During the ARMY 2019 arms exhibition, Russian TsNII TochMash showed a lot of different firearms. Besides the new guns such as the Udav pistol, they also brought several interesting samples of experimental firearms developed in 1960s-1980s. Let’s take a brief look at each of these guns.

AO-22M

This general purpose machine gun was developed by Gryazev and Lyubimov. It is chambered in 7.62x54mmR. The AO-22M weighs 6.18 kilograms (13 lbs 10 oz) which is about 1.3 kilograms or 3 lbs lighter than the PKM. This machine gun fires from an open bolt and ejects the spent cases forward. It is a gas operated firearm and has a quick change barrel.

AO-34

This bullpup rifle was designed in 1964 by G. P. Petropavlov. It is chambered in 5.45x39mm. The rifle has a recoiling barrel and a system of spring buffers that were supposed to mitigate the felt recoil and make the gun more controllable. The empty weight of this rifle is 2.5 kilograms (5 lbs 8 oz). The rate of fire is 600 rpm.

AO-36

This rifle was designed in 1965 by Sergei Simonov and Pyotr Tkachev. It is a double-barreled firearm designed to simultaneously fire two rounds. It has two barrels but one gas piston, one bolt carrier, and one bolt. The lockup of the action is accomplished by a tilting bolt. The gun is fed from one large magazine that has separate two-stack compartments inside it. AO-36 was chambered in an experimental 5.6mm cartridge (13МЖВ) which was based on the 7.62x39mm case.

AO-38M

Developed in 1968 by Yakushev and Tkachev, this is one of the early balanced action firearms. A balancing part is located over the barrel. It is linked to the bolt carrier and moves forward as the BCG starts moving rearward thus balancing the motion of reciprocating parts. The experiments with this kind of mechanism resulted in the development of a number of balanced action firearms including the AEK-971 and AEK-973 which were adopted by the Russian military in 2018.

AO-40

The AO-40 rifle was designed by Pyotr Tkachev. It was one of the first Soviet firearms to use the delayed recoil impulse system where the actual firearm recoils inside an outer shell. On the burst mode, the gun manages to fire three rounds while it recoils back. The shooter feels the combined recoil of the three rounds only after the third round of the burst is fired and the gun has reached its rearmost position in the outer shell. The main drawback of this particular gun was that the magazine was recoiling with the gun. The delayed recoil impulse was later used in many other experimental firearms and ultimately adopted in the AN-94 Abakan.

Which one of these concepts do you think was not explored thoroughly enough or can be redone with better results using modern technologies? Share your thoughts in the comments section.

Images from www.rostec.ru , www.cniitm.ru , www.mpopenker.livejournal.com