FRI | OCTOBER 18, 2024

Huk recognizes that fall brings cooler temperatures and new opportunities on the water. Huk designed the Tide Point Collection for all anglers looking for a performance-packed button-down. The lightweight polyester fabric is essential for a breathable, quick-drying, moisture-wicking shirt.
Leupold & Stevens, Inc. announces the new-for-2024 Mark 4HD has been given the Caliber Award for “Best New Optic” by the National Association of Sporting Goods Wholesalers (NASGW) and the Professional Media Outdoor Association (POMA). Leupold & Stevens was presented with the award at the annual NASGW meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 15 in Kansas City.
Winchester Ammunition and White Flyer will have a commanding presence at the 2024 National Sporting Clays Association (NSCA) Championship, October 19-27, the culmination of a full year of intense competitions throughout the country.

Congratulations to Team Vihtavuori’s Chad Heckler on winning the International Precision Rifle Federation (IPRF) World Championship in the Limited Division. Heckler represented the United States Precision Rifle Association Centerfire Team for the victory.
Registration for the Civilian Marksmanship Program’s (CMP) Three-Position Air Rifle Postal Championship is now open. The annual competition is designed for junior athletes involved in 4-H, Scouts, American Legion, club or JROTC sporter and precision air rifle programs.
Fiocchi congratulates Rachel Barringer on her success at the 2024 World Skeet Championships, where she claimed multiple prestigious titles.

SLG2, Inc. will be making a stop with its Shoot Like A Girl experience at Bass Pro Shops in Ashland, VA.
It was a night of appreciation in Kansas City as the National Association of Sporting Goods Wholesalers (NASGW) kicked off its 50th Expo with the Annual Appreciation Dinner. The festivities included honoring current and past board members, President Kenyon Gleason's 10th anniversary, and a farewell to NASGW's SCOPE program director Easton Kuboushek.
Target Sports USA announcef the addition of Jonathan Klein as the new Controller. Jon brings a wealth of experience from his previous roles at Dur-A-Flex, where he served as Assistant Controller, and Sherwin Williams, where he was an Accounting Manager for the High-Performance Flooring division.

DeSantis Gunhide introduces a new holster fit for the H&K CC9 pistol, the #137 Slim-Tuk. This is a minimalist IWB holster fashioned from Kydex that can be configured for left- or right-handed users.
Target Sports USA, in partnership with Hornady Ammunition, congratulates Josh and Josiah, the winners of The Hunt 2024. Their unforgettable adventure took them to the breathtaking Three Forks Luxury Ranch Resort in Colorado, where they embarked on a professionally guided elk hunt through the week of October 7th to the 11th.
The Beretta 92G Elite LTT was built in partnership with Ernest Langdon of Langdon Tactical Technology as the ‘Ultimate 92 Package’, incorporating many features from across the 90 series line, including the Vertec/M9A3 slide and M9A1 Frame that Beretta enthusiasts have always loved. In honor of 92 Day, September 2nd, Beretta will now be offering the 92G Elite series of pistols already customized by LTT directly to retailers.
DIVA-WOW, the worldwide sisterhood that provides a warm, inclusive, and supportive environment where women come together to celebrate their love for outdoor sports, hunting, fishing, and the outdoor lifestyle – no matter their skill level, announced today it has forged a unique partnership with Hunter Outdoor Communications.
Blaser is pleased to announce Austin Kiemsteadt as the newest member of Team Blaser. A resident of Missouri City, Texas, Kiemsteadt is a recent graduate of Texas A&M University, where he shot on the National Championship shooting team for four years.
Hornady® is proud to announce its lineup of new and technologically advanced products for 2025. The new ammunition, bullet, reloading and security products will be available from stocking dealers, major retail sporting goods stores and their websites.

Faxon Firearms announces a comprehensive lineup of barrels, firearms, and complete upper receiver groups for Hornady’s new .338 ARC cartridge, revealed at the NASGW Expo in Kansas City.
Introducing Winchester Supreme Optics, a new line of sport optics that includes binoculars, spotting scopes, range finders, and riflescopes.
ALPS Brands adds a new product to the company’s recently launched Evolution Merino line of performance outdoor apparel with the introduction of the Evolution Merino 250 Quarter-Zip shirt.

ALPS Brands has launched a new apparel series designed specifically for high-activity outdoor adventure. The all-new Evolution Merino 150 series base-layer shirts are made from 100-percent certified, ethically sourced Woolmark Merino wool.
In celebration of SAF’s 50th anniversary, Guns.com has announced a limited-edition T-shirt run with a portion of proceeds benefiting the Second Amendment Foundation’s legal efforts.
NSSF announced that A Girl & A Gun Women’s Shooting League has become an official partner of NSSF’s First Shots program, the introductory and refresher target-shooting program made available through host target-shooting ranges across the country.

Earlier this month, AG Composites made waves in the outdoor and hunting communities by announcing a bold initiative: a series of extreme torture tests on its innovative carbon fiber stocks. But these aren’t just any tests; they are designed to push the limits of durability and strength like never before.
The Wildcat CRX crossbow from Barnett reaffirms the company’s commitment to producing technologically advanced, deadly, effective crossbows that will not drain hunters’ wallets this season.
Taurus Rebate Season is officially here. From now through January 15, 2025, you can take advantage of exclusive rebates designed to make owning a Taurus even more rewarding.

GunBroker announce an exclusive sweepstakes giveaway, offering enthusiasts a chance to win a Weatherby Mark V Accumark rifle worth $2,199. Participants can enter the sweepstakes by visiting GunBroker Sweepstakes Page and filling out a simple entry form.
 

