Colt MG38 & MG38B water-cooled machine gun
Official wording
Colt, Model MG38 and MG38B, water-cooled machinegun, any cal., mfd. by Colt.
What this entry requires
- ATF REQUIRESMade or imported as stated: “mfd. by Colt”
- INFOATF states no date; production was about 1929–1945.
- INFOStill an NFA firearm; only registered examples transfer, with ATF approval (26 U.S.C. 5812, 5861).
Editorial facts · Our research
- Country
United StatesBasis: no citation - Manufacturer
- Colt's Patent Fire Arms Mfg. Co.Basis: the ATF wording
- Type
- MachinegunBasis: the ATF wording
- Action
- Select-fire / autoBasis: the ATF wording
- Caliber
- Any caliberBasis: the ATF wording
- Made
- c. 1929–1945production; ATF states no dateBasis: estimate ¹
- Service
- Commercial
Source
- Official wording
- ATF P 5300.11, April 2025 edition · Section IV · PDF p. 83 ↗ · ATF original ↗
- Entries
- 1 line
- Verbatim check
- Checked against the PDF text before every release
- Editorial facts
- Confidence: Medium · Last revised 18 October 2026 (Evidence pass) · How we rate confidence
- References
- 1. Wikipedia, “M1917 Browning machine gun” ↗, years (estimate: partly supports it): Commercial variants: "Colt MG38 series, derivatives of the Colt M1928 for general commercial sale, designed in 1931"; "The 38 and 38B were water-cooled"; but the same article calls the Norwegian m/29 "Norwegian designation for the Colt MG 38", in Norwegian service from 1929, so the sources disagree on the start and y covers both; end 1945 is our estimate
- Fact tags
- ATF the ATF wording states it.
- REF ¹ an outside reference supports it; the number points to the list of references.
- ESTIMATE an approximate or indirect reading, for example the production range of the base model.
- NO CITATION we haven’t attached a reference for this fact; it’s our editorial reading, not ATF’s.
- Source checked
- 20 October 2026: ATF’s page still lists the April 2025 edition
- Corrections
- 2 changes · see below
Correction history
- Evidence passEditorial confidence: Low → Medium. Re-rated after supporting references were added or re-checked.
- Evidence passYears: 1931–1945 → 1929–1945. The M1917 Browning article gives both a 1931 design year for the MG38 series and Norwegian service of the Colt MG 38 (m/29) from 1929; widened to cover both
Historical context
Image: Wikimedia Commons, “Browning1917.jpg” by US Army Center for Military History image, Public domain. Retrieved October 2026.
Summary: Wikipedia, “M1917 Browning machine gun”. Text CC BY-SA 4.0.
FROM WIKIPEDIA
The M1917 Browning machine gun is a heavy machine gun used by the United States armed forces in World War I, World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War; it has also been used by other nations. It was a crew-served, belt-fed, water-cooled machine gun that served alongside the much lighter air-cooled Browning M1919. It was used at the battalion level, and often mounted on vehicles. There were two main iterations: the M1917, which was used in World War I and the M1917A1, which was used thereafter. The M1917, which was used on some aircraft as well as in a ground role, had a cyclic rate of 450 rounds per minute. The M1917A1 had a cyclic rate of 450 to 600 rounds per minute.