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Hello
After many years of owning and shooting bolt action service rifles dated from 1850 -1950 I am going to venture into the single shot converted semi automatic rifle, but I need some advice as to which to start with. I would like a .30 M1 carbine but many others also take my fancy. If you own or shoot anything along these lines please comment on what you have found. My only concern is that over the years I have heard so many stories of extraction problems with people having to resort to over size handles. I do not intend to shoot factory or surplus, but to reload, also is it possible advisable to download ?? any help welcome.........

If I was to have one, it would be an M1 carbine!! Shot a proper one years ago and fell in love with it!! Then the psycho b****** Ryan came along....

+1 on the M1 carbine. Aside from not having a gas port, mine is identical to a standard M1 carbine. It will take the same magazines, that nice magazine pouch can be fitted to the stock and you can operate the bolt without the need for over sized handles. The one downside I can think of is to make sure you don't baby the bolt, if you do the bort won't go into battery which results in a FTF, or worse, firing out of battery. Just yank the bort handle back and release. I've had to explain this to shooters many times but luckily there's only been FTF's.

In terms of loading, the 30 carbine can be compared to firing 357 in underlevers. There are full power jacketed loads available but you can also load gallery loads using Red Dot or Bullseye pistols for gallery shooting.

There's plenty of other straight pulls that have hit the market, I've recently noticed one off Gewehr G43 and FG-42 but you'd be paying an eye watering sum for these rifles.

I assume an AR 15 isn't on the list?

A mate of mine has both the M1 Carbine & Garand, the Garand is a cracking rifle.

WelshShooter wrote:+1 on the M1 carbine. Aside from not having a gas port, mine is identical to a standard M1 carbine. It will take the same magazines, that nice magazine pouch can be fitted to the stock and you can operate the bolt without the need for over sized handles. The one downside I can think of is to make sure you don't baby the bolt, if you do the bort won't go into battery which results in a FTF, or worse, firing out of battery. Just yank the bort handle back and release. I've had to explain this to shooters many times but luckily there's only been FTF's.

In terms of loading, the 30 carbine can be compared to firing 357 in underlevers. There are full power jacketed loads available but you can also load gallery loads using Red Dot or Bullseye pistols for gallery shooting.

There's plenty of other straight pulls that have hit the market, I've recently noticed one off Gewehr G43 and FG-42 but you'd be paying an eye watering sum for these rifles.

I do fancy a M1 Carbine myself (especially with a para stock :)) as well as a G43 ..... probably the only 2 straight pull's I'd be interested in.

I've got the M14 but have resorted to an oversize handle.
Also got one & a half AR15s.

Why get a conversion? Go for a rifle designed to be straight pull. such as the Schmidt Rubin.
Fred

Get yourself one of these.......
The fact it is a straight-pull doesn't really detract from it, extraction is as smooth as silk with steel or brass cased ammo and it will easily shoot sub-MOA with handloads if I do my part.The action is very smooth and trigger is two-stage with a 3lb pull and in the time I've had mine I have had zero problems with it.They hold their value, it turn heads and it has impressed everyone that has shot it.

snayperskaya wrote:Get yourself one of these.......

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The fact it is a straight-pull doesn't really detract from it, extraction is as smooth as silk with steel or brass cased ammo and it will easily shoot sub-MOA with handloads if I do my part.The action is very smooth and trigger is two-stage with a 3lb pull and in the time I've had mine I have had zero problems with it.They hold their value, it turn heads and it has impressed everyone that has shot it.

Having shot a semi-auto version, I can see why you say it doesn't really detract from it.

I'm sure with some additional trigger time I could manage the recoil better, but I'm not sure whose great idea it was to use 7.62x54r in a semi-auto. Prone from a bipod the recoil put the sight picture in another post code after pulling the trigger... hahaha!

FredB wrote:Why get a conversion? Go for a rifle designed to be straight pull. such as the Schmidt Rubin.
Fred

+1

Redcat