I must be insane. And I blame my wife. No seriously, it's her fault. See, it all started about a week ago. I was visiting my best friend's dad to retrieve my EuroArms 1858 New Model Army Remington replica that my best friend has had for like... 5 years. He borrowed it, broke the sear and just finally got it replaced. Anyway, I was visiting my friend's dad and saw this beautiful rifle sitting on his gun rack. "Is that an HK 91?" I asked naively, as I'd never seen an HK 91 (or a G3, for that matter) in person. He clarified and instructed me that it was a CETME. Ah, I'd heard of these, but again, never have even seen a picture. I was curious, as it looked JUST like a G3/91 from Heckler & Koch. "Is it for sale?" Long story short, I left his place with both my 1858 and a CETME Model C made by Century Arms. I later learned after some research, I got a great deal on it, paying less than half of what they go for. I get my new toy home, and started doing some research. I had to find out why this thing looked so much like an HK G3.
And the answer came to me, as it will come to you all now in the form of a history lesson: Ludwig Vorgrimler, a German designer and engineer, developed the CETME rifle design for a Spanish company (oddly enough: CETME). The CETME was briefly used starting in 1958 by the Spanish army and the West German Army purchased a number of them as well (where the name G3 comes from). Beyond this, the CETME was largely commercially unsuccessful, but Heckler & Koch bought rights to the design and produce the HK 21, the G3, the G3K and even later designs such as the MP5 based on its principles. Vorgrimler was the root of all of these designs. So that explains it...
Anyway, back to the story. So I get home and start playing with the CETME, and the gears start turning. I could totally trick this thing out and make it as close to a modern G3/91 looking rifle as I could!!! I started researching and shopping for components... then my wife comes along. "What are you doing?" I then begin explaining my plot to HK-ify my CETME. "Wait, didn't you just get that? Why are you ripping it all apart? If you want an HK why don't you just build another rifle?" And we're off... why oh why hadn't I thought of that? For 30-40% additional scratch, I could have TWO .308 assault rifles instead of one and a bunch of parts... Genius! Now I just have to figure out how to build an HK 91...
... Oh dear God... there's WELDING involved!?!? Okay.. so this isn't going to be as simple as DCOA'ing a pistol, or building an AR... this is going to be some work... what the hell, I'm up for the challenge, right?
I guess we'll see... I guess I need to figure out what type of 91 I'm going to build.. 16"? 18"? Fixed stock? A3-style retractable? Oh man, what decisions to make... stay tuned!
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