Mystery
Mystery “Rocking Block” Pistol at RIA
There isn’t much I can say about this very unusual pistol, as I have no idea who made it or when. What I can tell is that it is a blowback action with a rather […]
Articles by Ian McCollum
Prototype
Gustloff Prototype Pistol at RIA
Gustloff was a large industrial concern in Germany which made many different weapons for the military. In addition to these, its attempted to market a small-caliber pistol for police or SS use. This pistol used […]
Bolt Action Rifles
Blake Bolt Action Rifle at RIA
The Blake was one of many rifle designs submitted to the US Army trials that would ultimately result in the adoption of the Krag-Jorgensen as the US Army’s standard rifle. The main innovation of Blake’s […]
Percussion
Pinfire LeMat Grapeshot Revolver at RIA
Colonel Jean Alexandre LeMat was a native Frenchman who emigrated to the United States and in 1856 secured a patent for a “grapeshot revolver”, which had both a 9-shot .42 caliber cylinder and a 20-gauge […]
Reproduction
A Semiauto FG-42 up on Gunbroker
Rick from SMG Guns dropped me a line to let me know that he has put one of his 8mm semiauto FG-42 rifles up for sale on Gunbroker. In fact, it’s actually the exact demo […]
Prototype
Japanese Pedersen Rifle at RIA
After he failed to win US military adoption of his toggle-locked rifle design, John Pedersen went looking for other countries that might be interested in the gun. One of these was Japan, which experimented with […]
Prototype
Very Early Mars Pistol #4 at RIA
Until the midle of the 20th century, the most powerful automatic pistol made was Sir Hugh Gabbett-Fairfax’s Mars pistol. With the .45 caliber version approaching the energy of a .45 Winchester Magnum, it was quite […]
Semiauto Rifles
ZH-29 Semiauto Rifle at RIA
The ZH-29 was the brainchild of noted Czech arms designer Emmanuel Holek in the late 1920s. It was one of the earliest practical and reliable semiauto rifles available, although Holek and the Brno factory were […]
Shotgun
Burgess Folding Shotgun at RIA
Andrew Burgess was an extremely prolific gun designer who gets very little recognition today. One of has particularly interesting weapons was a pump-action, folding shotgun. Because Spencer already had a patent on the use of […]
Semiauto pistol
Japanese Inagaki and Sugiura Pistols at RIA
The most common Japanese pistols used during World War II were the Type 14 and Type 94 Nambu designs, by a huge margin. However, there were a number of other handguns used in small numbers, […]