Heckler & Koch HK11

Heckler & Koch HK11 History

Like other HK designs, the Heckler & Koch HK11 light support machine gun inherits most of the elements of the HK G3 assault rifle's military success. The origins of the delayed recoil system of the HK system can be traced back to the last months of World War II, and the HK 11 was born with the permission of German rearmament a few years after the war. Before that, German gunmakers had expanded their trade to countries like Spain and developed a delayed recoil system that was later used in Spain's CETME assault rifles.

Armed with this engineering knowledge and wartime design experience, these engineers produced the HK G3 automatic rifle under the Heckler & Koch brand, which was known at the time for the design and manufacture of machine tools.

The first "real" machine gun produced by the HK company became the HK 11 LMG system, which is said to be a local and commercial success. The system is definitely HK in appearance and function, with a one-piece plastic stock, solid trigger group action, a streamlined receiver and a submerged barrel system. The HK11 can be mounted on a bipod (either on the front of the barrel or behind the magazine feed) for fire support, or the bipod can be eliminated from the configuration entirely. Distinguished from the heavy barrel of the G3 assault rifle, the HK11 machine gun is farther chambered and can accept standard 7.62x51mm NATO cartridges from a 20-round detachable magazine or an impressive 50-round fire drum . Early production versions of the HK 11 were known for their visible "S", "E" and "F" fire mode selector displays.

Later models adopted the more visually relevant "bullet" notation to denote "safe", "single shot" and "full automatic" firing modes.

The HK11 retains a 40.44" barrel length with a 17.71" barrel size. The barrel has 4 right-hand grooves. The curb weight is just over 17 pounds. The weapon's cyclic rate of fire is specified at 800 rounds per minute. The muzzle velocity was 2,625 feet per second.

The HK11 series basically consists of two main production variants - HK11A1 and HK11E. The HK11A1 is just a magazine version of the HK21A1 machine gun. The loading is designed in such a way that the transition from belt loading to magazine loading can be done in minutes. This allows the belt feed mechanism to be replaced with a magazine case. HK11E is an improved version of HK11E.

The HK11E introduced more three-shot bursts, a longer receiver and "drum" type sights. Like the HK11A1 before it, the HK11E can be switched to magazine or belt feed with minor modifications by the operator.

While the HK11 was purchased by Greece (and subsequently licensed to manufacture in that country), it is widely believed that some countries in the African continent and Asia also purchased LMGs for their ranks.

Specification

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