Submachine Guns - Forgotten Weapons

The Diggers’ Dismay: Austen Mk I SMG

September 11, 2019 Ian McCollum 20

When World War Two began, Australia saw little threat of invasion from Germany (obviously), and sent a substantial number of firearms to Britain to help arm the Home Guard there, which was seriously concerned about […]

Sterling S11: Donkey in a Thoroughbred Race

June 26, 2019 Ian McCollum 43

In the 1960s, the Sterling company began to worry about the prospects of continued sales of the Sterling (Patchett) SMG, especially in light of new competitors like the H&K MP5. Its chief design engineer, Frank […]

Sanna 77: A Czech SMG Turned South African Carbine

June 19, 2019 Ian McCollum 8

The Sanna 77 was a semiauto copy of the Czech Sa 25 submachine gun. It was first produced in Rhodesia by the GM Steel company for the Rhodesian military. In this form, it was the […]

At the Range with the Iconic MP5A3

June 15, 2019 Ian McCollum 25

The MP5 is widely considered the best submachine gun ever made, for its reliability, its handling, and it’s closed-bolt delayed-blowback action. It is so widely praised, in fact, that H&K’s efforts to replace it with […]

Lightweight Experimental Lanchester SMGs

June 14, 2019 Ian McCollum 33

George Lanchester was the engineer responsible for originally reverse engineering the German MP28 submachine gun for production by the British, under the designation Lanchester. Once he finished that design work, the gun was put into […]

Polish PM63 Rak at the Range

June 8, 2019 Ian McCollum 18

Whether it is described as a machine pistol, a submachine gun, or a personal defense weapon, the PM63 Rak is really not the best examples of this sort of thing to actually shoot. The open-bolt/slide […]

PM63 Rak: An Interesting Polish SMG/PDW Hybrid

June 7, 2019 Ian McCollum 29

The PM-63 Rak is a pretty interesting Polish Cold War machine pistol or personal defense weapon. It fires from an open bolt, but uses a slide like a pistol rather than a bolt in an […]

Local Boy Saves Nation: The Australian Owen SMG

May 8, 2019 Ian McCollum 46

The One submachine gun is one of the ugliest SMGs ever designed, and yet also one of the most beloved by its users. The original basis for the gun was a .22 rimfire submachine gun […]

Viper MkI: A Simplified Steampunk Sten

April 26, 2019 Ian McCollum 24

The Viper Mk I was an experimental submachine gun developed in the UK for use by military policemen in post-WW@ occupation West Germany. It was a simplified Sten gun (full-auto only, without the semiauto option […]

Shooting the MP35: Germany’s Left-Handed SMG

April 22, 2019 Ian McCollum 34

This submachine gun is lot #1011 in the upcoming April 2019 Morphy auction. The MP-35 is one of several very nicely made inter-war German submachine guns. Unlike most, it has the magazine mounted on the […]