistolgrip was in case you had to fight in california.
Celebrate that maybe, possibly finally being done, at some point, in the next year or two, provided biden/kamala doesn’t decide to ruin the surpreme court
It's the Snooper Rifle from Return To Castle Wolfenstein! That's awesome, so it was real after all :D
Yup, it is. I recognized it instantly in RTCW because I had known about the M3 rig before. I love my USGI M1 Inland. 😉
I saw M3 carbine in a magazine that i purchased back in 2008, and it stated that M3 carbines used in Battle of Okinawa caused almost 30% of Japanese casualties from small arms fire. Do you think it is true?
That's the number I have seen as well, but I haven't tried to verify it.
Somebody posted a link to a compilative "NVG history" down in the comments, and the claim it contains says "30% of the casualties suffered by small arms _in the first week of the Okinawa campaign_". Wiki says the land fighting lasted 81 days. (Though I don't know that part of history and can't say how the battle's intensity progressed.)
Cool find, probably worth holding on to until a collector pops up looking for one.
I just discovered this video. Have been going through your older ones. I really love this. Never heard of this set up before. Thanks for doing these videos for us!!
It's amazing that even modern infrared scopes aren't much smaller than this old piece of American iron.
Modern ones are far, far more effective though - and don't require the battery backpack!
+Forgotten Weapons do they run on a single AA? I really have no clue.
But I know my security camera requires 5v atmost 2.5amps (power supply rating, so just divide that by half) to run 1. PCB-cam and 2. PCB-led and 3. infrared LEDs to infrared-light across the street to neighbor. I actuallly dont know the distance of my camera because it was angled down.
Try seeing something 75yds away clearly enough to be able to take a shot with a small infrared LED though.... Not only was that scope from a time where batteries were not small, bulbs were not efficient, but on top of that they needed very powerful projectors to be of any use (imagine the kind of lamp you'd need to see something that far away clearly enough). Makes me think those night vision rifles were sorely needed for a 30+lbs kit to be considered ready to be fielded.
Also I think infrared has not been so popular with armies for decades. Original Russian PSO-1 scopes (the ones that came with the Dragunov) from the sixties already included special coating that would shine when illuminated by infrared. This did not require any batteries, as the coating "recharged" by being exposed to sunlight during the day. These scopes used batteries though (for reticle illumination). So the guy with the powerful infrared projector would be as visible as a lighthouse to most people on the opposing side (especially their designated marksmen).
+rpnct Excellent points. Some items loose their relevant perspective over time as we forget what was considered standard and acceptable. One needs only look to the last 10yrs of flashlights to see this. No one heard of Lumens or 18650 batteries and comparatively the 3D Mag w Zenon bulb of 10yrs ago is only as powerful as the little 65lm 1AAA key ring jobs of today. But if you consider night vision in 1943 it was revolutionary, most people never heard of the concept till Vietnam and it didn't really appear in movies and pop culture till the '80s. It would be the equivalent to finding out something like the Seals using a Lightsabre to kill BinLaden, yet never hearing of a Lightsabre for another 25-30yrs
rpnct cool info
awesome! So glad someone finally did a video on this. Very interesting and a steeping stone in Infantry night fighting.
This comment-section is now the property of the Battlefield community
NO!
Huh?
Our TF2 community says step aside sir
True 😂👌🏻 it's on my recommended videos
Haha exactly what brought me here
@@Comrade_Collects same here!
My Father was a Scout Sniper on Okinawa. He carried a Springfield. He became friends with a night sniper. He carried the guys spare batteries for him
And i thought the StG.44 Vampir was the only one out there ... you learn something new everyday ...
It ripped off, after defeat.
Ive gotten to see one of these scopes at a forearm and aircraft collection facility in Florida. Its gigantic and when I first saw it I thought it was either a giant long range light or a strobe light, I never knew it was an infrared until now, Thankyou.
"Anything above your neck is gonna' be a fine, red mist!"
i bought one from sarco in 1977 or so. worked great. looked really cool.that rubberized canvas smelled sweet and plasticy. most unique.
WW2 Operator- "Do you even Pack-a-Punch, bro?"
