ForgottenWeapons

Token of Appreciation: a Presentation Sokac SMG (Ad-free)

The Šokac was one of the more prolific Croatian domestic submachine guns of the Homeland War. This particular example is one that was specifically presented to the police chief of the town of Slavonsky Brod (the town where the guns were made). It is a mid-range production example, with the polymer lower house (instead of metal), and 25-round magazines. It was fitted in a briefcase - not one of leather, but one one M81 woodland camouflage - the pattern copied and used by Croatian forces. In a...

Tale of a Heroic Sailor: Ensign Stannus' M1911A1 (Ad-free)

Robert "Dickie" Stannus was , in technical terms, a total stud. So much so that he was awarded an inscribed M1911A1 directly by Colt as a prize for being the top sailor in his Naval Academy class. He got the privilege of choosing what ship he would be assigned to, and chose the USS Bear, an assault transport. On its 1959 cruise from Yokosuka for exercises, it encountered Typhoon Ellen, one of the strongest recorded storms of the century. When one of the Bexar's Marines was washed overboard, S...

Cheap vs Expensive Red Dots: What's the Difference? (Ad-free)

At SHOT Show this year I took some time to speak with Mike Branson of Gideon Optics (formerly of Primary ands and Swampfox). Mike's a friend and  a true optics nerd, and I figured he could help give folks an understanding of some of the fundamentals of modern firearms optics. Today, we are going to talk about the differences between cheap and expensive red dots. Just what does a couple hundred bucks extra get you, and why?

USAS-12 at the Range (w/ the Fun Switch)

The USAS-12, made by Daewoo in South Korea, is one of the better box-fed shotguns available (I use that term loosely; there are not that many of them around). It was available as both a semiauto and a fully automatic model - although the semiautos were arbitrarily defined as Destructive Devices in 1994, and must now be registered as such. The fully automatic ones were already registered and were not impacted by that rule. While I have shot a semiauto USAS-12 before, I've not had the chance to...

Mosin 91/30 PU: Soviet Standard WW2 Sniper's Rifle (Ad-free)

The Mosin M91/30 PU is the most recognized Soviet sniper rifle of World War Two, but it was not their first. It was preceded by the Model 1931 PE, the Model 1936 PEM, and also the scoped version of the SVT-40 semiautomatic rifle. The SVT was intended to become a universal infantry rifle as well as a sniper's rifle, and the short 3.5x PU scope was designed specifically for it (earlier PE and PEM scopes we long, and interfered with the ejection port of the SVT). Mosin sniper production was shut...

The Manda: Croatia's Minimalist .50 BMG

The Manda is a rifle that was designed for the Croatian Special Police at the beginning of the Homeland War in 1991. At that point, the Special Police (basically the SWAT teams) were basically the only really well-trained fighters in the country with combat experience. They wanted .50 BMG anti-material rifles for the war that was breaking out, and the Croatian Ministry of the Interior developed and produced the Manda for them.

Specifically, the rifle was designed by engineer Petar Vucet...

L41: Arado's WW2 Experimental MP40 Silencer (ad-free)

The German military tested several designs of silencer for the MP40 submachine gun during late World War Two. Designated the L4x series, they were made by the Arado and Opel-Schneider companies. This example is an Arado L41, designed to use the sort of heavy rubber baffles as the Soviet Bramit pattern. The L41 used two such baffles and a single large expansion chamber, giving it a rather short overall length.   

Instead of using a clamp-on attachment like many of the adopted r...

PSA "Spiker": A Clone of the Chinese Type 56 AK

Palmetto State Armory (PSA) makes a really wide variety of different guns, but one that they came out with a little while back that appealed to me in particular is their "Spiker". This is a reproduction of the Chinese Type 56 stamped AK with a permanently attached underfolding bayonet. These rifles were available as semiautos directly form China until the late 1980s, when import laws (and Presidential Executive Orders) changed to prohibit their importation. The prices on those original has ri...

M91/30 PU Sniper at the Range (Ad-Free)

Today we are out at the range with a 1943 Izhevsk M91/30 PU sniper rifle to see how it shoots...  

For more, check out the 9 Hole Reviews video taking a 91/30 PU on their full 800m course of fire: 

https://youtu.be/L3_C8ecgYLY

Armi Jager AP85: An Italian .22 Rimfire Faux-MAS

Armi Jager was an Italian arms-making company that was created in the early 1950s by Armando Piscetta. He initially made .22 rimfire sporting rifles, then transitioned into making Old West style revolvers, and in the 1970s began offering a series of military lookalikes (he was also heavily involved inn development of the 9x21mm pistol cartridge). These were made in both .32ACP and .22 LR to comply with Italian law, and they were also readily imported into the US (with .22 LR models being much...

