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An auto sear ("automatic sear") is a part of an automatic firearm that holds the hammer in the cocked position while the bolt of the weapon is cycling. An auto sear is required in nearly every automatic rifle.
An auto sear allows a semi-automatic gun to be converted into one capable of automatic firing with a single, continuous pull of the trigger. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives designated any firearm capable of firing more than one round with a single operation of the trigger mechanism as a "machine gun", and the possession of such devices is illegal under United States federal law if the person in possession does not have the required licensing. [1]
A firearm is any type of gun that uses an explosive charge and is designed to be readily carried and used by an individual. The term is legally defined further in different countries.
A machine gun (MG) is a fully automatic, rifled auto-loading firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges. Other automatic firearms such as automatic shotguns and automatic rifles (including assault rifles and battle rifles) are typically designed more for firing short bursts rather than continuous firepower and are not considered true machine guns. Submachine guns fire handgun cartridges rather than rifle cartridges, therefore they are not considered machine guns, while automatic firearms of 20 mm (0.79 in) caliber or more are classified as autocannons rather than machine guns.
A machine pistol is an autoloading pistol capable of fully automatic fire, including stockless handgun-style submachine guns.
The Colt AR-15 is a lightweight, magazine-fed, gas-operated semi-automatic rifle. It is a semi-automatic version of the M16 rifle sold for the civilian and law enforcement markets in the United States. The AR in AR-15 stands for ArmaLite rifle, after the company that developed it in the 1950s. Colt's Manufacturing Company currently owns the AR-15 trademark, which is used exclusively for its line of semi-automatic AR-15 rifles.
The National Firearms Act (NFA), 73rd Congress, Sess. 2, ch. 757, 48 Stat. 1236 was enacted on June 26, 1934, and currently codified and amended as I.R.C. ch. 53. The law is an Act of Congress in the United States that, in general, imposes an excise tax on the manufacture and transfer of certain firearms and mandates the registration of those firearms. The NFA is also referred to as Title II of the federal firearms laws, with the Gun Control Act of 1968 ("GCA") as Title I.
A semi-automatic firearm, also called a self-loading or autoloading firearm, is a repeating firearm whose action mechanism automatically loads a following round of cartridge into the chamber and prepares it for subsequent firing, but requires the shooter to manually actuate the trigger in order to discharge each shot. Typically, this involves the weapon's action utilizing the excess energy released during the preceding shot to unlock and move the bolt, extracting and ejecting the spent cartridge case from the chamber, re-cocking the firing mechanism, and loading a new cartridge into the firing chamber, all without input from the user. To fire again, however, the user must actively release the trigger, allow it to "reset", before pulling the trigger again to fire off the next round. As a result, each trigger pull only discharges a single round from a semi-automatic weapon, as opposed to a fully automatic weapon, which will shoot continuously as long as the ammunition is replete and the trigger is kept depressed.
A semi-automatic pistol is a handgun that automatically ejects and loads cartridges in its chamber after every shot fired. Only one round of ammunition is fired each time the trigger is pulled, as the pistol's fire control group disconnects the trigger mechanism from the firing pin/striker until the trigger has been released and reset.
An automatic firearm or fully automatic firearm is an autoloading firearm that continuously chambers and fires rounds when the trigger mechanism is actuated. The action of an automatic firearm is capable of harvesting the excess energy released from a previous discharge to feed a new ammunition round into the chamber, and then igniting the propellant and discharging the projectile by delivering a hammer or striker impact on the primer.
The CZ 52 is a semi-automatic pistol designed by two brothers, Jan and Jaroslav Kratochvíl, in the early 1950s for the Czechoslovak military. Around 200,000 vz. 52s were made by Česká Zbrojovka in Strakonice from 1952 to 1954. Before standardizing on the 7.62×25mm vz. 52, the Czechoslovak military used several domestic and foreign pistol models in three different calibers. After 30 years of military service, the vz. 52 was eventually replaced by the 9×18mm Makarov caliber vz. 82.
Pump action is a type of manual firearm action that is operated by moving a sliding handguard on the gun's forestock. When shooting, the sliding forend is pulled rearward to eject any expended cartridge and typically to cock the hammer or striker, and then pushed forward to load a new cartridge into the chamber. Most pump-action firearms use an integral tubular magazine, although some do use detachable box magazines. Pump-action firearms are typically associated with shotguns, although it has been used in rifles, grenade launchers, as well as other types of firearms. A firearm using this operating mechanism is colloquially referred to as a pumpgun.
A firearm is said to fire from an open bolt if, when ready to fire, the bolt and working parts are held to the rear of the receiver, with no round in the chamber. When the trigger is actuated, the bolt travels forward, feeds a cartridge from the magazine or belt into the chamber, and fires that cartridge in the same movement. Like any other self-loading design, the action is cycled by the energy released from the propellant, which sends the bolt back to the rear, compressing the mainspring in readiness for firing the next round. In an open-bolt gun firing semi-automatically, the bolt is caught and held at this point by the sear after each shot; and in automatic open-bolt fire, it's caught and held in this manner whenever the trigger is released. In contrast to this, in closed-bolt guns, the trigger and sear do not affect the movement of the bolt directly.
In a firearm, the sear is the part of the trigger mechanism that holds the hammer, striker, or bolt back until the correct amount of pressure has been applied to the trigger, at which point the hammer, striker, or bolt is released to discharge the weapon. The sear may be a separate part or can be a surface incorporated into the trigger. Sear mechanisms are also frequently employed in archery release aids.
A rubber band gun is a toy gun used to fire one or more rubber bands.
A trigger is a mechanism that actuates the function of a ranged weapon such as a firearm, airgun, crossbow, or speargun. The word may also be used to describe a switch that initiates the operation of other non-shooting devices such as a trap, a power tool, or a quick release. A small amount of energy applied to the trigger leads to the release of much more energy.
The Stechkin or APS is a Soviet selective fire machine pistol chambered in 9×18mm Makarov and 9×19mm Parabellum introduced into service in 1951 for use with artillery and mortar crews, tank crews and aircraft personnel, where a cumbersome assault rifle was deemed unnecessary. Seeing service in a number of wars such as the Vietnam War, Russo-Ukrainian War and Syrian Civil War. The APS was praised for its innovative concept and good controllability for its size. However, the high cost of the weapon, complex and time-consuming machining, combined with a limited effective range, large size and weight for a pistol, and fragile buttstock have been mentioned as a reason to phase it out of active service in favour of assault rifles such as the AKS-74U. The pistol bears the name of its developer, Igor Stechkin.
The following are terms related to firearms and ammunition topics.
Title II weapons, or NFA firearms, are designations of certain weapons under the United States National Firearms Act (NFA).
In firearms, a safety or safety catch is a mechanism used to help prevent the accidental discharge of a firearm, helping to ensure safer handling.
An AR-15–style rifle is any lightweight semi-automatic rifle based on or similar to the Colt AR-15 design. The Colt model removed the selective fire feature of its predecessor, the original ArmaLite AR-15, itself a scaled-down derivative of the AR-10 design by Eugene Stoner.
A Glock switch or Glock auto-sear is a small device that can be attached to the rear of the slide of a Glock handgun, converting the semi-automatic pistol into a machine pistol capable of fully automatic fire. As a type of auto sear, it functions by applying force to the trigger bar to prevent it from limiting fire to one round of ammunition per trigger pull. This device by itself, regardless if it is installed on a slide or not, is considered by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to be a machine gun, making possession of the device illegal in the United States under most circumstances.
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