Today for the monthly BackUp Gun Match I am using a Spanish JoLoAr pistol in .380 ACP. It's an interesting piece designed with a lever on the side that allows it to be cocked one-handed. It has no trigger guard or safety, a single-action-only firing mechanism, and a tip-up barrel. They were made ...

In August 2023, during a parade in Kyiv, Ukrainian Border Guards were seen equipped with Spanish CETME-L rifles for the first, and so far only, time.

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https://armourersbench.com/

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Vic's back! In this episode he takes a look at a very rare Spanish light machine gun, the CETME AMELI. Lucky enough to have access to an extremely rare factory cutaway model of the AMELI Vic examines how the gun works, and takes us through some of its features and discusses its history.

For Vic...

In this video we compare two of the last roller-delayed production rifles: the Spanish CETME Modelo L and the Heckler & Koch G41. These rifles represent the last evolutions of two strands of the roller-delayed development tree - the Spanish and the German.

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The AMELI (which is a contraction of "ametralladora ligera", or light machine gun) was introduced by CETME in 1981, and adopted by the Spanish military as the MG82. It was a counterpart LMG to the new CETME-L 5.56mm rifles, and is a mechanically fascinating design.

The AMELI is a roller-delayed ...

As with the shells, 1915 saw another shortage for Britain's burgeoning army: revolvers. To plug this gap, procurement went in search for off the shelf alternatives, as close to the Army's existing inventory of Webleys. Two solutions were sort from the USA, as was this one from the Basque region o...

The Astra Model F was the final evolution of the Astra 900, a C96 Mauser lookalike. The Model F used detachable magazines and was select-fire, with a very effective rate reducing mechanism in the grip. It was adopted by the Guardia Civil in 1934, and 1,126 of the guns were produced in 1935.

O...

This revolver looks like it is a Smith & Wesson DA from the early 20th century, right down to the S&W grips. However, it is actually a Spanish Eibar-made copy, and you can tell when you take a close look at the patent markings atop the barrel. Instead of "Smith & Wesson, Springfield, Mass, USA", ...

The FR-8 is a Spanish rifle manufactured in the 1950s as part of Spain's adoption of the CETME semiautomatic rifles. Spain was not only moving to their first semiauto rifle, but also changing from 8mm Mauser to the new 7.62mm NATO. It was not possible to immediately equip everybody with the new r...

The Model 1920 was Star's first locked-breech pistol, basically a combination of features from the Colt 1911 and their traditional Eiber blowback .32 pistols. It was tested by the Spanish Army in 1920, with inconclusive results. The Guardia Civil, however, found it to be suitable and adopted it a...

Alkartasuna SA was a company formed in 1914 by a handful of disgruntled Astra (well, Astra was still called Esperanza y Unceta at that time) employees. This was a difficult time for the Eibar gun industry - demand was low, their reputation for quality was not good (the lack of a central proof hou...

The Eibar region of Spain is known as the center of a lot of pistol production from WWI through the Spanish Civil War, typically pistols called Ruby clones. Well, the various small gunmakers there were looking to copy more than just the Ruby. They duplicated a number of American and European revo...

Spain was historically a major center of patent infringement in firearms manufacture because its patent law left open a big loophole: patents were only enforceable if the patent holder actually manufactured their guns in Spain. The major European and American firearms manufacturers were not inter...

The JoLoAr pistol was a combination of a poor-selling and unremarkable Spanish blowback semiauto pistol called the Sharpshooter and an idea by a man named Jose Lopez Arnaiz (whose name is the source of the pistol’s name). Arnaiz conceived the idea of mounting a lever (palanca in Spanish) onto a p...

The Spanish military, like many others, was quite interested in developing a new semiautomatic or selective fire combat rifle after World War II. Franco's political ties to Germany (combined with Spanish neutrality in the war) gave them unusually good access to German arms designs, and the Spanis...

Developed by CETME in the 1960s, the C2 (aka CB64) submachine gun was clearly inspired by the Sterling, but includes several clever mechanical safeties. The charging handle is non-reciprocating and integrates a bolt lock which it automatically deactivated when the charging handle is used. This al...

The Modelo A was the first series production version of the CETME rifle, following a series of successful trials in Spain. It was developed by a team of ex-Mauser engineers led by Ludwig Vorgrimmler, and is part of the link between the late-WW2 StG45(M) and the H&K G3 rifles.

The CETME A was ...

Manufactured from 1899 until 1905, the Charola y Anitua pistols (later becoming just the Charola pistols) were basically scaled down C96 Mauser designs chambered for the 5mm Clement and 7mm Charola cartridges. They were briefly tested by the Spanish military, but not adopted and ultimately only s...

Juan Esperanza was one of the two partners who formed the Astra company (with Pedro Unceta). When the two had a falling-out in 1925 and parted ways, Esperanza formed his own company and went on something of a patenting binge. He made an unsuccessful attempt at designing a new machine gun for the ...

The Mauser 98 may have been the best bolt action design of all time, but it did not spring forth from Paul Mauser’s head fully formed. The Mauser took nearly 10 years of development and iteration to reach its full potential, and the 1892 pattern Spanish Mauser we are looking at today is one of th...

Star produced 1911-style pistols in a wide variety of calibers and configurations for more than 50 years, including several models with shoulder stocks. Two of the later such models were the MMS and MB. These were standard 5 inch barreled pistols shipped with wooden combination holster stocks and...

The Z45 was a submachine gun designed during World War Two by the Start firm in Eibar, Spain for export sale to Germany as well as domestic Spanish use. It was heavily based on the MP40, including the same stock, telescoping mainspring guide/cover, and disassembly method as the MP40. To this, how...

Llama was never the most prestigious of the three major Spanish pistol makers, and in the 1980s they decided to have a try at an upscale new pistol. The design was done by an American, Gary Wilhelm, who worked with the Stoeger company (which was Llama’s US importer). The gun was offered in both ....

Spain adopted the CETME Modelo B rifle for service in 1958. These early rifles were chambered for the reduced-pressure 7.62mm CETME cartridge, and had a few other unique features. Some of these were made with a metal handguard with a folding bipod, and some were also made with a top-folding stock...