Recently received an older Mini that was owned by a departed friend. It is in good not great shape, shoots all over. I know that this isn t suppose to be a rifle of great accuracy by any stretch, but it should be better.
Where is the best place to go to get info on tightening this thing up? It has value to me as it was from a good friend, so selling it off really isn t an option, but I want to be able to shoot and hit with it.

they do make a little gizmo to put on the front of the barrel that is suppose to help tighten them up.
I would do a google search. The new ones are suppose to be a lot better due to heavier barrels etc.

Check out perfectunion,

Correct on both points.

Well I had one, mine was a Ranch Rifle, minute of grape fruit at 100 yards was all it would do, I ended up sending it to Chief AJ back when he was gunsmithing. he did his thing on it, including a new barrel. It shot well after that, but like a lot of things I sold it for some reason. My guess find a gunsmith that works on them, chances are a trigger job and a new barrel will get it shooting decent. There was a time when it really was hit and miss with ruger barrels. Not so the last 20 or so years.

This, but before you get carried away I'll mention a couple things I've noticed dealing with them.

1-Stay away from bipods. They tend to torque the gas block which also torques the barrel.

2-Add one of those aftermarket muzzle brakes. The weight on the end of the barrel seems to tame the vibrations of that thin barrel.


3-While not as accurate as the AR platform, the ergonomics are much better, IMHO. I'd much rather carry a Mini afield than an AR when handling characteristics come into play. Most of my complaint is based in the heigbt of the AR action. The Mini is much more like your average sporting rifle in handling.

http://accu-strut.com/pages/accurizing.htm
Thanks guys, the info you gave above led me to this site, I will try the strut for sure and report back on any improvements.
Minute of grapefruit! exactly!
Bruin, yes I like how the rifle feels/handles, to my taste its much quicker on target to me than AR, now I just have to be able to hit them.
Thanks

Yeah, what Skot said.
A buddy if mine did these things to his Mini 14 and it went from a grapefruit to a plum size group. Good enough for most duties. The Mini isn't a varmint rifle after all.

I'll ad my vote for perfectunion - they have a section just on the mini: http://www.perfectunion.com/vb/ruger-mini-14-mini-30/

and there is a vendor section for Great West Gunsmithing - (gundoc) that has a lot of info as well. If that guy is still smithing, he seems to do miracles with them: http://www.perfectunion.com/vb/great-west-gunsmithing/

First thing I would suggest, is that the older ones had a 1 in 7 twist barrel which likes heavier bullets than the common 55 gr. stuff. Try some 69 grain ammo first. Another is the orfice in the gas block. Gundoc and others make smaller orfices to tame down the action a bit, which won't throw the empties as far, and may help accuracy as well.

Ruger's website has manuals available for download, by serial number range, that should give you the twist rate for your barrel.

There are a lot of "fixes" for them which can go from mild to wild and pricey. Start with an ammo change and work from there.

Myron

The Mini is the US Made AK.

It shoots every time.

You can drive yourself insane looking for AR accuracy from a Mini.

Put a dot sight on it and use it for home defense. That's where it will shine.

Minute of Grapefuit is fine accuracy inside a house.


BMT

Also look into getting an adjustable gas block.
Keeps the brass from busting windshields and going on holiday.

Get an Accustrut, will help a lot.
Google is your friend

This one is a 188 series. Gun Doc did the trigger work, and supplied the smaller gas port bushing. Muzzle brake helped a lot with accuracy.
Mine likes M855 62 grain MilSurp ammo, and will give two inch or less groups all day long. Sight is a Vortex Strikefire.

Sam:

Nice looking rifle. My Mini-14 shoots 4-5" groups and I'd like to tighten it up. I've tried the Accu-strut with limited results (down form 6"). Who is "Gun Doc" and what did the work cost?

djs,
read my post above - it tells you who gundoc is and where to get the info.

