Sterling SMG L2A3 Replica

[Onoff]

This will be illegal to own unless you either spray it a high viz colour or join a reenactment group. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/38/part/2/crossheading/imitation-firearms

You also should consider how you construct it and ensure there are no working parts in it that could be construed as part of a firearm, a chamber or see through barrel, feed pawls on the bolt etc. Work on the basis that if they got hold of it the police will inspect every part with a determination to prosecute you even if they have to invent a crime, so make it totally beyond any function as a firearm.

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That's certainly food for thought, had no idea! Going to have a good read.

I think these plans might be from the States...different laws etc I guess. The instructions come with the option to make it into a 6mm Airsoft.

What if I legally change my religion to Jedi and say it's a Star Wars blaster?

 

[Onoff]

Hmmm.....readingthe link @sardine put up.....I think I might have to abandon this project. Saved me a lot of grief there potentially!

So far I've cut the steel to length and wrapped the template around it. I'm beginning to doubt anyway the accuracy of the plans. The A4 pieces were printed out and great care taken to achieve the template size (449x119.). Wrapping it round the pipe and it comes up short at the join.

What are supposed to be 10 dia holes are 12 dia ovals!

Maybe time to consign this to the "tube that'll come in handy one day" bin.

 

[sardine]

I found plans online for STENs were wildly off and had to measure a real one to check.

Then again it's much easier and cheaper to make it in metric so your plans are just a guide anyway, finding imperial steel stock in the UK isn't easy. My STEN was made from the top tube of a mountain bike which was within 10 thou of the original.

Sterlings were not welded like STENs they were all silver soldered ( brazed ) together.

 

[Onoff]

I found plans online for STENs were wildly off and had to measure a real one to check.

Then again it's much easier and cheaper to make it in metric so your plans are just a guide anyway, finding 1/8" steel sheet in the UK isn't easy. My STEN was made from the top tube of a mountain bike which was within 10 thou of the original.

Sterlings were not welded like STENs they were all silver soldered ( brazed ) together.

So was this a non firing replica you made? Any pictures & what became of it?

A bit of a mission but I wonder if a say half scale model would be legit? Guessing not on the basis of it potentially firing smaller diameter ammo...

 

[ronan]

Cool fact! It's the improvised SMGs made from square box section during the Irish troubles amaze me, barrels were square too!

Edit: I think I read once that the sale of heavy wall tube was once restricted in NI?

Ulster funny guns. A lot were made in the Harland and Wolff shipyard i heard, could be bs of course. But i did see a video recently of a covert gun factory back in the early 80's on a farm in NI, and it was not an unsophisticated set up at all. They had some pretty good machinery, presstools, punch tools, CNC machinery etc.

Anyway the Sten was a 2 quid bit of improv engineering made by Triang toys.

 

[Onoff]

A lot were made in the Harland and Wolff shipyard i heard, could be bs of course.

Aka "shipyard specials" I've heard / read that too.

 

[sardine]

Ulster funny guns. A lot were made in the Harland and Wolff shipyard i heard, could be bs of course. But i did see a video recently of a covert gun factory back in the early 80's on a farm in NI, and it was not an unsophisticated set up at all. They had some pretty good machinery, presstools, punch tools, CNC machinery etc.

Anyway the Sten was a 2 quid bit of improv engineering made by Triang toys.

Only Mk III's were made by Triang toys out of rolled sheet instead of tube. You can see in the picture the seam along the top which was spot welded.

 

[sardine]

Aka "shipyard specials" I've heard / read that too.

 

[northwest]

The most difficult (functional) part to make is the magazine.
@sardine is right, it can get you into hot water, however make the barrel from wood and do not bore a hole through it or in it and you are on firm ground, painting the end bright red is belt and braces. The whole of the VCR (Violent Crime Reduction) Act is fundamentally flawed. The premise is that if a gun is bright Orange it is an imitation. There is nothing at all stopping criminals spraying real guns bright orange. Where are we then? Do you want to be the armed response cop who shoots the guy with the orange gun?

So then they decided Tasers would be bright yellow. Are they not real guns then? It's a mess.

 

[Onoff]

unless you either spray it a high viz colour

Morning, I've read through the link a couple of times thanks and saw reference to colour but not what colours are allowable. A nice metallic blue might be acceptable I think.....nothing too ostentatious like an African warlord's gold plated AK!

Any links to what colours are acceptable. Fluorescent, Airsoft pink won't really cut it!

Woken up thinking I might relook at the project.

In part as my mate has just offered me an A3 printer so I might try another template.

 

[sardine]

Not worth making a magazine, just buy one.

 

[northwest]

Not worth making a magazine, just buy one.

I didn't actually mean make one for this project, I meant the actual magazine is the hardest part to make. The one thing that sets the AK47 apart and the one thing that has never changed in all the re-incarnatons is the magazine. They are not a trivial thing to design and make.
If the OP decides to go ahead I have a couple of mags somewhere and I would look one out for him.

 

[Onoff]

Thought I'd make some swarf...lots of 10mm holes starting with a 3 mm pilot (then a 1/4" and finally 10mm). Couldn't resist a quick blast of satin black from a rattle can:

Accuracy...hmm...in the absence of a decent workspace it was a 30 year old no name drill on the garden step and a couple of V blocks I made as a 16 year old apprentice! Started the ejection port with a 20mm Starrett...

 

[Onoff]

I lied it is a named drill, well sort of, it's a ROLSON. Guard long gone, NVR switch died soon after purchase so I made a new one up with a 240V contactor and hold in circuit.

"Quality Tools" my backside, pretty sure the table's never been quite square to the drill axis but it's served me well!

Think it came from Makro...

 

[My Old Landy]

It just proves you don't need large and fancy workshops to produce superb things!
It is nice to have one though...

 

[Onoff]

It just proves you don't need large and fancy workshops to produce superb things!
It is nice to have one though...

Yes but I want a large and fancy workshop to produce superberer things...

I have now officially reached stack overload. Stacks of stuff and nowhere decent to put it. <1m2 of floor space in a double garage.

An asbestos roofed, leaking stable block which SWMBO won't buy into redoing properly. Cracked walls, unstable walls, cracked floor, leaking roof etc.

 

[My Old Landy]

Yes but I want a large and fancy workshop to produce superberer things...

I have now officially reached stack overload. Stacks of stuff and nowhere decent to put it. <1m2 of floor space in a double garage.

An asbestos roofed, leaking stable block which SWMBO won't buy into redoing properly. Cracked walls, unstable walls, cracked floor, leaking roof etc.

Ah that is a shame. Hopefully, in time, she will come around to it

 

[sardine]

Sterling made ones were finished in " crackle paint" a rough texture Hammerite like paint.

 

[sardine]

I didn't actually mean make one for this project, I meant the actual magazine is the hardest part to make. The one thing that sets the AK47 apart and the one thing that has never changed in all the re-incarnatons is the magazine. They are not a trivial thing to design and make.
If the OP decides to go ahead I have a couple of mags somewhere and I would look one out for him.

The magazine has changed, there are loads of different ones from slab sided, ribbed steel, waffle aluminium, GRP, polymer.

 

[northwest]

The magazine has changed, there are loads of different ones from slab sided, ribbed steel, waffle aluminium, GRP, polymer.

You are right, but the design and the feed ramp and the ears have never changed really, just made "21st Century"