#M79 thumper how to#
#M79 thumper manual#

A grenadier wore tall, mitred, pointed, metal headgear, while those of the later Georgian Era British redcoats and their opposite numbers, the Napoleonic French, wore equally high bearskin busbies.īritish knowledge of how to make grenades was transferred to the Americans, and noted Philadelphia scientist Ben Franklin designed American grenades.ĭuring the American Civil War, the “universal model” cylindrical grenade was made in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for the Union Army.

The M-79 had a large flip-up sight midway down the barrel, as well as a leaf foresight at the end of the barrel.ĭuring the 18th century, European troops who wielded explosives that could be thrown were known as grenadiers and wore distinct clothing to set them apart from ordinary infantrymen. When the Spanish Conquistadors began their wars of extermination against the indigenous peoples of Latin America, their soldiers flung hand grenades in combat. Before that, the Byzantines had used Greek Fire in the wars they fought during the Middle Ages. Knowledge of how to make black powder probably made its way to Western Europe either via the Silk Road or the Mongol invasions. By the 13th century, the Chinese were using it to make bombs and grenades. The first written formula for black powder dates back to the Sun Dynasty in 11th-century China. The hand grenade has been a staple of the European infantryman’s inventory since Europeans learned how to make black powder. Army came to develop the M79, it is worth taking a look at the evolution of the grenade itself over the centuries.

#M79 thumper manual#

Army Field Manual 3-22.31 Appendix A, states: “Do not place your thumb over the small of the stock, as the safety could injure your thumb when the launcher recoils.” In the movies, the shooters always seemed to have their thumbs around the rear of the weapon, as if they were firing a rifle, which is incorrect. Many of the movies during the Vietnam era and afterward portray the weapon as being fired in the exact opposite manner that we were told to, namely with our right thumb aligned along the stock of the weapon so as not to be cut by the recoil. I recall in advanced infantry training that I got a sore shoulder if I didn’t hold and fire the weapon close in with the stubby, wooden stock pressed firmly against me. The M79 was popular with the Vietnam-era soldiers, easy to use, highly reliable, and required little maintenance. Some Australian forces fighting in Vietnam also allegedly referred to the M79 grenade launcher as the more colorful Wombat Gun. But I do not recall anyone I knew calling it by any of those names. The close-support infantry weapon reportedly was nicknamed Thumper, Blooper, Thump Gun, or Bloop Tube by some soldiers due to its distinctive report. It launched a 40mm by 46mm grenade in a round that resembled a huge bullet. The M79 was a large-bore, single-barrel, single-shot weapon that was breech loaded and fired from the shoulder. I fired the M79 grenade launcher in advanced infantry training at Fort Dix, New Jersey, in 1965, and had one on the back seat of my machine-gun jeep during my tour of duty in South Vietnam in 1966-1967 as a member of the U.S.