The Firearm Blog

Joe Huffman has had some pretty nifty photos he took of pistols recoiling published in an Italian magazine.

Earlier this month Serbian police discovered a weapons cache hidden inside a buried oil tank. The weapons were found outside a village that was a former stronghold of an ethnic Albanian militia. It is quite impressive how much hardware and ammunition can be packed away in a relatively small space!

Investigative Judge with the Vranje District Court Staniša Mihajlović said that 100,000 bullets, a recoilless cannon, three mortars, six RPGs, three machine gun stands and 21 anti-tank mines were recovered from the tank.

Hat Tip: MP.net

Mike, a reader of TFB, bought a K98 Mauser from Mitchell’s Mausers and emailed me some photos.

Mike says …

I also have a Yugo Mauser from them. The Yugo was made in 1946 at a German plant after they were kicked out. The K98 was made in 1941, the quality isn’t as good as the Yugo one.

It didn’t come with a sling, just with a “military strap with buckles” (read, Mosin Nagant sling), and they were out of some of the goodies (new ads reflect that), but I’m happy. I wanted a German Mauser and got one.

Many thanks to Mike for emailing me the photos.

Fat White Man has posted photos of his new Gun Room. What a nice setup! I am very jealous.

He even has a gun woodwork area for stock work!

I asked Dave, who blogs at LetsKillDave and is a reader of TFB, to take photos of the internals of his new civilian Steyr AUG A3 rifle and he was kind enough to oblige.

16″ barreled AR-15 vs. 16″ AUG. The bullpup length advantage is obvious.


AR-15 bolt vs. AUG bolt. Very similar design.

I highly recommend reading Dave’s blog post. I learnt a lot about the AUG design that I did not know before.

Thanks Dave.

Vote for David has written a detailed tutorial on producing great looking photos of a gun bores like the photo below. I highly recommend reading it.

Beautiful!

These photos are of a AMT Combat Government Hardballer 1911 pistol that fired a handloaded .45 ACP round that was overloaded with powder. The result is quite spectacular. The top of the chamber has been blown right off taking a considerable section of the slide with it.

That looks sore.

The photos are from Photobucket via. the Blue Gun Blog.

UPDATE: Elvis for identifying the pistol.

Master gunsmith Steve Zihn, who made the huge 2 bore rifle I have blogged about before, emailed these photos of this magnificent .54 caliber flintlock rifle he built.

Look at the trigger blade. Beautiful.

It has a 44″ swamped barrel.

The rifle along with a matching custom made knife is being raffled off to raise money for the Cowboy Church in Riverton, Wyoming. Tickets for the raffle cost $10 each or 3 for $25 and can be purchased from CJ Vandermuehlen. He can be contacted at 1-307-851 8829 or at the below email address.

Brian, who blogs at SKS’s and More, emailed me photos of his Mosin-Nagant M44 which has been configured for short range ( 75 yards ) hog and deer hunting. The scope mount attaches to where the front sight would have been.

Click to expand the photos.

I love that laminated stock.

If you are into SKS and other comblock firearms I recommend checking out Brian’s SKS’s and More blog.

The fact that guns get dirty is is one of those unfortunate facts of life, along with death and taxes.

A piston operated gun will reduce the dirt that enters the rifle compared to a direct gas impingement gun (AR-15). When you add a suppressor, I think it makes little difference what type of gas system your rifle uses, it is going to get very dirty!

From the patent of an early model MP5SD suppressor.

A suppressor works by slowing down the gas through a series of baffles. The slower moving gas makes less noise as it is vented out of the can (can = slang for suppressor). The downside is that on a autoloading firearm once the action cycles and the spent cartridge is ejected there is more pressurize gas in the system than there would be without a suppressor. This gas, along with carbon, dirt, unburned power, is vented into the rifle action. Without a suppressor this still happens but the pressure inside the barrel is lower because the gas is vented faster.

“new-arguy” posted photos at AR15.com of his HK 416 upper (piston AR-15 upper), which had a AAC 416 suppressor attached, after firing 2000 rounds without cleaning.

This is my HK 416 upper, I ran it with an AAC 416 silencer at the last Magpul Dynamics class here in St Augustine. 2 days, 2000 rounds. I only took the silencer off the start of day 2 for a few drills, I would guess about 150 rounds. All the rest were with the can. I dropped some lube in the gun at the start of the class, aside from that, no cleaning, no oil, nothing at all. No problems either, well, not really. I will admit, I have run regular DI guns like this without problems, but I needed to keep dumping oil on the bolt group. In fact, one of the guys who works with me ran his Noveske N4 with a AAC M4 2000 right next to me the whole class. His gun ran fine as well, but he did keep dumping lube into the bolt carrier.

