It’s no secret to anyone that knows me. I like guns. As a matter of fact, you could say I love guns. I love the mechanics of firearms. I love the challenge of putting that little piece of copper-jacketed lead onto a small target so far away that I couldn’t even see it without a scope.
I love taking an old, beat-up, rusty gun and breathing new life into it by refinishing and repairing it. I love the smell of the powder when I shoot guns.
I love the noise. I love the flash of the powder as it leaves the muzzle (it’s especially cool at night as you can see in the picture below of me firing my Draco AK47 pistol).
Unfortunately, though, many people never get to know the joy and thrill of firing a loud, powerful, firearm.
From the biggest, baddest, handgun, to the most elegant and beautifully engraved hunting rifle or even just a boring ol’ “black rifle” (AKA the AR15), firearms come in all shapes and sizes (and calibers).
P.A.K blank firing guns have the look, weight, feel, and sound of a real gun, but without the projectile (unless you want them to, i.e. live fire conversion).
Just in case you don’t know, “P.A.K” stands for “pistole automatik knall”, which is German for “automatic blank pistol”. There are also revolver versions for those of you that are into revolvers. But for me, I prefer the semi and full-auto versions.
There are about 18 different manufacturers of blank firing guns, 20 models of which are convertible. Some of these blank gun manufacturers also manufacture real firearms as well.
Makers like Taurus, who makes a model LOM-13, 9mm P.A.K caliber revolver based on their model 905 revolver. The blank firing gun is made from steel, just like a real gun. This blank gun is VERY easily converted to fire live ammunition.
In my state, in my country, converting the SEMI AUTOMATIC blank gun to fire live ammunition would be perfectly legal.
However, converting the fully automatic blank firing gun to live fire would be illegal for the average citizen.
There are certain licenses you can get to become a gun maker that can make NFA weapons, but they can only be sold to military and law enforcement.
Private Citizens in the United States CAN buy and privately own fully automatic weapons. The catch is that we can’t buy any NEW ones. We can only buy those manufactured before 1986(?).
I’m 99.999% sure that year is correct. Because of that law, although it IS legal to own full autos here, it is still very difficult to get them.
The reasons are that first off, there just aren’t very many of them. Maybe somewhere around 100,000 and someone already owns them.
On the occasion that someone does put one up for sell they are exorbitantly expensive. For example, a full auto AK47 or M16 runs around $25,000-30,000 dollars!
There are “cheaper” alternatives, like an Uzi with all the fixins’ for around $15,000. Or you can get a really “cheap”, Mac 10 or 11 for around “only” $8,000.
You can also buy certain parts that will make your AK or AR etc. become fully automatic, like a drop in auto sear for example. That part is considered the “machine gun”, and that is what is registered.
Those parts are still very expensive. But the upside is that you can buy a cheap AK or AR and shoot it until its dead, then buy another one and put the part in it, taa daa, new machine gun, perfectly legal.
On the other hand, if you buy a complete machine gun the receiver is what is registered. If something happens to it, if it breaks, no more machine gun.
That’s all just such a ridiculous hassle. Those prices have almost doubled in the last 7 or 8 years. I will never be able to afford one. But I can legally simulate full auto with a slide fire stock, and I have several of those.
But you can see why it might be tempting for some people to buy the blank firing gun because it’s a cheap alternative to play with and have all the sights and sounds of a real machine gun, just no bullets come out.
Unless, of course, you convert the blank firing gun to fire live ammunition.
The blank cartridge is 9×22 mm, which is shorter OVERALL than an actual 9mm Luger/9mm Parabellum cartridge. The 9mm Luger has a case dimension of 9x19mm, but then the projectile extends beyond the case.
This is why you are able to fire the .380 or .32 ACP from the blank gun. (On a side note, I find it interesting that Parabellum means “prepare for war” in Latin.)
The .380 ACP case dimension is 9x17mm, and with flat nose jacketed projectile, or a wide throated hollow point ammunition, like a Hydra-Shok, the cartridge will fit the magazine and feed. A 9×19 Luger cartridge won’t even fit in the magazine.
There is a 9x21mm cartridge, I wonder if that (or maybe even the 9x19mm for that matter) could be loaded like a wad cutter and fired from the blank gun. Probably not, because it probably wouldn’t feed.
(A wad cutter, seen on the left in the pictures to the left, is a cartridge that the bullet is seated flush with the casing, for those who didn’t know). Second from left are a semi-wad cutter, a semi-jacketed hollow point, and then a flat-nosed full metal jacket. All are .38 Special.
The same goes for the .32 ACP. It has a case length of 17.3 mm, but even it, with a round nose FMJ (full metal jacket) bullet might still be too long for the magazine.
But by using a flat nosed FMJ, or a wide throated hollow point projectile, like the Hydra-Shok (which the .32 ACP measures 23mm overall), it then would fit the magazine.
Pictured above are 3 .32 ACP cartridges. A Czech FMJ on the left, a Federal Hydra-Shok in the middle, and a Magtec hollow point on the right.
You can see the length differences in the picture below. You can also see the difference in the throat of the two hollow point projectiles.
Below are pictured several variations of the 9mm Luger cartridge, just to give you some perspective on the many configurations available of the same caliber.
From left to right are a subsonic lead round nose, a common round nose full metal jacket, a flat nose full metal jacket, a Starfire jacketed hollow point, a black talon jacketed hollow point, and then last on the right is a Winchester brand hollow point.
The next picture below shows a side view of the 9mm cartridges to see that the same caliber can come in many different total lengths.
This is something to consider when making a conversion to live fire, because some cartridges of your conversion caliber will work, while others will not.
It occurred to me that many of you may not even know what a P.A.K blank firing pistol is. Well, there are a few brands (18 or so), but the one that caught my attention was the EKOL Jackal because it looks similar to my favorite handgun, and has select fire.
Maybe it’s just me, but there’s something about fully automatic gunfire that just gets me going. I love it.
There is another EKOL blank gun, the ASI model that looks more like a sub-machine gun. But in reality it’s just a plastic cover around this pistol.
These two particular blank firing guns have a select fire switch to select semi-automatic or full automatic fire. They shoot fast too! If you have never fired a full auto weapon it’s not really that much different than firing a semi auto except that you have to maintain control of the firearm longer.
That part takes a little practice, but within just a few magazines of ammo most people can get it under control.
If you already know how to fire a weapon then you are a step ahead of the game, but to be safe I always suggest that the first time you fire a fully automatic firearm you only put five or six rounds in the magazine. That way the gun can’t really get away from you too bad.
One time a friend of mine shot one of my AK47’s on “fast fire” mode and he stepped back a few steps and the muzzle rose up to an “unsafe angle” by the time he got to round 6. Fortunately, round 6 was the last round, so no harm was done.
I can’t help but wonder if the magazine had been full, would he have had the mindset to release the trigger?
If the magazine had been full (30 rounds), and he didn’t release the trigger, then he would have fired over the berm and off into the distance. No telling what, or who, he may have hit.
He was a fairly small-framed guy. Weighed only about 140 pounds (about 65 kilograms), but he was strong for his size. He was an arborist, so he worked hard, lifted heavy chinks of wood, and swung a chainsaw all day.
But that AK, it almost ran away from him. We all got a good laugh and teased him about it.
Here is a video of the blank pistol in a configuration called the EKOL Asi:
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