tell me about the MAS 49/56

[justin22885]

well as i said before, resale isnt a concern of mine, what is a concern of mine is having a reliable, accurate 308 battle rifle, the MAS 49/56 seems to bring more benefits to the table than other competing battle rifles, more accurate than the FAL, HK, M1, more reliable than the FAL, M1, AR10, lighter than the HK, M1, and maybe the FAL as well... so if you were to take the AR-10, FAL, M1A, and HK91/PTR91 and give them a number of points based on accuracy, reliability, weight, in my opinion i think it has the potential to score up more of those points than the others

the downside to the MAS is the magazines and the poor conversion job century has done and id really like to be able to put on a quality, reliable barrel with a real .308 bore set up for .308 from the start, this leaves me the option of copying the MAS 49/56 contour over to a blank, or machining out the threads and rethreading the receiver for AR-10 barrels (after the extension is removed of course), that last option would cost less and if i ever need to replace the barrel in the future i can take just about any barrel off the AR-10 to do it, plus it gives me far more options in terms of construction, finish, contours, and other features... much cheaper to get say a 16" match grade fluted barrel with a nitrided finish on an AR-10 barrel where you can find them like this off the shelf than it would be to have a blank made up like this

besides that, and putting on a mag release for FAL magazines the potential to be one of the best battle rifles for the total price of the project is certainly there

__

so dean, let me ask this, why did you do all those things youve mentioned? were you concerned with resale value or did you simple do them because you felt like it and wanted to?..

anyway, it could be a few months before i start this project since ive become cautious about trusting people on online auctions like gunbroker and dont want to risk buying something used or surplus sight unseen so its important i find one close enough i can see and inspect before i pay for it

 

[barnbwt]

I'm not sure why, but MAS rifles tend to be in very good shape (stupid "dropped once" jokes aside, all service weapons tend to be beaters --these appear to have been rearsenaled before surplus or by Century), so there's less a worry about a blind sale. Especially if chamber quality is not a criteria.

TCB

 

[justin22885]

ill still have to wait till one pops up on armslist nearby

 

[Dean1818]

so dean, let me ask this, why did you do all those things youve mentioned? were you concerned with resale value or did you simple do them because you felt like it and wanted to?..

To be honest.... thats a great question.....

I like to tinker, and enjoyed the experience. But.... over time, I have found that I like simplistic.

I went through cycles trying to find the smallest CCW weapon..... I went from a P226 through maybe 5 pistols.(One of them a Bersa UC40)... and I am back to a SIG a P229 as my EDC (I have a Shield that gets the nod somedays.)

In regards to the Mauser...... I enjoyed the time..... BUT I wouldn't do it again....

I found over tinkering, and many options, and trials.... the true purpose of the gun and meeting that purpose, raises my final enjoyment of the gun.

For example, if you want a gun to take to the range, and show off the MAS is a decent choice. It has a cool factor

But if it a true home defense or a crap hits the fan weapon....... I wouldnt put my trust in anything that is out of production, and may not be able to be fixed easily.... I would go with tried and true. (Or.... buy a duplicate for everything... )

Again your call.

Good luck

 

[justin22885]

well, theres a couple schools of thought you can go buy for the scenarios many people put a lot of effort into a good go-to rifle for.. one is cheap, common, easily replaced parts you can find anywhere, this in my opinion is the only area where the AR shines.. then the other school of thought is something brutally simple, rugged, and durable that maybe doesnt need its parts to be replaced, AR doesnt win in that category as they do have many small parts, springs, detents, etc.. so you may not NEED to have a plethora of easily replaceable parts in something like the MAS which has fairly large, durable parts

i must admit though i was a tad disappointed to find they use the plunger style ejector because thats one more part and one more spring that something like an AK just doesnt have.. so its a tradeoff, easy to repair, but more likely to need it, or a PITA to repair but less likely to need it.. its much more rare to shear a lug off an AK bolt, however if that were to happen and i didnt have special tools to re-fit and re-headspace the entire rifle, id be pretty screwed and should anything happen to the barrel i'll be needing a 10 ton press and some jigs to swap it out, an AR-15 only needs a simple wrench for that same task

what i like about the MAS, big, durable, solid metal parts, solid steel frame, they seem to me like something thats been built to take a beating, but surprisingly theyre pretty light weight and typically sturdily built and lightweight dont seem to go together.. as youve noticed in some videos mentioned above, side by side tests against the M1A, the MAS beat the snot out of it for reliability, and simple accurate reports show they can be about as accurate as the AR-10.. so i think once the project is finished the end result is something that would be less likely to need repairs.. i do plan to put so many rounds through it in a relatively short period of time im probably going to need a new barrel so being adapted to use AR-10 barrels makes that easier.. my plan is though to make any part thats going to break or fail to do so, so that i know which, if any replacement parts i will need to purchase for spares and have them pre-fitted to my rifle (i have a spare AK-74 bolt for my AK as well, already headspaced to match the original)

 

[eastbank]

i would like to see the tests where the 49/56 beat the snot out of a mia, any one who has used a mia knows its easy to maintain and take down to three parts,stock,trigger group and reciever-barrel with hand guard in 5 seconds with out tools. and in another 20 seconds the bolt,op rod and gas cylinder can be removed( replacement parts are easy to optain). let me know what time it takes to do that with a 49/56. the sights are better on the mia along with a longer sight radius and mag swaps are easier too. i own and shoot a mas 36 and a 49/56 and reload for them to and also own a m1 garand-m1 carbine-m1A- ar15,s and load for them to. another bitch with the mas 36 and 49/56 is the sights, the front sight is just to thick for longer shots at smaller odjects. this does not mean i don,t like the french rifles as i like all milsurp rifles from any era, but both were a step forward towards a better battle rifle and and the search for a better rifle still goes on. eastbank.