Anyway, the gun was fiilthy. I have never cleaned a gun that was so dirty. Grime and crud was seeping out between the upper and lower trying to escape. It is worth mention that a large piece of carbon built up and fell under my trigger group toward the end of the second night. I thought it was a primer, but when I opened the gun up and shoot the lower, it was plainly a piece of carbon. So technically, the gun did comletely fail. I have seen this same thing happen one other time, in another Magpul class (actually the one from the last DVD). My friend Derek was running a gun with a can on it for about as many rounds. Same thing, crud kept building up until some of it found its way under the trigger group.

bigbore, of adcofirearms.com, posted photos of his AK-74 rifle after firing 2000 rounds of corrosive ammunition using a suppressor and leaving it sit for a week.

After leaving it sit for a week, the bolt rusted into place and it was no more than a club.

A problem with some of the now discontinued Ruger Police Carbine and Marlin Deer Camp, blowback autoloader pistol caliber carbines, was that their actions got very dirty. A pistol in the same caliber with a 4″ barrel would vent gas much faster than a 16.5″ barreled carbine.

Ruger PC4 (Police Carbine .40 S&W).

There is no substitute for cleaning your rifle. If you are considering a suppressor this is something to take into account. Bolt/lever/single shot action rifle with suppressors will not have this problem. The gas will be vented before the action is manually cycled. I personally have not had any problems with .22 semi-autos rifles with suppressors, nor have I heard of anyone having problems.

Many thanks to Jay for emailing me the link to the photos.

“PooFire” was using his car as a barrier to practice shooting over (NOT a good idea) with his AR-15 but forgot his revolver was placed on the car roof. His S&W Model 442 Airweight took a 5.56mm bullet to the chamber.

Click to expand the images.

He knows what he did was idiotic, and as someone at AR15.com said, he has balls of steel posting it on the internet. So don’t mock him for it!

Thanks to Jay for the link.

Colin Stolzer, who owns Stolzer & Son’s Gunsmithing, emailed me photos of a custom 8 Bore Boxlock muzzleloader he was recently build for a client. It is a true work of art.

Click to expand the photos (the small thumbnails do not do it justice):

8 Bore (.835″) 1:104 twist Octagon to wedding band transition then straight tapered round to the muzzle.
Jeff Tanner Ball Mould (.805″).

The finished rifle weighs right at 11 pounds.

The Action is a Pete Allan Boxlock Casting, it is representative of the 1860’s Edwin Wesson Boxlocks. The metal finish is rust blued.

The Ramrod is Rosewood w/ a steel button on one end and a threaded steel tip on the other for accessories.

It has a full length underrib to add a little weight.

The Stock is rock maple, stained with a dark walnut stain and then oil finished and then waxed to a sheen.

The forearms has an ebony tip, all the pipes, underrib, front sight and sight base were custom made in my shop.

The action was also reshaped, and the original triggerguard was removed and replace with the more elegant and classic one in the finished pictures.

The butt plate is a wide English style plate. The checkering is flattop.

I asked Colin to email me some photos to give a sense of scale to large bore size.

8 bore balls. These would weight 875 grains is they were pure lead.

A nickel on the barrel.

Many thanks to Colin for emailing me this photos. If you are wanting a custom muzzleloader designed I am sure Colin could make you one. His contact info is on his website.

James found this photos of a pair of homemade pistols that appear to be chambered in .303 British! Apparently they, along with the cartridges, were confiscated from some students. Can you imagine the blast of burning power that must shoot out of these!

I found the following photos of a Martini-Henry .303 1870 rifle which has been converted into a pistol. It was captured by Marines in Afghanistan.

The pistol has an original Martini-Henry barrel which was cut down to 2.5″ and sights carved out of it. Other than the addition of the pistol grip and sling swivels, the pistol is made entirely from original parts.

These pistols, converted from rifles in the Khyber Pass, are said to be common in that part of the world. It is designed to for one purpose: to kill an enemy in order to take his weapons … that is of course if the death-trap of a gun does not kill the operator first!

More information about this pistol is at gunboards.com.

These photos, posted on AR-15.com by m1ajunkie, compare AR-15 parts to the equivalent SCAR parts. They are very interesting photos.

Bolt Carriers

Bolt Faces

SCAR carrier disassembled.

Many more photos here.
Many thanks to Jay for emailing me the link.