Hi guys, thanks for tuning in to another video on ForgottenWeapons.com.
I'm Ian McCollum, and I'm here today at HK's grey room
in Ashburn, Virginia, and we are taking a look at some
interesting historical HK firearms, specifically today the G41.
This was developed by HK as a product improved version of the HK33, which is the roller-locked 5.56 rifle.
Perhaps the easier way to think about this is it's basically an M16-ised HK33.
So they took the standard roller locking mechanism, a classic HK,
you know, what goes back to their roots, and they added a number of
features to it that were available ... mostly on the M16 at the time.
This project originated in 1977. By 1979 they
... delivered the first batch of 18 rifles to the German military for field testing.
And in 1981 this actually formally came on the market for export sales.
Now, when I say they have added M16-like features, what I'm talking about are first off,
using M16 magazines, standard NATO pattern magazines; and then adding a carry handle,
a spring-loaded carry handle; a dust cover; a
it looks like a forward assist, although that's not how HK described it, we'll talk about that in a moment;
a bolt hold-open. So it really kind of became this hybrid of the two systems, and this was developed
largely for the NATO trials that would eventually adopt the SS109 cartridge.
NATO did not end up adopting a new standard rifle as a result,
but this was sort of HK's attempt to develop a rifle for that competition.
If we take a look at the receiver markings, obviously it is a G41.
I think it's important to note, to point out here, that this is not the same as the HK41,
the G and the HK numbers are different. The HK41 is actually a civilian semi-auto version of the G3 rifle
imported for just a short time. So this is a G41, serial number, calibre, HK markings and such.
Note a couple of the unique new controls added compared to the HK33.
We have a magazine release for our standard AR-15 type magazine.
This is the bolt hold-open button. Because the AR mag does allow for the bolt to be held open,
the G41 here does support that.
The selector switch is a four position one; safe, semi-auto, three round burst and full auto.
Worth pointing out that this is the first of the HK rifles to introduce that three round burst.
The HK33 did not have it and it was a very specific inclusion here,
and I think you can really take that as a sign of the times when this was manufactured.
The M16 rifles around this time period were also getting the three round burst option. A lot of
... militaries liked that idea as a way to improve hit probability by firing multiple rounds,
but without needing the level of training necessary to really be able to control bursts
and not just wildly dump magazines, by having a mechanical limiter for 3 rounds.
Also interesting to note that this is the first of the HK rifles to use what we now see as very standard,
these little bullet pictogram markings on the selector. Prior to that you had things like S E F,
... the letter abbreviations for German words on the selector group. This is now pretty much universal.
We have a spring-loaded carry handle here, although it's kind of had its purpose defeated by the scope mount.
That scope mount is another one of the additions, one of the new features on the G41.
This has a STANAG pattern scope attachment to it.
So this one has a little fixed power Hensoldt optical sight on it.
In fact, specifically for the G41, as you can see there, marked ZF G41.
Now the charging handle on the G41 remains the same style as all of the earlier HK roller-locked guns.
Although they did give it this larger machine gun pattern charging handle, which gives you a little more leverage.
If we go back to the ejection port we have a spring-loaded folding dust cover there to cover the ejection port.
A common feature at the time, and one of the potential complaints about the earlier HK guns.
When you start pushing the bolt back that, of course, pops open.
We do also have what looks like a forward assist here,
and HK did not describe this as a forward assist, for them this was a silent bolt closure device.
Which in my opinion is a little dubious, but it does make more sense on the roller-locked guns
than perhaps on the M16, because with that roller-lock system you do tend to have
... there is this little bit of travel right at the end of the closing stroke of the bolt
that you need some force to actually close.
So if I just gently let the bolt down there, it's going to stop and the rollers aren't actually going to engage.
If I want to make sure it closes I have to open it up and let it snap forward, and that does make some noise.
So, if I unlock it there, I can then use this lever to close it - a little more quietly.
