Emma-Rose Lena
Emma-Rose Lena | |
|---|---|
 Emma-Rose Lena | |
| Born | Emma-Rose Lena 9 August 1872 |
| Died | 24 April 1980 (aged 107) |
| Occupation | Weapons designer and Engineer |
| Spouse(s) | Ark James Lena |
| Children | Val Smith Lena Guy Lena |
Emma-Rose Lena (9 August 1872 - 24 April 1980) was a Lucian-Erebonian engineer, inventor, and arms designer, best known for her series of action and magazine that were used in her series of rifles, notably the Lena-Manjensen rifle and the famous Lena-Elfield rifle.
Early Life and Career
Born in 1872 at Ordis, Western Erebonia; she was the only daughter of a Lucian seaman and Erebonian farm girl. At a time when women did not have much opportunities, Emma-Rose was admired in during her youth in which she was often recognized as a gifted child. Her parents believed that she was going to make something great as she gets old. Coming to age, she was fascinated in weapons of war when she visited Thors Military Academy. At the age of 12, she built her first gun out of a small steel pipe, oak wood, and a piece of a tin can as a primer. While the gun failed to fire, she remained interested in gunsmithing and inventions.
She graduated in the University of Trondheim at the age of 19, following her several outstanding achievements and knowledge being recognized that allowed her to be raised to 2 years ahead of her batch. She worked for Royal Ordnance Trondheim as a designer in 1891
Lena Family of Rifles and Systems
In 1892, Lena was among the designers who were contracted by the Lucis Army to produce a new rifle to replace the aging Morland-Harry Rifle. Among other competitors were from Meuser Arms, Tulo Arsenal, Krag-Mauserheim Arsenal, and the Atlantian Tulle Arms. The Lucis Army had requirements such as the rifle being able to fire the .303 Lucis that has seen service since 1889. Since her college years, Lena had been designing a rifle that incorporated several innovations as found in the 1889 Meuser Rifle.
To avoid being sued by Meuser, Lena designed her rifle in an internally inconspicuous way. The rear-mounted lugs placed the operating handle much closer to the rifleman, over the trigger. This allowed her rifle to operate than most other, forward-mounted lug designs which forced the user to move his hand forward to operate the bolt. The bolt's distance of travel was identical with the length of the cartridge/ The rotation was only 60 degrees compared to the 90 degrees bolt rotation of Atlantian and Meuser-style actions. In addition, Lena introduced a superior detachable box magazine to replace the integral or tube magazines used in most rifles of the time. This offered her rifle a much greater capacity than other competing designs. She contacted Erebonian designer Hans Manjensen to allow her to incorporate Manjensen's rifling into her rifle. This reduced fouling from powder residue from building up on the barrel. It also made maintenance much easier.
Her ideas were not usually seen common during the time. Her rifle carried almost twice the amount of rounds that most rifles would have during the time but following testing that it proved to be superior with regards to action, stopping power, rate of fire, capacity, and durability. Her rifle won the contract and was made standard issue from 1893. However, shortcomings of her rifle were beginning to appear. While most rifles of the time were using smokeless powder, her rifle still used black powder. During those times, rifle designs from several manufacturers were switching to using smokeless powder cartridges, which allowed bullets to be propelled at a much higher velocities without much smoke or residue. The .303 Lucis designed for the rifle was intended to be loaded with cordite propellant. Cordite cartridges were found to be unsuited for use with the Manjensen rifling. The Manjensen rifling tended to wear-off and be unusable after 6000. This forced Lena to redesign her rifle in late-1894. Lena bought about significant changes to her rifle; the magazine was changed from eight-round single stock to ten-round staggered, sights, safety, deeper square-cut rifling, and sights for flatter trajectory.
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In 1895, she introduced the Magazine, Lena-Elfield Rifle, which was similar in appearance to the Lena-Manjensen rifle but was wholly improved to fire smokeless cartridges. She redesigned her rifle further and in 1904, introduced the Short, Magazine, Lena-Elfield Mk. I. In 1907, she introduced the most famous and iconic variant of her rifle, the Short Magazine Lena-Elfield Mk. III No 1. It had a simple rear sight arrangement, a fixed bolt-head-mounted sliding, charger guide, and a chamber to fire the new Mk. VII High Velocity .303 Lucis. The principal manufacturers of her rifle were RO Elfield, Birmingham Small Arms Factory, and Insomnia Small Arms Factory.
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In early 1930s, despite her advanced age, Lena continued to work on her rifle and introduced the Rifle No. 4 variant, which was simplified but much heavier because of the larger barrel. The reason for the redesigning came from the demand of the Lucis Army to make the production of the rifle to be simple and much easier. The No. 4 rifle turned out to be more stronger than its predecessor.
Lena lived to see four wars where her rifle was used, which included the Lucio-Auro Wars, the First Europan War, the Second Europan War, and the War of Lorican Aggression. She also served as a senior advisor in the 1960s for the Erebonian company, Rainford Group, in which the company, at present, continues to produce reproduction models of the Lena-Elfield.
Personal Life
Lena was known to be very optimistic and often refused to have negative thoughts. Being a woman, many doubted her creations, especially her rifle, when the Lucis Army General Staff were skeptical of a woman to create such a weapon. Later on, she gained admirers around the world, including the famous Wolfgang Theimer, who designed the Theimer Model 1911 pistol. While many feminists see her as one of their icons, she revealed in 1960 in an interview that she refused to be identified as one of their kind and that her passion and love for her work is what allowed her to go on top without fighting for rights.
Lena died peacefully in 1980 survived by her two sons and her grandchildren, The ownership of the patent of her creations being passed over to her eldest son, Val Smith Lena, which later on passed over to his son, John Kirk Lena.