Myron

I bought the ATI kit for mine. Admittedly its mostly for show but it does give it a mean look.

djs, speedsixman has the right info. Gun Doc did my trigger some years back, I forget what the cost was. The muzzle brake helped a lot, and heavier bullets are more accurate in mine than say 45 or 55 grain stuff. My handloaded 64 grain Winchesters are accurate enough for most things.

You can find a lot of good info over at perfect union website.

I bought my mini about 12 years ago. Took it out, and it was a minute of grapefruit shooter.

I made the following mods:

Trigger job
Hogue stock
Bedded and pinned the action
Downsized gas port
Torqued gas block
Shortened barrel to 16.5"
Installed recoil buffer.

It will now shoot almost to 2" with a few different types of ammo, and this gun loves winchester white box 45gr jhp's. It will keep those to about 1.5 or a little under.

I'm not picking of prarie dogs at 400 yards with it, but it is hell on jackrabbits and coyotes. I've had many a jack out there at 200 plus scoff at the mini, much to their detriment.

Handi rifle that just processes whatever crappy ammo you can throw at it without a hiccup or complaint. It wasn't a great out of the box shooter, but with a little work and not a lot of $, it shoots quite well.

I've since bought a nice little LMT AR (more or less as a FU to Feinstein and crowd, and bought that on the day she last introduced the AW ban), but will be keeping the mini.

This company can make the mini 14 shoot well but they are not cheap.

http://www.accuracysystemsinc.com/index.php

+1

I got one 10 or 20 years ago. Back when 223 was cheap, it was great fun

I gave up on the AR accuracy part.

........minute of grape fruit at ANY range> works well for the nate's ,on a boo heard.... sob's

You should tell us how inaccurate it is and people with experience will be able to tell you if that can be improved.

CLEAN THE BORE! MOST PEOPLE DON'T CLEAN MINI-14 THEY JUST SHOOT THEM. BROUGHT A USED ONE A FEW YEARS BACK, IT DIDN'T SHOOT VERY WELL NEITHER. STARTED CLEANING THE BORE ON FRIDAY NIGHT, SOAKED IT, FOAMED IT, SOAKED MORE ALL WEEKEND DIDN'T GET A CLEAN PATCH TILL TUESDAY. IT SHOT MUCH BETTER AFTER THAT, STILL NOT A TACK DRIVER BUT GOOD ENOUGH FOR WHAT I WANTED.

I have done a trigger job and replaced the barrel. shoots most of the time about 3 shot one inch groups. It will open up another inch with a hot barrel.

The Mini works great for a self defense weapon , they will do min of Hood Rats very well

Why are you SHOUTING?

Dirty bores are a problem on any rifle. It isn't the cause of most Mini 14's not shooting tight groups though.

mini 14's are a funny rifle, i understand the new ones with better barrels and so on work. Hard not to like a rifle based upon a garand or M1Carbine.
I remember shooting one years ago, that the rear sight kept falling off. It was minute of barndoor at 100yards.
Then ruger not liking hi cap mags put the kabosh on them for a long time. And for the same amount of money you can buy any variety of ar15 that will most likely outshoot it, and cheaper cost mags.
Having said that, I might know where there is an unfired Arizona highway patrol commemorative mini14, new in the box. Often wondered about shooting it or carrying it in a vehcile with that big ol DPS badge embedded in the buttstock. No idea how it shoots.

The mini just has too many things rattling around against the barrel. The original skinny barrel ones typically average around 3-4 MOA. And while that's nothing to write home about, it's accurate enough to hit most things you're ever going to shoot at.

The new ones have barrels that are shorter and much fatter under the handguards to dampen all that vibration, so they're more accurate.

I consider the Mini a sporting rifle that can double as a defensive rifle. It's not a true military grade rifle, and they're not as reliable as an AR, or other major military rifles.

But they are probably the most reliable commercial sporting semi auto ever built. They're light years ahead of the Remington 740 series, BAR's and even the Remington 8 & 81 (which is saying something, because those were pretty good).

