Garand vs. AR

[notorious]

If I had to choose only 1 rifle for everything when SHTF and I need to bug out fast with whatever arms I can carry, I would have to be sorry to say that a semi-auto probably wouldn't be on the bill just because of reliability and parts and if you lose mags, then it's a single shot. Then again, having an AR with a scope and a bandolier full of mags is vey comforting against an army of zombies too.

 

[chriso]

Very true I feel extremely comfortable with my rem 700 sps in the m24 stock and leupy mark 4 Keep em far away If they get to close I have a shotgun or pistol or I can take of my mark 4 and put on a EOTECH HAHA!!!

 

[notorious]

That's what I was thinking. I would either take my SSG or my Mosin and with the Mosin, I also have a bayonet for CQC if I needed to conserve bullets or do it silently.

Then again, my Glock 9mm is pretty much failure proof too.

 

[Doc_Jude]

Can I get a gas piston and a .308 upper for the AR? Can I try to turn it into an M-14?
I'm choosing the Garand, for most of the reasons listed above. However, if one had an M1 Garand AND an M1 Carbine & knew the strengths and weaknesses of the two, I doubt they would miss the AR at all. People talk about the the ranges that the AR can reach accurately, while the AK and SKS can reach out to those ranges, with the same sights WITH TRAINING. The 7.62x39 can reach out to 450-500 meters but peters out after that. However, you gotta have optics to shoot accurately at that range anyways, so why not use a scoped bolt gun? It's made for those ranges. Scope your M14, it's REALLY HAPPY at those ranges.
For home defense/self-defense, you don't need something that shoots that far anyways. Accuracy to 200-250 meters is the most extreme range that I can imagine someone needing for a big homestead.
If there was a choice, the M14 or even the newer "black gun" SOCOM is the perfect amalgam between the small varmint caliber black guns and the "Garandmaster"

 

[M&PVolk]

I can't imagine trying to clear a house or take a defensive stance with a Garand. The Garand is an awesome weapon that I really do love, but the more time I spend with the AR-15, the more convinced I become that it is the more versatile and useful firearm of the two.

In terms of caliber, the .223 gives up a little damage potential to the 30-06, but not as much as many would have you believe. The .223 can deliver 6" wounds, more than enough to stop zombies and other game. What the .223 does give away in power, it more than makes up for in its reduced weight, recoil and ammo cost. You can carry significantly more rounds in the AR along with plenty of spare ammo. In the AR, the .223 is also more versatile than the Garand (bullet weights and loads), which gives up a lot of the versatility of the 30-06 due to its age. In the accuracy battle, the AR winds hands down, and follow up shots are easy. The only edge I give the Garand is reliability.

If reliability and bigger lead are the sole factors for making this selection, by all means get the Garand. Otherwise, I believe the AR to be a superior package. I stand by my original statement that I see no advantage of the Garand to a conventional bolt action 30-06, which would be my choice in that caliber.

Again, the Garand is awesome, but the AR is the better overall weapon.

 

[notorious]

The Garand is awesome when facing down a gang of Hmong wannabes who is trespassing on your lawn. Clint taught me that.

 

[472x1A/B]

Voted for the Grand. Have both, shoot both, reload for both. Dad was in WW II, issued a Grand . I was in Southeast Asia and issued a M 16. Thats it. Like one just as well as the other.

 

[amprecon]

You can't take out those zombies hiding behind the cinder-block walls or semi-trucks with the AR though, but the Garand on the other hand........

 

[dscottw88]

This is easy. Get both. I have a garand and it was one of the best firearm purchases iv'e ever made. But If i can only have one, I'd keep one of my AR's. It's more practical in almost every way.

 

[2RCO]

AH GAWD--I can't take another vs. thread seriously. I think I'll start one on Matchlocks vs. Ma Deuce.

 

[Samuraigg]

Didn't vote since there wasn't a "buy both" option.

Heck, I'm a broke college student and I still managed to buy both of them. I just don't have money to buy ammo now...

 

[innerpiece]

I agree with 'Kindd of Blued' :
"This is the dumbest thread ever.

On that note, depending on what I needed a rifle for, I could easily pick one of the two."

so why dont we throw SKSs or AK47 in there just to mix it up......

there is a major and discernable difference between all of them..

