HK drops USC

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gunnutery

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http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2013/05/02/hk-discontinues-usc-sales/

Part of me dosent care, but another part of me is just a little bit sad. Every once in a while I'd dream about someday converting one to a UMP (without sbr because my state isn't cool like that). But the everytime I'd look at parts costs I'd put it out of my head again. I guess that's why I'm a bit sad.

HK really had a great little design, but no one could afford it, or for those that could, it just wasn't worth it, exept for a select few I'm sure.

What say you?
 
While a non-neutered UMP would have been cool, what they sold was not something the market wanted. My guess is HK-USA is focusing more on their handguns which I wager sell significantly better than any of their rifle offerings.
 
I've been torn between one of those an a .45 AR that runs on grease gun magazines.

The AR would be much cheaper and MUCH more customizable, and wouldn't look as goofy without a SBR. The USC would be lighter, smaller and cool in that Teutonic way that only HK can muster.

...Then again... a .45 AR pistol would be the cats meow, most of the fun, and most of the functionality of a SBR without a tax stamp, or worrying about your state laws.

It's a dated design, and dosen't quite hold up to modern subguns like the Kriss which costs less I believe. But they're still cool carbines! I'm a HK fan (among Glock, and S&W revolvers!) and I'm excited to see if they'll bother to release a new, .45acp sub gun which I'll probably just lust at from afar.
 
You mean a gun stripped of features and sold at a very high price wasn't a big hit? Shocking.
 
Huh, a $1200+ gun that was only $500 in parts away from being configured the way people wanted didn't sell very well? Weird.
 
They're too expensive but being discontinued won't help the prices either :(.

HK is the only company that makes pistol caliber carbines with any sense of class. Sure, the Cx4 will work just fine but it's a goofy space rifle.
 
Here's one I don't understand: "And terrible customer service on top of that!". Not in my experience. I got it done for the entirely reasonable price quoted with the work properly done and rapid turn-arond. What's not to like?

900F
 
Man HK grinds my gears. They have some great MILITARY designs, but a lot of the long guns they put out for civilian purchase are like many have stated above "neutered" and for whatever reason stripped of many features found on the military versions of their rifles. I do like there pistols.

As far as pistol caliber carbines, I would take a Kel Tec Sub 2000 over a USC any day of the week.
 
I *want* to like the USC, I just can't over the 2x4 pistol grip on the thing.

Can't say I'll miss it.....
 
The reason for the neutered military style rifles has to do with not only our crappy import regs. but also German law as well. Once again blame our government.
 
I had one and really liked it (post conversion), but it has since moved on. It shot great and never failed to gather a fair bit of attention at the range. I miss it every now and then, but not nearly enough to spend the money and go back down that road again. It did hold it's value though. I got everything back out of it that I had in it with the exception of $100 or so on one of the tax stamps.

20sarz6.gif
 
Hmmm. Well, hate to see any firearm be discontinued, but if something had to be discontinued a neutered version of a stillborn example of an evolutionary dead end in firearms development made by an obscure foreign firm is a good one to choose.
 
I would only consider H&K obscure because I don't own any of their products but a lot of police departments do or at least did have a lot of their products. Theirs pistols as I understood were upper crust items that performed quite well but were considerably pricey when compared against Sig Sauer products for price and performance.

I'm too much of a Ruger fan to bother with Smith & Wesson products so far that I'd rather buy a SRH .454 Casull (another one plus the one I already own) and have it converted for .45 ACP (cut for moon clips) than buy a Model 25 S&W in .45 ACP, and the Model 25 in .45 ACP is an awesome revolver. With that, since I won't even bother with S&W products that aren't incredibly low priced (getting a 95%+ Model 19 for less than $400 is an incredibly low price, getting a 85%+ S&W 15 for under $300 is an incredibly low price, so if can't get a Model 22 or 25 for under $500 I likely will never have one) I don't see myself ever buying H&K.

Not to say H&K doesn't turn out great products, i just don't think the average buyer with a budget under $1,000 will ever get familiar with them. And that's why they might be considered obscure.
 
It was said before, when it comes down to it, HK has some great rifle concepts, but they cannot make them in Germany for import (either cannot or will not).... and they don't want to risk building a factory in the US to make US compliant versions of guns like the G36 only to have an AWB make that a wasted investment.

Frankly, I think they charge too much. It isn't that much more difficult to make a Glock for instance, and yet, they cost 3 times as much as a Glock. If you were making HK products in the southern US, like Amarillo, TX or Hattiesburg, MS you could get labor @ about 2/3 the cost of German labor. Just a thought.

Anyhoo... if HK dropped their price and if they began to manufacture full capacity, semi-auto versions of their top selling state of the art mil-spec rifles, then I would be much more interested. I'm not counting on it.

Overall, this gun was not state of the art, milspec copied, or normal capacity. Semi-auto was the only thing I can say for it.
 
Ok. I really just think of them as "obscure" (probably an inaccurate word, I confess) in that, as a competition shooter and "practical" shooting junkie, I never see any of them on the range, or in anyone's holsters, or slings. They seem to occupy a sort of foreign cachet as "must be great 'cause they're so expensive and rare" but that doesn't translate at all into folks who can afford to dump a lot of cash into their go-fast gear actually choosing them for whatever super-cool features they might possess. So seldom-seen makes them a bit obscure. Then add in all the frustrating oddity of HK's manufacturing and sales issues/policies/rules that seem to baffle and confusicate American shooters, and that just adds to the obscurity.

All-in-all, for me they fall into the "interesting oddities" category along with Korth revolvers, Desert Eagles, Blaser rifles, and a number of other guns and makers which are undeniably really neat, but that relatively few knowledgeable shooters ever seem to find sufficient reason to buy and use.

(As opposed to SIGs, which are similarly rather pricey and have a grand reputation but which really don't equate to anything magical in the hands -- but at least some folks I respect do choose to shoot them.)
 
You don't consider HK an obscure German firm? Weird
Click to expand...

No, not at all. HK is a pretty prolific gun maker world wide. They make some very well known guns that one can find the world over, MP5, G3, etc. You can go into any local gun shop here and find H&Ks. I'd also wager that every kid with an Xbox or PS3 knows of HK. I have traveled and worked outside of the states a fair bit and seen a lot more H&Ks than a number of other makers.

Not being used in one particular, or even several gun games hardly makes H&K an obscure maker IMHO.

H&K obscure? No not in my opinion. Over priced yeah. Over rated, in some instances they probably are. Obscure, no not really at all.
 
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