Machine Guns - Forgotten Weapons

Walther’s Forgotten SMG: The MPK (and MPL)

December 3, 2025 Ian McCollum 27

https://youtu.be/3qElfsloKH8 Walther began developing a modern stamped sheet metal SMG in the late 1950s, and it entered production in 1963. It was an open-bolt, simple blowback gun available in a short (MPK; 6.75” barrel) and […]

The First M60 Prototype: FG42 + MG42 = T44

December 1, 2025 Ian McCollum 48

The FG-42 caught the attention of a lot of countries at the end of World War Two. The British and Swiss both used it as the starting point for some developments. The US went one […]

Drum-Fed LMG for Chinese Warlords: the Finnish LS-26/31

November 8, 2025 Ian McCollum 29

Join the Forged in Snow launch here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/headstamp/forged-in-snow?ref=2sw39d After the Finnish Defense Forces adopted the LS26 light machine gun, Aimo Lahti and the Tikkakoski factory continued to work on further developing it. They designed a […]

Hungarian K1 “Kucher” Light Submachine Gun

October 20, 2025 Ian McCollum 13

In the early years after World War Two the Hungarian government needed new small arms, but chose to license Soviet designs instead of developing their own. when it came to submachine guns, this entailed production […]

ZK-466: CZ Makes a Folding Submachine Gun

October 17, 2025 Ian McCollum 14

The ZK-466 was one of the post-war submachine guns developed in Czechoslovakia as part of the competition for a new Czech military SMG. Developed by Josef Koucky (who was also designer of the ZK-383 before […]

Type 85: China’s Special Forces SMG (Regular and Silenced Versions)

October 8, 2025 Ian McCollum 1

Jason Clower’s video on the development and use of the Type 85: The Type 85 was a submachine gun developed in the 1980s in China to replace the failure that was the Type 79. It […]

Hovea M44: Husqvarna Makes a Submachine Gun

September 22, 2025 Ian McCollum 7

The Hovea M44 was tested by the Danish and Swedish militaries in 1945, competing agains the Carl Gustaf M45. It was designed and produced by Husqvarna (yes, the chainsaw company) and just 10 of them […]

The Best Operational Briefcase: American 180 & Laser Sight

September 5, 2025 Ian McCollum 45

The “American 180 Security Briefcase” is the best execution of the operational briefcase concept that I have yet seen. The idea is simple; hide a submachine gun inside an ordinary looking briefcase so that it […]

Registered Bolt vs Registered Receiver Uzis

September 1, 2025 Ian McCollum 17

Most of the transferrable Uzis in the US are not factory original guns, but rather semi autos that were converted and registered as machine guns in the US before 1986 (when such activity was legal). […]

Potato Digger at War: Marlin Model 1917 Machine Gun

August 27, 2025 Ian McCollum 19

John Browning’s first machine gun design was a gas operated system that used a swinging lever instead of a linear piston. He presented the first prototype to Colt in 1890, and it went into production […]