What I love about the mini is first the magazine. It's everything the AR magazine should have been. The factory 20 & 30 round Ruger magazines are just flawless. Next is the light weight, and the handling. They're much nicer to carry than an AR because the AR has such a tall action. The mini is much more like carrying a bolt rifle, just slim and sleek. So they tend to handle like a "real" rifle, which is very nice.

For a fighting rifle, I prefer the M1 Carbine over the mini because they're more reliable and generally a bit tougher; they truly are military grade. If you feed the Carbine JHP's then they're a good deal more effective than the .223's. But in general, the .223 is a FAR more versatile cartridge, so the mini makes more sense as a general purpose rifle than the M1 Carbine and many other rifles.

Kevin, you can't be serious? The .30 carbine is a 'good deal more effective' than a .223?

This one is more accurate than my old Ranch rifle.

The .30 Carbine will make a much more severe wound if you use JHP's than the .223. JHP's, especially the Barnes are absolutely wicked in the .30 carbine. But one difference, the .30 carbine with JHP's will make a fairly impressive permanent cavity, but it doesn't develop sufficient velocity to do any damage from the stretch cavity (and truly, there are only certain parts of the body that are susceptible to stretch cavity damage).

For FMJ's the .223 is much more effective. But inside of 200 yards, the .30 Carbine will typically do better on barrier penetration than the .223, but beyond 200 yards, the .223 just stomps the .30 carbine.

The .30 carbine is a downright decent round, but it's very limited in what it can do; not nearly as versatile as the .223.

Kev, we have to part company on a .30 carbine burning a bigger hole than a .223...

I know we both do outdoor writing, but I'd have to ask for your basis on that statement.

Do admit my ignorance on hunting animals with a .30 carbine because I never found it to perform as well as say a .223 in all applications except not tearing up something as badly.

I did ammo/load testing for ATK and some of the HP's they sent blew over a 6" hole on impact out of a .223/5.56. (Coyote. Live Target.)

Well my basis is ballistic gelatin testing I did back in the '90's (for which I actually used a 181 series mini-14). I compared the Winchester factory .30 Carbine 110 JHP to .223 FMJ and .223 55gr SP's. The Winchester .30 Carbine JHP penetrated about 14", and typically broke up into 4 pieces (typically 3 petals of the expanding nose, and the base). The petals generally penetrated around 6-10 inches (depending on size), and the base would go about 14".

The .223's I tried back then (both 55 grain) typically penetrated around 9-10". At about 4" the FMJ would yaw, break in half and the two pieces would travel around 9-10". The SP opened up and typically severely fragmented inside of 3" and penetration was generally 5-8 inches at most. So the Carbine's wound cavities under those conditions were greater. The base and fragments of the .30 caliber projectiles were larger than those of the .223, and they penetrated further; so the Carbine produced a larger wound.

Now I was testing the two loads as an urban defense cartridge, so it was a rather limited test. I fired into the blocks from about 20 yards away, which really doesn't help out a 55 grain .223 SP; I think you can pretty much expect a SP would blow up that close. The FMJ's did pretty much what you'd expect them to do, and performed very well.

Now honestly, this testing I did was a LONG time ago, and things have changed. There are more effective loads for .223's, and now there's the previously mentioned Barnes bullet for the .30 Carbine (as loaded by Cor-Bon) is a much better bullet than the old Winchester JHP. But I tend to find that most people who pick up a .223 for defense, generally stoke their weapons with 55 grain FMJ's. Some will stoke it with M855's. The Winchester or Barnes JHP's out of the Carbine will produce nastier wounds than either FMJ load in the .223 out to 150 yards or maybe a little more. And if both use FMJ's, inside of 200 yards, barrier penetration is typically better. So there are times where the carbine can be better; but it's a small window. (Since the Barnes bullet is a solid copper, I�m sure it would have the same penetration characteristics of a FMJ. The Winchester 110gr JHP is a semi-jacket, so it will deform if it hits a barrier). The Cor-Bon/Barnes load in the .30 Carbine really gives the little Carbine some impressive teeth.

