Semiauto Rifles - Forgotten Weapons

SKS Manuals at Allegheny Arsenal

August 4, 2013 Ian McCollum 16

One rifle that isn’t really forgotten at all but still interesting and historically significant is the Samozaryadnyj Karabin Simonova – the SKS. Predating the AK by several years, the SKS was a staple weapon in […]

Controls Long Past

July 16, 2013 Ian McCollum 70

Guns are like vodka. The better and better new ones get, the more indistinguishable they become, as they get closer and closer to that Platonic ideal design. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, really – […]

Swedish FM59 Ljungman

July 10, 2013 Ian McCollum 19

In the midst of World War II, the Swedish government adopted the AG-42 Ljungman self-loading rifle, which was chambered for their standard 6.5x55mm cartridge. It was issued to supplement squad firepower, and proved to be […]

Holloway HAC-7 Video

July 8, 2013 Ian McCollum 53

The HAC-7 was a rifle designed in the 1980s, and only available for a short time before the Holloway Arms Company went out of business. It was designed as a military-style weapon, although what military […]

Caseless Ammunition Overview

July 5, 2013 Ian McCollum 48

Caseless ammunition has always been an interesting topic on the fringes of arms design – people keep trying it out, but none of the systems seems to really get a solid foothold in a civilian […]

Madsen 1888 and 1896 Self-Loading Rifles

June 26, 2013 Ian McCollum 10

It is often said that the 1907 Mondragon was the first self-loading rifle formally adopted by a military, but it turns out this is not quite accurate. In fact, the 1896 Madsen-Rasmussen rifle was produced […]

Book Review: German Pistols and Holsters

June 13, 2013 Ian McCollum 10

I’d heard some negative things about today’s book before I picked up a copy, and I was happily surprised by its usefulness. The book is German Pistols and Holsters 1934/1945, by Major Robert D. Whittington […]

Guns on a Plane

April 30, 2013 Ian McCollum 12

We attended a symposium at the Institute of Military Technology a while back, and one of the talks was on the development of the AR-10, given by C. Reed Knight Jr. One of the neat […]

Brøndby Rifle Photos

April 26, 2013 Ian McCollum 5

We have previously mentioned Fridtjof Brøndby, a Norwegian arms designer who created a number of self-loading rifle designs in the 1930s. Last time we were looking at his model 1933 maskinpistole (submachine gun), and today […]

Mannlicher 1905 Experimental Self-Loading Rifle

April 12, 2013 Ian McCollum 26

Before we can really take a close look at today’s rifle, some background is necessary. Ferdinand von Mannlicher was a very successful Austrian gun designer, with patents on several major ideas, and successful rifle and […]