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Absolute worst automatic pistol design in history

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tark said:
Your link is to Wiki's report on the type 14, Nambu, which was none of those things, except for the underpowered part. Ugly? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think Glocks are ugly, but I would trust my life to one if push came to shove.
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yea, I wasn't sure which one it was, I think I mentioned it wasn't all, but I some of them in my reply, if I didn't, sorry for that, I should have. I still think they're all ugly, but thats subjective.
 
tark said:
There is nothing unsafe about a Baby Nambu. Don't confuse the Nambus. The 94 was the only one having any safety issues. Ugly? Have you ever held a Baby Nambu? Marveled at the exquisite polishing and the deep, rich blueing? Both of which, BTW, put a luger or C-96 to shame. If you think a baby Nambu is ugly, then I guess Lugers must be ugly as well.
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I can disagree about Lugers, they have a style to them. The Edsel was a great car, well made, fast, but still ugly. Subjective, but most agree. The Baby Nambu is far better looking, but still kinda off. I will say the Ruger Standard is a fantastic pistol, and love its looks. I have marveled in the way you describe over them on more than one occasion, and I suppose we have the Nambu design to thank for that. But I did mean the type 94 when I wrote the original reply, calling it dangerous.
 
The Hi-Point has got to be up down with anything produced in the last 100 years. It's shot to shot reliability is down there with anything like a Nambu, it blows away almost any pistol in terms of size and weight, and as far as durability, it's made of pot metal. The only saving graces are that it's powerful (in the pantheon of all pistol rounds, 9mm is actually pretty strong, and 40 and 45 are stronger yet) and accurate.

They're fun range shooters because of the accuracy, but no one puts them on the line for any serious use... even if it's as non demanding as throwing it in a nightstand.
 
commygun said:
Yes, the Grendel. And a whole bunch of similarly inherently inoperable semi-autos. For some reason the ‘80’s and ‘90’s seemed to be a kind of perverse Golden Age for these turkeys.
Cheap or not, I don’t understand how any one releases a design they know doesn’t work. Wishful thinking and engineering are two things that seem distinctly at odds.
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Actually sought one of these out back in the pre internet days of the 80s. Needed a deep carry gun for a road trip in a non gun friendly area I was visiting for a woman. {sigh} Never found one, fortunately. Came across and bought a used AMT Backup, but honestly it didn't work reliably either.
 
Makarov accuracy and reliability. | The High Road

As for DA trigger pulls, I've never found the DA pull on five different Maks to have as much stacking (increase in tension) as with the HK USP series; stock triggers.

It's sometime difficult to be open-minded about any gun designed by our enemies during the Cold War. Emotions can influence impressions.

I'm not defending the Mak's drawbacks, only suggesting keeping conclusions based on detached objectivity
 
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Riomouse911 said:
My bad design gun is the AMT backup.

Heavy for its size and intended use, unergonomic sharp edges, lousy sights, abysmal trigger and less than stellar reliability with anything but hardball... maybe.

What’s not to love? ;)

Stay safe.
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Could a 380 ACP pistol have had an aluminum alloy frame at the time the Backup was designed? That would have been the only option for making lighter, I think. The rest of it is down to poor manufacturing more than poor design, IMO.
 
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Monac said:
Could a 380 ACP pistol have had an aluminum alloy frame at the time the Backup was designed? That would have been the only option for making lighter, I think. The rest of it is down to poor manufacturing more than poor design, IMO.
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Hmmm, that I don’t know. I do know Colt was making 9mm Commanders for ages before the AMT came out so it’s certainly possible. I do think AMT was big on all-stainless guns so an alloy frame probably wasn’t in the cards.

The design had a few edged corners rather than smooth ones and a thin little finger hook on the magazine that hung up on everything. For whatever reason they designed it so nothing felt good in the hand (to me anyway). I still have one and it is by far my least favorite gun much less .380, to shoot. :thumbdown:

Stay safe.
 
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GeoDudeFlorida said:
FEG PA-63 - 1963
AMT Backup .380 - 1978

So, yes.
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Oh, yes, a 380 with an aluminum frame certainly could be made at that time. Beretta had been doing it for a while too. But the AMT Backup was the smallest 380 around at the time; that was the whole basis of its design and appeal. Would that have made a difference?