So it's not exactly an apples to apples comparison. I did that because you're constantly hearing people talk about how impotent the .30 Carbine is, yet most are quite happy with the performance of the 55 or 62 grain FMJ's out of a .223. So with a change to JHP ammo, the .30 carbine can be the better round at ranges under 200 yards. Again, admittedly not an apples to apples comparison.

So as I see it, there's a narrow window in which the .30 Carbine CAN be the better cartridge. For urban defense, the .30 carbine properly loaded can be an ideal self defense weapon. As a general cartridge, the .223 is a much better cartridge because it performs well out to much greater distances.

For a defensive rifle, I�d take a good AR over the Carbine. But if I had to choose between the Mini-14 and the M1 Carbine, I�ll take the M1 Carbine because it�s a purpose built military rifle that was built to an extremely strict quality standard. AR�s can be had with parts that hold to the same standards. But the Mini-14 is NOT a military rifle and has never been built to a military standard regardless of how much it looks like a Garand/M14.

I thought I read that for a good while it was the most produced and distributed US military rifle so it must have had some merits.

Has anyone ever made a .30 Carbine upper for an AR?

Yes it was, but the M16 finally surpassed it in numbers. I have personally seen an M1 Carbine with a 6.7 million serial number. I don't know what the absolute number was, and I'm not sure anyone really knows. But we know it was close to 7 million carbines built in just 4 years.

The Carbine is unique in that it has worked perfectly from day one. It's one of the only major military weapons that didn't have any problems whatsoever and needed to be de-bugged. Most rifles have issues related to materials and manufacture that need to be worked out. The Garand initially really didn't work quite right, took a few years to de-bug. The M14 had issues, FAL had issues, AK had some serious manufacturing issues, and of course, we all know the story of the M16.

The little Carbine was so good, it has never been really considered as what it was intended to be; a personal defense weapon (PDW) and a replacement for a pistol. In that role, it holds up damn well even today. But it has always been compared to general issue infantry weapons where it tends to fall short because of its cartridge.

I wanna say Olympic Arms made one years ago, and someone else, but I don't remember who.

The good old .30 carbine just doesn't get the respect it deserves. Loaded with expanding bullets it has plenty punch. Under 100 yards I'd take a .30 carbine over a .223 every time.

Noise can be fixed. Ever shake an AK?


You have to be joshing. So you're in hostile territory, able to carry only one long gun, you're gonna throw down your Mini because there's a .30 Carbine laying there available? Just can't see that playing out.


No. "Effective" projectiles for the 5.56/.223 are endless.


You're kinda going in both directions on this. Whatever......for a "rifle" to carry the civilian designed Mini-14 .223 just is not being bested by a .30 Carbine "military" design or not. Granted the 110 HP at carbine velocity puts it past the bad guy killin .357 110gr or 125gr but still not in the class of the 5.56/.223

I've had three M1 carbines, and none of them were as reliable as the Mini-14s I've had, NONE. Period.

Yep, the M1 is better made, but not more reliable, at least in my own experiences.

Maybe you can�t understand it, but I can. The Mini 14 is a great little rifle, and makes a great sporting/defensive weapon, but talk to people who have been to the carbine classes and ask how well the Mini�s hold up over several days of heavy use. It�s just NOT a military grade weapon. I sense you just don�t get the difference between a military and a non-military rifle. The mini-14 has never been exposed to the constant use and abuse of a major military. It has never been drug through one war, let alone dozens.

