Semiauto Rifles - Forgotten Weapons

History of the Designated Marksman’s Rifle (Video)

May 13, 2015 Ian McCollum 11

Today Karl and I are looking at the history and evolution of the DMR concept. This is the idea of a squad force-multiplier in the form of a rifle with greater precision capability than the […]

The SVT-40 and Soviet Tactics

May 12, 2015 Ian McCollum 27

I have an SVT-40, but haven’t had a chance to really put it through the paces and do a video on it yet. So I was interested to watch when I saw that Balázs Németh […]

The Rheinmetall model 1928 (designed by one Karl Heinemann and made in Switzerland) was one of the rifles tested by US Ordnance in trials that eventually settled on the Garand and Pedersen designs (and ultimately […]

Mannlicher 1885 Semiauto Rifle

May 6, 2015 Ian McCollum 21

Ferdinand von Mannlicher’s Model 1885 self-loading rifle design as a failure, never seeing anything even resembling mass production. However, it was a failure which in many way set the stage for a huge number of […]

Walther G41 and G43 in the 2-Gun Action Challenge Match

May 3, 2015 Ian McCollum 9

I decided to bring back my Walther G41 for the April 2-Gun match, this time with a reproduction ZF-41 scope mounted on it. My G41 is a bit unusual in that it was originally made […]

Slow Motion: Gewehr 43

April 30, 2015 Ian McCollum 11

The G43 was intended to become the standard infantry rifle for the Wehrmacht (replacing the Kar 98k), but production never ramped up sufficiently, and the concept of the intermediate-caliber Sturmgewehr took over by the end […]

A Semiauto FG-42 up on Gunbroker

April 19, 2015 Ian McCollum 15

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 […]

Japanese Pedersen Rifle at RIA

April 19, 2015 Ian McCollum 10

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 […]

ZH-29 Semiauto Rifle at RIA

April 17, 2015 Ian McCollum 23

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 […]

Collected Works of John Pedersen

April 11, 2015 Ian McCollum 8

John Pedersen was one of the more prolific and successful gun designers in American history, having even been described by John Moses Browning as “the greatest gun designer in the world”. And yet, many people […]