M1 Garand vs. M1 Carbine

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BGlaze250

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With all the chatter about the CMP's new batch of M1 Carbines in stock, it's got me wondering what the difference between the two rifles is. I assume that the carbine's got a shorter barrel/stock, does that effect the accuracy of the gun, overall? Is the M1 Garand much more accurate? Other than that, how do they compare?
 
They are two completely different weapons, similar only in their method of operation and the fact that they were both used by the Americans in WWII. The M1 Garand is a general battle rifle for the infantry firing full power cartridges (.30-06) and capable of engaging enemies effectively at 600 or more yards. The M1 carbine is a lightweight, compact rifle firing what amounts to a long pistol cartridge (the .30 carbine). The M1 carbine was intended as a personal defense weapon for people who weren't on the front lines but needed a weapon to protect themselves, though it was also used by paratroopers and some other special units who preferred its compactness and light weight. It's useful range is more like 200 yards at most. The M1 carbine was really intended as an alternative sidearm instead of the 1911A1 pistol, because the carbine would have slightly greater range and be easier for rear echelon troops (who rarely fire their weapons) to shoot accurately.
 
The carbine was developed as a substitute pistol, for REMF’s who could not shoot a .45. It turned out to be so light and handy that everyone who could get their hands on the thing wanted one. The Garand weighs a lot more. However it was found that a low powered pistol cartridge had limited stopping power, and I heard of failures to penetrate ice covered North Koreans in Artic Conditions. The Garand never had that problem, the 30-06 has millions of satisfied users. One shot will pretty punch the clock of any Chi-Com.

Accuracy, both of those rifles in military configuration will hit a pie pan at 100 yards. Of the two, the Garand is slightly more accurate. Accuracy is something shill gunwriters can write about and compare, but in a war, it is more important to put firepower down on that spot, as soon as possible and as much as possible. Bad guys hide you see. So it takes a number of rounds to find them. The more, the merrier.

One bud of mine, who was going to be dropped with the 101 Airborne over Cuba, traded his M1 Carbine for a Garand just before load up. He said “the carbine was a fine weapon to play solider with” but since his life depended on it, he took a Garand.
 
So, in essence, what you guys are saying is that I need to buy both guns? sounds good to me.

On the M1 Carbine, how available is the .30 cartridge? I've personally never heard of it. :(
 
It's very available

kind of expensive, but it's all getting that way. My carbine doesn't handle factory loads very well so every time I see them I pick up a bandolier of surplus ball ammo. Usually about $30 for 100.

I love my carbine and will never give it up. I sold my Garand. I know that is sacrilege, but it just never inspired me.
 
Winchester USA (WWB) 110gr. 50 rounds for $20 from Midway USA
American Ammunition 110gr. 50 rounds for $12 from Midways USA

I believe that they even sell it at Wal-mart...
 
On the M1 Carbine, how available is the .30 cartridge? I've personally never heard of it

There once was a time when you could buy a 50rnd box of .30carbine at every general store, hardware store or mom-and-pop shop in the country for only a few bucks. Unfortunately, those days are long over.
 
Well, then, I'm looking forward to a M1 Carbine in my future. Just gotta start saving up. Anyone have a ball park on the possible cost?
 
There once was a time when you could buy a 50rnd box of .30carbine at every general store or mom-and-pop shop in the country for only a few bucks. Unfortunately, those days are long over.

Yah, and you could buy the M1 carbine for $20.
 
Very Different

The cartridge difference is night and day.

The M1 Garand (.30-06) cartridge is unarguably a RIFLE cartridge.

It's large, it's heavy, it's undeniably manly.

The M1 Carbine (.30 carbine) cartridge is much shorter, is round-nosed, and is often confused with pistol cartridges. Gun writers even CALL it a "pistol" cartridge -- even though, if you fire it from a pistol, you'll quickly understand that it was designed for a (short) rifle. Fired from a 10-inch revolver, it produces a daylight-visible muzzle flash (some call it a fireball) and so much noise that only an auditory masochist would fire it without protection.

The Garand has serious power and range. A 600-yard shot with a Garand is only a matter of skill. The rifle has no problem with it.