Military service will expose every flaw in a weapon�s design, manufacture, and materials. The Mini-14 has NEVER had that.
Now compare that to the M1 carbine. I personally will take reliability every time, and the mini just isn�t anywhere near as reliable or durable as the M1 Carbine. The Mini 14 has failed every military trial it�s ever been in due to reliability and parts breakage (dig around in Daniel Watter�s excellently researched �5.56x45 timeline found here: http://www.thegunzone.com/556dw.html ). Just stop and think�how many militaries or military units have used the Mini-14 or AC556? Then ask yourself why that is?

So you just go on believing the mini is a better rifle because it looks like more of a big boys gun than the M1 Carbine; looks are deceiving. But everywhere in this world where you find armed conflict you�ll find an M1 Carbine; they�re proven in the worst of environments. And the mini�s tend to not hold up in carbine courses where the only adversity is just a high round count. The SKS is vastly superior to the Mini-14 also, again; military grade...they don�t malfunction and they don�t break.

I think you need to study up on what kind of testing and abuse military rifles go through, and then think for a minute�if you were to go into battle, would you want an un-tested civilian rifle that has never seen battle, or one that�s fully tested and has been used in every major conflict around the world since WWII?
The only thing the mini has over the M1 Carbine is the cartridge. So if I want a .223 rifle for combat, I�ll take an AR built as close to military spec as I can get. But if I have to choose between the mini and the Carbine (again, for fighting), then the Carbine will get the nod every time.

I can't even imagine such a thing. Did you have bad magazines? Loose gas piston nuts? Were they commercial Carbines?

Postal Meter and IBM, and a Universal. Perhaps the magazines were bad, but I worked in a gun shop at the time, and swapped out a couple that gave me fits, and by cracky, the "new" GI mags gave me fits, too. 15 rounders, not 30s.
I've just been snake-bit with M1 carbines.

However, I've owned 4 Mini-14s (bought two, won one in a raffle, and inherited one) and shot umpty-gazillion rounds thru them, with nary a gag or choke, without factory Ruger magazines, at that.
The first Mini-14 (181 series) shot quite well, the second was pitiful, and the third and fourth weren't anything to write home about, either.
I'm glad they're gone from the house, frankly, and at today's prices, I'd rather have an AR despite the handling, which is where a Mini shines.

I'm not bagging on the Mini-14, I really love the things. My first .223 was a stainless 181 with a wood handguard and I'd gladly give a testicle to have it back now. And I've never had any problems with the Mini either, but then again I've never really driven one hard.

Back in '84-'85 I worked for a small arms importer (actually it was several companies under the same roof) called Pacific International. We imported 7,000 M1 Carbines form China, and 4,000 from Israel, and I was the lucky SOB that got to go through each and every one. I got pretty good at working on the Carbine. But I have to say, it was very rare to find one's that didn't work. And consider, these were ex-military carbines that had been drug through at least one war, if not two before they were dipped in cosmoline and put on the shelf for a few decades.

The Chinese ones were pretty rough, but most were in working order. Some needed a new recoil spring, and most needed a new finish. There were some that had hand made replacement parts. There was an M2 that cracked me up. Someone had whittled out a bolt, but put the extractor right on the very top of the bolt, so it would have ejected ever case right into your forehead...hahaha.

The Israeli one's were in VERY nice condition, I'm betting most had been carried at the most, but probably never saw action in the Israeli independence war because they had most of their finish intact.

Bummer you had bad luck with your carbines, that's really odd; you just don't see that. You ever come out west, I'll let you play with mine; just too much fun.

Bad mags are the plague of the Carbine. Great little rifle, so light and handy. It was designed as a replacement for people carrying a 1911. Never really intended for a front line or full auto tool. The book War Baby tells the rapid development and production of the carbine - very interesting.

I guess it's a good thing I have the .30 Carbine option covered as well.

The little Carbine was so good, it has never been really considered as what it was intended to be; a personal defense weapon (PDW) and a replacement for a pistol. In that role, it holds up damn well even today. But it has always been compared to general issue infantry weapons where it tends to fall short because of its cartridge.

