FN C2

[Drobb]

How been the C2 proform campared to other SAW’s of the day? Did the hand guard/bi-pod actually work?

Thanks

 

[Kirkhill]

As a hand-guard it was a great bi-pod.

 

[Drobb]

Was it as good as Bren? Or more like a PKM? How many were used in a section?

 

[dangerboy]

Was it as good as Bren? Or more like a PKM? How many were used in a section?

There were two per section.

 

[expwor]

Was it as good as Bren? Or more like a PKM? How many were used in a section?

When I was in the Militia (now called Army Reserve) it was two LAR (carried the FNC2) men commanded by the Section 2IC. Section Commander carried SMG, everyone except "C2" men in the section carried an FNC1
Don't know about the Bren or PKM
BTW A section was 12 men total
This was my experience

Tom

 

[Drobb]

So 2 per section then? From your experience if your were still in the Forces when the switch was made to the C7 and C9 did vastly increase the firepower of the section?

 

[Michael OLeary]

You may find this article of interest: http://regimentalrogue.com/papers/sect_atk.htm

 

[expwor]

I was in the Militia 1979-1981, never saw the C7. Just FNC1, FNC2 and SMG were the three personal weapons I used.  No way to compare to any others the CF used/uses

Tom

 

[kkwd]

It made a very satisfying sound when fired.
Here is a YouTube video of the weapon being fired on a range. They mostly use the 20 round C1 mags but at the 6 min mark of the video a proper 30 round mag is used.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvewxOYU6Go&t=319s
Here is the C2 "bra". A carrier for 4 mags meant to be strapped to your chest. It was bizarre.
https://www.marstar.ca/dynamic/product.jsp?productid=77679
It didn't have a quick change barrel. I would have figured by the time this weapon came out the lesson of changeable barrels would have been learned.

 

[Old Sweat]

I was going to stay out of this, but I joined in December 1957 and trained on the Bren, which I enjoyed firing. The C2, on paper, had all sorts of advantages, not the least was its compatibility with the C1. However I thought it was awkward and cumbersome. On the other hand it could be fired from either shoulder (I am a leftie) and its magazines were interchangeable with the C1. I qualified as a first class shot on the Bren in recruit training. Later as a very junior NCM before going on officer training I had worn both crossed rifles and crossed rifles and crown, so I had some ability as a shot.

I think the only time we used the C2 in action was by the Airborne Regiment in Cyprus in 1974.

Hopefully some of the experienced infantreers here will step forward.

 

[Kat Stevens]

The C2 wasn't meant to be fired standing or kneeling for any amount of time. The handguard was meant to do exactly that, stop your tender flesh from sticking to a hot barrel. The bra may have looked goofy, but once you had it dialed in, it was infinitely preferable to having 120 rds of 7.62 thumping around in your pockets. If the C2 had a flaw, it's that it was too accurate; if you had a good grip, the 30th round didn't land far from the first one. Great to keep one guy's head down, but little to no cone of fire, just a straight line of lead. If you got good with it you could be deadly from a long way away. Rundowns from the 600 yd point sucked. Keep it clean because when you had to turn the gas down it would hammer the shit out of your shoulder.

 

[Old Sweat]

Kat

Remember 7-45 and the bits about the rest of the section carrying loaded Bren magazines in the basic pouches, and refilling empty mags. This, of course, was written in the Lee-Enfield days and the Bren was the main source of firepower in the section.

 

[Kat Stevens]

If we were lucky in the C2 group, we got one extra guy to hump a couple boxes of clipped ammo and a couple of mag chargers.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Here's Lee Ermey (RIP) demonstrating the differences between the Bren and the BAR.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKj1W91cB9M

I fired the C2 in the CAF, and the Bren - re-barrelled to 7.62mm - in the British Army. Neither were as awesome as the C6, of course, and while the Bren was better in that it had a changeable barrel, the C2 was lighter.

IMHO, we should always have at least one belt fed support weapon in the section. Magazines empty out pretty quickly, causing the embarrassing silence just as #2 rifleman gets up to chuck a grenade

 

[FJAG]

Two points.

Firstly SAW v FN C2. the first is 5.56 mm while the C2 was 7.62 so a more powerful weapon but limited by the thirty round magazine v box fed.

Secondly, the thirty round magazine stuck out of the bottom of the C2 v the Bren's top. This created a problem in any position (prone or trench) where the weapon needed elevating as the magazine was as long as the bipod and it would block raising the barrel up easily.

Drobb. Who are you and why do you care about this?

???

 

[Drobb]

I have also been a fan of the FAL and C2 seems like a strange beast compared to heavy barreled FN’s of the Israelis. When I was the CF I only used the c7 and it was very limited as my time was short due to a injury.

 

[Drobb]

Follow up question did everyone in the section carry C-2 mags or extra 20 round magazines for the C-2’s and how does it work now is every men carrying rounds for the C-9?

 

[Kat Stevens]

C1 had a 20 rd mag, and everyone had five of them. C2 had a 30 rd mag, each gunner had four in the bra and one on the gun. Everyone in the section carried as much clipped ammo as the stores/ammo rep issued them.  As I said before, a lot of the time the LAR group had a spare guy from the HQ section to hump a box or two of ammo.

 

[daftandbarmy]

C1 had a 20 rd mag, and everyone had five of them. C2 had a 30 rd mag, each gunner had four in the bra and one on the gun. Everyone in the section carried as much clipped ammo as the stores/ammo rep issued them.  As I said before, a lot of the time the LAR group had a spare guy from the HQ section to hump a box or two of ammo.

IMHO, that's a good way to go vs. everyone carrying 10 mags, or more.

 

[Loachman]

From my experience, only the gunners got the bras and thirty-round mags. The bras covered up the chest pockets on the combat shirts, so riflemen would have had an even harder time getting their own mags in and out from behind the bras, and mags were always part of the weapon EIS, so four for C1s and four for C2s.

I didn't mind the C2 at all, but preferred the C1 to anything else available.

Or maybe Kat is right - I remember four for each, but it could have been five. The clipped ammo was issued in olive green plastic bandoleers with tear-away pockets for each pair of five-round clips or cardboard boxes. We usually got the bandoleers even for range practices in my early days, and rarely boxes.