Underwood M1 Carbine
Underwood (Actually Underwood-Elliot-Fisher Company, who made typewriters FWIW) was the third largest manufacturer of M1 Carbine rifles, with Inland and Winchester in the #1 and #2 slots, respectively. Other manufacturers included National Postal Meter (who made soda fountains - just kidding), International Business Machines (who at the time also made typewriters; apparently there's a historic correlation between sitting at a keyboard and wanting to shoot something...), and Rock-Ola (who made jukeboxes).
The M1 Carbine, it can be argued, is the first "assault rifle" - folding stock, bayonet mount, detachable magazine... The only debate is over the .30 Carbine round. Most commercial loads for the .30 Carbine give it a punch somewhere between .38 Special and .357 Magnum, essentially a 7.62mm +P (the round is actually 7.62X33mm). Given that the venerable SKS and AK-47s fire a 7.62X39mm round, it's not terribly far off; especially when the StG44, considered by many to be the first true "assault rifle", fired a 7.92X33mm round.
The M1 Carbine is a lot of fun to shoot. Because of the round's power level, it has little recoil and is crazily accurate. There are pistols chambered in .30 carbine - the Ruger Blackhawk and Taurus Ragin' 30 for revolvers and the AMT Automag for semi-automatics. In pistol form, the fireball from the 30 carbine round is the stuff of legend, competing with the 7.62X25mm Tokarev for marshmellow-roastin' fireball...
And they're available from the CMP, too...
That is all.
10 comments:
MMmmmm I like that!
Hey, wanna trade Underwoods? :)
I heart my Inland carbine (yes, Mopar owns a GM gun, oh the irony!)
Oh, and for legendary fireballs, don't forgot the M44 Mosin!
You can't beat a Rock-Ola carbine for sheer cool, though. Almost makes me wonder if some home invader even deserves to be shot with such a cool weapon.
It's the gun I would sling up if I had to leave the house if the SHTF. No question, no other long gun comes even close.
A quibble.
The M1 didn't have a folding stock. That's the M1A1, and Inland made them all. Other makes got the stocks as the arsenals refinished. Yours has a [shudder] aftermarket stock...
I'm searching for an Underwood myself.
I think in design it's not too far from being an assault rifle (especially after the banana mags were developed), but the 955 ft/lbs at the muzzle with the military load compared to the 1,470 of 7.62x39mm and 1,408 of the 7.92 Kurtz makes it seem to fall short. The round nosed bullet doesn't help it much downrange either.
I think that the M2 definitely qualifies as an assault rifle, intermediate round, select fire, detachable box mag. Just because it's the weakest intermediate round ever issued doesn't mean it's not one.
I do think that it acquits itself well considering it was intended, in concept, to be a PDW (before that term was coined) where the StG.44 and AK were intended to be general issue to the infantry.
I had a friend, sadly departed, who carried one in Korea. His only negative comment about his carbine was that the Garand was definitely better at long range and could reach through heavier cover. I considered that as "praising with faint condemnation".
Matt Groom: I had often made that comment m'self---"gives new meaning to International Business Machine". Also, Rock-Ola gave new meaning to 'rock-n-roll', and Postal Meter gave the original meaning to 'going postal'.
I had me an M1 carbine back in the 1960's. It had been manufactured in the 1940's by Singer Machine Corp
I assume it was the sewing machine folks.
The carbine was in very good condition and was fairly accurate under 100-yards.
regards,
Toejam
The fine state of New Jersey certainly agrees that the M1 Carbine, not the StG 44, was the first assualt rifle - so they banned it. Assholes.
I was recently given a carbine with a collapsible stock with metal upper, exactly like yours. Have you found any information on the manufacturer of the stock. I'd like to find more information about it.
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