Patchett Machine Carbine MkI: Sten Becomes Sterling

The Patchett Machine Carbine Mk I is the predecessor to the Sterling SMG. It was developed by George William Patchett, who was an employee of the Sterling company. At the beginning of the wear, Sterling was making Lanchester SMGs, and Patchett began in 1942 working on a new design that was intended to be simpler, cheaper, and lighter than the Lanchester. He used the receiver tube dimensions from the Sten and the magazine well and barrel shroud form the Lanchester. His first prototypes were re...

Q&A Questions for Jonathan Ferguson

I'm filming at the Royal Armouries in the UK this week, and I'm going to do a Q&A video with Jonathan Ferguson. What should I ask him?

Prototype Czech Silencer-Ready vz70 (Ad-free)

Courtesy of CZ and their reference library, we are looking at a prototype model of the vz.70 pistol intended to use a suppressor. It has an extended and threaded (with interrupted threads for quick attach/detach) barrel, and a mechanism to allow for locking the slide. This will prevent the slide from cycling, thus reducing the noise of a shot and also preventing the ejection of spent brass. Ultimately only a handful of these were made, and they never got into production or issued use.

Suomi Noisemaker Training Magazine (Ad-free)

No blank-firing adapter? No money for practice ammo? What you need is a wooden clicky-clacky noisemaker that locks into your Suomi!

DSA's Mini-RPD at the Range

Today I am at the range with one of DSA's mini-RPDs. The RPD is a nearly 80-year-old design (doesn't that make you feel old!) and a really good candidate for modernization. DSA made a whole bunch of improvements - new dual-spring recoil system, fluted barrel, solidly fitted handguard with a nice repeatable optics mount, and adapters to use SAW belt bags. I will be doing a short series on the whole RPD modernization program at DSA, but here's a short range teaser until that is ready...

Ultra-Premium S&W Performance Center Model 3566 (Ad-free)

When Smith & Wesson introduced their Model 3566 pistol for USPSA use, the company shooting team needed six of them for use at the 1994 USPSA Nationals. The Performance Center made these six guns, and they are magnificent examples of custom gunsmithing. This is the first of them, and designed for use in Limited Division. It has a six-inch extended barrel, brass barrel bushing ring, extended 20-round magazines, and fantastic single action only trigger.

Update: Clockwork Basilisk Books on the Way!

Want to help us cover our extra shipping costs? All of Headstamp Publishing's books are available at: 

https://www.headstamppublishing.com  

If you have changed addresses since ordering Clockwork Basilisk, please head over to Backerkit now to update your information. This article will show you how: 

2024-02-08 12:00:07 +0000 UTC View Post

Everything Wrong with the Sniper Rifles in "Enemy at the Gates” (Ad-free)

One of the very few blockbuster American movies about the Eastern Front in World War Two is Enemy at the Gates, a film about the Soviet sniper Vasily Zaitsev. The movie is based around a duel between Zaitsev and the fictional German sniper Erwin König during the Battle of Stalingrad. There are lots of points of contention surrounding the historical accuracy of the film overall, but today I want to look at specifically the small arms.

Enemy at the Gates really has just one problem when ...

PT83: The Sneaky Silenced Version of Poland's P83 Pistol (Ad-free)

When the P-83 pistol went into production, the Polish military decided that it wanted a dedicated suppressed version of the gun, and the result was the PT-83. Thw P-83 was a 9x18mm pistol with a fixed barrel, so attaching a suppressor was not going to cause any problems with functioning. However, the designers wanted to have the slide remain closed when firing, and to do something more than just extend the barrel and thread on a suppressor. So, the redesigned the recoil spring to site below t...

Tour: Croatian Homeland War Museum Vehicle & Artillery Park (Ad-free)

While in Croatia for filming, we stopped in at the Homeland War Museum (Muzej Domovinskog Rata) in Karlovac. Built in the preserved ruins of the "Hotel California", it houses a small but pretty comprehensive collection of small arms form the Croatian Homeland War, in addition to many other artifacts that tell the story of the war. Outside is a small vehicle and artillery park, which really highlights the diverse origins of the weaponry used in the war. American, British, German, and Soviet eq...

Fiji in World War Two: the Momi Bay Gun Battery (Ad-free)

When the clouds of World War Two began to loom in the 1930s, Britain decided to begin securing some of its more distant colonial outposts - places that might be of strategic importance in a future conflict. Fiji was once of these outposts - a vital point on the seagoing supply line from Europe and the Americas to Australia and Asia. Construction of coastal defense batteries began in the late 1930s, mostly using 6 inch MkVII naval guns. These batteries were constructed around the capital of Su...