It was intended to replce a 1911 for support troops, but was often put in other roles. The irony is the m16 rifle was to be the replacement for the carbine until "the whizz kids" under johnson got ahold of the idea, to protect air force bases.
The carbine is the ONLY rifle starting it's life as a semi auto that became a select fire late in the war. Over 7million of them were made, estimates at less than 1million roughly left in the world. And now they are being manufactured with forges recievers like the orginal. I think ten different manufacturers during the war, something like 1400 parts suppliers, and yes they were and are an effective rifle.
I am kind of a carbine whore among other things you might say.
The barnes or hornady bullet puts a different spin on them.
I have never understood why someone would wet their pants at the thought of a HK MP5 shooting a 9mm bullet at about 1300fps, but turn their nose up at a carbine firing the same weight bullet at just under 2000fps. Makes a lot of sense doesn't it?
And a lot of that poppycock about then not penetrating, shoot one some time. It could be in korea skinny chinese in winter clothing they were not getting good hits on the chinese. And they were NEVER intended to shoot five hundred meters. Oh, wait a minute. How much energy does that poodle shooter bullet have left at five hundred meters.
To each his own.
The fire control group in the garand and carbine was appreciated by others. Ever compare them to another widely produced rifle?
The a.k.47?
you put a carbine on a folding stock with two 30round mags, you have a LOT of firepower.

geez, first it's the beard, then the hat, then a fondness for knives, then the carbines. Are you a long lost relative?
the only problem i see is you have those spare mags mounted on the wrong side.

Mini-14 can be tuned into a tack driver. Never said it was cheap, but what a fine rig it can become.

DF

there is war baby one and war baby two, by the way. The mag thing has to do with aftermarket cheapo mags. I have NEVER had a problem with a military mag, which are getting harder to find these days, particularly in the 30round type. Those require a certain mag release that helps support the mag by the way. Without that catch, the 30rounders have a tendency to fall out.
I can't really imagine it either as to the reliability issue except for one thing. By the time most people would get their hands on a carbine, not knowing in general anything about them, most were used hard and put away wet. It is NOT a fair representation to complain about them after 50 years of being dragged around by little brown/yellow people.
There are some carbines out there that are in close to factory new condition, stored by the military for years, such as the "white bag" carbines. But you ain't gonna find anybody wanting to sell one easily or cheaply either for that matter.
might add the gvt was not particularly fond of releasing carbines after the war. Thus the "duffle bag" bringbacks. When they did turn some loose it was years later and declared unfit for service. Which is a crock because i ran across one of those last year sold through the NRA years ago, that was basically brand new. What did happen is after the war there were a lot of parts circulating and people were building them with cast recievers, such as alpine, universal, and so on, which are generally crud. They were not military at all. One of the interesting things is tho, cmp was selling barreled recievers a few years ago, rumor being they were returned from south america, and cmp only had access to stuff returned as lend lease.
They were selling universal barreled recievers i think for 50bucks a piece. Interesting how they got in the pipeline as they were never military. C.I.A. maybe?

My experience mirrors yours exactly. I've had three M1 Carbines, and all of them occasionally flubbed, and that's with FMJ. I've had two Mini-14s, and both were super reliable. More accurate, too.

Good post. Carbine mags are better quality than M16 magazines, so I don't understand the comment about bad mags. Even the GI 30 rounders were somewhat less than perfect suffering from the same malady of the 30 round M16 mag; straight then curved. But my two GI 30 rounders are very reliable, but they are never allowed to get "battlefield" dirty.

In my case, two were Iver Johnson, and one was military surplus, Inland.

Same here. Exactly as you say.

Universal didn't do the M-1 rep. any favors.

My brother had a Universal. I had the Iver Johnsons, one standard, and one WWII commemorative.

My carbine is a Universal and I'd put it up against ANY other carbine for accuracy. From the sound of it, it is more accurate than most older Mini-14s. It will stove pipe every now and then but I attribute that to the low scope mount.