 

[innerpiece]

"You can't take out those zombies hiding behind the cinder-block walls or semi-trucks with the AR though, but the Garand on the other hand........"
amprecon, the .223 works thru 5/8 inch steel.. thats a fact. while I have tests that would impress, and depress yer theory about "cinder blocks" Ill wait to post them in a thread that has more relevance to a specific tool.

but hers a "real world" preview of what the .223/5.56 can do against hard objects.... http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=400904


"Im talking about Dropping a Full en bloc in compared to slamming a ar15 mag in I can do it faster having the rounds at the ready in clips and or magazines... I can also load my garand faster than alot of my buddies that have xcr's ar's and all that fancy stuff..."
"fancy"? Chriso... compare capacity.. then tell me you can load as many bullets in yer gun as I can into an AR..... in the same amount of time....
regaurdless. what IS getting missed, is: shot placement. and what is also getting missed, as I stated above.. an AK is getting "vrs'd" to an SKS....

really. whatever yer best with is what you should "vote" for ... cause thatll be the most effective..

ip.

 

[notorious]

The 5.56 would more than go through regular sheet steel in a car door. We have a car door up at the academy with various holes from various projectiles shot through it to show penetration effectiveness. I'll take a pic for you guys next time I go there in mid-January.

As for zombies, they don't hide behind cinder blocks. Zombies will home in on the immediate source of attraction and attack with mindless abandon. Hiding is not in their repetoire. Now if you want to take out a zombie that is stuck behind a cinder block because it can't figure out how to get around it, that is different, but in that situation, I would just lob a Molotov at it because you have to burn the body afterwards to get rid of the Solanum.

 

[notorious]

AH GAWD--I can't take another vs. thread seriously. I think I'll start one on Matchlocks vs. Ma Deuce.

Well, obviously it's good enough to get 4 pages and 90 responses so far.

Let's all start our own comparison threads and see what we can come up with.

I am going to start my Glock 34 versus Mini-14 stainless tactical carbine thread right after I get done comparing the M1 Carbine to the Uberti SAA nickel finish with pearl grips.

 

[Doc_Jude]

In terms of caliber, the .223 gives up a little damage potential to the 30-06....

A LITTLE!?! That's the understatement of the day.


As far as penetration and performance goes, I've read plenty of articles from troops having problems with the .223 round lacking necessary stopping power, needing 4 and 5 rounds to put a target down (above the issue of moving targets was addressed as though the Garand would have problems with this...)
I will try very hard tomorrow to find the source, but I read a reliable source (I may have it in print, I'm not sure), a platoon or company commander from WW2 reporting that one of his men was at the top of a trail and fired a shot down at the head of the line of some Japanese walking single file... and he dropped the first 4 or 5 enemy soldiers. Now, you will NEVER here that kind of thing about a .223

I had this discussion with someone else about the M-14 vs M4, about the weight of the .308 ammo, about being able to carry less of it than .223. My answer was,"Well, if I only have to shoot the guy ONCE as opposed to two, three, or even four times to have stopping effect, then I guess I'll break even, huh?"
The 30-06, even more so. I don't bank on "shot placement", I keep in mind that with moving targets, sometimes it's all you can do to get rounds on target, there won't be any guaranteed head or CNS shot. With that in mind, I trust .30 caliber power over a varmint round.

 

[notorious]

That's what General Patton said. No American fighting man should ever carry a rifle less than 30 calibre.

However, being that modern soldiers and terrorists don't generally line up in a single file, we'll probably not get to see that comparison again anytime soon.

If I want a big calibre battle rifle, I would get the SoCom II 16" in snow camo. (drool)

 

[carbine85]

I voted Garand. It's clearly the best heavy battle rifle ever built in mine and George Patton's opinion.

 

[jjohnson]

Try using a question in your poll.

Hey, not to give you a hard time, but you really need to make a serious and well defined question to make a poll worth anything. As it stands, the poll is meaningless because anybody can interpret it for anything.

For example:

Which is the better rifle for 500+ yard killing power?
Which is the better suited to jungle warfare?
Which has greater historical value?
Which is the better deer rifle?
Which is better for breaking something with the butt?

