The American 180 is a .22LR machine gun that fires at a high rate (1300 rpm more or less) from a super-high-capacity magazine (177 rounds). Conceptually it was designed by Richard Casull in the 1960s, but he only produced about 70 of his original M290 design. He sold the rights to the design, and in 1972 an Austrian company called Voere bought a license to it.
Voere thought that a fast-firing .22 with a substantial magazine could be paired with a then-cutting-edge laser sight and offered to elite police and military units for counter terrorism work. This was spurred by the 1972 Munich Massacre, in which the German police response to a terrorist attack on the Olympic Games was badly bungled. It led to the formation of GSG-9, and a number of gun designs including the Walther WA-2000 and H&K PSG-1.
Well, in addition to marketing to the police, Voere also made a semiautomatic version for civilian sale, and these were imported into the US. Today we are looking at one of those, the SAM-180.
Slap an Eotech or other circle-reticle sight on there, and you’ve got beginnings of a nice little anti-drone tool… Or, at least, something worth experimenting with.
Ian really ought to do a piece on the whole German/Austrian Voere thing. The German company sold a bunch of hunting rifles here in the US through Kliengunther, and marketed through the Rod & Gun Club system in Germany. The Austrian company of the same name was the one that did this, and the caseless cartridge .22, which was another failure on the US market. VEC-91, I think…? Somebody once told me that the development of that rifle was tied in with this one, in that they’d looked at the Daisy V/L tech for use with this rifle, and then it sort of grew from there into what became the VEC-91. Fascinating source for Fuddlore, and I’ve never found all that much on the two companies and what the hell their relationship actually was. Family, I suspect…?
Voere is an interesting name and company, nonetheless.
“(…)Voere is an interesting name(…)”
According to http://voere.com/de/historie.html#firmenhistorie it was made from names of Erich Voetter and Paul Restle, c.f. Halger cartridge.
“(…)German(…)Voere thing(…)”
I do not have any information w.r.t. Voere located inside Bundesrepublik Deutschland, w.r.t. Austrian Voere one might find overview of fire-arms they made at http://voere.com/de/historie/produktpalette-kufstein.html
“(…)Ian(…)”
Might find VOERE X5 https://www.voere-shop.com/shop/VOERE-X5-Cal-416-Barrett-50-Browning-c57887152 interesting as it is (if I understand correctly enough) bolt-action AND could be reconfigured for left or right hand usage (rare features intersection, most often left bolt-action rifles are made as such at factory)
Maybe Voere is a nod to FEUER ?
Use full auto .22 Mag for anti-drone weapon and you can get extra range.
Dont forget copper plated bullets, which this magazine can only feed without jamming
Anyone here know the usual altitude at which the drones a military would want to take out operate? The ballistic path of the bullets would be different shooting upward, instead of parallel to the ground. This would determine just how useful this gun would be for anti-drone use.
Wouldn’t training and adequate sights adjust ing for trajectory take care of the bullet path problem?
My one encounter with the semi-auto version showed that when the pan got down to the last two or three rounds, at least one would fall into the feedway at too steep an angle and jam the bolt.
Also, holding the piece generally absolutely upright was a must.
Maybe the full-auto version developed enough inertial energy in bolt cycling to avoid problems. If so, it might be more reliable than the civilian model.
clear ether
eon
Go full yacto-gun.
They also sell a system that ignites a lead-free primer by means of a laser, which allows you to shoot with a very low lock time, and zero parts moving before the shot.
They still produce very nice “normal” hunting rifles.