Why doesn't the Mini14 come in .30 Carbine?

[Sowega86]

I think it would work pretty well.

There is one in 7.62 x 39 and it's called a Mini 30. Avoid the stainless steel barrels and get the regular steel barrels.

 

[BHPSteel]

I did a rifle & handgun class with CMshoot a few years ago, and my rifle was a folding-stocked Mini-14.

The "rock it in, Toe then Heel" method to lock a magazine in place was really awkward compared to the AR platform guns everybody else had. Slow to drop old magazines, and slow to get a new one in place.

I've got that setup myself in 300BLK, and you're right - mag changes are a real pain until you get the feel for them - but that's basically the way the M14 works too.

 

[BIKER13]

Bought a Mini14 at Wilsons in Lavonia in 1979 for $149.95. Traded it away

 

[cmshoot]

Sounds like you're thinking about the Ruger XGI

As I understood it, the Mini-14 was designed from the get-go to be a really inexpensive close clone of the extremely expensive-to-make M14, which is why things like the bolt roller that you find on an M14 is pared back to being a rounded nub of cast metal. In that form factor, you'd be talking an awful small reciever for such a powerful cartridge as the 308.

There it is! That's the info that my brain garbled together. Thanks for the clarification.

 

[Radar363]

I have an early production Universal carbine that my Dad bought new back in the mid to late sixties. I wouldn't trade it for anything but it never gets used anymore.
Now if Ruger made their PC Carbine in something besides 9mm and priced them to compete with a Keltec I might think about getting one.

 

[Twitch2120]

I have an early production Universal carbine that my Dad bought new back in the mid to late sixties. I wouldn't trade it for anything but it never gets used anymore.
Now if Ruger made their PC Carbine in something besides 9mm and priced them to compete with a Keltec I might think about getting one.

You pay a premium to have something that works.

 

[gh1950]

Why not 30-06 and call it the Maxi 30?

They tried hard to develop a .308 version. The action wouldn't hold up. Not knocking the gun, just a fact. Bigger cartridge = less metal in the action.

 

[Hayata]

Marlin made a lever action in .30 carbine.

Daddy want.

 

[Mr. Goodbar]

What in the fuddness is going on in here

 

[Radar363]

You pay a premium to have something that works.

I've never owned a Keltec but plenty of ODT members swear by them. I assumed they did the job, whatever that might be.