Me too, and I thought a fully automatic straight blow back 7.62 X 39 was violently Chinese, if only it was during the period with all the warlords and infighting. You know, fully automatic c96 broomhandles and all that.
So a Chinese conversion of a British gun, which was made in Canada, in a Russian caliber. Supplied as mutual aid to China, then used against the people who made it and captured in Korea?
Don't forget the Star Wars verssion. It couldn''t hit the broad side of a Wookie to save it's life. It shoots around the target making cool lighting and neat sound effects.; Pew pew Pew!
@@tibbar20111987 back in the 70s you could buy parts kits to make your own Sten. You got all the parts including a "cut" tube, reciever demil. You just needed to find a new tube and do a little minor welding. Can't recall the exact price but it was cheap, maybe $24.95 or less. They also provided you with a paper pattern which you would wrap around the tube to indicate where the cuts and welds would be located.
"54 7,62" is Type 54, 7,62 caliber, the Chinese Tokarev ammo designation; 25-2 is the Factory/Depot designation which did the conversion; and 748 is the Serial number. Since these were converted by several facilities, there are variations. Straight mag-well versions still with Canadian imprints also exist, with modified straight mags.( saw one years ago in friend's collection. Conversion of 7,9 Brens to 7,62x39 was a post-Korean war job...for use by Min Bin ( peoples militia)...late 50s- 1960s. A lot of 7,9 weaponry was used in Korea, alongside Russian supplied 7,62x54R and 7,62x25 guns...7,62x39 was only adopted by China in 1956 ( Type 56) under the Soviet Technical Aid Program. Doc AV
"Master Yi Wan, how do I make PPS-43 even simpler and cheaper to make?" "Listen closely, Wai Di Mir. You take STEN..." "..." "...you rechamber it in 7.62 x 25..." "..." "...and you make it accept PPS-43 mags"
Or try to explain how any Ork shoota from Warhammer 40.000 works He would just sit there for a minute silently, staring at the gun, and then sigh and say "I have no clue how it works" Shoota falls apart from a single touch Credits roll: "Archmagos Ian, circa 999.M40"
Most people think of 7.62x39, I myself was like "I mean it's probably not in 39, but given some of the shit I've seen it might just be" then I saw the mag and was relieved to see it wasn't.
Yeah, because the 9mm evolved from the 30 Luger, which is virtually the same dimensionally as the 7.62x25. Not much new under the sun, plus there was no need for the Sovs to reinvent the wheel
@@troy9477 7.62x25 Tokarev is almost a copy of 7.63x25 Mauser C96 so 7.62x25 Tokarev and 9x19para are similar. In Russia we have a lot of PPSh-41 in 9x19para cause 9x19para is four times cheaper than 7.62 Tokarev.
@Alexander Yes. You can buy army surplus AKM (original 7.62x39 with a new semi-automatic trigger) and SKS if you have a license for rifled weapon or you can buy army surplus AKM and SKS in .366 (they have a new barrel 9.5x39 Paradox) if you have a license for smoothbore weapon.
They are both grandchildren of 7.65mm Borchardt, via 7.63mm Mauser and 7.65mm Parabellum. The length of the case varied between rounds but not it's diameter and headsize.
i imagine that this was probably a quite effective submachine gun, like its Soviet cousins: 7.62x25 is a pretty remarkable little round, and with an extended barrel this probably could punch through a helmet pretty easy. almost like a proto-PDW of sorts, I love it.
Actually, the bolt was slightly modified in the 7.62 conversions....the underside of the bolt was machined to ride over the wider feed lips of the PPS-43 mag. A 7.62 bolt will work in a 9mm gun, but an unmodified 9mm bolt wont function/feed in a 7.62 gun. You can see it 4:45 and 4:49 …..It's more noticeable when next to an unmodified 9mm bolt for reference
I was going to comment on a single feed design working with a double feed mag. Sterling/Patchett guns work with Sten mags, but that could be by design. The VC MAT49 conversion to 7.62 flattened out the internal rib in the rear of the mag. I wonder why the Chinese didn't go that route.
I love the Royal Armouries, I live nearby and I've been visiting since I was a nipper, I had no idea they had all these cool firearms tucked away behind closed doors!
@@9HoleReviews The hands of Mao will rise from the depths of hell to guide your shot if you purge enough rightists, Nationalists and anti-revolutionaries!
The barrel length being much longer on this gun is maybe because they repurposed PPS-43 barrels and didn't want to waste perfectly good barrels they already had or were already making?
Awesome for hump day morning while I'm drinking coffee before going out to the heat of tucson to save people whose air conditioners are broken thanks buddy
@Mr Brightside the Velocity in truth wouldn't hurt, in least getting it the 75 to the hundred yard range with some Effectiveness left. But you are correct with those sites hitting anything at 200 all you're doing is spraying and praying.
@Mr Brightside most smgs at the time could shoot that far they were made this way because there was a necessity for something that could hose bullets at people. Remember assault rifles weren't a thing for the majority of soldiers and 200 yards is pretty close most bolt action rifles are boringly accurate at that distance and machine guns were unwieldy and suited to suppression.