Probably not. I guess S&W had already been making Airweight 38 Special J-frames for a while. I don't know if a revolver frame is differently stressed from an automatic frame, though.
 
Monac said:
Oh, yes, a 380 with an aluminum frame certainly could be made at that time. Beretta had been doing it for a while too. But the AMT Backup was the smallest 380 around at the time; that was the whole basis of its design and appeal. Would that have made a difference?

Probably not. I guess S&W had already been making Airweight 38 Special J-frames for a while. I don't know if a revolver frame is differently stressed from an automatic frame, though.
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Bear in mind also the FEG PA-63 was a ComBloc military weapon, not a civilian firearm, and fired the 9mm Makarov round. the 9mm Makarov standard load was a 95 grain weight bullet at a muzzle velocity of 1050 feet per second compared to the .380 ACP standard loading of a 95 grain weight bullet at a muzzle velocity of 980 feet per second. Does 70 feet per second less make a big difference in stress or pressure? Not really. But, the PA-63 had to pass more stressful testing standards than the AMT and that does make a little difference. The PA-63 is the size of a Walther PP, dimensionally not significantly different from the AMT - it is 3oz. heavier, 2 inches longer, and has almost an 1-1/2 inches more barrel, plus a larger magazine capacity and is DASA vs. the AMT's DAO. I didn't mean to imply they're twins or anything, just comparable as far as power and weight are concerned and the PA-63 was a strong aluminum action built as a copy of a steel-framed gun, the (very rare) 9mm Kurtz Walther PP. Could AMT have built an aluminum framed Backup .380? Sure. They didn't and I have no idea why.
 
GeoDudeFlorida said:
FEG PA-63 - 1963
AMT Backup .380 - 1978

So, yes.
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Also, the Star PD.
GeoDudeFlorida said:
The PA-63 is the size of a Walther PP, dimensionally not significantly different from the AMT - it is 3oz. heavier, 2 inches longer, and has almost an 1-1/2 inches more barrel, plus a larger magazine capacity
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The PD was 7 oz heavier, 2 inches longer than the Backup, but it was in .45 acp.

There is also a more obscure (over here) version, the DK, which was aluminum framed and in 380. I believe the size was smaller, since it's a .32/.380 pistol, instead of .45acp.
wm_10566612.jpg
 
Of the guns I have personally shot, I have to give a nomination to the Keltic P11. The trigger pull on it is long, heavy, gritty and vague. I understand the long, heavy trigger as being a safety, but there is no reason for the grittiness and vagueness. There is no place in the trigger pull where you can say "I've hit the wall, another few pounds of force or inches of travel and it will go bang". It will go bang somewhere before the trigger stops against the frame, but I couldn't identify it. A friend bought one for concealed carry, and if was inaccurate no matter how you tried to shoot it. Fast, slapping the trigger and the bullets were a shotgun pattern. Slow, like target shooting and it was a shotgun patten plus it took forever to fire (like the thief would have taken your wallet, run down the block and around the corner slow). Inexcusable for a gun designed for CCW.
 
Riomouse911 said:
My bad design gun is the AMT backup.

Heavy for its size and intended use, unergonomic sharp edges, lousy sights, abysmal trigger and less than stellar reliability with anything but hardball... maybe.

What’s not to love? ;)

Stay safe.
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I has one that was 100 percent in 380 and I have shot snakes with it even without having any proper sights on it. It is very compact and only downside was a pin in needed to be driven out of to field strip it.
 
barnetmill said:
I has one that was 100 percent in 380 and I have shot snakes with it even without having any proper sights on it. It is very compact and only downside was a pin in needed to be driven out of to field strip it.
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Mine was bought for nostalgia purposes, they were very popular when I was new at work. Now that I’m getting to be one of the 30+ year oldsters, a couple of years ago I took a trip back in the time machine and bought one for about 140 bucks.

I quickly remembered why I never bought one back then. ;)

It’s a cool little retro piece, but I’ll personally take along any of a half dozen other options in the safe before the amt.

Stay safe.
 
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