Gun Sabotage

[Snyper]

No expert, but the easiest and best way to me would be to damage the crown just before installing the flash suppressor. Its going to get noticed though. Eventually It will get backtracked from the field back to the factory and eventually the line most likely.

Crowns really don't have as much effect on accuracy as most think, and even if it does it's easily repaired with simple hand tools.

http://www.accuratereloading.com/crownr.html

 

[kcofohio]

I have read that late in the war, desperation by Germany, to produce/replace weapons, mainly cannons (flak guns), lost in battles. It became easier (lack of better word) to slip sabotaged barrels, mainly incomplete bores, into the supply line.

If the inspector took every 10th product out to inspect, the workers may have been able to time when to slip by a bad item.

To the OP, I hope you can find the accurate info you need. You may want to search out forums of WWII history buffs.

 

[bannockburn]

Larry Lewyn

I would think that somehow altering the gun's sights would be one way of effectively sabotaging rifle production. I read somewhere that slave laborers also did less than a "proper" job in regards to the heat treatment of the metal parts that went into many of the guns, including the receivers and barrels. Keep in mind too that as the war dragged on the Germans had increasing difficulty in even supplying the essential raw materials to the factories to make all of the weaponry they required.

Likewise the laborers use to mess with the gyroscopic mechanism that went into the German's V1 and V2 rockets as to send them way off course.

 

[pintler]

The OSS published a guide to sabotage:

https://www.cia.gov/news-informatio...tory-archive/CleanedUOSSSimpleSabotage_sm.pdf

A lot of the suggestions for factory workers don't involve directly sabotaging the parts. Instead, mess with the process. For example, if you run a drill too slow or too fast it will wear prematurely. That means that you get to take a slow walk to the tool crib to get a new one, and maybe as a bonus, that it will produce some bad parts before QC notices it's drilling off size. And you can explain those bad parts - the drill was off size, after all.

(as a bonus for office workers, check out the suggestions for sabotaging office work on page 28. I worked in an office, and had those framed on my office wall. Not because I wanted to sabotage anything, but because they often seemed like the normal process I encountered)

 

[chicharrones]

The OSS published a guide to sabotage:

https://www.cia.gov/news-informatio...tory-archive/CleanedUOSSSimpleSabotage_sm.pdf

A lot of the suggestions for factory workers don't involve directly sabotaging the parts. Instead, mess with the process. For example, if you run a drill too slow or too fast it will wear prematurely. That means that you get to take a slow walk to the tool crib to get a new one, and maybe as a bonus, that it will produce some bad parts before QC notices it's drilling off size. And you can explain those bad parts - the drill was off size, after all.

(as a bonus for office workers, check out the suggestions for sabotaging office work on page 28. I worked in an office, and had those framed on my office wall. Not because I wanted to sabotage anything, but because they often seemed like the normal process I encountered)

Nice find.

The office worker section is hilarious.

 

[Carl N. Brown]

I recall reading that during packing at Nazi-run arms factories in World War II, slave laborers would frequently knock the front sights off enough to miss a man at 100 meters. That would be after the guns were test-fired for proof, but just before they were shipped.

After World War II, when the Israelis received military surplus rifles from Europe, they knew to double check the sights and rezero the guns that needed it.

ADDED:
Wait a minute.
That Simple Sabotage Field Manual (Strategic Services) "(11) General Interference with Organizations and Production" and "(12) General Devices for Lowering Morale and Creating Confusion".
That must be where management got the standard operating procedures for where I used to work. That explains a lot.

 

[CapnMac]

That must be where management got the standard operating procedures for where I used to work. That explains a lot.

You and me both, brother.

 

[RPZ]

Over hardening firing pins, ejectors and extractors seems most viable to me. Springs could be a target, but the fine line between them working for a brief period and then failing, and failing during factory tests would be tough to do.

 

[gotboostvr]

Nice find.

The office worker section is hilarious.

That hit so close to home my windows rattled.

Oof.

 

[Larry Lewyn]

The acceptance measure for Kar98K, IIRC, was 5 or 10 shots into 800mm x 800mm square at 200m. So, bent sight blade would not be noticed until much later.

Cross-threading or stripping the threads on simple things--like barrel bands, sling swivels and the like. Things which would not deadline the rifle but would lower soldier morale.

Ah, here's an idea. The sight base on the Kar98K is soldered to the receiver. Skewing the jig used to solder the sight base would mean that all the sight bases would match "spec," but would be wrong. Mismatching the shight graduations and the notches the sight base indexes to would be hugely subtle. It would also be very hard to detect. Mis-grinding the sight base ramp would also be effective--and extremely hard to detect.

The best thing, though, would likely be a mis-cut of the chamber, which could be out of spec for length, or off center or the like. The boring jigs could be blamed for that, as well. ["Ich bestellte nur folgendes."]