You'd probably have to side mount the iron sights so the magazine wouldn't block your sight picture and overall it would look terrifying, both of the people using it and the enemy going against it.
@@0neDoomedSpaceMarine heck, with those magazines and higher BC round, they were probably better weapons. Not that 'better SMG than the Sten Mk. II' was a particularly high bar to meet
Hi Ian, If I wasn’t mistaken, actually the mark of 54-7.62 on the mag catcher means that this gun uses type 54 7.62mm submachine gun(Chinese copy of soviet PPS43) magazine instead of 1954 as the year of conversion
A simple yet effective conversion, I could imagine the 7.62mm tokarev round would have given it some decent stopping power. So glad Ian has gotten round to doing this one. :)
The barrel length can be a result of splitting a barrel of another gun in two making it this length for PPSten... PPSh41 had the 10,6 inch barrels and it was a result of taking a Mosin rifle barrel and cutting it in half.... looks like the same happened here :)
Years ago 23 years actually a friend went back to England on holiday. While there he purchased a demilled Sten gun kit. $180.00 which was quite a sum at the time. He called a friend who helped supply the parts from an Ole shotgun news. They were able to track down parts and pieces to make the gun work after some rudimentary welding on the receiver ejector port. The end product looked exactly like the sten in the video. Lost touch with the old boy...he passed away during the hiatus. Wonder what his girl's thought when they found that sten amongst his belongings🤔
I am always surprised at how few companys have made comercial conversions kits for 7.62x25. seems it would be an easy sell to offer a barrell, spring, mag drop in conversion for 1911 platforms or glocks or even highpoint. a highpoint carbine in 7.62 would be handy and fun
I live in Long Branch and have walked the old armory grounds where those guns were made. Who knew what happened to them? Thanks for filling in a really unique bit of Long Branch history.
The Andrew Salmon series "To the Last Round" and "Scortched Earth, Black Snow" contain some interesting context to these guns. Apparently the Chinese intervention had a lot ammunition supply problems, because they had stockpiles of small arms from indigenous sources, France, the UK, US, Canada the Soviet Union and Japan. According to the book the army used by China had been about to invade Taiwan when Mao realized that the Korean War was going south and redirected them to intervene in Korea instead. The planned invasion of Taiwan was going to use surrendered Nationalist forces as their front line so that they could purge the army of politically unreliable soldiers and play on the loyalty of the Taiwanese defenders. As a result the army that entered North Korea used a particularly large amount of western foreign aid weapons in addition to Communist manufactured weapons. The Chinese supply lines were primarily done by people literally carrying the supplies on their backs through snow covered mountain passes, being covered by US Air force fighter-bombers, up until the Russian Air force intervened. The most notable tact taken to solve the ammo compatibility issues was to produce and issue large quantities of grenades. Chinese produced concussion grenades were not very effective though, so they didn't catch a break on that either.
I think you should consider doing regular gun reviews as well. You take it upon yourself to learn everything there is to know about the motivation, history, and purpose of every gun you review, and I admire and respect that. Your views on guns are very well rounded, and I think you would be able to succeed in the vastly flooded genre of gun reviews. Something to consider :)
The 25-05 marking is most likely a part of 7.62x25 , then 05 072 is the magazine type used and barrel matching number. China stopped using imperial calendar system after 1949, so month is in front day and after year, like year/month/day. As a Chinese, according to my very limited knowledge, a lot of these converted guns were not serialized at all. That serial number looking mark is purely used to ID the caliber and the matching barrel. Thus, the marking should be understood like this: this gun uses Type 54 pistol(Chinese version of TT33) caliber 7.62x25 ammo compatible with type 50 submachine gun magazine (ppsh-41), barrel number 072 belongs to this receiver. This type of weapon were typically converted poorly by uneducated/undertrained gunsmiths, a lot of these makeshift guns were made by local law enforcement units to shoot supplied ammo. Fitting was so bad that parts between guns are sometimes not interchangeable at all, that’s why they had to mark the barrel in order to be able to find the right one. These guns were often made in small batch (1 to maybe 1000, depending on how many they had on hands) by armorers of a certain unit, then the idea is copied by a different unit, a lot of these guns are made in different shops with no standardized manufacturing process, quality control is also minimal. I have seen many types of misprint in terms of marking, like in this case, 05 probably should be 50. This type of manufacturing practice continued well into the late 1950s to offset the pressure during Korean War. Well made guns were sent to frontline troops, and everybody else had to make do with whatever they had.
7.62x25 is my favorite caliber! It makes so much sense to put it an sten! I really wish we could have the designs to make then, this would be a great reproduction! Prolly really cheap too
The only thing stopping the 7.62 Tok from a revival as the great battlefield handgun cartridge bridging the gap between 5.7x28 and .357 SIG is: the lack of a good handgun to drive demand for it. Generous barrel length to convert all that boom to velocity, double stack, etc etc
The weakness of the Sten was the double stack, single feed magazine. This conversion uses a much better double stack, double feed magazine. It was probably more reliable than the original 9mm Para Sten. Interesting that it apparently worked well with this magazine, without any modification to the bolt.