The Carbine has better "firepower" meaning "practical rate of fire" which equates to the number of rounds you can put downrange in a given period of time. There's no 30-round magazine for the Garand, but there is for the Carbine.

For up close "social" work, the Carbine would be preferred. For long distance work and large game, the Garand would be preferred. You'll never take an elk with the Carbine, but the Garand has taken many.

The Carbine weighs about 6 lbs, while the Garand is closer to 10.

The .30-06 cartridge is available in many different loadings, and is a popular reloading cartridge, while the .30 Carbine has maybe 3 loadings and is a finicky cartridge to reload (so I'm told).

The Carbine is just plain fun. You can shoot it all day and not get sore. The Garand . . . has a little more umph. And the .30-06 ammo costs more than .30 Carbine.

I like the Carbine. I own one. It shoots minute-of-milkjug at 100 yards. I wouldn't put it up against kevlar, but for home defense . . . well, the round is as hot as a .357, so I'm okay with that.

I don't own the Garand, and have never fired one. All my data is from friends who have them and old codgers who carried them in the war. Like my dad. (He did say, however, that he preferred the Johnson.)

Lots of shooting, fun at the range, small to medium varmints? CARBINE.

Hunting, long range shooting, fearsome sidekick, real power? GARAND.
 
I love the carbine so does the wife. It's great for home defense and will push a 110gr JHP at 2000fps. It does stop. anybody who thinks it dosn't needs to talk to a wwII vet or study it's ballistics. It was intended for officers to replace the 45 and for tanks and truck drivers that needed a light compact weapon.

After reading the wilkapedia article I probably agree with it's assessment in principal.

Use of the speer 110gr JHP probably brings the M1 Carbine up to the level of the 357 magnum 125gr JHP which is a well documented stopper.

Arfin. I have only found one bullet for it the speer 110gr JHP and the FMJ. I tend to use the JHP and load it with 296 which is a magnum power I use for my 357 and 44 magnum. I push the load at 2000fps as chronographed. I never had any problems with the loading except resizing the cases with my carbide die which was a bear until I read here to lube them and they are as now easy as 45 to resize.


I own both the M1 garand and M1A. I find the garand a pussycat compared to the M1A. I don't know why it just is for me.
 
Ammo Availability

I don't buy .30-06 so I'll leave that cartridge to the other guys.

I do buy the .30 Carbine and I've been able to find it darn near everywhere.

Do a web search, and you'll see that several manufacturers are loading that cartridge.

The M1 Carbine is now being produced by Auto Ordnance (owned by Kahr), the same people who do the Thompson subs, so there are new ones (warranty and all) being put into circulation. This encourages ammo makers to keep making the stuff.

The original war production was more than 6 million, so there are still quite a few of them around.

Please don't buy one, so there will be more for me.
 
FYI, there is nothing tricky about reloading the .30 carbine. It's quite simple, in fact, just like loading pistol cartridges. The only somewhat difficult thing about it is the rather paltry projectile selection.

As molonlabe pointed out, the .30 carbine has an undeserved reputation for being anemic. You're not going to take elk with it, but it is more than enough as a man stopper at reasonable (<150 yards) ranges. The various reports of it failing to penetrate the clothing of North Koreans have all been thoroughly discredited. What's much more likely is that the people making those claims simply missed, or in fact hit the clothing but missed the little man buried somewhere inside it. There isn't a winter coat on the planet that will stop a 100 grain (or thereabouts) .30 caliber slug traveling at near 2000 fps.
 
IMHO if you don't have a major caliber battle rifle, get the Garand first. Carbines are fun, cheaper to acquire and feed, but if you need to stop a truck or shoot through cover the Garand is what you want. If it is too heavy, money spent at the gym is a better investment than a carbine.
 
I'm hearing there was problems with the Winchester Manufacture of the M1 Carbine!
How many Manufacturers of the Carbine were there? Can you name them? What one rated the Best overall?
 
M1 Carbine Penetration

I have tested .30 Carbine ball ammo for penetration at 100 yards. We used bowling pins. Not only wouldn't our carbines (3 different specimens) knock them over, the bullets were stuck on the vinyl skin. My father-in-law is a D-day veteran and landed on Utah beach. He was a combat engineer and was issued a carbine. He has told me that when his unit went out in front of the infantry to build a bridge or whatever that he took a Garand, because he KNEW it had the power to do the job at great distance.