‘Light rifle’ is a term we don’t hear very often these days. We have the “assault rifle,” the battle rifle, and the infantry automatic rifle, but the wee light rifle as a concept doesn’t get discussed much. That’s likely because there is only one really worth mentioning, the M1 Carbine. The M1 Carbine won the light rifle competition in 1942 and went on to serve its country around the world. There hasn’t been much mention of light rifles as a genre ever since, but I think we might be seeing a revitalization of the concept of the light rifle.

The M1 Carbine is the original Light Rifle (Wikimedia Commons)

 

What is a Light Rifle?

A light rifle, as epitomized by the M1 Carbine, isn’t a pistol-caliber carbine or an intermediate rifle. It fires a real rifle caliber between your typical pistol cartridge and an intermediate rifle round. The .30 Carbine is a perfect light rifle round and exemplifies the concept. In the modern era, no one is taking advantage of the cool .30 Carbine round except for companies still producing M1 Carbine replicas.

A light rifle should be relatively lightweight and compact, even in an era of modern AR carbines. It’s designed to be light, handy, and easily used in and out of vehicles. Something you can toss over your shoulder and forget about. These guns should be semi-automatic with detachable magazines and modern ammo capacities.

The ‘LC’ in Ruger’s LC Carbine stands for light carbine…right?

Its effective range is about 300 yards max, but it’s probably best used within 200 yards. Typically, we want flat-shooting performance out to 150 yards. In a perfect world without the hated NFA, we wouldn’t be limited to 16-inch barrels either, so for that reason, a light rifle could have a barrel of around 10 inches, but not one longer than 16 inches. Maybe we’re not only talking about light rifles here, but also large pistols…that’s for you to decide.

The Modern Light Rifle Cartridge

With all the above in mind, what exactly does a modern light rifle look like? A lot of the light rifle’s use case relies on the cartridge it fires. In 2024 one of the best light rifle cartridges would arguably be the 5.7x28mm. The .30 Carbine and M1 Carbine as a whole was designed to arm troops who weren’t on the front lines. It was smaller and lighter than an M1 Garand, but offered a lot more punch than a M1911.

In the 1990s, NATO wanted a personal defense weapon, specifically a platform that functioned like the M1 Carbine. It armed noncombat troops with something better than a pistol but lighter than a rifle. The program resulted in the FN P90and HK MP7. The P90 seemed to be the more successful weapon, and the 5.7x28mm cartridge has gained a fair bit of popularity ever since.

The PS90 is certainly a light rifle, and the P90 is a PDW variant.

The 5.7x28mm round is roughly the length of a large pistol round. It’s small enough to fit inside a pistol grip and uses a spitzer-type projectile and a bottlenecked cartridge. From a rifle, the round can reach 200 yards with a reasonably flat trajectory. It also has excellent penetration up close. The little 5.7 bullet won’t be confused for a medium game cartridge, but it’s been effective on coyotes and even small hogs.

The 5.7x28mm cartridge isn’t the only option, though. There’s also 4.6x30mm, although I think only two guns on the civilian market use it: the pricey Tommy Built TP7 and the CMMG FourSix AR. One could argue the 10mm, in certain loads, isn’t far from the .30 Carbine.

The CMMG FourSix is one of the few 4.6mm carbines.

The 10mm round in a 16-inch barrel can get a 180-grain Buffalo Bore round moving at up to 1,600 to 1700 feet per second. That’s not far from the 110-grain .30 Carbine round at 1,990 feet per second. The little 10mm might be this realm’s most common ammo option.

The New Trend

This idea has been bouncing around in my head for quite some time. What spurred me to explore it further was the release of the KelTec SUB2000 in 5.7x28mm and the Ruger LC Carbine in 10mm Auto. Both guns fit the concept of a modern light rifle well. Both are lightweight, compact, and capable of reaching 200 yards or so.

Of course, they aren’t the only examples. There’s the semi-automatic FN PS90 with its bullpup format. There are numerous ARs from CMMG in all sizes and in calibers like 5.7x28mm, 10mm, and the previously mentioned 4.6x30mm. The M1 Carbine could still fill the role as well. I think having a folding stock, or in KelTec’s case, an entire folding gun, makes the gun more adept than light rifles.

The KelTec SUB 2000 in 5.7 is a solid contender for best light rifle due to its folding design.

The purpose of such a gun in the civilian context is simple. It’s lightweight, easy to store, and easy to carry. It offers more range than your typical pistol caliber carbine. The rounds tend to have better penetration and overall ballistics. It could be a camp rifle or truck gun. It would also be a great tool for someone who is recoil-sensitive.

Outside of the 10mm rifles, the 5.7 and 4.6 rounds have near rimfire levels of recoil with centerfire reliability. The .30 Carbine tends to be a fairly soft shooter as well. The 10mm rifles aren’t bad, depending on the configuration. The CMMG Banshee series with their radial delayed blowback systems is very soft-shooting, but anything straight blowback can have 5.56-like recoil.

The 10mm LC Carbine could qualify as a light carbine, but its got a bit more recoil than the other options.

The light rifle concept has little if any military application these days. It seems to be purely a civilian concept.

A Worthwhile Cause?

Like many firearms concepts, the light rifle is held back by cost. The guns and ammo are more expensive, and the concept’s benefits aren’t great enough to warrant the additional cost for most people. Things like the KelTec SUB2000 in 5.7 offer a lower barrier to entry, but the ammo price can still be a hassle.

It might be a silly little idea, but if I can get ahold of a SUB2000 in 5.7x28mm, you can look forward (or not) to me testing the concept and seeing if it holds water…or if I’m just bloviating about something silly.

—Travis Pike

Editor’s Note: This piece first appeared in our companion service Shooting News Weekly 

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