I wonder if this conversion resolves one of the major Stengun issues: the awful magazine design. In the literature about his gun, this appears to be the pet peeve, even more than the famous weak recoil-spring leading to regular accidental discharges. In official weapons manuals it's always recommended to keep the magazines squeaky clean and to never-ever, while loading the magazine, pushing a cartridge between the feeding lips since they may bend, nor to give the magazine a slap after being loaded into the gun; all in order to avoid damage to the extremely fragile feeding lips. Fitting a new magazine well, as well as using the sturdier PPS 43 magazines, may have resolved at least one of the major Sten weaknesses.
I've fired a Bren converted to 7.62x54R by the expedient of running a 7.62x54R reamer into the original .303 British chamber. Accuracy was fine but the fired cases had an interesting double shoulder, almost invariably split just below the neck.
I noticed that the magazine is double feed rather than the single feed of the regular magazine. Have they done any modification of the barrel to facilitate the double feed or is it possible to just stick a double feed mag in a sten and it works?
A Sten is literally just a pipe with a bolt in it, so it will probably fire anything as long as there is enough space for the cartridge to feed. There's nothing in the way.
@@Stoney3K So there is no need for something to guide the cartridges in to the chamber (feedramps etc.) eventhough the cartridges now feed offset from the barrel? Or is it that the cartridges are close enough to allow the tip of the bullet to guide them in the chamber?
@@mathiaslindgren9544 I do believe there's a feedramp inside but it's already tapered the right way for double feed magazines to work. And the top of the magazine feed lips is already pretty close to the center of the bolt face so there's not a lot of guiding you have to do.
@@arrowtt3364 It's unlikely. The communist does not use the this kind of numbering of years. They tend to use the common era year, so the marking of 54 means 1954, which makes more sense
This weapon could be something issued to Chinese volunteers Amy division 25 regiment05 from my understanding. It might be modified by the division machinery
When you pulled that mag out idk why but that sound was satisfying as hell. I wanna get more guns so badly. I miss them. Had to sell them for my family :/
For a STEN, that is a sexy configuration. With the longer barrel and the higher pressure SMG loads this is nice little set up. Sure, still a STEN, but an improved one.
That version should be far more better than original Sten, with the problems with the original magazine solved in the process with proper attachment and double feed.
This one of variants definately cannot been captured in Korea, for the magazine well is from type 54 smg, which is a copy of PPS-43. First manufactured in 1954s, which is the year after the end of the war. The Britishs probably did capture some origin stens but most of them are pretty damaged, so they use 7.62 version for replacing.
Fascinating. Come to think of it, there are a heck of a lot of adaptations of the Sten design from across the world! Including this one and more famous ones like the Owen gun and the Mp 3008, there must be at least 18 countries that have done it.
@@StromBugSlayer Let us hope it's a reasonably intelligent person making a silly comment thoughtlessly instead of an idiot making a stupid one. If it's the later, you can expect an inbox full of idiocy lol.
Markings on the mag well: "54-7.62" - Chambered for Type 54 7.62mm pistol cartridge (There's no "Type 54 pistol cartridge" in China, but there's a Type 51 which actually is 7.62 Tokarev. The armourer who's responsible for the conversion might misunderstood something.) "25-05" - Code number for (provincial) military zone. 25 refers to Gansu provincial military zone which is attached to Lanzhou military zone, indicating the gun came from Gansu, a province in China. "072" - Serial number. I hope these would help :)
And by the way these conversions, like Bren / ZB-26 / Type 99 Nambu rechambered for 7.62x39 and Sten / M1 Thompson / M3 Grease Gun rechambered for 7.62 Tokarev, were done in the 1970s. As such there's no way for the Canadians to capture converted guns in the Korean War (But they could still capture a lot of the original, unmodified Sten guns and Bren guns). Gansu province had had 5,789 obsolete guns converted in the beginning of 1976.
When the Palmach made Stens the biggest problem was brass for the ammunition. So they bought and imported Lipstick cases. Though barrels are the most complicated, maybe the 10 1/2 inch was what was set up for manufactuer?
Look at Ian's video "Gnome et Rhône R5: A Foiled Communist Arms Plan". This was about a French Sten manufacture. It also had unknown number separated by a dash.
My grandfather said 25-05 could mean the ID of the factory or gun repair department that modified these guns, like 05 workshop of the 25 factory, but he could not be sure. His father carried out modification work on these guns in North Korea and Hebei in the 1950s.
My mind immediately went to full-size 7,62, that would have been a sight
My brain did the exact same thing lol
Me too, and I thought a fully automatic straight blow back 7.62 X 39 was violently Chinese, if only it was during the period with all the warlords and infighting. You know, fully automatic c96 broomhandles and all that.
same here, I was wondering how many rounds it would take to shake the gun apart.
Indeed, I was very concerned about an open bolt smg chambered in 7.62x39
My god, imagine that! It would have hideous recoil in such a light gun! Wowzers
So a Chinese conversion of a British gun, which was made in Canada, in a Russian caliber. Supplied as mutual aid to China, then used against the people who made it and captured in Korea?
