The Firearm Blog

The Carabinieri (Italian gendarmerie) have seized a pen gun from a mobster in Naples.

.22 Short rounds and one standard (subsonic) .22 Long Rifle

My memory is pretty bad but I think it was 6 months ago when the Italian police captured one of those cell phone guns from another mobster.

SFGate reports:

A Carabinieri paramilitary officer holds a .22-caliber pen gun that was confiscated from a man in Naples. According to reports, Carabinieri were investigating if the weapon has been used in crimes or “acts of intimidation.”

Hat Tip: Zeon @ MP.net

About two weeks ago the police in Winnipeg, Canada, confiscated a a bunch of saw off shotguns, ammo and a unidentified submachine gun that is reported to be homemade.

Full photo at The Winnipeg Sun

The Winnipeg Sun reports:

Possibly homemade, the submachine-gun and five sawed-off shotguns, along with ammunition, were seized at a house in the 400-block of Manitoba Avenue on Jan. 7, police said.

Three males, aged 17, 27 and 28, are facing almost 120 charges.

If it is homemade whoever made it did a very good job. Either it is homemade or of a pre-1950ish design. Note that it has a non-telescoping bolt resulting in a long receiver.

At first I thought it may be an MP-40, but it is not. Can anyone here identify it? Please provide a link to a photo in the comments if you can.

Regular readers know that I have fascination with homemade guns

Chain SAW … get it?

They must have had a lot of fun putting this thing together Click to expand the photos.

Note the M203 grenade flare launcher


[ Above Photos Copyright Ken Lunde. Used with permission. ]

UPDATE: A couple more photos taken by SMGLee:

Click to expand. Photo ⓒ Chen “SMGLee” Lee. Used with permission.


Click to expand. Photo ⓒ Chen “SMGLee” Lee. Used with permission.

You were warned … This is the Frankenstein’s monster of early 20th Century American arms:

An M103 Springfield in an SBR (Short Barrel Rifle) configuration presumably converted to .45 ACP with a 1911 pistol grip being used as the magazine well.

It is hideous. Something only its mother could love!

Hat Tip: Хроники безумного Макса

The latest Popular Mechanics (Jan 2009) has an article about the 12 foot long vertical gun NASA has at the Ames Research Center. The gun is used to simulate impacts from meteor and space debris.

What is very interesting is that it utilizes a hybrid air gun / gun powder system. It uses a gunpowder charge to accelerate a piston which compresses hydrogen gas to 100,000 psi (maximum pressure of a .338 Lapua Magnum is 60,916 psi). This propels a saboted projectile at 26,400 fps!

The piston system if very common. All spring air guns use it, even the simple springer airsoft guns use a simple piston system. The difference is they use a spring to propel the piston which compresses air.

Here is my attempt at explaining my understanding of how the NASA gun works:

Excuse my drawing skills. Click to expand

UPDATE: A diagram by NASA of a Light Gas Gun (thanks to R.A.W and Billl):

I got it more or less correct

English Russia, a humorous blog about all things Russia, has photos of home-made firearms confiscated by police and army in Chechnya.

Click to expand images:

30mm or 40mm grenade launcher?


Looks like a Baikal over and under shotgun
with pistol grip and cut down barrel.


Pretty nifty carbine.

Many more at English Russia.

The modern Soldier of Fortune prefers the “full auto” chainsaw rail attachment over the old fashioned single stab “blade” or “spike” bayonet. It makes the bayonet pistol look impotent!

Pictured on an AR-15

Now available for the Saiga-12 shotgun (note the 20 round drum mag)

Thanks jdun1911 for the tip.

More about the chainsaw at ar15.com.

This site showcases some very small firearms.

.38 caliber, the brass padlock alarm gun


.22 rimfire pipe gun

This one is truly bizarre! I guess it is some sort of ’self defense hook’! I don’t know the caliber or how it was supposed to work. LibertyNews and bigfoot explain how it works in the comments below.

More here.

Hat Tip: Xavier Thoughts

GunPorn wrote a post on this very interesting shotgun. It is a reverse pump action bullpup shotgun invented by a South African company.

From what appears to be the official website.