That is brilliant and just what I need. I was wondering how sights were attached to rifles and had started googling to try and find out (I have never owned a firearm). By sight base ramp, are you talking about the little thing in front, as opposed to the other sight that is attached at the end of the barrel? Would you happen to know how they are ground? Do they use like a vise and a machine like (I'm reaching way back into my twenties for this) a blanchard grinder?

 

[Larry Lewyn]

The acceptance measure for Kar98K, IIRC, was 5 or 10 shots into 800mm x 800mm square at 200m. So, bent sight blade would not be noticed until much later.

Cross-threading or stripping the threads on simple things--like barrel bands, sling swivels and the like. Things which would not deadline the rifle but would lower soldier morale.

Ah, here's an idea. The sight base on the Kar98K is soldered to the receiver. Skewing the jig used to solder the sight base would mean that all the sight bases would match "spec," but would be wrong. Mismatching the shight graduations and the notches the sight base indexes to would be hugely subtle. It would also be very hard to detect. Mis-grinding the sight base ramp would also be effective--and extremely hard to detect.

The best thing, though, would likely be a mis-cut of the chamber, which could be out of spec for length, or off center or the like. The boring jigs could be blamed for that, as well. ["Ich bestellte nur folgendes."]

PS - no offense, but my dad was german. I'm pretty sure Ich bestellte nur folgendes translates as I order only the following. I think maybe what you want is Ich gehorche nur Befehlen. But I could be wrong. Zu befehl means at your command, a common phrase with the wehrmacht, Ich being I, nur means only and gehorche meaning obey. In any case, I appreciate your help!

 

[hdwhit]

Big7 wrote:
In WWII Russia, the ROUNDS were loaded with high explosives every so
often as to blend in with the others.

Can you provide citations to your sources?

 

[hdwhit]

Capn Mac
The acceptance measure for Kar98K, IIRC, was 5 or 10 shots into 800mm x 800mm square at 200m. So, bent sight blade would not be noticed until much later.

Cross-threading or stripping the threads on simple things--like barrel bands, sling swivels and the like. Things which would not deadline the rifle but would lower soldier morale.

But as a matter of historical fact, were any factories making the Kar98K staffed with slave labor?

We need to be careful to be historically accurate here because fanciful ideas about how to sabotage a particular production line that was not staffed with slave laborers does nothing but fuel the Holocaust denial machine.

 

[Larry Lewyn]

But as a matter of historical fact, were any factories making the Kar98K staffed with slave labor?

We need to be careful to be historically accurate here because fanciful ideas about how to sabotage a particular production line that was not staffed with slave laborers does nothing but fuel the Holocaust denial machine.

Very, very good point. I admit it had not occurred to me to think about exacerbating the denial malarky. Not to get too far off the subject, but one very interesting thing I learned in my research for this film was that there was a lot more resistance that was commonly known. When the Berlin wall fell, the west Germans got access to the east German archives. These contained more details about the fates of many of the victims. But the SS responsible for the records were unlikely to report information that made the Ubermenschen look foolish, especially if they were outwitted by the inferior races. A number of instances were documented by surviving victims, with names and dates, in which the prisoners rebelled and escaped. Many of them died, but some made it. Leading proponents of the rebellions were - wait for it - Russian POWs, especially members of the officer's class. I have wondered myself, if I was freezing, starving, weak and close to death, if I would find it in my heart to strike back. The answer for me is, I think, absolutely. I would hate to go out as a total victim. Especially if I had access to rocks, improvised clubs, steel and tools, as some of these guys did. There were carpenter shops, shoe makers, kitchen workers and so forth. Anyway, like I said, I don't want to go too far off target, but you have to admit it makes for interesting conjecture.

 

[Deus Machina]

Yup, heat treatment is the most likely.
I've heard--and have no sure way to know, but I'm sure it's been tried--that camp laborers would intentionally mistreat sears, locking lugs, and especially firing pins. Too soft and things wear quickly or bend. Too hard and they snap. The fourth-hand info is that they would target the thinnest parts of firing pins.
Springs wouldn't be too bad. I've run into enough cheap springs, and jury-rigged enough of my own for short-term fixes, that work well enough a good handful or repetitions and then stop. Again, could be accomplished through heat treatment.More than a couple times, I've taken a short spring and pulled it.
This could done by clipping it a few coils short, then stretching it out to the appropriate length. In my experience it will work anywhere between half a dozen to a hundred cycles or so before it settles back to way-too-short. For the long springs often used in firearms, only a little trial and error could result in one that works more than long enough for testing, but start causing misfeeds or light strikes after the first extended battle or two.
Bonus: considering late-war conditions, this could easily be blamed on lack of field maintenance (it often mimics the symptoms of a lack of lubrication or overly dirty parts) or even rushed design. And without a compression gauge (which I'm not sure were common then) or physically counting the coils, it would be hard to catch.