@John Smith I mean you're probably not wrong.
@John Smith still would say Eh and aboot
Mister Worldwide
These re-chambered weapons were mainly used by militia.
Ahh globalism; making sure you have no idea who is screwing you over.
I just love Stens. Everyone used them. British, Poles, Germans, every single resistance, communists, capitalists, Aussie biker gangs.
Don't forget the Star Wars verssion. It couldn''t hit the broad side of a Wookie to save it's life. It shoots around the target making cool lighting and neat sound effects.; Pew pew Pew!
As Michelangelo told the Pope about the three Christs in his Last supper; "It works mate!".
@@bongobrandy6297 Actually that was the Sterling.
And the yakuza too.
@@bongobrandy6297 the stormtrooper blaster is a sterling smg
"It's not that complicated"
Sten.
"Look man, it's not complicated. We have all the facts, this is a clear cut case."- Sten Pool
Metal tube goes "pew pew".
@@kabob0077 Just sprinkle some crack on it, open and shut case.
The moment you outcheap the chinese
@@tibbar20111987 back in the 70s you could buy parts kits to make your own Sten. You got all the parts including a "cut" tube, reciever demil. You just needed to find a new tube and do a little minor welding. Can't recall the exact price but it was cheap, maybe $24.95 or less. They also provided you with a paper pattern which you would wrap around the tube to indicate where the cuts and welds would be located.
Automatically my brain just thought this was going to be a Sten with a 30rd AK mag hanging off the side Lol
While I want a tok Stein, id take one that takes ak mags to.....scary to shoot im sure
Imagine with a 10 round mag for 7.62x54r
Might build a non functional wall hanger for kicks.
The next evolution: Chinese STEN look-alike clone from Khyber pass.
Khyber Pass .410 break action sten.
Alex Carrara it’s going to be bolt action too.
Bolt action, bullpup Sten from Kyber Pass.
@@LOL-zu1zr when you fire you gotta shout "Daka daka daka!"
No kidding. The Khyber pass fabricators have copied just about everything
"54 7,62" is Type 54, 7,62 caliber, the Chinese Tokarev ammo designation;
25-2 is the Factory/Depot designation which did the conversion; and 748 is the Serial number.
Since these were converted by several facilities, there are variations.
Straight mag-well versions still with Canadian imprints also exist, with modified straight mags.( saw one years ago in friend's collection.
Conversion of 7,9 Brens to 7,62x39 was a post-Korean war job...for use by Min Bin ( peoples militia)...late 50s- 1960s. A lot of 7,9 weaponry was used in Korea, alongside Russian supplied 7,62x54R and 7,62x25 guns...7,62x39 was only adopted by China in 1956 ( Type 56) under the Soviet Technical Aid Program.
Doc AV
Great aswer! Do you have a sourse of this information? I would love to learn more about this firearm
"Master Yi Wan, how do I make PPS-43 even simpler and cheaper to make?"
"Listen closely, Wai Di Mir. You take STEN..."
"..."
"...you rechamber it in 7.62 x 25..."
"..."
"...and you make it accept PPS-43 mags"
Speaking of which, Ian should do an April fool's series called "rotten weapons" covering bad conversions of good weapons.
This is great
but this is good conversion, one could argue it made the gun better.
This is a very good idea.
Or try to explain how any Ork shoota from Warhammer 40.000 works
He would just sit there for a minute silently, staring at the gun, and then sigh and say "I have no clue how it works"
Shoota falls apart from a single touch
Credits roll: "Archmagos Ian, circa 999.M40"
@@flawlesstheory5111 as todd howard would say " it just works!" 😂😂
oh, _that_ 7.62mm. i'm a moron for thinking otherwise I guess..
Most people think of 7.62x39, I myself was like "I mean it's probably not in 39, but given some of the shit I've seen it might just be" then I saw the mag and was relieved to see it wasn't.
Yes not by 39 but 25 ;)
Imagine if it wasn't x25 or x39, but 7.62x54...
@@kabob0077 A lot of people probably thought it's in 7.62 NATO
@@gohunt001-5 Dear God...
Didn't know the case heads for 9mm para and 7.62 Tokarev were nearly identical until now.
Yeah, because the 9mm evolved from the 30 Luger, which is virtually the same dimensionally as the 7.62x25. Not much new under the sun, plus there was no need for the Sovs to reinvent the wheel
@@troy9477 7.62x25 Tokarev is almost a copy of 7.63x25 Mauser C96 so 7.62x25 Tokarev and 9x19para are similar. In Russia we have a lot of PPSh-41 in 9x19para cause 9x19para is four times cheaper than 7.62 Tokarev.
@Alexander Yes. You can buy army surplus AKM (original 7.62x39 with a new semi-automatic trigger) and SKS if you have a license for rifled weapon or you can buy army surplus AKM and SKS in .366 (they have a new barrel 9.5x39 Paradox) if you have a license for smoothbore weapon.
They're very close. Tok is .393 inch, the Luger is .394
They are both grandchildren of 7.65mm Borchardt, via 7.63mm Mauser and 7.65mm Parabellum.
