A accumulator arrangement (10) for a machine gun has a handling conveyor (17) passing through a supply channel (16), a bypass channel (14), and a return- channel (18). The supply channel leads to a freed system (12) of a machine gun. At the junction of bypass channel and return channel there is connected to a return conveyor (46) leading from the feed system. A gate (24, 50, 52) is mounted at the junction of the bypass channel and supply channel operably between two positions, one position directing ammunition (58) on the handling conveyor onto a supply conveyor (44) leading to the feed system and a second position directing ammunition on the handling conveyor through the bypass channel via the return channel. Upon release of a trigger mechanism operably connected to the gun, the gate moves from its first position to the second position. The feed system continues its forward operation to clear itself of any live ammunition therein. The handling conveyor maintains a forward mode directing ammunition into the bypass channel. A reversing mechanism reverses the handling conveyor to retrieve live ammunition from the bypass channel to the supply channel after the feed system is cleared of all live ammunition. So the live ammunition intermediately accumulated in the bypass channel can be fed to the feed system during the next operation of the machine gun.
The accumulator arrangement and feed system might also be used for article handling systems in general which handle individual linkless articles other than ammunition in rapid sequence.