 

[SSN Vet]

American Rifleman ran a story about a year ago about the plant in Poland that made the Random pistol (Polish variation of the BHP). The Nazis continued to run the plant for the duration of their occupation using both the skilled Polish workers who had been working at the plant and slave labor form the concentration camps. The article detailed the experiences of one Jewish woman who worked there.

Damaging any of the hand guns or tooling would automatically be considered sabotage and would most likely get you shot (or worse) and the Pols were no kinder to the Jews than the Nazis were. Replacement personal were readily available at no cost.

 

[CapnMac]

By sight base ramp, are you talking about the little thing in front, as opposed to the other sight that is attached at the end of the barrel? Would you happen to know how they are ground?

Shooter's end of the barrel, the long rectilinear base the tangent sight attaches to.

I'm not sure the base was ground; I think it was simply silver soldered in place using a jig. The end of the barrel has a bit of a taper, if memory serves. So, a simple curve would not suit the base.

But, I really should be looking at an exploded parts diagram rathe than fickle memory.

 

[CapnMac]

what you want is Ich gehorche nur Befehlen.

Stumbled ofver Time/Manner/place and alsi clean for got the "habe" to make it past tense.

 

[CapnMac]

But as a matter of historical fact, were any factories making the Kar98K staffed with slave labor?

An excellent point.
And, as a point of fact, I used the Kar98K only becasue I knew what the acceptance standard (800mm square at 200m) for that was.
Were quite a number of weapons produced under German control, several French rifles, probably more than a few Czech, some Hungarian and Polish--just need to find the one to hold the story true.

Personally, I give short shrift to deniers. They are the ones with the onus of positing a premise based upon a logical fallacy of proving a negative. I have a hard enough time not looking like an idiot to waste any time engaging in pointless forensics with known idiots.

 

[Leanwolf]

" ... First, let's look at this from the story telling angle. Why is the sabotage important to the story? What impact will it have? Is it necessary? Will the protagonist be saved because a minion has a sabotaged weapon? Will the sabotage be foreshadowed will complaints by soldiers, NCOs or officers? Or by showing workers sabotaging weapons at the factory? When the foreshadowing takes place determines how much time and detail is needed to make it work and believe me, you have to have foreshadowing. You can't have a soldier fire his weapon, miss and curse because the front sight was bent at the factory. You'll have your audience going "Where did THAT come from?" ...

I am somewhat constrained by the fact that this is a true story.

Larry Lewyn, don't let yourself become too constrained because it is a true story. Trying to write a "true life" screenplay without taking a bit of literary license here and there will really bog you down. In my opinion, the above advice from MistWolf is very, very important. The sabotage by the slave laborer should benefit someone you define as an interesting character rather than merely a large group of Allied soldiers out in the field. Therefore there should be important scenes showing the German soldiers out in the field, in battle, suffering very dire consequences due to the sabotaged rifles and one of "our guys" surviving because of it. Personalization is very important in screenwriting.

Is the the slave laborer your main protagonist? It would seem to me your main antagonist would be the German inspector, and how your slave laborer manages to fool him and not end up in a gas chamber.

I suggest not getting too bogged down in finding the most believable method to sabotage rifles. I remember years ago I was having trouble with a screenplay I was writing. Although I had a couple of credits already, I was still "learning." I told an older friend, a well known, successful screenwriter I was spending a lot of time mid-script bogged down and didn't know what was wrong. He gave me some of the best screenwriting advice I ever heard. He said, "Blast on through to the end. Don't worry about where you're bogged down. Just finish. Then you can rewrite it and fix it."

He was right. I suggest you not get hung up on being 100% correct because I can guarantee you, there probably isn't a studio reader in Hollywood who knows anything about firearms, so he/she is not going to catch some technical error or a bit of literary license. If it advances your plot, use it. Your biggest chore is going to get that studio reader to turn past page six. If he/she doesn't do that, your screenplay will end up under another 25 screenplays piled up on the reader's desk that day.

I say, "Finish! Then fix it."

By the way, after 47 years in "the Business," I'm still learning.

Good luck.

L.W.

 

[olafhardtB]

It is totally believable to me that someone urinated on a tray of parts. Doing so during heat treatment could have messed up the heat treat. In manufacturing I have seen unbelievable screw ups get past Quality Control.

 

[Larry Lewyn]

Larry Lewyn, don't let yourself become too constrained because it is a true story. Trying to write a "true life" screenplay without taking a bit of literary license here and there will really bog you down. In my opinion, the above advice from MistWolf is very, very important. The sabotage by the slave laborer should benefit someone you define as an interesting character rather than merely a large group of Allied soldiers out in the field. Therefore there should be important scenes showing the German soldiers out in the field, in battle, suffering very dire consequences due to the sabotaged rifles and one of "our guys" surviving because of it. Personalization is very important in screenwriting.