I heard, years ago, that the IR illumination from these was about the equivalent to a 2 D cell flashlight for light in the visible spectrum. That seems consistent with the advertised maximum effective range of 75-120 yards.
Love these RIA vids. Some very nice unique stuff.
I was in the USMC 1958 - 1962 while stationed on Okinawa 1960 I was in crew served weapons we had 2 of these and did use them a couple times it was bulky with the back pack on and completely out of balance we had know members of our squad walk towards us at night If I remember right we could recognise someone at maybe 50 yards never out to 100 yards or beyond.
Cheers, bud! But it was still neat, wasn't it?
I remember seeing this in one of the Wolfenstein games (The one released in 2001) and I was thinking it was a completely made up weapon, When I read up on it I was surprised it actually existed! I have been fascinated with it ever since.
That would be a great piece of history to own but the price would be so obscene in the auction house it would be nigh impossible to acquire....
I would love to see how well this thing works compared to the NVG's I had in the Army.
It was in Return to Castle Wolfenstein, which was released in 2001, as the Snooper Rifle (possibly a reference to the actual weapons nickname the "Snooper").
GoredonTheDestroyer That's the one, I have heard it referred to as the Snooper rifle before in some literature.
GrOuNdZeRo7777 The germans started work on a inferred night vision device in 1936. The ZG 1229, code named Vampire. It was used by troopers called "Snippers" for night operations. Most where fitted to STG 44 rifles late in WWII. You can pickup a Russian NVG Model PPN-2 for $300 from Apex gun parts. It is a lighter weight version.
Damn that's right. I remember that now using it the game. I thought it was made up too. Didn't bother to look it up then. Lol.
redthegreendog114 There is something just so endearingly steampunk about the early night vision scopes, That Vampir is no exception!
some of the amazing tech developed back in wo2 blows my mind everytime, thanks for the great look at a original wo2 infrared sight!
Damn, I was expecting it to sell for more than 5k
Gryffin DarkBreed all it takes is some major wiring skills and a lot of patience
@@avshutsach
Sure, if you want it to be functional and completely disregard its speculative value as a history piece. Why not replicate it with more modern and efficient technology if you want something like this that actually works?
@@DinnerForkTongue finding period wire and using period techniques
it did sell for more than 5K
oh shit I found myself
Love seeing the camera stabilizer getting the microphone into the frame at times with the closeups
Battlefield V: *Its free real estate*
They add this but not the Springfield rifle.
I got this gun fully golden. It's mint 👌
when a gun is getting added to a game I search for the gun on RUclips before it gets flooded by people making videos about this gun
@@EntZeroEsc some grind isn’t it. 🤣🤣
@@DannyBoy-jy1kq well yess because once you're done with an assignment, you are forced to go back to the menu and get another assignment. A total of 6 times for each piece of the gun...
What a great video! Actually got a hold of a few of these as "destroyed surplus" and was kinda hoping I could take a few with damaged parts and recombine them into a functional IR scope, but it sounds like it would be quite the project...
Imagine having this gun in battlefield
This gun is in battlefield.
@@MakeLoveNotHate9 wooosh
Ohne Namen take a fucking joke
@@MakeLoveNotHate9 Nur weil du deutscher bist heißt es nicht, dass Amerikaner keinen Sarkasmus kennen.
@@herrboritooriginal9670 hä? Ist das irgendwie geschrieben wurden?
Sarkasmus im allgemeinen ist im Internet oft schwer zu erkennen.
Es bringt eigentlich überhaupt nichts, außer für denjenigen der es benutzt, der fühlt sich nämlich ganz toll.
I'm learning quite a lot about some historical events and war strategies
I love this
"you want to hear somethin' funny? You're dead"
"Whats up you Bloody wankers!"
-sniper from TF2
Manuel
@@rogelio_34 yup that's my name
Jorge
Deign
I find myself remembering as a kid how many of these I have passed on buying not because of their price (which was not much at All) but because of their vast weight, Ah to have the knowledge I have now back then!!
"Were surplussed to the public." You don't see that these days.
No, now they just give them to the police, because if there's one thing that says community outreach, it's the police rolling in a tank.
@@sac3528 not gonna lie, if the police gave public tank rides, that would be great community outreach lol...
@@MrSolLeks Tank Rides: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, from 12:00 to 4:30. Adults: $15 Kids:$7.50
@@TheWoodsman661 shit id do a tank ride for $15 so long as its a good ride around town and I can dress as a ww2 paratrooper who just landed in Normandy and hopped on the back of a Sherman that is advancing.
@@MrSolLeks I think most people would. We just need to talk to Arnold Schwarzenegger about it, since he has a tank.
I absolutely love your videos. I want to sincerely thank you for showing and talking about these firearms in such detail. I've watched a ton of your videos and love the historical value of the weapons you feature. Most people do videos on new guns, but I'm way more interested in old weapons. I discovered your channel through watching TBF TV. I'm also about to buy a Swiss K31 because of one of your videos as well. Anyway, keep up the awesome videos!
My grandfather talked about how they used them- They would creep through the jungle at night, the guy with the night vision in the center with the rest of the men on either side in a line. If the guy with night vision started shooting they would all shoot, blindly ahead. The way he described it, it sounded like that was actually effective.
Nice, I was reading about this system a while ago, nice to see it in the flesh.
It's the sniper's gun from TF2 lol.
that's what I noticed lol!
+PKMN Trainer Elias Bullshit. Sniper's sniper rifle resembles M40 more. You can find SR from this vid in Return to Castle Wolfenstein game
get out
Think about ya head wanka
Snipers gun is also bolt action.
I am loving that gigantic primitive yet really complicated scope this is something i would love to own
That's amazing, it's pretty cool to see how far night optics have come. I had no idea there were variants like this all the way back into WW2
7:28 they probably used the spot light in short bursts to reduce battery consumption. For example, if a sentry heard something outside of his post and he wanted a quick check. There’s no reason to waste the battery by having it permanently on when there’s no shooting.
I remember seing this in the burbs. "Hey Rumsfield!" Lol
SHUT UP & PAINT YOUR GOD DAMN HOUSE!!
It occurs to me that an additional function of the spot light could have been invisible morse signaling that also happens to be radio silent. A squad of soldiers equipped with this technology could coordinate ambushes without brodcasting it. So long as the enemy doesn't have infrared vision.
Pretty dang cool rifle. Would be a really interesting addition to BFV since it was found in the files a while ago.
Cool I just commented earlier that I'd expect this to show up at some point with a cool night map (Which sounds like it'll be Okinawa in the) Pacific theatre. Didn't know someone had already found hints of it.
Another reason that the M1 Carbine (.30 cal ~20 round box magazine fed semi-automatic carbine) works better here than the springfield or M1 Garand is because it's fed from the bottom with a box magazine instead of being clip fed from the top where the huge night vision optic system is. You can't use a gun very well that feeds from the top because the optic is in the way and you'd have to move it further forward to get it out of the way of the feeding and extraction mechanisms which both makes it less easy to see into while using AND puts a ton of weight further forwards making it much harder to hold and raise up for shooting.
This is what they called "Snooper Rifle" in Return To Castle Wolfenstein
These M3s showed up in 1964 in the Man From UNCLE TV series. There they were referred to as the THRUSH carbine. They had IF night vision which looked like it was just some prop made for the show.
BFV: Allow us to introduce ourselves
Snipin's a good job, mate...
Sniper's a good job mate!
"The difference is one is a job and the other is a mental sickness."
keep up the good work man. Love your vids
It still annoys me when people say infra red when they mean thermal imaging. Infra red still needs needs a light source to work. One of my old girlfriend's uncle was a photographer and he showed me how to use infra red film and flash setup to take black and white pictures of things at night without the subject's knowledge. He used the technique to get pictures of night workers at a car manufacuring plant all sleeping on the job for a national newspaper. Good old British Leyland of the seventies.
Did you not watch the video? He said that was a infra red light bulb on top to illuminate.
There is a decent RUclips channel called, “The History Guy”. Ian does an excellent job of being the history guy for firearms. Both are better than TV.
I was wondering why you and the gun are so high up in the shot at the start of the video, and then I realized it's probably so that the RIA logo is more visible. Seems like a small price to pay for access to such a variety of firearms. Love the videos!
My great uncle got to use one in WWII. After the war he was telling his friends and family about them. They all treated him like he was lying.