A few other minor changes to the G41. The stock attachment ...
well, they changed the style just a little bit. Instead of being a cap that encloses
the end of the receiver, it's now flush with the end of the receiver. Two pins here to hold that in place.
There is no pin on the front of the trigger group,
this locks in to the front of the magazine well and is pinned back here.
And we do have a third pin up here to hold the handguard on.
On the stock they now have actually three storage holes, which I think that's actually an improvement.
It's a little odd to me that they didn't do this on the G3 or the HK33.
You have three push pins, if you strip the gun down it makes sense to me to have
places to put them all instead of having places for two of them,
and then just leaving the third pin out there dangling.
There were two different patterns of the G41 made. There was the standard rifle
which has a 17.7 inch barrel, that's 450mm, and a fixed stock.
And then there was also the K, or Kurz, or short, version which has a 380mm, or 15 inch, barrel and a collapsing stock.
Of course, being kind of typical HK modularity, you can swap that
collapsing stock onto the full length rifle and vice versa if you would like.
They also offered this with two different twist rates in the barrel,
you could get either a 1 in 7, or a 1 in 12 twist, meaning that you could get the version
for 55 grain ammunition or the version for the heavier projectile, ... the 62 grain or even heavier later on ammo.
The carry handle makes a little more sense on this iron sighted version.
And when not in use it snaps back down.
And I can show you here the lock open.
So, even though my charging handle is not in the actual
fully locked open position, the bolt does stay open because it is set up to use M16 type magazines.
So if you want to close that you can hit the button, that'll shut the bolt.
We can go ahead and pull this apart easily enough, we've got
one pin right there on the handguard,
handguards going to come off.
Note that this is kind of like all the other features on here, kind of an M16
pattern-ish, triangular, drain hole, sort of handguard.
We've got two pins on the back, push those out,
and we can pull the collapsing buttstock off.
The fire control group comes off.
The recoil spring comes out.
And the bolt and carrier come out.
This is very much like the HK33 bolt carrier, but it's had these ratchet
notches added to it for the silent bolt closure device.
In fact, I can compare it directly to an HK33 bolt and carrier right here.
Notice this has the little thumb pad serrations for closing the bolt,
not necessary on the 41 because it's got the forward assist on it.
A little bit of a change here, they've removed some material from the bolt carrier.
Locking spring, the anti-bounce spring is still there, but a little bit different.
So these parts are not actually interchangeable, but they are very similar.
Camera perspective here is going to distort this a little bit, but if we compare the receivers,
you can see that they actually extended the charging handle tube at the top.
The ... 41 here has a longer handguard and so the front sight block is farther forward,
but it is the same front sight block as on the 33, which is just farther back.
The barrel length on these two is identical.
A few changes to the receiver besides the obvious stuff, the carry handle, dust cover and forward assist.
The rear sight has actually been moved backwards just a little bit on the 41.
So between this moving back about an inch and the front sight moving forward a bit,
you actually have a longer sight radius for the same barrel length.
Beyond that, it's pretty much just the magazine well that has changed.
They're not quite the same receiver flats to begin with, the overall length on the 41 on top
is just a few millimeters shorter than the 33 on the bottom.
The ... main spring on the 41 is also a bit more robust than that of the 33.
They've actually used a compound coil to the wire here to improve its strength and durability.
Ultimately, the G41 really kind of was a commercial failure.
These were purchased by a number of countries, but always in relatively small numbers.
So I know Turkey bought some, Italy bought some, some other countries as well, but
nobody decided to really standardise on the G41, and there are a number of reasons.
The HK33 was a much more popular rifle, just the standard original, really more simple
and lighter weight. It's hard to believe it but the 33, being a heavy rifle to begin with,
is actually lighter than the G41. All the extra things they put on the gun did increase its weight, so.
These have ended up being a very rare rifle today, and it's really cool
to get a chance to take a look at not one, but both typical major patterns of them here.
So hopefully you guys enjoyed the video, a big thanks to HK for giving me the access.
And thank you for watching.