#Carcano

Gun collections can be a fun way to explore different types and aspects of firearms. The interwebs are full of images of people’s firearms collections lined up at their feet (why they insist on keeping their feet in the picture is beyond me), and they range from a random assortment to a more focused aspect of firearms. One type of gun collection is called “cloning,” in which a collector sets out to recreate a historical firearm as it would’ve been assembled in the given time era, which is typically seen with guns from any military conflict. Today, we bring you a more unique style of firearm cloning, in the form of Doug B’s clones of assassination guns.

Welcome back to another Featured Deals of the Week. Prices are high, a good deal is rare, and I’m out here trying to find whatever I can to get you guys to take out those wallets. So without any further ado, let’s get into it.

Steinel Ammunition is a manufacturer of premium vintage military ammunition as well as hunting and self-defense ammunition. Steinel has produced several vintage ammunition for both rifles and pistols including 8×22 Nambu, and 7.7×58 Arisaka. The Italian 6.5x52mm Carcano has been Steinel’s latest venture into the vintage military ammunition market, but what makes it different than modern offerings?

In March of 1963, a man named Lee Harvey Oswald purchased an M38 Carcano rifle and some quantity of ammunition from Klein’s Sporting Goods in Chicago. Oswald would later use this rifle and ammunition (or so the official narrative goes) to assassinate the then- President of the United States John F. Kennedy on November 22nd, 1963, in Dallas, Texas.

By this point, it’s impossible to hide my affinity for early selfloading rifles, and today we have another great video from Forgotten Weapons on an early Italian model that made it all the way to adoption. Though the program was cancelled before it could be produced, the Armaguerra Model 1939 rifle is still an important piece of Italian firearms history. You can learn more about it in Ian’s video embedded below:

The Italian Carcano family of rifles are generally regarded as poorly made, crude guns with few merits and poor accuracy. While they certainly aren’t as bad as is commonly believed, they are one of my least favorite bolt guns. The action is rough, the length of pull is awful, and they cannot fed spitzer bullets, however they do function and will send lead down range. Let’s shoot it!

These days, it’s easy to forget that once upon a time at the dawn of the smokeless powder era there was a huge variety of bolt-action repeating rifles being developed to re-arm the military powers of the world. While the Mauser 98 and its progeny eventually took the world by storm, in the early days of repeating bolt actions rifles like the Krag–Jørgensen, Mannlicher, and Belgian Mauser competed on the world stage for contracts.

The Carcano rifles were a series of Italian firearms introduced in 1891 chambered in 6.5 Carcano. These little rifles feed from 6 round en bloc clips and served the Kingdom of Italy until the end of World War II. By popular request (for whatever reason), we decided to wrangle one up and take it to the run and gun course.

These pictures and video were published on War History Online in two separate articles over the course of the past six months. The images and video are absolutely astounding. It seems that a duo of treasure hunters or artifact seekers, using commercial metal detectors have an excellent grasp of the battles on the World War Two Eastern front, and use that knowledge to discover all kinds of stuff still laying around. Some of it is still visible at ground level, while most of it is just barely covered with soil. You see one of them scrapping out an STG44, barely a couple inches below the surface, and in another clip a PPSH41 and an MG34 spare barrel. They certainly have the history knowledge down, but I hope they know a thing or two about high explosives, as they very foolishly/bravely are yanking out mortar ends and other ordnance out of the ground.

I have been around firearms all of my life, and working in the firearms industry for some time now.  In that time I have seen some interesting things.  I have seen scopes shimmed with toothpicks, 1911 grip that was covered in steel putty to make a “custom fit” grip.  But this time I can honestly say that this is the weirdest firearm modification that I have ever seen.  A reader sent this in, and really I can understand why.

The Carcano rifle often evokes only two reactions in people.  First, most remember the Kennedy Assassination.  This is usually followed by a murmuring of how Oswald could have done the deed with such a sloppy, inaccurate, unreliable, rifle that has just as much a chance as blowing up in your face as firing properly.