The length of the case varied between rounds but not it's diameter and headsize.
i imagine that this was probably a quite effective submachine gun, like its Soviet cousins: 7.62x25 is a pretty remarkable little round, and with an extended barrel this probably could punch through a helmet pretty easy. almost like a proto-PDW of sorts, I love it.
Actually, the bolt was slightly modified in the 7.62 conversions....the underside of the bolt was machined to ride over the wider feed lips of the PPS-43 mag. A 7.62 bolt will work in a 9mm gun, but an unmodified 9mm bolt wont function/feed in a 7.62 gun. You can see it 4:45 and 4:49 …..It's more noticeable when next to an unmodified 9mm bolt for reference
I was going to comment on a single feed design working with a double feed mag. Sterling/Patchett guns work with Sten mags, but that could be by design. The VC MAT49 conversion to 7.62 flattened out the internal rib in the rear of the mag. I wonder why the Chinese didn't go that route.
Omg. Remembering all those commando comic books from my childhood
I remember those. A least one solider would carry a sten and there would also be a big guy carrying a Bren probably called something like Tiny lol
I remember the Tommy gun outnumbering the Sten, usually wielded by a lantern jawed commando.
@@WorldCupWillie so true haha... 🤣.
@@jic1 My life is complete.
@@jic1 how are they still going?
I love the Royal Armouries, I live nearby and I've been visiting since I was a nipper, I had no idea they had all these cool firearms tucked away behind closed doors!
I live close by, have been three times. It's such a great museum.
Same bro, used to do foil fencing every Friday when i was a kid. Such a great place.
@Alexander erm yes we can... check your sources please.
I want this.
Say, maybe Henry's cousin in Hong Kong can pull some strings.
Over 500 yards?
@@howardchambers9679 500码必中！
@@9HoleReviews The hands of Mao will rise from the depths of hell to guide your shot if you purge enough rightists, Nationalists and anti-revolutionaries!
Well as Tallahassee from Zombieland.Would say “Don’t shoot me with my own gun!”
That welding and finishing.
Well, there is some weldings, but no finishing.
The repurposed stench gun. I bet the stock would freeze to the chinese soldiers faces during the wintertime.
The barrel length being much longer on this gun is maybe because they repurposed PPS-43 barrels and didn't want to waste perfectly good barrels they already had or were already making?
Exactly what I was thinking.
why not manafacture a longer barrel?
@@cosmophobia1917 Because then they'd have to manufacture a longer barrel.
@@cosmophobia1917 because that requires new tooling, while using an existing pps barrel is simple.
Could it also have been related to needing a longer impulse during recoil to achieve reliable cycling with the original bolt and spring?
Perhaps that middle marking is the "Factory" designation or unit code the particular batch of stens were attached to?
That's my suspicion as well.
Thought it was 'Day - Month'.
In one line - 54-7.62 25- 05 - "54" - mfg year, "7.62x25" - caliber, 05 - plant number
Now we know the real reason for the Korean war. So the Chinese could return their guns to Canadians. Geo-politics is such a wonderful thing.
And the Canadian will say "I am sorry" for the trouble of this whole process.
Awesome for hump day morning while I'm drinking coffee before going out to the heat of tucson to save people whose air conditioners are broken thanks buddy
Interesting, never even heard of these, guess its better than the original?, because of the better magazines? Propably...
Better ammo for SMGs, a longer barrel, so this could be better if the barrel was held in place correctly.
@@lostalone9320 Yeah, but some extra velocity doesn't hurt at 200yards.
7.62x25 is too long for handguns though.
@Mr Brightside the Velocity in truth wouldn't hurt, in least getting it the 75 to the hundred yard range with some Effectiveness left. But you are correct with those sites hitting anything at 200 all you're doing is spraying and praying.
@Mr Brightside most smgs at the time could shoot that far they were made this way because there was a necessity for something that could hose bullets at people. Remember assault rifles weren't a thing for the majority of soldiers and 200 yards is pretty close most bolt action rifles are boringly accurate at that distance and machine guns were unwieldy and suited to suppression.
You're not really gonna shoot anything at 200m with a sten gun
Imagine that with the drum mag of PPSH 41
i know it doesn't take ppsh 41 mags and takes pps 43 ones instead, but just imagine
A drum mag on the side just like MP18
@@ALovelyBunchOfDragonballz That's my thought too, you'd have to hold it gangster just to shoot it
Good luck finding PPSH-41 Drum mags that work.
Colin Masterson after 42 year they almost all work properly
You'd probably have to side mount the iron sights so the magazine wouldn't block your sight picture and overall it would look terrifying, both of the people using it and the enemy going against it.
I imagine that the longer barrel also helped with muzzle flash and noise - important when no one's wearing earpro and fighting at night.