I can tell you one story about a carbine, friend of mine now deceased found one in a stream in vietnam. Took it to the navy armorer who cleaned it up, put in the magic parts, and cut the buttstock. Dave put a leather thong on the handle, looped it over his neck, with a 30round mag. He called it his "whore" house gun when visiting various establishments.

neither universal or the iver johnson were military guns, both aftermarket.
The later universals are different than the original design, and personally i wouldn't fire one.

I would love to own one of the military carbines, just don't see them much anymore.

http://www.m1carbinesinc.com/carbine_universal.html

a good writeup on the universal.
The military ones around but they suffer as said before of being used hard and put away wet in many many conflicts. But good ones are still floating around if you know what to look for.
Generally a WWII or korean war vet dies, and the grandkids hock the gun for a few bucks.
There have been some released through CMP that were arsonal rebuilt by the military in the early 50's and stored all those years, refered to as "white bag" carbines for the storage method.
They are basically brand new.
The ones given to the germans in 1945 and brought back a few y ears ago are also in pretty good condition, as are the italian "F.A.T." carbines.

the sorry part of it is i have often thought about taking a military reciever and rebarreling with spec parts. The way i figure it, about 1000bucks to get it done.
I have seen ads in shotgun news where a company is making forged recievers with criterion barrels and selling them for around that price. The are suppose to be military spec. on the parts.

well kevin, I am the second person that went through a bunch of those israeli carbines. They were sold to various law enforcement agencies and a sheriff's department turned them in to get different stuff. I spent quite a bit of time cherrypicking parts out of them to repart parts to the reciever manufacturer. Quite fun.

Looking like or not looking like a "big boy's gun" has no more to do with it than believing or disbelieving because a gun writer said it. You're still talking about a carbine that was and is a substitute for a handgun. And the only militaries using it, outside the U.S., used it because we gifted it. None of them adopted it as their standard weapon and ordered new product. Somehow I believe Ruger could win that bid. The mil-spec .30 uses a lead core FMJ round nose 110gr bullet at less than 2000fps having about the same bc as a sewing thimble, not a handloaded Barnes hollowpoint. That load is on the absolute low end of rifle performance in a military rifle and that's generous. As close to mil-spec as the Ruger has come, far as I know, is the GB. From a ballistic standpoint the current military loaded SS109 in the GB is actually a rifle round. Try running those two loads side by side thru gelatin, steel helments, wool robes or anything else. If you're saying the GB is so far behind the .30 Carbine in reliability that the carbine wins the contest as a battle weapon in whatever form the battle may take, that just looks like an awful stretch. And as far as the SKS goes I'd say the 7.62x39 in battle form being run thru a semi-auto that cycles in practically any environment with at least a 10rnd magazine is a step above a GB and so far ahead of the .30 carbine as to be in another time zone. Carrying what amounts to a long barrelled pistol with a short stock as a chosen battle weapon over a rifle still sounds weak.

I had a stainless 181 series Mini-14.

It shot pie plates at 100 yards with mil spec ammo, but groups got down to about 3.5 MOA if I loaded ammo down to .222 spec. (probably better, but it wasn't scoped)

50 grain bullets at 2600 fps turned it into a decent shooter.

It's been a long time, but I used a lot of H322 in the .223 back then, so I'd guess that's what most of the ammo was loaded with.

The Mini cycled fine with the downloaded ammo.

As for the .30 Carbine, I like those that you can carry in your pocket.

Cool.

PS That thumb safety was added on to make it legal to import to the US.

PPS The bottleneck cartridges it shoots are cool, too. If they were available in modern JHP, they'd be awesome at 1,300 fps.

1300 is a poot load in a 7.62X25.

100 grain Hornady XTP's are no trouble to take to 1550.

Even better.

The Ruger Blackhawk in 30 carbine was fun to shoot.
Wish I still had it.

I've been to the range when one was being fired. Talk about flash and blast!