why not more stripper-clip fed semi-autos?

[roscoe]

I have family in CA and was thinking about the potential disembowelment my firearm collection would endure should I move there (god forbid). Along those lines, I was looking at the FAB 10 website and thinking how much of a pain in the rear loading looks like. When I compare loading that to loading my trusty SKS, it got me wondering why top-loading is not a better option in states that have AW restrictions (possibly MD also, where the other half of my family lives).

It seems to me that a top-loading semi-auto in .223 with a fixed magazine would be a pretty sweet deal, if you have to go that route. When I look over my Saiga, it looks like changing the mechanics of an AK to offset the gas tube/rod and opening up the receiver a bit would be all that was necessary. I don't know as much about ARs, but that seems like a much better way to go should you ever have the inclination to load the firearm quickly.

Or is this just one of those things that is just too absurd to contemplate?

 

[Gabe]

Correct me if I'm wrong but as far as the AK is concerned this cannot be done. The AK use a long stroke piston in a piston over barrel layout and you can't load from the top.

This is why early automatic rifles all used short stroke pistons. 'Cause everyone wanted to use stripper clips. The Garand was an exception, made possible by a really strange looking piston under barrel layout where the connecting rod actually goes around the reciever.

One possibility is Ohio Ordinance's copy of the Czech Vz58. The Czechs designed it to be loaded with stripper clips to begin with.

 

[Andrew Wyatt]

I've always wanted to see a mini-14 style gun with a johnson rotary magazine. that would be the heat.

 

[MrMurphy]

The Vz58 is designed to use the standard detachable mag. But of course, like the M14 it was designed to be able to top off the mag through stripper clips, because the Czechs just had to be different from the Russians.

 

[DMK]

You could do it easily with a FAL. Tapco sells a nice stripper guide top cover and there are also some T-48 style ones out there. Permanently attach a 20 round mag(or 10 round mag if you had to) to the magwell, get a letter from the ATF or state DOJ and you are ready to go. The caveat being that the 7.62x51 clips are only 5 rounds.

 

[Kalos]

I think it's perhaps a sign of this dementia cruffleritis that I'm beginning to think stripper clips are and were a better way of approaching loading than detachable mags--quick, cheap to manufacture and transport, basically disposable. The great advantage of magazines seems to be capacity--a thirty round stripper clip would be a bit unwieldy. Anyway, I'd love to see more clip-fed rifles/handguns...

 

[dave3006]

You are not the only one. I like the Garand enbloc clips better than any box magazine. I find them faster to reload and I do not have to manage partially empty mags. You can store your ammo loaded forever. You can carry more ammo on clips than in magazines for a given weight and space. They are inexpensive.

The only advantage is capacity. Unless your rifle is full auto, I think capacity is overated.

 

[artherd]

Meh, suit yourself. Stripper clips are a PITA.

Try this (SAFELY!) turn off all the lights in your house. Find your rifle. Start shaking like a banshee, and wetting your pants (someone is shooting at you!)

Now try to re-load it.

Oh yeah, there's a light coat of rust on the steel clip guide.

The people who made the laws which only allow the FAB-10 want us DEAD, not just inconvienenced.

 

[blfuller]

DSArms already has California versions of their FAL available for sale. These are fixed magazine with a stripper clip guide built into the action cover ala T-48/C1A1.

 

[Gewehr98]

This may still be legal out there...

(Dunno about the attached side-folding bayonet, though) Czech VZ-52, 10-round detachable mag, stripper clip reloadable, and they never made mags greater than 10 rounds for them. But you'd want one in 7.62x39, because the more common 7.62x45 version is hard to keep fed, no more surplus ammo is being imported.

 

[No4Mk1*]

The SKS and M1 Garand are great California rifles. You are pretty well armed with either, maybe not quite as well as with 20-30 round detachable magazines, but close. I find clips hard to use in the M1A- it takes me 20 seconds to load a 20rd mag from 4 clips. I can load a 20 round mag in 30 seconds from loose ammo. SKS, M1, and Mauser clips are fast, especially the Mauser clips! I wonder how fast the FAL loads from clips.

 

[Chuck Jennings]

This may still be legal out there...

Yep. CA legal. Bayonets are OK on rifles in CA.

That's why we have all those drive by bayonettings!

 

[fjolnirsson]

Roscoe,

Sir, if you value your sanity, stay the Hel out of CA. It's awful here.

 

[Jim K]

"Try this (SAFELY!) turn off all the lights in your house. Find your rifle. Start shaking like a banshee, and wetting your pants (someone is shooting at you!)

Now try to re-load it."

Wow, sounds like the movies! A shootout, in your house, in which the bad guys stick around to engage in a firefight and you have to reload!

Still sounds like the movies. Buy a pump shotgun.

Jim