Neostead Features

* Selectable twin tube magazine
* 13 shot capacity
* Overall length is 27 inches with full length barrel of 22.5 inches
* Totally ambidextrous as all controls are centrally mounted
* Pump action is reversed
* Straight line stock with magazines above barrel
* Negligible muzzle lift
* Intergral carry handle houses ghost ring sights
* High stength polymers for main external components
* Boltless design
* Sling swivels on top

Safety Features

* Trigger safety locks trigger positively
* Pump handle operates trigger disconnector
* Pump lock
* Firing pin positive return
* Out of battery firing prevention
* Reversed pump action

Wikipedia has this to say

The NeoStead 2000 (NS2000) is a type of shotgun developed by the South African company NeoStead. Along with the Pancor Jackhammer, it is considered one of the most technologically advanced shotguns ever created. The NS2000 has been used in trial runs for a few years by special forces like the British SAS and there are hopes at NeoStead that larger weapons manufacturers will license the production rights. Production of the shotgun began in 2001 and the first models were made available in October of that year.

The NS2000 is a 12-gauge pump action shotgun weighing in at just over 3kg, designed primarily for security and civil disturbance situations.

The firearm includes a 22.5 inch (572mm) barrel despite the overall weapon length of just 27 inches (686mm). The short length makes the weapon easier to handle in close quarter situations however, unlike most firearms of this type, it can still remain accurate at relatively long ranges. The long barrel length is achieved by using a bullpup configuration, with a rear-fed tubular magazine.

Another aspect of the NS2000 is its dual six round magazines. The selector switch can be set to left, right, or alternating. For example in riot conditions less-lethal flexible baton rounds can be used with standard rounds in reserve.

A possible production variant of the NS2000 has an 18 inch barrel in a weapon with an overall length of 22 inches. The shorter length reduced the magazine capacity to 5+5 rounds and makes the weapon easier to import or license in many countries.

Its pump mechanism operates in a forward-back motion, due to its rear-load configuration. This is different from conventional pump methods as the pump action is achieved by shifting the hand forward-back, as opposed to the standard back-forward motion of the non-trigger hand.

Some more photos

This photo makes it look a bit like a side by side shotgun. The two cylinders next to each other on the top are the magazines.

Patent application drawings:

This shows how the magazines are inserted:

CMMG have announced an .50 Black Powder AR-15 Upper!

To fire, the powder charge and bullet are loaded via a ramrod. Using a standard magazine with a single shot follower, an unloaded 5.56 case is loaded into the mag, inserted in magazine well and loaded just like a standard rifle.

Once the rifle is fired, the empty brass is ejected manually and then reloaded.

…

It is a modified .223 case that uses a 209 primer. Currently .50 cal. Should have pricing and other specs tomorrow.

Interesting! As one commenter said

Can you imagine the face of an unsuspecting
game warden the first time he runs across these..

They have yet to announce pricing.

UPDATE

This isn’t a loaded case, it is a 209 primer in a piece of .223 brass. There is no way a live round or a blank will load into the “chamber”.

UPDATE

A video of it in action. Actually, it looks pretty good.

More at AR15.com

Hat Tip: Freedom Sight

How far would you go to enjoy 12 gauge shot gunning without disturbing the neighbors?

Wendell Diller has invented a lightweight shotgun barrel extension that is about 5 feet long!

When Sean Coffey’s honker call pulled a flock of geese within range, paraplegic Dave Guzzi swung his shotgun with a 7-foot-long barrel and dropped one of the geese dead.

There was a moment of stunned silence — and not after the goose tumbled out of sky. The morning stillness was barely disturbed when Guzzi pulled the trigger on his extraordinarily long shotgun.

The sharp blast of the 12-gauge was replaced by a muffled fzzzttt. Sitting just four feet away, I was struck by how the shotgun sounded like a loud air rifle. Guzzi, who lives in Burnsville, laid the experimental shotgun between his legs and waited for more geese.

“Pretty amazing, isn’t it?” he said of his gun.

Apparently it is also useful for deer hunting.

More here.

This great looking contraction was called the “Apache”.

Read more about it at Hell in a Handbasket

Oddly enough the below ‘rocket’ is actually a rifle chambered in the 7.62×39mm cartridge! It is used in a RPG launcher for training purposes. I assume that it would be used in an actual RPG launcher and not a training replica.

I came across this link a PFOA post. From the website that sells it:

Used by the Czech military as a training aid to simulate firing a rocket propelled grenade using 7.62×39 ammunition. Features blued-steel construction with a rifled barrel, bolt assembly, knurled grips and yellow rocket head. The push-button type trigger assembly is designed to be fired while inside the RPG launcher itself (launcher not included or available), but it can be fired manually by depressing a small lever and pressing a recessed button in the rocket body.

Here is a video of it being fired: