M3 Grease Gun

One our door gunners got busted sending an AK, piece by piece, to his uncle. He got an Article 15 with loss of a stripe. No one wanted to drum out a good 60 man. Besides, he had enough on his mind sitting in back of a Huey, shooting FROM a moving target. :eek:

What they didn't know was he got busted on his third one, according to what he told me.
 
The T-39 arrived at Takhli AB , Thailand regular stop, classified, high priority cargo, some personnel.
The Wing Sergeant Major is making the pickup.
Not a fuel stop, so they shutdown the left side engine and the CoPilot opens the door.
Hands out some packages, says one more!
Hands out a long heavy package. An AK-47 breaks through the butcher paper wrapper.
Go to go! Door closes, away they go.
The Sergeant Major takes the classified to usual suspects, then puts AKs on Wing Commander’s desk.
Early next morning Commander yells , What the Hell is This!
Sergeant Major in next office tells him they arrived on the T-39.
Addressed to Fred Z (last name starts with Z)
Get him down here now! Yes Sir!
Fred of course knows nothing!
Apparently a Buddy of Fred’s was a Raven FAC up in Laos.
He flew over into Thailand and put the guns on the T-39 addressed to Fred.
What happened to the AKs?
Don’t know. But I don’t have them!
 
had a grease gun in korea. it didn't have a cocking handle. only a 4" barrel. the mags. could be used for a hammer. easy to clean, wire handle loosened the barrel, then screwed off. it was a cold weapon to carry when it got below zero. our LT. liked it, ended up he carryed / switched, i got a 45 w/ a tanker holester.
 
2152hq said:
If you peruse that NFA handbook I posted the link to earlier. it gives details and pics of the necessary deactivation/cutting processes necessary to make a MG/SMG just that.
Torch cut is the latest method and cuts must be 1/4" in width IIRC, placed across specific areas of the weapon, etc.

Sometimes just a few internal parts of certain weapons are considered to be 'a machine gun' under the NFA law. So it can be a confusing bit of landscape to travel through

The Handbook downloads slowly at times, but other times seems to play nice.

National Firearms Act Handbook | Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
Click to expand...

Correct,

Torch cuts minimum of 1/4" metal displacement/burn. Barrel trunnion and barrel is one cut that is mandatory.

Sadly historic pieces such as the M3 above are nothing but contraband and junk
 
While on foot patrol in 1969, an oldish gentleman walked up to my partner and me, saying "can I ask you a question"? He asked, "do you know what a M3 Greaser is? I told him I had seen them while in the military. He said "good, its yours". Opened his coat and handed me a fully operational, M3 with ammo, and hurried off. We walked to the nearest callbox and asked for a supervisor to meet us. A Sargeant and a Lieutenant shortly arrived and we handed the M3 to the Lieutenant. The Lieutenant told us the Sargeant would take care of the paperwork. We never saw the M3 again or any report about gun. It also was never part of the Special Operations Division inventory nor on the range. I could never find any paperwork about the gun. Do you think... . ?
 
lkabug said:
While on foot patrol in 1969, an oldish gentleman walked up to my partner and me, saying "can I ask you a question"? He asked, "do you know what a M3 Greaser is? I told him I had seen them while in the military. He said "good, its yours". Opened his coat and handed me a fully operational, M3 with ammo, and hurried off. We walked to the nearest callbox and asked for a supervisor to meet us. A Sargeant and a Lieutenant shortly arrived and we handed the M3 to the Lieutenant. The Lieutenant told us the Sargeant would take care of the paperwork. We never saw the M3 again or any report about gun. It also was never part of the Special Operations Division inventory nor on the range. I could never find any paperwork about the gun. Do you think... . ?
Click to expand...

It became part of someone’s collection…even if “unofficial”. I’ve been told that most undocumented machine guns in the country are in the hands of individual law enforcement officers.

It’s also not unheard of that the most collectible firearms confiscated by police and members of the local prosecutor’s offices are cherry picked by senior officers who make sure any destruct orders are signed off on as completed.

I don’t know how commonplace that is today compared to back in the day…but I wonder about that.
 
Way back in 1953 & 1954 I worked in a USAFSS compound. We had the
M3A1 "Grease Guns" hanging on the wall ready to use if necessary. We,
of course, were required to know how to use them. What I remember
most is to point the gun at the targets "feet" because when you cut loose
the gun climbs.
 
I don't know what I'd do if I found one of those in a wall of my house. I'd admire it for a bit, but I couldn't take it to any of the local ranges without prying eyes asking questions. Plus, it would be quite a burden to own it legally, let alone illegally. But I wouldn't want it destroyed either.
 
One of my friends had an M3 dewat that he bought pre-68 for $25. Unfortunately it was stolen before he could register it in the amnesty. He can't believe what they cost now. He would like to buy one now, but his wife would beat him to death with it.

