eli5 Why weren’t machine guns possible to make in the past?

Question

What stopped 18-19th century armies with guns from being able to create automatic weapons like AK-47s and Uzis?
Since they don’t use electricity I feel like they’re made with materials and technology that was already available in the 1750s, surely they could’ve put their heads together to create a machine gun and just annihilate any ops…

Thanks

In: Engineering

Answer 1

Precision machining ain’t the easiest thing man. You’d have to hammer out the parts over an anvil. Hell, even modern machine guns jam. Can you imagine the situation where the metal was more warped or uneven?