Remember that scene in the movie Predator, when Jesse Ventura is unleashing his M-134 mini-gun into the forest? It was being fed by an ammo box strapped to his back. Turns out, that wasn’t an actual piece of Army kit, at least until members of the Iowa National Guard created it themselves.

The National Guard division had been recently deployed to a forward operating base in Afghanistan and were issued Mk 48 machine guns when they arrived. The problem was, the belts of ammunition were extremely cumbersome and difficult for the gun’s operator to carry while on foot-patrol. The initial solution of chopping the belts into 50-round lengths and reloading constantly was abandoned after a harrowing 2.5 hour long firefight proved it untenable.

So, Staff Sgt. Vincent Winkowski welded two ammo boxes atop one another (with the upper case’s bottom removed), lashed them to an all-purpose ALICE pack frame, and mounted the feed chute assembly from a vehicle-mounted CROWS (Common Remote Operating Weapons Station) to the top of it. This allowed the gunner to carry a full load of ammo—500 rounds—unassisted. Even with ammo, the entire system weighed a mere 43 pounds.

Originally posted by angrysniper
I'm pretty sure these have been around for a while and were made by a company prior to being improvised as described in that article. Cost a lot less too and don't use the crows feed shoot.