After posing the question yesterday, here’s the gun I would want if I had no restrictions on ammo, availability or money:
FG-42 (FallschirmGewehr Model 42)
The top is the first model — easily distinguishable by its sharply-raked pistol grip, stowable cruciform bayonet and milled receiver — and the lower is the second iteration which was sturdier and lighter, with a stamped receiver and no bayonet.
I would take either in a heartbeat.
Here’s Ian (a.k.a. Gun Jesus) first with the background story, and then on his day at the range.
Want. Want.
Update: As do Readers Frognot and Preussenotto, from yesterday’s Comments, thus showing themselves to be connoisseurs of fine weaponry.
I know that was a temptation for my choice but you said “1” so I went with the one that I had been lusting after the longest.
Figures that I’d lived down to my username and posted too late in the Ideal Gun comments. Still, it’s gratifying to see our host agrees, too.
Although I stand by the STG-57 as first second choice remark, as long as money isn’t a consideration.
Hey, I finally won something.
Damn, that’s sad.
Would have said BAR.
30-06 is all you need.
That is why I selected the HCAR version of the M1918 BAR. It is the modernized version and weighs about half of what the original did and has a 30 round mag instead of a 20 round.
I first thought about the Cobb Armory MCR-300 but there is no spare parts or support if there is a problem with the gun. I had all the parts necessary to put a MCR-300 together except for the upper receiver for well over 10 years. I finally sold all of it to a guy that had a MCR-300 for 4 times what I had invested in it. He wanted the 10 magazines I had more than anything.
Some friends who deal in Title II firearms purchased two of the second model FG-42s at Rock Island some years ago, but thanks to the quirk of them being too busy working to get to the range they both resold before we got a chance to shoot them. They both paid and made serious bank though, and the amount they had invested in buying them made the quick turnaround really attractive to them! The next time we shot with them they brought two PKMs they wanted to field test and an M79 Thumper, but I’d already shot those and there is still a big, gaping hole in my firearms bucket list.