United States - Forgotten Weapons

Book Review: Winchester Model 07 Self-Loading .351 Caliber

February 13, 2014 Ian McCollum 57

The full title of this recently-published monograph by Leonard Speckin is actually Winchester Model 07 Self-Loading .351 Caliber: Its Past and Its Future with Modern Brass, Bullets and Powders. There is very little modern published […]

Followup w/ Pictures – Smoothbore Trapdoor

February 12, 2014 Ian McCollum 39

The owner of this interesting firearm (who is a regular reader of the site) sent me this information about it: Here are the things I do know about this weapon, which is one if six […]

Winchester-Hotchkiss Rifles (Video)

February 10, 2014 Ian McCollum 34

The US military experimented almost continuously with new repeating rifles between the end of the US Civil War and the beginning of the 20th century, and the rifles submitted for testing are a fascinating spectrum […]

Book Review: Bullets by the Billion

February 6, 2014 Ian McCollum 20

Bullets by the Billion is a short book (77 small pages of large print) written by one Wesley Stout and published by the Chrysler Corporation on 1946. It was a company project to commemorate the […]

Johnson M1944E1 LMG

February 5, 2014 Ian McCollum 36

In addition to his work on designing a basic infantry shoulder rifle, Melvin Maynard Johnson and put a lot of effort into creating a light machine gun for US military forces to use. In terms […]

Smoothbore Trapdoor Springfield?

February 2, 2014 Ian McCollum 36

Got a question from a friend, which is outside my area of knowledge. Does anyone know about the history of smoothbore, .45-caliber Trapdoor Springfield rifles? This fellow bought what was advertised as a forager conversion, […]

Vickers Cal .30 Parts List

January 31, 2014 Ian McCollum 15

Presented for general reference: An illustrated parts list for the .30-06 caliber Vickers machine gun and accessories. Complete with translations between English and American!

FG-42 vs M1 Garand – 2 Gun Match (Video)

January 20, 2014 Ian McCollum 53

For this month’s 2-Gun Action Challenge Match, we had a loaner .308 FG-42 from SMG Guns, which I handed off to my friend Karl to shoot. I went up against him with an M1 Garand, […]

Safeties – or not – on US Military Pistols

January 14, 2014 Ian McCollum 39

The question of what type of safety is appropriate on a combat pistol is a source of lots of debate. That’s partly because it’s ultimately a subjective rather than objective question, but also partly because […]

Book Review: MAGNUM – The S&W .357 Magnum Phenomenon

January 10, 2014 Ian McCollum 11

Today we’re looking at one of the most recent additions to the Collector Grade ensemble: Tim Mullin’s MAGNUM: the S&W .357 Magnum Phenomenon. It’s a very good history of one of American’s iconic handguns: You […]