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<\/a><\/p>\nFor those of you who don’t know, the CETME was designed by the Spanish government in the 50’s based on the German STG-45.\u00a0 It’s a roller delayed semi-auto .308 with a 20 round detachable magazine.\u00a0 It’s easy to see the similarity of this rifle and several H&K rifles.\u00a0 H&K actually had a hand in its development, and would use it as the bases of the G3 to the point that a large number of parts are interchangeable.<\/p>\n
Most of the CETMEs you see on the market (including this one) were imported in pieces by Century Arms.\u00a0 To get around import restrictions, Century Arms imported parts kits and built enough parts in the states to be compliant with the import laws (including, I think, the lower receiver).\u00a0 Century Arms doesn’t have exactly the best reputation in doing this well.\u00a0 Some of their rifles come out great, and some… well… not so good.\u00a0 Even though this one was in good shape, the seller included some spare parts from where he’d replaced a few bits.<\/p>\n
My initial impression of the rifle is that they went with the philosophy of “go big, or go home.”\u00a0 While the barrel is only a 16.5″ barrel, it’s set so far forward, that it feels like it’s much longer.\u00a0 This does have the benefit of a very long sight radius, considering that they placed the rear sight as far back as they could.<\/p>\n
The receiver itself is not small by any means either.\u00a0 Anyone used to being able to reach over with there index finger and pressing the mag release will be disappointed with this design.\u00a0 I found that I have to completely rove my hand from the pistol grip to reach it, which is just as well, as the magazine does take some rocking to remove.\u00a0 The original design had an AK style lever mag release, and I’m not clear if the change to a button release was a Century Arms decision or if this was a CETME originating modification.\u00a0 Since you still have to rock the magazine in a little, it requires some practice before insert the magazine becomes a smooth operation.\u00a0 The safety is also oddly designed in that easy to engage the safety from a firing position, but disengaging it is awkward.<\/p>\n
Anyone familiar with the charging handle on the G3, MP-5, etc, should feel at home with the one on this rifle.\u00a0 The handle folds away nicely when not in use.\u00a0 Of course, since you’re pulling against the massive recoil spring, it is a bit of a work out to pull it back.\u00a0 To hold the bolt open, you simply pull the charging handle back and shift it into a hold open notch.\u00a0 There is no hold open on last round option, so you have to manually charge the rifle when replacing an empty magazine.<\/p>\n
I did manage to hit the range on Sunday and try this beast out.\u00a0 It was a beautiful day, and it wasn’t nearly as hot as it has been.\u00a0 I started by trying it with the aftermarket (I think UTG) bipod that the seller threw in as part of the deal.\u00a0 I must say, considering that this was designed as a battle rifle, it is very accurate.\u00a0 It’s no sniper rifle, but I would say that it would be good enough to work as a deer rifle if you happen to live in a state where the authorities wouldn’t piss there pants at the sight of you hunting using a rifle with a 20 round magazine attached to it.<\/p>\n
The recoil is very manageable.\u00a0 I was actually surprised at how little kick it has.\u00a0 I was expecting it to be similar to my Ishipore Enfield, but it was much more of a firm push than a kick.\u00a0 I attribute this to its weight (they claim 9.5lbs, but it feels heavier), and the semi-auto action of the rifle taking the bite out of it.\u00a0 Even off hand, it was a pleasure to shoot and very easy to quickly reacquire the target after shooting.\u00a0 The Cetme (along with the G3) has a reputation for mangling its brass.\u00a0 I inspected a number of the cases after firing, and, for the most part, I failed to see any damage that I would think would cause the case to no be reloadable.<\/p>\n
One thing I do need to comment on is the speed at which the brass is ejected.\u00a0 The range I went to has chicken wire partitions in between lanes, so that the ejected cases don’t wind up hitting the guy next to you.\u00a0 The guy to my right was very happy that they were there.\u00a0 I had several round bounce off the partition on my right, then on my left, then hit my arm!<\/p>\n
All things said and done, I’m pretty happy with this rifle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On Friday, I did something that makes the anti-gun nuts skin crawl.\u00a0 I met a stranger in a parking lot and paid cash for a “high powered assault weapon.”\u00a0 No paperwork done.\u00a0 I inspected the rifle, handed him the cash, and we both went our separate ways after a hand shake. This particular acquisition is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-guns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1652\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunscarstech.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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