With the rise in use of water-cooled machine guns - which offered prolonged firing as long as a cool water supply was being made available to the hot barrel through a surrounding "water jacket" - the Skoda Model 1893 was revised in 1902 to become the "Model 1902". This was essentially a modernized version and its water-cooling feature now opened the line up to broader service within the Austro-Hungarian military. A large, rectangular armored shield was added ahead of the receiver to provide some limited protection for the operator. The large nature of the gun shield was necessitated by the fact that the pendant lever swung so low under the receiver that this exposed the operator to unnecessary danger by creating a tall firing profile. A tripod mounting introduced a hand-cranked facility for assisted movement of the gun in training the barrel onto targets/target areas. A new 30-round magazine was also brought along and intended to reduce the troubles encountered with the original gravity-fed boxes - though this only proved a limited success. In time, the switch was finally made to a belt-feed arrangement, the change proving too little too late for the Austrian-Hungarian Army was favoring the competing Schwarzlose machine gun design (adopted in 1905). As such, few Model 1902s were actually taken into service.
In 1909 a new initiative for the Skoda Machine Gun was enacted, this to compete directly with the Schwarzlose line. The Model 1909 was a nearly all-new weapon for much reworking was done to the original to help offset its standing deficiencies, producing a more simplified product as a result. The obtrusive pendant lever action (rate regulator) was removed and an all-new locking mechanism instituted. The oil reservoir was relocated to the top of the receiver and the water jacket enlarged, the latter change allowing the forced water pump to be dropped from the design. A 250-round fabric ammunition belt was standard though the feed mechanism accepted the belt, and extracted it, both from the same side (left) of the receiver which led to an all new set of issues. Other changes included a German-influenced optical sighting device replacing the original leaf sights and a relocated trigger group protruding from under the receiver. The tripod assembly was cleaned up for simplified function. Despite the changes, very few - as little as 30 or so - guns of this mark were ultimately realized - the end of the Skoda Machine Gun line beginning to dawn.
Prior to World War 1, one final attempt at revitalizing the Skoda Machine Gun was attempted through the Model 1913. The Salvator-Dormus system was still retained in these final guns and a new, more compact/low profile tripod assembly was coupled to the weapon. The feed mechanism was attended too one more time and the gun shield was optional. Regardless, the Austro-Hungarian military still heavily favored the Schwarzlose series leaving the Skoda Model 1913 to be issued to reserve units instead. Even then, the guns were ultimately replaced by their competitor into the last days of the war in November of 1918. The Schwarzlose line was itself progressively updated during its tenure as the standard Austrian-Hungarian Army machine gun.
The Skoda Machine Gun series joined the many other machine guns of the period that attempted to meet the quality and operating standards of the original Maxim weapon - falling short of these feats in many ways. Better, more successful, examples of the time became the British Vickers .303 and the American Browning Model 1917.
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