Many thanks to "REMOV" for finding a picture of the Vietnam-era Three-shot Grenade Launcher. The photo is NOT Ralph Zumbro. The original title was "M-75th Ranger, 199th Bgd, Mark Johnston".
Many years ago I read Ralph Zumbro's rightly acclaimed book "Tank Sergeant". One thing that interested me was several references to a "three-shot grenade launcher". I assumed that this was some kind of field improvisation, but how you could join several M-79s or M-203s together without the result being unwieldy escaped me. Recently I've been lucky enough to talk to Mr Zumbro, and one of the first things I asked him about was this weapon:-
"One of our drivers in RVN had one. It had a three-shot Harmonica type magazine that slid back and forth through a fixed, slotted breech and was moved by a scroll spring. You could load any two chambers while keeping one in firing position. HELLUVAWEAPON, that's probably why they only made just a trial batch. My buddy got one off a dead infantryman."
Ralph
When I heard about this it occurred to me that such a configuration could be used as an underbarrel weapon-in fact it might be easier to reload from a prone position than the current M203. Mr. Zumbro has expanded this idea further by suggesting that the underbarrel weapon have a three shot cylinder. This would be turned manually, so the Grenadier can "dial-up" the most suitable round loaded. Each cylinder would have a switch on its side that operates a simple ejector. The capability to quickly select different types of ammunition may also have police applications.
FEEDBACK Sever writes:- I think I may have found some stuff on that three-shot grenade launcher mentioned on the Scrapboard, at