@@0neDoomedSpaceMarine heck, with those magazines and higher BC round, they were probably better weapons. Not that 'better SMG than the Sten Mk. II' was a particularly high bar to meet
Hi Ian, If I wasn’t mistaken, actually the mark of 54-7.62 on the mag catcher means that this gun uses type 54 7.62mm submachine gun(Chinese copy of soviet PPS43) magazine instead of 1954 as the year of conversion
A simple yet effective conversion, I could imagine the 7.62mm tokarev round would have given it some decent stopping power. So glad Ian has gotten round to doing this one. :)
The barrel length can be a result of splitting a barrel of another gun in two making it this length for PPSten... PPSh41 had the 10,6 inch barrels and it was a result of taking a Mosin rifle barrel and cutting it in half.... looks like the same happened here :)
The PPS43 used a 10.5 inch barrel. China was making new one at this same time. So reusing those barrels was a cost saver.
love these chinese conversions, they all have a good story behind them
Oh thank God, I thought it was gonna be a 7.62 x *51* Sten and I wanted to see how the world's biggest hand grenade looked like.
Do you one better - the Sten in 7.62x54mmR.
A 50. Call stengun
@@Jasonth131 for when you play a RPG game and the devs forget to put a damage upgrade cap on your sten gun.
There was a 7,62x51mm Sterling.
Tbf i was expecting a 7.62x39
That title almost gave me heart attack.
Why?
@@arrowtt3364 I initially assumed it was 7.62x39 straight blowback when I read the title.
Arrow TT33 because big sten go boom boom
@@arrowtt3364 It suggested it was a full power 7.62 rifle cartridge conversion!
@John Smith because there can't be "too much of dakka".
Angry pipe became big angry pipe
Years ago 23 years actually a friend went back to England on holiday. While there he purchased a demilled Sten gun kit. $180.00 which was quite a sum at the time. He called a friend who helped supply the parts from an Ole shotgun news. They were able to track down parts and pieces to make the gun work after some rudimentary welding on the receiver ejector port. The end product looked exactly like the sten in the video. Lost touch with the old boy...he passed away during the hiatus. Wonder what his girl's thought when they found that sten amongst his belongings🤔
As a Chinese Canadian this is very interesting
I am always surprised at how few companys have made comercial conversions kits for 7.62x25. seems it would be an easy sell to offer a barrell, spring, mag drop in conversion for 1911 platforms or glocks or even highpoint. a highpoint carbine in 7.62 would be handy and fun
I live in Long Branch and have walked the old armory grounds where those guns were made. Who knew what happened to them? Thanks for filling in a really unique bit of Long Branch history.
Pretty cool. I like the little extra length on the barrel.
This causes me emotional and physical distress
I was exited !
Why?
I read “7.62mm Sten” and assumed Sten in 7.62x54
@@GetWarded That would be fun
@@GetWarded most people think 7.62x39, but sure
This, and the 7.62x39mm Chinese Bren are two of my favourite forgotten weapons
The Andrew Salmon series "To the Last Round" and "Scortched Earth, Black Snow" contain some interesting context to these guns. Apparently the Chinese intervention had a lot ammunition supply problems, because they had stockpiles of small arms from indigenous sources, France, the UK, US, Canada the Soviet Union and Japan. According to the book the army used by China had been about to invade Taiwan when Mao realized that the Korean War was going south and redirected them to intervene in Korea instead. The planned invasion of Taiwan was going to use surrendered Nationalist forces as their front line so that they could purge the army of politically unreliable soldiers and play on the loyalty of the Taiwanese defenders. As a result the army that entered North Korea used a particularly large amount of western foreign aid weapons in addition to Communist manufactured weapons. The Chinese supply lines were primarily done by people literally carrying the supplies on their backs through snow covered mountain passes, being covered by US Air force fighter-bombers, up until the Russian Air force intervened. The most notable tact taken to solve the ammo compatibility issues was to produce and issue large quantities of grenades. Chinese produced concussion grenades were not very effective though, so they didn't catch a break on that either.
Lets be real. Sten Guns are just plumbing with a firing pin
When are you showing us a bullpup Kyber Pass Sten, Ian?
It’s not kyber pass, but look up his video on the viper smg. It’s a bullpup, full auto only, simplified, one handed sten gun.
Despite what a kludge this looks to be; the magazines are probably an improvement!
Im guessing that the numbers on the mag-well (25-05) would be the month and day that the conversation took place, so pretty much the 25th of May, 1954
was thinking the same thing. felt about right sadly my first though had the date flipped aka day 5 of month 25 so I drooped it.
Because chinese don't write date like that. They would wrote 5-25, not the other way around
If you want to make your angry tube a little bit angrier. Honestly thought it was gonna be a full size 7.62x39, that would’ve been a real step up.
"... It's not all that complicated"
Ofcourse it isn't, it's a _Sten Gun!_ xD
Ian, your videos are the highlight of my subscriptions, keep them coming
When I saw "7.62mm Sten Gun" my silly ass thought it would be 7.62x39, not 7.62mm Tokarev. 😂😂😂
That would be pretty freak’n awesome
I think you should consider doing regular gun reviews as well. You take it upon yourself to learn everything there is to know about the motivation, history, and purpose of every gun you review, and I admire and respect that. Your views on guns are very well rounded, and I think you would be able to succeed in the vastly flooded genre of gun reviews. Something to consider :)
For a little bit i thought it was a 7.62x51 conversion. That would be a monstrosity.
