Ian McCollum - Forgotten Weapons

Uruguayan Celmi Hermanos .32 ACP Pistol

March 1, 2021 Ian McCollum 15

The Celmi brothers were Italians who moved to Uruguay and opened an arms factory. They are best known for sporting shotguns, but in 1943 they introduced an automatic pistol, much like the Walther PP but […]

Sneak Peek at Thorneycroft to SA80 with the Author, Jonathan Ferguson

February 28, 2021 Ian McCollum 10

Jonathan Ferguson, author of our newest Headstamp Publishing book “Thorneycroft to SA80: British Bullpup Firearms 1901-2020”, has just gotten his advance author’s copy of the book! Let’s join him to take a look through its […]

Scattergun Science! Testing Diverter and Duckbill Chokes

February 27, 2021 Ian McCollum 13

Matt Haught joins me one more time to try out some practical testing of the Diverter and Duckbill shotgun chokes. We are using a 2-liter bottles of seltzer water on strings at 10 yards, and […]

Clair Brothers Semiauto Shotgun from the 1890s

February 26, 2021 Ian McCollum 15

The Clair brothers were three men from Saint Etienne, France – Benoit, Jean Baptiste, and Victor Clair. They submitted their first patent in 1889, which described in general a gas-operating system for firearms. This was […]

Very Rare and Mostly Pointless: the Bren Fixed Line Sight

February 25, 2021 Ian McCollum 19

The very early production MkI Bren light machine guns were made with two dovetail brackets on the left side of the receiver. The rear one was for the standard rear sight, and the front one […]

Bren MkI: The Best Light Machine Gun of World War Two

February 24, 2021 Ian McCollum 102

In the years after World War One, the British military wanted a new machine gun, and they wanted it to replace both the Lewis and the Vickers. Through the 1920s the British would tinker with […]

The FG-42 as a Sniper Rifle?

February 23, 2021 Ian McCollum 24

The FG-42 was specifically made with a scope attachment on every rifle, and intended to serve as a marksman’s or sniper’s rifle. But how much of that actually happened during World War Two? And was […]

Prototype Ross “H5” from 1909

February 22, 2021 Ian McCollum 3

The Ross MkII (aka Ross 1905) was a reasonably successful rifle design, but it lacked a few elements that the Canadian military would have preferred. Most significantly, it was not compatible with the charger clip […]

Duckbill Done Right? Testing the A&W Diverter Shotgun Barrel (w/ Matt Haught)

February 20, 2021 Ian McCollum 11

The A&W Diverter was designed by Clifford Ashbrook and Wilson Wing to change a shotgun’s circular pattern into a horizontal linear one. They applied for a patent in 1967, and it was granted in 1970 […]

Winchester Mystery Prototype: Melvin Johnson does Project SALVO?

February 19, 2021 Ian McCollum 29

This rifle is a Winchester semiauto prototype that has no documentation I could find in any source. So, today we will take a look at what we can possibly extrapolate from its various features. It […]