The Firearm Blog

The Kriegsmarine apparently issued mini-RPG rounds for their double-barreled flare gun. Crazy.

Designed to be as inexpensive as possible, assembled from mostly stamped sheet-metal parts, the Liberator was a single shot pistol chambered for the .45 ACP cartridge the US military was using for standard handguns and submachine guns. It was so cheap that each one set the US government back only $2.40 in 1942 money. A million were made in less than three months during the darkest days of WWII, to be airdropped to Resistance fighters in enemy occupied territory.

Read about it at Hell in a Handbasket.

The T26, otherwise known as the “Tanker” Garand, was an experiential 18″ barreled carbine version of the M1 Garand. It was designed late in WWII for use in the Pacific jungles. Tom emailed me photos of his new T26-style M1.

Tanker (top) fitted with Smith Enterprises muzzle brake.

Note barrel length and the upper handguard difference

Note the odd bend in the T26 short op-rod and the major
difference in length of the follower arm/spring guide.

Tom had this to say about his new Garand:

I did get the chance to shoot the shorty a week or so ago before the rain started up. It functions flawlessly, despite the somewhat seedy reputation of gunsmith custom T26 Garands like this one. Many of the first shorty rifles to hit the market many years ago were rewelded receivers, which are much weaker and downright dangerous in many cases. On many of these reweld guns (this is true of full sized Garands and T26 style ones both) the op-rod may dismount while firing, which as you can imagine causes quite a few problems.

That muzzle break is a real shoulder-saver, and surprisingly the shorty Garand has considerably less recoil than the FAL I recently built. I don’t have a huge range, but from about a hundred yards I was on the paper on the first shot (after a full strip and thorough cleaning) and managed to tune my way to a fairly respectable group around three inches with Lake City ammo. It may not be a match gun, but it’s definitely more accurate than I was expecting. Really a blast to shoot and more than acceptable accuracy in my opinion!

The T26 is a very interesting rifle. In a sense it is much more modern than the full size M1. As I mentioned yesterday in the post about the new Italian service rifle which even in the designated marksmen version has a 16″ barrel, the modern trend is to compromise maximum ballistic performance with maneuverability.

A big thanks to Tom for emailing me the photos and information. More can be read about the T26 at the Wikipedia M1 Garand page.

Armed Canadian describes the bolt action French MAS36 rifle as classic “weapon of war”. It features no safety what-so-ever (including no mosin-nagant type “safeties”) and an integral bayonet that is stored under the barrel.

Despite its classic and attractive stock, the MAS36 is a weapon meant to shed blood and it shows in its design. One non-visible aspect of this is the fact the MAS36 has no safety whatsoever. Childproof this rifle is not. The moment you chamber a round, the rifle is ready to shoot. MAS36s were often carried on patrol with no round in the chamber and the soldier cycling the bolt to load a round the moment combat occurred.

Read the very interesting homage to the “weapon of war” here

Google is hosting a huge archive of millions of Life magazine images since 1750. I thought I would see what interesting gun photos I could find.

Winchester 1890 pump action rifle. © Time Inc.

Actress Donna Drake taking aim with a rifle on the balcony of her home, dressed in a two-piece swimsuit, her dog lying on a cushion nearby.

Location: CA, US
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Peter Stackpole

Hollywood is just not the same anymore. Imagine the media frenzy if Scarlett Johansson was spotted with a rifle on her roof!

Full sized photo here.

Guy waterskiing with revolver. WTF?

Swiss farmer’s rifle with bandolier. Taken 1941. Presumably on hand in case of a German invasion.

Ordnance shop at Skoda Munitions factory. Too little too late. Less than a year later the factory would be producing arms for the German war machine.

What not to do with a gun.

The Fedorov Avtomat is possibly the first (see comments) an early firearm used in action that would classify as a true self-loading battle rifle.

Photo by Semen Fedoseev

It weights in at about 4.4kg compared to the 7.7-8.8kg of the BAR: much closer in weight to that of a battle rifle (rather than a light machine gun).

3200 were produced and it saw action during the Russian civil war and WWII.

More about it at Wikipedia and guns.ru.

Gary Sterne discovered the huge ‘Maisy Battery’ after he found a crinkled map which fell out of an old pair of US serviceman’s trousers at a military memorabilia fair in Stockport.

…

He discovered an extensive installation “the size of four football pitches“, including bunkers, offices, a sizeable field hospital – less its roof – and housing for 155mm cannon.

Very cool!

Part of the installation

More here

New Jovian Thunderbolt has written about his past love for the BAR (M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle)

The BAR was always my dream gun. Or it was. Back when I knew nothing and only looked at capabilities on paper, and then not looking TOO closely.

I have loved the look of the BAR. It just looks so solid.

A beautiful looking rifle.

I don’t really like the concept. My opinion is that the US forces should have adopted a true light machine gun such as the Bren.

Advantages of the Bren

• Standard magazine capacity was 30. BAR held 20.
• Top loading magazine. Better for prone firing.
• Swappable barrel

An ugly machine gun (Click to expand image)

On the other hand it would be foolish to say one is better than the other. The BAR served for 30 years through three major wars (WWI, WWII and the Korean war).

According to Wikipedia other countries modified the BAR to make it more like a LMG:

Poland (Browning wz.1928), Belgium (FN M1930) and Sweden (Kulsprutegevär m/21 and m/37) developed and issued BAR variants during the 1930s which had pistol grips and quick-change barrels.

From an A-Team episode

Read more at the New Jovian Thunderbolt’s excellent blog.

Do your kids play with Lego? Then treat them to life-like Lego guns!

A company called BrickArms sells Lego guns based on real guns. To image to the right is a WWII Sergeant armed with a M1A1 and his trusty 1911.

Other guns available are the MP5, M4, S&W 500 and more

even a briefcase uzi

Hat Tip: The Download Munkey