 

[justin22885]

https://www.full30.com/video/9eef6b3a4eb6c8846a4c8dc4b8968bc4
https://www.full30.com/video/6618755f336970e55e6c50c1fe894ff8

 

[bainter1212]

the mas 49/56 was probably one of the best guns at the tail end of the wood and heavy steel forgings era. I would love to have a good .308 conversion.

Wikipedia says the max pressure is 280 mpa (a mere 40kpsi) which is only 2/3 of the 7.63x51mm. Is that believable given 2,600-2,700 ft-lb performance for heavier bullets in 22" barrels? Is that cartridge that efficient? If true, i suspect there are gas issues as well as chamber smoothness issues on the century guns. However, unless they made a poor choice in recoil spring, i would not consider being over-gassed to be likely make the gun fail to run. Also, the brass is semi-rimmed (.482 at the web and .486" at the rim), so there is significantly less extractor engagement with 7.62x51mm.

It looks like it would be easy to make 7.5x51 brass form european (.480" base dia) 6.5x55mm brass. I would not even try it with american (.473" base dia) brass with ppu euro-spec brass easily available (whether american is safe or not).

These conversion were done in the "drunk monkey" days that earned century such a bad reputation (vz2008s since 2012 or so seem really good).

Mike

 

[Nom de Forum]

i would like to see the tests where the 49/56 beat the snot out of a mia, any one who has used a mia knows its easy to maintain and take down to three parts,stock,trigger group and reciever-barrel with hand guard in 5 seconds with out tools. and in another 20 seconds the bolt,op rod and gas cylinder can be removed( replacement parts are easy to optain). let me know what time it takes to do that with a 49/56. the sights are better on the mia along with a longer sight radius and mag swaps are easier too. i own and shoot a mas 36 and a 49/56 and reload for them to and also own a m1 garand-m1 carbine-m1A- ar15,s and load for them to. another bitch with the mas 36 and 49/56 is the sights, the front sight is just to thick for longer shots at smaller odjects. this does not mean i don,t like the french rifles as i like all milsurp rifles from any era, but both were a step forward towards a better battle rifle and and the search for a better rifle still goes on. eastbank.

Thirty years ago I was shooting and maintaining M1 Garand, M14, and M21 rifles at Fort Bragg. I started shooting a MAS 49/56 almost twenty years ago. Any advantages the Garand system rifles have in regard to take down are at the very least matched by the MAS 49/56. The Garand system makes it easy to remove the trigger assembly and receiver/barrel assembly from the stock. The MAS system makes it easier and faster to remove of the bolt, bolt carrier, and action operating spring from the receiver for clearing and cleaning the action in a hurry under adverse conditions and that is a superior attribute. Cleaning the barrel of a MAS is also easier and faster. Ease and speed in the removal of the MAS trigger assembly is definitely not an attribute because a easy to lose screw must be removed. This is somewhat compensated for by the MAS trigger assembly when in the receiver being better protected from debris than the Garand system. In my opinion the MAS trigger assembly is also mechanically more durable and less likely to fail due to debris that enters it. As far as stock removal goes, there is little reason to need to remove the forestock and buttstock on a MAS because there are no moving parts under them, unlike the Garand system that has critical parts that must be accessed for maintenance.

If you are going to use comparisons of time between a MAS 49/56 and a Garand system rifle I suggest measuring a task that is a more realistic critical situation for a soldier than routine. Foul the barrels and actions of the two rifle types with dirt and mud so that barrels must be rodded and actions stripped to be cleared before firing can resume. When you measure the time it takes to get the rifles back in action I would not want to bet against the the MAS 49/56 taking longer than a Garand system. As show in the video links posted in this thread the MAS is resists action fouling much better than the Garand system.

So the front sight is wider on the MAS than the M1A. The MAS front sight is conical and the very top of the sight is very small in diameter. Not much of a problem with a six o’clock hold and if it is, a little judicious contouring could reshape the sight post. When compared to the M1 Garand front sight the MAS sight does not appear to be exceptionally wide for head shots routine combat ranges.

In my opinion the MAS 49/56 is beyond question a better combat rifle than a M1 Garand or M14 for all but a few combat situations. Situations such as bayonetting and buttstroking, and using the rifle as stepping platform for hoisting soldiers over an obstacle, because the MAS has a two piece stock. Too bad we don’t have videos showing firing performance in arctic conditions because I am fairly certain the MAS gas system would clean the Garand systems clock.