Each time I`m thinking that I`ve seen everything, Ian uploads such a video
Soviets: Burp gun
Chinese: Cough gun
25-05 might have been factory code as its common in PLA arsenal to have 4 digits code under factory stamp
I'm a simple man, I see a video by Ian I hit watch and like
The 25-05 marking is most likely a part of 7.62x25 , then 05 072 is the magazine type used and barrel matching number. China stopped using imperial calendar system after 1949, so month is in front day and after year, like year/month/day. As a Chinese, according to my very limited knowledge, a lot of these converted guns were not serialized at all. That serial number looking mark is purely used to ID the caliber and the matching barrel. Thus, the marking should be understood like this: this gun uses Type 54 pistol(Chinese version of TT33) caliber 7.62x25 ammo compatible with type 50 submachine gun magazine (ppsh-41), barrel number 072 belongs to this receiver. This type of weapon were typically converted poorly by uneducated/undertrained gunsmiths, a lot of these makeshift guns were made by local law enforcement units to shoot supplied ammo. Fitting was so bad that parts between guns are sometimes not interchangeable at all, that’s why they had to mark the barrel in order to be able to find the right one. These guns were often made in small batch (1 to maybe 1000, depending on how many they had on hands) by armorers of a certain unit, then the idea is copied by a different unit, a lot of these guns are made in different shops with no standardized manufacturing process, quality control is also minimal. I have seen many types of misprint in terms of marking, like in this case, 05 probably should be 50. This type of manufacturing practice continued well into the late 1950s to offset the pressure during Korean War. Well made guns were sent to frontline troops, and everybody else had to make do with whatever they had.
Gun Jesus: sten gun
My AK guy brain: angry tube
7.62x25 is my favorite caliber! It makes so much sense to put it an sten! I really wish we could have the designs to make then, this would be a great reproduction! Prolly really cheap too
im sure you could build this off a sten parts kit if that’s any consolation
Ah side loading guns, my favourite
Side loading guns (exept the FG-42) give me headache
@@pussyslayer2295 But how can you even into fun with boring bottom loading normalcy?
The only thing stopping the 7.62 Tok from a revival as the great battlefield handgun cartridge bridging the gap between 5.7x28 and .357 SIG is: the lack of a good handgun to drive demand for it.
Generous barrel length to convert all that boom to velocity, double stack, etc etc
Would love to see this on the range 👍
The weakness of the Sten was the double stack, single feed magazine. This conversion uses a much better double stack, double feed magazine. It was probably more reliable than the original 9mm Para Sten. Interesting that it apparently worked well with this magazine, without any modification to the bolt.
I wonder if this conversion resolves one of the major Stengun issues: the awful magazine design.
In the literature about his gun, this appears to be the pet peeve, even more than the famous weak recoil-spring leading to regular accidental discharges. In official weapons manuals it's always recommended to keep the magazines squeaky clean and to never-ever, while loading the magazine, pushing a cartridge between the feeding lips since they may bend, nor to give the magazine a slap after being loaded into the gun; all in order to avoid damage to the extremely fragile feeding lips.
Fitting a new magazine well, as well as using the sturdier PPS 43 magazines, may have resolved at least one of the major Sten weaknesses.
I've fired a Bren converted to 7.62x54R by the expedient of running a 7.62x54R reamer into the original .303 British chamber.
Accuracy was fine but the fired cases had an interesting double shoulder, almost invariably split just below the neck.
I noticed that the magazine is double feed rather than the single feed of the regular magazine. Have they done any modification of the barrel to facilitate the double feed or is it possible to just stick a double feed mag in a sten and it works?
A Sten is literally just a pipe with a bolt in it, so it will probably fire anything as long as there is enough space for the cartridge to feed. There's nothing in the way.
@@Stoney3K So there is no need for something to guide the cartridges in to the chamber (feedramps etc.) eventhough the cartridges now feed offset from the barrel? Or is it that the cartridges are close enough to allow the tip of the bullet to guide them in the chamber?
@@mathiaslindgren9544 I do believe there's a feedramp inside but it's already tapered the right way for double feed magazines to work. And the top of the magazine feed lips is already pretty close to the center of the bolt face so there's not a lot of guiding you have to do.
That is highly aesthetic, which is not something often said about a Sten.
I suspect the "05" could mean it was converted in Year 5 of the Chinese Revolution.
makes sense. Take your like, you filthy heathen.
Then it is 1917.
@@hongyangjiang4976 I meant of Mao's Revolution, obviously.
@@arrowtt3364 It's unlikely. The communist does not use the this kind of numbering of years. They tend to use the common era year, so the marking of 54 means 1954, which makes more sense
This weapon could be something issued to Chinese volunteers Amy division 25 regiment05 from my understanding. It might be modified by the division machinery
When you pulled that mag out idk why but that sound was satisfying as hell. I wanna get more guns so badly. I miss them. Had to sell them for my family :/
Now I know why the Sten gun in BO3 is called the "Bootlegger", because it's the Chinese Bootleg Sten
Actually seen this in the royal armoury fantastic weapon history keep up the good work Ian👍
Maybe that 25-05 is the desegnation of the gun? like how 56-2 is the sidefolding AK variant.
