MG34 armoured barrel

The MG34 was equipped with a heavy barrel or panzerlauf, which offered some protection while also allowing more rounds to be fired before the barrel had to be changed.

The normal mantlet around the barrel was replaced by a 6.2mm thick armour mantlet, which didn't have all the holes, but instead had a sleeve in top and bottom for air cooling.
I have no accurate data on the subject, but several sources indicate that the heavy barrel could fire more shots before it had to be replaced. The cause of this could have been a better heat flow through the mass of the surrounding armour. The actual barrel was probably the same as on a normal MG34.

In the La Gleize December 44 museum, I found an MG34 tank version without the barrel. I own special thanks to Mr. Ph. Gillain and Mr. Gérard Gregoire of the museum, who made it possible for me to take dimensions of the gun inside the diorama.

The dimensions and photo's shown here, provide more than enough information to make an exact model. especially note that on this model, the flash hider is locked in position by a clip underneath the barrel. Also note that the "nuts" are eight-sided instead of the six you would expect. Further, the sleeves in the mantlet have a different length top and below.

Standard barrel

Sources: The La Gleize "December 1944" historical museum.