Then he noticed that other Vets weren't talking about the IR scopes. He figured that he did not get the "don't talk about this" speech that the other guys in the unit received. And did not talk about it again for decades.
Did anyone else get this recommended to them after the bfv update
we love your work Ian keep it up
DICE must watch this guy
What!!! This was incredibly effective I remember.
Killed a lot of enemies with it.
In Return to Castle Wolfenstein
yeah, great riffle with very rare ammo
Who came here because for battlefield V update?
It was in my suggest videos,
Just look for this comment
yes
Tf2 beats battlefield, but I do like the new update, good soldier uniforms
@@chikenxlegend1833 huh
I remember hearing my grandfather telling me about these in the Korean war, awesome video
I remember this weapon from the movie "The Omega Man" starring Charleston Heston.
I'm pretty sure it was indeed this optic but was instead mounted on an M1918 BAR
They are adding this to the latest upcoming update for Battlefield V :) What a cool bit of history
looks like an stg 44 vampir
Isn't it a copy of zg.1229?
I believe 1 reason to use that carbine is fragile optic setup for powerful cartridge.
Would have been good to hear more about the technology in the scope.
Yeah. I suspect that 1. It probably doesn’t work anymore. 2. I would be really hard to get it to work. 3. It’s not really in Ian’s wheelhouse.
It does use a transformer, but it also has a vibrator to generate an AC signal from the battery. Here’s a Wikipedia description of the principle. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vibrator_(electronic)
Here’s a link to a description of image intensifier tubes. It has a fair amount of detail on the one used in the M3. www.photonics.com/Articles/Image_Intensification_The_Technology_of_Night/a25144
First time I saw this weapon was in the movie 'The Omega Man' w/ Charlton Heston… The M3 was in the movie but the best look you get at the IR gear was when it was mounted onto a BAR.
Didn't the germans have something similar to this for their stg-44
Yes, they had the Zielgerät 1229, also known as the Vampir scope.
They even have an infrared scope for their tanks.
So cool. Also that scope is huge.
perreterecon Well if you had to carry that with you all the time you might need the jeep after you get tired.
perreterecon It could be even worse if They could of decided to put this system on the BAR.
TroopperFoFo Now THAT is cringeworthy, but would be pretty cool. *cringe*
TroopperFoFo I actually saw a picture of one mounted to a BAR. Don't know backstory, but soldiers dressed in early Cold War era uniforms. Possibly some field improv.
diasirea They must've hated themselfes
You all here after Battlefield V update.....
Very cool stuff. Thanks for sharing.
Everytime a gun gets leaked on Battlefield 5, i come here for the History Lesson.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Excellent review. Never even knew this existed
What type of reticle does the scope use?
As early as late 1940 early 1941 the German Luftwaffe (prior to the introduction of radar equipment) had similar 'active' night vision equipment called 'Spanner Anlage' installed on a limited number of night fighters. While it worked as a proof of concept, the limited effective range of the IR light and scope made if of little practical use in the night fighting business. Over time similar systems found their way to vehicles and armour, and ultimately (assault/sniper) rifles.
Wow... just shows you how long the BNC connector has been in service (usually associated with RF applications).
+SpectreOZ No kidding! It's a bit of a surprise to me that the tiny cable they use doesn't break down at 20 kV, I wonder what materials it uses...
***** Well the cable for HID lights in vehicles carries 25kV from the unit to the bulb and that isn't a notably over heavy cable.
To be sure, but we're talking about modern materials vs 40s era stuff. Pretty nifty!
+Scott McKelvey True... but the resistance of wire/cables has remained fairly constant (regarding surface area etc.), that's not to say advances haven't been made :)
+Scott McKelvey Having worked as an electronics tech at a university working on kit from the 50's to present day. Voltage never really make much difference to the size of the cables as even fairly basic insulators will protect from high voltages if there is a path of lower resistance i.e. metal of the wire.
Large current is what requires large cables as the resistance in the cable causes large currents to heat up the wire which causes the insulation to fail.
Use a thicker wire and you reduce the resistance which stops the wire from overheating.
You learn something new every day. i knew the Germans had experimental night vision called vampyir or something like that. but i never knew the US had a production version of IR tech at the time.