Or 25 of May that year
For a STEN, that is a sexy configuration. With the longer barrel and the higher pressure SMG loads this is nice little set up. Sure, still a STEN, but an improved one.
Do you still have to mind your fingers?
I guarantee you that someone in the Middle East has one of these strapped to their back.
I was wondering when these guns would come up for years. Very cool.
I got excited by the title and didn't look at the thumbnail. I was hoping to see a 7.62x39 Sten with AK mags.
"Chinese Sten gun"--a phrase synonymous with quality.
Quality enough to fight the Korean War despite massive deficiencies in heavy equipment.
That version should be far more better than original Sten, with the problems with the original magazine solved in the process with proper attachment and double feed.
Im disappointed, I was hoping for a 7.62 rifle round chambered sten gun.
For those who love Stens and also like it loud. I bet that thing roars.
I wonder if this abomination will have a higher rate of fire than the 'vanilla' sten given more powder in the round.
More powder but less mass, which means 9mil has slighly more recoil, so rate of fire should be reduced
This one of variants definately cannot been captured in Korea, for the magazine well is from type 54 smg, which is a copy of PPS-43. First manufactured in 1954s, which is the year after the end of the war. The Britishs probably did capture some origin stens but most of them are pretty damaged, so they use 7.62 version for replacing.
I don't know if Ian is wearing gloves for the virus or for handling the gun 😂
I kinda like the converted mag paddle latch they added! Think I prefer it to the original STEN button latch! Very interesting.
Every time Ian's visited my home town I haven't been there, would love to say how much I like his work in person one day.
After finding the Sten, the Chinese learned forever how to make cheap things
Fascinating. Come to think of it, there are a heck of a lot of adaptations of the Sten design from across the world! Including this one and more famous ones like the Owen gun and the Mp 3008, there must be at least 18 countries that have done it.
could just be they had 10" Tokarev barrel blanks and that's what they used
Johnathan at the Royal Armouries sent me back to this video! Cool to watch it again after seeing a Chinese made copy.
Is it my imagination or are the comments on this significantly more idiotic than usual for FW?
Lots of yes.
might it just be that arriving this early means the garbage hasn't been slid out of sight yet?
@@mergemechanismToo right, every one knows Aussie Bikers preferred Owen' s
wow bro you're so smart and cool
It's all this staying at home killing brain cells
By the time you've changed the barrel and the magazine on a sten there's not much left, it's practically a new gun!
Only time Chinese were lazy enough to not steal and recreate 😂
That's a pretty stupid comment.
that's a terrible take ujan
@@StromBugSlayer Let us hope it's a reasonably intelligent person making a silly comment thoughtlessly instead of an idiot making a stupid one.
If it's the later, you can expect an inbox full of idiocy lol.
@@iemozzomei Well, to be fair, that pretty much is what they do.
Markings on the mag well:
"54-7.62" - Chambered for Type 54 7.62mm pistol cartridge (There's no "Type 54 pistol cartridge" in China, but there's a Type 51 which actually is 7.62 Tokarev. The armourer who's responsible for the conversion might misunderstood something.)
"25-05" - Code number for (provincial) military zone. 25 refers to Gansu provincial military zone which is attached to Lanzhou military zone, indicating the gun came from Gansu, a province in China.
"072" - Serial number.
I hope these would help :)
And by the way these conversions, like Bren / ZB-26 / Type 99 Nambu rechambered for 7.62x39 and Sten / M1 Thompson / M3 Grease Gun rechambered for 7.62 Tokarev, were done in the 1970s. As such there's no way for the Canadians to capture converted guns in the Korean War (But they could still capture a lot of the original, unmodified Sten guns and Bren guns). Gansu province had had 5,789 obsolete guns converted in the beginning of 1976.
I was given one of these conversions with stampings that are very close to that one..
When the Palmach made Stens the biggest problem was brass for the ammunition. So they bought and imported Lipstick cases. Though barrels are the most complicated, maybe the 10 1/2 inch was what was set up for manufactuer?
25-05 sounds like a day and month xD. The long barrel 7,62x25 conversion was also present on french MAT-49 smg's.
Look at Ian's video "Gnome et Rhône R5: A Foiled Communist Arms Plan". This was about a French Sten manufacture. It also had unknown number separated by a dash.
I spent a day at the Royal Armouries collection, I saw loads, but it’s a shame how much more is not available for us mere mortals to see.
My grandfather said 25-05 could mean the ID of the factory or gun repair department that modified these guns, like 05 workshop of the 25 factory, but he could not be sure. His father carried out modification work on these guns in North Korea and Hebei in the 1950s.
I think the longer barrel was for better cycling of the bolt with that smaller caliber. Not just accuracy
I’m in the process of building one with a mk3 parts kit and a pps 43 mag well chambered in 9mm
That's the biggest twist in Arms history