Is the the slave laborer your main protagonist? It would seem to me your main antagonist would be the German inspector, and how your slave laborer manages to fool him and not end up in a gas chamber.

I suggest not getting too bogged down in finding the most believable method to sabotage rifles. I remember years ago I was having trouble with a screenplay I was writing. Although I had a couple of credits already, I was still "learning." I told an older friend, a well known, successful screenwriter I was spending a lot of time mid-script bogged down and didn't know what was wrong. He gave me some of the best screenwriting advice I ever heard. He said, "Blast on through to the end. Don't worry about where you're bogged down. Just finish. Then you can rewrite it and fix it."

He was right. I suggest you not get hung up on being 100% correct because I can guarantee you, there probably isn't a studio reader in Hollywood who knows anything about firearms, so he/she is not going to catch some technical error or a bit of literary license. If it advances your plot, use it. Your biggest chore is going to get that studio reader to turn past page six. If he/she doesn't do that, your screenplay will end up under another 25 screenplays piled up on the reader's desk that day.

I say, "Finish! Then fix it."

By the way, after 47 years in "the Business," I'm still learning.

Good luck.

L.W.

Thanks very much. I needed somebody to tell me that. The story is about my father, as so many true stories are. He got jacked by the Gestapo when he was only 18. He survived where 147,000 other Berlin residents did not. Probably because, although very young, he was incredibly self-disciplined. He did NOT do many of the things that would make this thing a hollywood movie, like being a hero type and slaughtering an entire brigade of SS by himself. He was very cautious and very lucky. Still, some interesting things happened, like the time he impersonated an SS officer in a training camp. He was with a friend whose father was a SS officer, but was responsible for getting propoganda movies out to the troops. This officer provided my father's friend and my dad with papers and SS uniforms to get inside a training camp and work on the projectors. A stupid thing to do, but interesting in retrospect. My dad was a machinist. There was another incident where he conspired with 2 other guys to make a key to their cell. It worked and my father escaped detainment for the third time. He was talented, intelligent and willing to do what it took to survive, but he was also very, very lucky. Otherwise he was just a regular guy. Thanks for taking the time to post. I think I'm going to sex him up a bit. I'm pretty much a newbie when it comes to film but it seems to come easily to me. I've written 3 movies and 2 TV pilots in the past 4 months and the one about my dad was my first, so probably not the best in the bunch. Writer's block I do not have, but I need to learn how to polish the work. Again, thanks.

 

[Leanwolf]

Larry Lewyn, check your P.M. here. Sounds like you're serious about screenwriting, but whatever I'd say here now about that would not be "on subject" for a firearms forum. Perhaps I can offer a point or two of advice.

L.W.

 

[Sunray]

"...The supervisor checks..." Isn't the supervisor. It's the QC tech.
Barrels don't get hardened. You can't machine hardened steel and hardened surfaces are not flat. They do get stress relieved. Do that too much and the steel gets brittle.
Whole scenario was done on Hogan's Heroes. 1965 to 1971.

 

[Jenrick]

Having worked in large scale manufacturing and machining, I'd say the easiest thing to do that is the least detectable with the longest set of results, is to tamper with the QC gear it self. The place I worked as a summer job in HS, had just gotten a brand new QC inspection jig that was computerized and all setup from the manufacturer. They plugged it in, it ran it's self diagnosis, and off we went (I'm sure there was more to it, but that time I was driving a forklift so I wasn't real involved with that stuff). Two weeks later we got a bunch of stock returned due to it being out of spec. Said fancy QC jig was off calibration apparently, or had drifted. To even test that though, it took an extra week as the guy in charge of QC sent all their gear back to Starett (and I forget who else, they were the main one) to have them factory certified as calibrated (next day super express airmail, I remember the freight charge was something like $2500 before insurance for one box, I was threatened with death if I dropped the box off the pallet). Gage blocks, micrometers, venier calipers, etc.

How it had all occurred, was that they did a lot of casting and finishing. The master was something you had to check out of the pattern room to setup your shift production mold (the production mold was basically trashed and recycled each shift), and as a general shortcut, folks would just keep a piece back that had indicated good in QC, and was on the low side of the tolerance's. Use that for the master for the next shift. Repeat until things started getting close to being out of spec, and then go through all the hassle of getting the master out to use for the next shift (they talked about getting the master out as similar to launching a nuclear missile, two people, two keys, etc.). So as the QC machine started to drift, pieces started to drift out of tolerance. It was a combination of not the best work practices (it did seem like a reasonable shortcut however) and you've got to trust something as the standard in the work process.

-Jenrick