Weapons from all over the world. To begin with, let's recall the popular science fiction story of the Strugatsky brothers "Predatory Things of the Century", written in 1964 by the Strugatsky brothers. There were many interesting predictions about the future, but unfortunately limited duration. In 1974, this work read like a revelation. In 1984, practically the same. In 1994, with a sense of surprise: how the authors, living in the USSR 30 years ago, guessed everything so accurately. But in 2004, the story was outdated at once. It did not have computers, laptops, mobile phones and electronic games, which by this time had flooded the whole world.
However, there was still this, something that is happening right before our eyes:
“We are constantly bewildered by the talk of terrible new inventions. We have already sat down in a similar puddle several times. When Mkhagana and Buris turned to the UN with a complaint that the separatists were using a new type of weapon - freezing bombs, we rushed to look for underground military factories and even arrested two of the most real underground inventors (sixteen and ninety-six years old). And then it turned out that these inventors had nothing to do with it, and the terrible freezing bombs were purchased by the separatists in Munich at a wholesale warehouse of refrigeration units and turned out to be defective superfreezers. True, the action of these superfreezers was really terrible. In combination with molecular detonators (widely used by underwater archaeologists in the Amazon to scare off piranhas and caimans), superfreezers were able to provide an instant drop in temperature to one hundred and fifty degrees of cold within a radius of twenty meters. Then we persuaded each other for a long time not to forget and always keep in mind that in our time literally every month there are a lot of technical innovations of the most peaceful purpose and with the most unexpected side properties, and these properties are often such that violations of the law prohibiting the production of weapons and ammunition become simply meaningless."
All this is to the fact that, if you wish, today you can make an automatic machine from a water pipe, by the way, and a mortar too, use a drone-drone as a "flying bomb", and place the firing device directly in your mobile phone. Technical creativity “from everything at hand” is developing more and more widely. When you do not need to hew out the hull of the boat model from the log, but you can make it by cutting and cutting out all the parts from plywood or polystyrene on a CNC machine and laser cutting. You can buy a 3D printer and print any designs on it, up to pistols and rifles, both made of plastic and metal. By the way, we have already tried to print grenades for a 40-mm grenade launcher made of zinc alloy and it turned out. It turned out to print from plastic a model-copy of the FAU-2 rocket, and such that it is only necessary to insert the engine into it and it will fly. Well, what if you insert a stronger "engine"? And pour TNT into the bow? Ready RS high-explosive action will turn out, that's it!
Well, if you live in a country where the free sale of weapons and the manufacture of new models of it are allowed, then those amateur designers who are interested in doing this business will have just the broadest field for activity. Take it, buy whatever parts you want and design! Satisfy your craving for the creation of something new that has not yet existed, let it be a new pistol, machine gun or rifle.
This is what Wilfred G. Ellis (1935-1994), an American police officer and master gunsmith from Abington, Pennsylvania, who clearly had a passion for designing new types of firearms, did, by the way. In his house, he equipped an excellent workshop, in which he was engaged in restoring old weapons and at the same time creating new ones, using for this weapon parts that were available on the free market. And in 1986, in just 15 days of work, he created his own 5, 56 mm rifle chambered for 5, 56 × 45 mm NATO, which he named "Fort Ellis". And he made it, of course, not from scratch, but using parts of such rifles as AR-15, M14, M16, M60 machine gun, AK47 machine gun, in a word, what his hands reached, then it went into business. And it should be noted that his rifle … turned out.
And not only it turned out, but it turned out to be truly unique, since it is much simpler than the AR-15 and all other models, but at the same time it is not inferior to them in terms of combat effectiveness. That is, for mass armament, it is more profitable than the same M16. Much of his design is just "cubes" that he put together. So, for example, the flash suppressor on the barrel was taken from the M60 machine gun. The gas vent on the barrel and the gas piston were borrowed from the M14 automatic rifle, the barrel from the AR15 rifle, and the pistol grip and stock from the M16. And from the AR-15 was taken a flat magazine for 20 rounds, trigger and the entire bolt group, that is, almost all the main parts.
But then the original design of the author of the rifle went further. To begin with, having located the gas outlet from the M14 on the barrel, Ellis did not pass his bolt-pusher piston under the barrel, but brought it to its right side, where it moves under the barrel casing. The shutter from the AR-15 is turned 45 degrees to the right, respectively, and its tube, into which hot gases from the barrel enter in the original, is tightly welded, because the pusher rod now abuts into it, which, in turn, is acted upon by the gas piston during a short stroke … The bolt, as in the original rifle, is not rigidly attached to the bolt handle. The bolt handle is welded to a metal bar with a through hole drilled in it, through which the push rod goes back and forth. That is, the bolt is by itself, and the handle is by itself, and they only interact when you cocking the bolt yourself, and when the pusher rod acts on it, it remains motionless. In fact, this is the design of the same AR-15, but only equipped with a gas piston instead of directly acting on the shutter with powder gases.
USM designer, as well as the receiver of the store, located in a homemade case on the left side. Moreover, the pistol grip from the early model AR-15 (without a protrusion under the finger) is located where it should be, that is, from below under the cylindrical receiver, and is connected to the trigger body with screws. This part is attached to the receiver in two places, with a spring-loaded lock at the back and a T-shaped stop at the front. Inside the cylindrical receiver there is a return spring and a buffer - everything like the AR-15 and M16.
Since the trigger has now changed its position with the trigger, the designer introduced a pusher lever into it, which presses on the sear instead of the trigger, but from its impact, after which the entire trigger works as expected. Accordingly, the magazine is also inserted on the left, by analogy with the power supply of the German FG-42 rifle, in which the magazine was also inserted on the left.
So, on the left of the receiver is a magazine receiver, combined in the same case with a trigger and a pistol grip, on the right of the receiver there is a tide under the bolt handle, but where are the casings extracted? And they are extracted through the hole at the bottom, which opens when the bolt carrier moves back. And this is convenient, by the way, since they do not fly in the face of their neighbors and cannot hit someone by the collar.
There are no sights on the rifle, but there are two racks on which the Picatinny rail is welded, which allows you to install any sights on it. On the body of the trigger there is also the following "proprietary" designation of this rifle: "Cal 5.56 m / m FORT ELLIS / ABINGTON PA 3-15 / 1986 / XR86 №.0001".
Her stock is ordinary, plastic, again from the early M16 sample, which can be easily removed from the pipe, which contains the mainspring. True, the author added two fixing metal plates to it and to the butt.
It is known that its creator fired about 860 shots from it, and only on one of the last did the bottom of the cartridge case come off, but this is more a cartridge defect, not a rifle. In general, the designer turned out to be a very simple and cheap rifle for total war, although why he made it himself is unknown!
P. S. Not so long ago, the rifle was put up for auction with a starting price of $ 3,750 - $ 5,000, but whether it was sold or not, there is no information.
