Ultra rare PPSh41: German 9mm conversion

[James C]

amazing story ade and what a well engineered conversion ,thanks for sharing

[Adrian Stevenson]

Thanks James.

I forgot to say in my last reply that photos are now prohibited at the museum.

Cheers, Ade.

[pitfighter]

9mm works fine in unconverted mags -
We're also running 9mm Swanson blanks, too - drums and sticks all cycle fine in full or semi.

[HeinrichM]

Hello
As I am very interested in this topic, allow me to shed some light and background on the subject for study. One of my hobbies is detectoring and I happened to find this broken relic. This is an original MP.41(r) including the appropriate magazine. It is apparent that the conversion was not simply a barrel swap and a mag reduction, but much more modifications to the gun...some of which could not be done in the field, but had to be done in a fairly well stocked arsenal. The barrel is 100% sure a lathed MP-40 barrel, plus there is an additional baffle welded into the barrel cooler to support the front of the barrel since the MP-40 barrel is much shorter. Furthermore, the entire front face of the muzzle brake is milled off and a new face with a much larger hole for the bullet is welded. Everything is done relatively hastily and haphazardly. What surprised me the most is the drum magazine itself, which is specially modified with an insert for the 9mm Parabellum cartridge... from this it is evident that there was an effort to use the greatest advantage of the weapon in the form of a high magazine capacity. Personally, I thought until now that the MP-41(r) used only the reduction and the MP-40 magazine, but that is not the case. The only marking that I have found so far is the code 27 on the lower part of the barrel and some Soviet original markings are clearly legible, unfortunately the marking on the upper part of the upper part has not been preserved

[Teck 147]

On the Origin of the conversion....
In the opening (approx.) 6 months of Operation Barbarossa the Wehrmacht captured some 25,000 Artillery pieces more than 1 Million 'soviet' soldiers and god only knows (in long lost registers recorded) how many lower Level weapons. It was quickly decided to use this Advantage and when captured ammunition ran out one either modified the weapons to fire commonly available calibres ((r) weapons) or to produce German ammunition to fit, the latter sometimes in captured factories on russian soil if they hadn't been relocated in time.
The "MP 41(r)" wasn't that 'uncommon' particularly amongst the russian Wehrmacht units but it was decidedly rarer than the MP38/40 donor.
The 'russian' Wehrmacht units contrary to their name weren't really all that russian given that they were mostly made up of either russians that didn't want to die in the appalling POW Camps or more commonly repressed persons forced into soviet service that couldn't relate with soviet politics and found a common Ally in the invaders. These units were of course for reasons of convenience (as far as possible) equipped with weapons for which they were trained.

The original designation for captured PPS was MP 717(r) the adapted versions have only recently been described as MP41 (r) the MP41 was a Haenel-Schmeisser production from Germany

[PRE]

...The original designation for captured PPS was MP 717(r) the adapted versions have only recently been described as MP41 (r) the MP41 was a Haenel-Schmeisser production from Germany

Correct. The Kennblatter fremden Gerats was the document created by the Wehrmacht (there was also probably some involvement from WaPruf2) to help identify foreign weapons. The designations didn't refer to the captured versions of the weapons, just the weapons themselves.

[HeinrichM]

Notice the modified feeding lips on the drum magazine, they are longer compared to the Soviet original, probably due to more reliable feeding of 9mm parabellum. Also, the rear part of the 9mm barrel is longer in the chamber, and because of this, the hole for securing the bolt in the front position is profiled. It is so interesting to me that I will try, if there is interest, to make a small phototutorial after cleaning the relic, where all the differences and modifications on this German conversion will be obvious. I think there's really little evidence on a global scale for this stuff, outside of the general descriptions that everyone knows...

[Teck 147]

Would interest me to know if any 7.63x25 Mauser versions survived. The only Mod required would have been a Barrel change so probably not that easy to discern i suppose

[HeinrichM]

I am convinced that no such version ever existed. The dimensional differences between the 763 and 762 are so small that even long-term use in such an oversized weapon as the PPsh would not harm it in any way. However, the big question is the relatively lower performance of the 763 Mauser, and I personally think that it would be a big risk in frequent jams due to the weak impulse on a relatively heavy bolt. In addition, the 763 was not even introduced as a common army caliber in the war machine of Germany, and its occurrence and production capacity were much lower compared to the 9 parabellum.... so the question is, why would they do such a thing? Conversion to the standard established caliber makes much more sense

[HeinrichM]

I am attaching some details of the cleaned drum magazine. The sheet metal ring inside seems to have been originally sprayed with the color dunkelgelb. I also attached the original ppsh-41 drum so that the differences are clear. Look at the famous photo of a German soldier, he seems to have the same drum with rivets in his weapon

German Soldier in a Trench with a Captured PPSH-41, Somewhere on the Eastern Front, 1943/44 : wwiipics