United States - Forgotten Weapons

Springfield Hellion: The VHS-2 Bullpup Comes to the US

January 14, 2022 Ian McCollum 47

Today we are taking a look at the Springfield Hellion, the semiautomatic US version of HS Produkt’s VHS-2 bullpup rifle. The VHS-2 development goes back almost 20 years, with a first VHS rifle and then […]

Stemple STG-34k at the Range

January 8, 2022 Ian McCollum 24

Today’s video is the Stemple STG-34k at the range…but if I’m going to be honest, it was mostly just an excuse for me to try it out for fun. 🙂 It’s definitely the least practical […]

Stemple Makes a Star Wars Blaster: the STG-34k

January 7, 2022 Ian McCollum 8

One of the best-looking versions of the Stemple is, I believe, the STG-34k. This was the result of BRP obtaining a whole bunch of MG-34 parts kits as part of a separate project to make […]

Airtronics PSRL: An American RPG (with demo shot…for real!)

December 27, 2021 Ian McCollum 33

Thanks to Jeff Folloder and Airtronics USA, I have a chance today to look at and test-fire a PSRL (Precision Shoulder-fired Rocket Launcher) – in essence, an American-made RPG-7. The rocket we are using here […]

The Thumb Trigger Concept Anew: Iron Horse’s TOR

December 22, 2021 Ian McCollum 30

The idea of a thumb trigger in place of a traditional index finger trigger has come up a number of times in firearms history (the Pieri carbines tested in France and Italy, the Winchester Thumb […]

The Sure Defender: An O.G. Knuckleduster Knife Gun

December 8, 2021 Ian McCollum 12

One of the early combination self-defense guns was the “Sure Defender”, with a combination of brass knuckles, a small and finicky wavy-bladed dagger, and a single shot percussion pistol barrel. The rather complex process for […]

Winchester Reference Collection: Uruguayan M1908 Short Rifle

November 22, 2021 Ian McCollum 9

Uruguay first adopted a Mauser rifle in the 1880s, with the single-shot Mauser model 1871. After an abortive attempt to update those rifles to a small bore smokeless powder cartridge (the Dovitiis conversion), they opted […]

Throwback Thursday: A .22 Rifle for John Wayne

November 18, 2021 Ian McCollum 18

Today I’m reposting part of an interview I did with L James “Jim” Sullivan back in 2014. Aside from being one of the two men who did the conversion of the AR-10 into the AR-15, […]

Dodge Patent Prototype Rolling Block Rifle

November 11, 2021 Ian McCollum 28

William Dodge and his brother were inventors in Washington DC who in the 1870s patented a bunch of different improvements to the Remington Rolling Block, among other guns. This particular one I cannot identify with […]

Spitfire: The Semiauto That Became a Machine Gun

November 9, 2021 Ian McCollum 13

The Spitfire is a firearm with an interesting importance in legal history. Originally designed and marketed as an open-bolt semiautomatic-only carbine, it was determined to be a machine gun under the law in 1968, and […]