In the early 1970s, Poland wanted to replace their 7.62x39mm Kalashnikov rifles. The Soviet Union was developing the 5.45mm AK-74, but the Poles wanted to make a more ambitious advance in small arms systems. They launched Project Lantan (Polish small arms programs were code named after minerals a...

With Poland's entry into NATO in the 1990s, a new service rifles was needed, chambered for the 5.56mm NATO cartridge. Initial development work had been done in 1990/91 to adapt the wz.88 Tantal to 5.56mm, and this project was dusted off in 1995 to create the Beryl. Essentially a Tantal in 5.56mm,...

Yesterday we took a look at the history and the design of the Polish wz.88 Tantal, and today we are taking it out to the range. Let's see how that unique Polish 3-round-burst works!

As part of the Warsaw Pact, Poland anticipated adopting the AK-74 after it was developed by the Soviet Union. However, the eventual Soviet terms for license fees and export restrictions were too severe for Polish taste. Instead, Poland opted to develop its own new rifle to use the 5.45x39mm cartr...

Having wrapped up our series on the major development of the Lee Enfield rifle in British service, I figured it would be a nice addendum to talk about the bayonets developed for the No4 rifle. These went through a substantial evolution, and are an interesting field for collectors all by themselve...

The final standard pattern of the venerable Lee Enfield as a standard-issue service rifle was the No4 MkII, introduced after the end of World War Two. The new pattern was adopted to resolve problems that had come about because of wartime simplifications to the rifle. Specifically, the use of kiln...

This is a great example of an interwar single-shot fancy target pistol. It is chambered for basic .22 rimfire, and uses a Martini system of dropping breechblock to operate.

The Spitfire is a firearm with an interesting importance in legal history. Originally designed and marketed as an open-bolt semiautomatic-only carbine, it was determined to be a machine gun under the law in 1968, and all examples were required to be registered or destroyed. The reason was not its...

Thanks to the 1 Shepherd cadre for making Midnight Brutality possible! And thanks to our excellent match sponsors:

Tactical Night Vision Company (TNVC)
B.E. Meyers Advanced Photonics
Live Q or Die
Varusteleka

Midnight Brutality was a 6-stage all-nighttime match held at the Echo Valley Tr...

On my recent trip to Finland for Finnish Brutality, I spent a few days first in Iceland, with my friend Dr. Jackson Crawford. Some Icelandic gun videos are coming, but we also took a moment to try out one uniquely Icelandic foods, most notably hákarl (pronounced "how-cath"). This is arctic shark ...

I have done some videos previously with Tom Whiteman from Legacy Collectibles - mostly ones about his area of specialty; German WW2 handguns. Well, he has now published a reference book compiling more than 20 years of research on SS-contract Walther PP and PPK pistols. Thanks to records captured ...

Since I happen to have simultaneous access to both a military-pattern F1 FAMAS and also a civilian semiautomatic MAS-223, I figured it would be nice to compare them side by side and see how they differ. A number of changes were made for the civilian semiauto rifles, including:

- Rifle grenade...

When we think of "last-ditch" rifles, we normally think of 1945 and the very end of World War Two. For the British, however, the lowest ebb of the war was in 1941 and 42, and it is during that period that the Lee Enfield was at is crudest. British ordnance instituted a number of simplifications t...

The Valmet company in Finland made excellent AK-type rifles for the Finnish Defense Forces, but also offered a variety of designs on the international commercial market. The Valmet was a very expensive rifle for a AK, however, and only a few significant commercial sales were made. One of these wa...

Yesterday we took a look at the inner workings of the VHS-2, and today we are going to put some rounds through it. I am trying out both a short-barreled VHS-K2 that was limited to 2-round burst (for French police trials) and a full-length VHS-F2 from French military trials.

Overall, I quite l...

Accuracy International's L96A1 was a stunning success in British military trials, and became the basis for one of the most respected line of precision rifles in the world. However, it very nearly was abandoned almost as soon as the first rifles were delivered to the British military in 1986. Prod...

HS Produkt of Croatia makes an interesting modern bullpup rifle, the VHS. The rifle has gone through several major design iterations in the past two decades or so, and the most recent version (the VHS-2) was part of the competition to replace the FAMAS in French military service. It ultimately pl...

0:00:00 - Intro
0:02:05 - Why no Madsen LMGs in WW1?
0:06:26 - MG34 use post-WW2, and Norwegian rechambering of the MG34
0:10:40 - Post-WW2 use of the MG42, and comparison to the MG5
0:13:34 - Difference between prototyping and troop trials
0:17:45 - Modern handgun to use 7.65mm French Long...

The stalwart No1 MkIII "Smelly" served the United Kingdom well during the First World War, but by the 1920s it was growing obsolescent. The war had revealed a number of shortcomings of the design, and in the interwar years the British developed a replacement. The main issues that the new rifle wo...

Thanks to Thomas for sending me a couple of these clips to try out!

Huzzah! I finally have a chance to take a proper full-auto FAMAS F1 out to the range. My conclusions? It's very nice, just like the semiauto civilian model. It has a limited 3-round-burst option for those who need it, but also unrestricted automatic for those with enough practice to use it. The g...

Today we are looking at a Chinese Type 56 RPD, but we will be focusing on the basic design and why it was adopted in the Soviet Union rather than the details of its use in China. The RPD was the result of research into reduced-power cartridges to replace the 7.62x54R for infantry use. While that ...

Thanks to Legacy Collectibles, today we have a unique Colt prototype pistol to look at today - a double-action variation of the 1911. Judging by the grips and markings, this was made in the late 1950s - but I have been unable to find any documented record giving details. The double action capabil...

John Moses Browning is, without argument, the greatest firearms designer in history. While we have had many brilliant designers who had their names forever connected to guns (Maxim, Luger, Kalashnikov...), Browning invented whole categories of firearms. Gorenstein's new book "The Guns of John Mos...