Okay, you got the idea.

I carried an M16 for three years, and when I left the Army, I bought a Garand.

Because it's better.

 

[esq_stu]

The Garand was great. Now it is quaint.

 

[Jim PHL]

I didn't vote because an SKS is probably the only "battle rifle" I can afford!

I think between the two I would prefer the AR, but put me on the list of those who'd prefer to split the difference with an M14.

Is a "vs." thread better or worse than a "if you could have only one..." thread?

 

[Kansan]

As I mentioned earlier, I like both guns and wish I had both of them. But as as far as being able to carry more .223 than .30-06 argument... I'm trying to think of a scenario where I would have to load myself down with ammo to the point where it would matter (in civilian life). First, I would have to be on foot because if I had a vehicle, I could carry as much as I wanted. I would also have some kind of need for enough ammo for a prolonged fire fight (maybe I'll be walking through ganstaville during a riot?). I suppose I could be bugging out on foot through a rioting city with my wife and children and was carrying so much food, clothes, & medical supplies for a long term stay in the countryside that I couldn't burden myself (or the accompanying stroller / wagon) with an extra 100 rounds of .30-06....

 

[chriso]

I dont think Innerpiece read when I said PRECISION IS KEY go back and read before you make your statement... I also stated that I wouldn't have to reload as much if I had a AR but I feel comfortable with a garand because I can load it quite fast... READ and post...

 

[M&PVolk]

Doc J wrote

A LITTLE!?! That's the understatement of the day.

As far as penetration and performance goes, I've read plenty of articles from troops having problems with the .223 round lacking necessary stopping power, needing 4 and 5 rounds to put a target down (above the issue of moving targets was addressed as though the Garand would have problems with this...)

Stopping power is a myth. All kill/stop shots come down to shot placement. Any caliber out there will stop a zombie with good placement. The fact that you don't want to worry about placement doesn't make it any less real. If you want to be able to simply squeeze the trigger and get a drop, you want something that explodes, not a rifle.

As to the power advantage of a 30-06, no one is arguing it doesn't have one, just that it isn't as big as you seem to think. The .223 is the most widely utilized military round today for a reason. Also worth noting is that the 30-06 had its day in the sun, and was found to have fewer advantages in combat than the 5.56. For every peace of anecdotal evidence I hear about how bad the .223 is, I have heard at least as many about how amazingly effective it is. I have also heard a myriad of complaints about the 30-06 and how ineffective it is with improper shot placement. In fact, some have argued that the .223 is MORE lethal than the 30-06 due to a reduced propensity for pass through and greater yaw and fragmentation. A 6" permanent wound cavity is massive and completely fatal.

Still, all these arguments seem a bit foolish when you consider your rights as a civilian firearms owner. The right to self defense is not a right to murder, but merely a right to stop a threat. Either of these two guns is sufficient for such a purpose.

 

[notorious]

As I mentioned earlier, I like both guns and wish I had both of them. But as as far as being able to carry more .223 than .30-06 argument... I'm trying to think of a scenario where I would have to load myself down with ammo to the point where it would matter (in civilian life). First, I would have to be on foot because if I had a vehicle, I could carry as much as I wanted. I would also have some kind of need for enough ammo for a prolonged fire fight (maybe I'll be walking through ganstaville during a riot?). I suppose I could be bugging out on foot through a rioting city with my wife and children and was carrying so much food, clothes, & medical supplies for a long term stay in the countryside that I couldn't burden myself (or the accompanying stroller / wagon) with an extra 100 rounds of .30-06....

In a simple riot situation where you can stay inside your house and sit tight, it makes no difference as long as you can defend your immediate area from threats. Civilians have a hard time justifying self defense at ranges beyond 25 yards or so unless you got a guy who's sniping you from afar. Unless you have a big yard and he's shooting you from 50 yards away in your yard, the castle doctrine doesn't help you either since he is not on your property. (Correct me if I am wrong on that, we don't have the castle doctrine in California)

In any event, if there was a Class 3 or 4 outbreak and zombies overran our city, I would be in a car loaded with as much ammo as I can and I certainly will carry the most for my money, including a lot of 5.56 and not so much shotshells.