At a gun buy-back, someone turned in a WW2 Japanese Type 92 aircraft machinegun. It was based on the Lewis gun.
 
10 or 20 years ago, workers at Guide Lamp in Anderson In. found 2 M3 grease guns wrapped in oily cloth in the roof supports.

Guide Lamp was the only manufacture of the M3's. Rumor was that some Guide employees "liberated" a couple of M3's and hid them in the rafters expecting to retrieve after the war when security would be much more lax.

Evidently the employees were laid off before they could retrieve the M3's.

I kinda remember that when GM closed all the Anderson IN plants, the stash was found before the plant was leveled.
 
I bet a barrel and magazine could've been found for the old gun.
Turned it in to the ATF you say?

Of course that is the only legal thing to do.
 
Drm50 said:
You would be surprised how much stuff from WW2 is still in the woodwork, literally. Used to be when a full auto surfaced the sheriff would take possession of it and end of story. He could file for dept. ownership or it went up the line to ATF. Some went home with deputies to start their second unofficial unlicensed life.
In todays political atmosphere I would not want to find one or have anything to do with one.
Click to expand...

You mite need one.
 
alwslate said:
A gun that I have always wanted. I wish now that I had bought one back in the 60s when they were fairly common at gun shows for a few hundred $.
Click to expand...

But how many hours would you have had to have worked to make those 1960’s dollars? Might have taken several paychecks just like now.
 
Drm50 said:
You would be surprised how much stuff from WW2 is still in the woodwork, literally. Used to be when a full auto surfaced the sheriff would take possession of it and end of story. He could file for dept. ownership or it went up the line to ATF. Some went home with deputies to start their second unofficial unlicensed life.
In todays political atmosphere I would not want to find one or have anything to do with one.
Click to expand...

The PD my uncle worked for had a Tommy Gun and an M3. You could check them out and use them at the police range if you supplied the .45ACP. The Tommy Gun came from a biker gang they busted for something in the '60s. Don't think I ever heard the story of the M3.
 
Last edited:
In the mid 60's when I was in the Sea Bee's , I got to fire a grease gun when I was on
either Guam or Okie, when I had some spare time , from taking care of all the weapon in the Armory.

During the change over from WW2 weapon to the NATO weapons, the one that I liked to fire the most was the old M-1 , even though it only held eight rounds.

However the "Grease gun" put a smile on every ones face, that fired it.
Most targets got off easy.
 
Neat weapon, though the mags aren't the best.
Very controllable in full auto.
When I was in the 24th Infantry Division in the late 80s, my track driver (AN/VSC-3 RATT) was issued one. Was vehicle OVM ATT.
 
Among the SMG's I had as an Advisor in IV Corps was an M3, I can't recall if it was the one with crank for moving the bolt or one with just the hole in the bolt for the operator's finger. It was handy and just the size to drop into the passenger dash grab handle of a Jeep on short road trips. It had a very slow cyclic rate, maybe 300/min or so. I could count the rounds as I shot it for fun.

Had it with me for fun on a MAT mission out along the Plane of Reeds, and met up with a middle aged Jesuit priest in a tiny village on a canal. Asked him how he was going to defend himself when Chuck came to kill him. He showed me his revolver, and I told him that would never do, so gave him my M3 with some mags.

I always wondered what became that Man of God, and happened to read somewhere that a decade ago he died, still serving his faith.

In another post I will discuss what one of my EOD friends in Germany found behind a brick wall in a German arms room.

Stay Safe, SF VET
 
The LCUs that I ended up on in Danang, RSV were commissioned in the late 30's and had been sitting in Luzon Harbor, PI since the end of the war. When we got them the hatches were all welded shut, we had to cut them open with a torch. We found all sorts of **** in their, no bodies...but plenty of old school WWII gear including the odd Grease Gun, Thompson, 1911...usually in the crew's quarters which sat on both port and starboard sides. The 20mm Cannons and M2's were stored in the Galley which was the largest compartment. Everything was covered in cosomoline, took the mechanics weeks to clean the engine room...two methods for cleaning that stuff were high pressure steam and gasoline. We only had access to the later, it was a miserable job in the heat, not to mention dangerous as hell. The grease gun I messed around with was in very good condition but somebody much smarter than I, maybe C. Puller said "The only enemy killed by those things were the ones hit by Marines throwing them over their shoulder." Fun though...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

D
Cane Gun
Replies
10
Views
639
Doriangray6
D
K
Ruger pellet gun
Replies
7
Views
669
Golddollar
Golddollar
Goony
A Classic "Space Gun"
2
Replies
33
Views
755
SW Gun Guy
S
R
Ship My Gun
Replies
0
Views
261
rockquarry
R
Breakaway500
My movie star gun: OA93
Replies
6
Views
645
Hawg Rider
H

Latest posts

Back
Top