Whitneyville Rolling Block for the Montreal Riot Squad (Ad-free)

In 1875 the Montreal City Police decided that they wanted to equip a riot squad in case of public disturbance. They initially requested funds for 50 revolvers, but this changed to 60 carbines instead, and these were purchased via broker in 1876 from the Whitneyville Armory. Whitneyville was a factory that made a variety of independently patented designs, and their rolling block design was actually protected by a different patent (the Whitney-Laidley) than Remington's, despite the very similar...

Prototype French MAS-49 SMG in .45ACP (Ad-free)

In the late 1940s the French developed a new suite of small arms, including a competition to replace the 7.65mm MAS-38 submachine gun with a new 9x19mm SMG. The eventual winner of this program was the MAT-49, which became an iconic part of French Army weaponry in Algeria and elsewhere. The St Etienne arsenal also submitted a design though, and theirs was a lever-delayed system. In addition to the variety of models in 9x19mm, it appears that they also made a couple examples in .45 ACP. I'm not...

M98kF1 ZF41: Norway Recycles Germany's Worst Sniper Rifle (Ad-free)

When Germany capitulated at the end of World War Two, several hundred thousand German soldiers were stuck in Norway (thanks to the efforts of the Norwegian Resistance preventing them from moving south to reinforce against Allied landings in Normandy). These solders' arms were surrendered to the Norwegians, and they formed the basis of Norwegian Army and Home Guard armaments for many years. With hundreds of thousands of K98k rifles to choose from, the Norwegians were able to pick out plenty in...

Romeo M17 Red Dot: Worth It?

In my opinion, the SIG Romeo-M17 red dot is a really good piece of gear, but substantially overpriced. This is a red dot that SIG has developed specifically for the M17 and M18 military pistols, and is not compatible with any other platform. By using a proprietary mounting setup, SIG is able to make this a very low-profile optic compared to other closed-emitted red dots, and it fits the lines of the gun very well (less of the mailbox effect than one normally gets). The controls are good, and ...

Can the Honey Badger a Replace the MP5SD?

The .300 Blackout cartridge and the rifle we now know as the Honey Badger were originally developed by AAC by request of a US special forces military unit. They wanted to replace their MP5SD submachine guns with a weapon that was still very quiet but had more terminal lethality than subsonic 9mm Parabellum ammunition. To do this, Kevin Brittingham and AAC started with the .300 Whisper cartridge and made a few tweaks, then chambered it in an AR derivative with a collapsing stock, short buffer ...

Can the Honey Badger a Replace the MP5SD?

The .300 Blackout cartridge and the rifle we now know as the Honey Badger were originally developed by AAC by request of a US special forces military unit. They wanted to replace their MP5SD submachine guns with a weapon that was still very quiet but had more terminal lethality than subsonic 9mm Parabellum ammunition. To do this, Kevin Brittingham and AAC started with the .300 Whisper cartridge and made a few tweaks, then chambered it in an AR derivative with a collapsing stock, short buffer ...

Battle Rifles of World War Two: Overview

Today we are going to take a look at the three main battle rifles of World War Two - the M1 Garand, the SVT-40, and the Gewehr 43. We will also consider the SVT-38, Gewehr 41(W), and Gewehr 41(M). The United States, Soviet Union, and Germany were the three countries that fielded large numbers of semiautomatic full-power rifles in combat in WW2; how did they differ in their approaches to infantry firepower?

Vila Velabita: Croatian Submachine Gun Made in a Shed (Ad-free)

At the beginning of Croatia's Homeland War, a severe need for small arms led to a whole plethora of simple submachine gun designs. Some were made in proper factories with professional tooling, and some were made by a couple blokes in a shed - and the Vila Velabita we are looking at today definitely falls into the "blokes in a shed" category. Designed by one Juraj Đelalije, it takes many elements form the Yugoslav M56 (which in turn took many of them form the German MP40). It is chambered for...

Guns for the Pope's Police: Mazzocchi Pinfire Revolver (Ad-free)

The revolver we are looking at today is a 9mm pinfire revolver adopted for the Papal Gendarmerie in 1868. At that time, the Papal States controlled roughly the same amount of territory as Switzerland today, and had its own armed forced for internal security - the Papal Gendarmerie. The Papal States had previously adopted a 12mm Lefaucheux revolver for its army, but this was deemed too bulky for the Gendarmes. So in 1867, they went looking for a smaller new pistol. The Mazzocchi brothers in Ro...