As far as manufactures, there were 10 during WWII.
Here's a link about the M1 Carbine........Click Here
M1Carb.gif
 
Zullo74 said:
I have tested .30 Carbine ball ammo for penetration at 100 yards. We used bowling pins. Not only wouldn't our carbines (3 different specimens) knock them over, the bullets were stuck on the vinyl skin.
:confused: Where did you get that ammo? Toys 'R Us? Standard military .30 carbine ammo launches a 110 grain bullet at 1,990 fps. At 100 yards, it's still doing over 1,500 fps and packs more than 600 lb-ft of energy. That's still more energy than a .357 magnum packs at the muzzle (about 580 ft-pds for a 125 gr JHP), and almost double the muzzle energy of a 230 grain .45ACP.

The idea that the .30 carbine is too weak to be effective is a myth that just won't die.
 
I love the carbine so does the wife. It's great for home defense and will push a 110gr JHP at 2000fps. It does stop. anybody who thinks it dosn't needs to talk to a wwII vet or study it's ballistics. It was intended for officers to replace the 45 and for tanks and truck drivers that needed a light compact weapon.

Thats the reason a number of police forces aquired them ranging from Israel, South Vietnam to the Philpphines. Sure I wouldn't want to take shots over a 100 yards with them but it be hard for me to justify firing at that range anyway and its not a big game rifle. Its rather a nice little piece, especially if you throw on the M1a1 Carbine folding buttstock and pistol grip.

M1 Garand is a much bigger beast and a nice rifle. I just don't care for its loading method and the resulting Garand thumb if you are too slow. Even then its got a fine power level to it and capable of taking down big game at a fair distance. The drawback being its long and heavy.
 
The ammo used was brand new PMC ball. Here's a link to the ammo used.....


The REAL world is sometimes different than the paper world. I was shooting and you weren't there!

M1Carb.gif
 
Standard military .30 carbine ammo launches a 110 grain bullet at 1,990 fps. At 100 yards, it's still doing over 1,500 fps and packs more than 600 lb-ft of energy.

Right, but it won't penetrate a bowling pin very far. Neither will a .357. (What wood are those things made of?) As far as "knocking them over", that has to do with momentum, not energy. The Garand doesn't "knock things over" very well either (but it will go through them!)
 
telomerase said:
The Garand doesn't "knock things over" very well either (but it will go through them!)
True, but if a round packing a lot of energy doesn't go "through" the target, then it MUST have deposited all of its energy into the target. It's simple physics. Therefore, any round that is carrying 600 ft-lbs of energy and fails to penetrate a target at all must transfer all 600 ft-lbs to the target. That is more than enough energy to knock a bowling pin over!

There is simply no possible way that a standard .30 carbine round traveling at 1500+ fps on impact would both fail to penetrate AND fail to knock over a bowling pin. The laws of physics don't permit it. That energy has to go somewhere. So if his claims of what he observed are true, then he had some REALLY bad ammunition, or those were 2,000 pound kevlar-coated bowling pins.

The bottom line is that anyone can say anything they want. I can claim that I shot a loaf of bread with a 750 gr AMAX from my AR-50 at 50 yards and the bullet failed to penetrate. I don't expect anyone to believe it without some evidence.

A good place to find actual documented evidence of the performance of particular ammunition and firearms is the excellent website Box 'o Trust -- www.theboxoftruth.com . They've tested .30 carbine ammo on several occasions, for penetration of walls and penetration in water. The .30 carbine has done, in their words, "surprisingly well."
 
"The bottom line is that anyone can say anything they want. I can claim that I shot a loaf of bread with a 750 gr AMAX from my AR-50 at 50 yards and the bullet failed to penetrate. I don't expect anyone to believe it without some evidence."

I was there. I was one of three shooters. I picked the slightly smashed bullets off of the still standing bowling pin with my fingernail. If you do not want to believe it, so be it. I saw it. I like my M1 carbine. Why would I berate it if it didn't happen. BTW, bowling pins are made with maple. :mad:
 
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