Hi guys, thanks for tuning in to another video on ForgottenWeapons.com.
I'm Ian McCollum, and I am here today at the Rock Island
Auction Company taking a look at some of the guns
that they are going to be selling in their upcoming
May of 2017 Premier Auction.
Today we're taking a look at a
pretty modern submachine gun actually.
Certainly any viewers in Italy will think that this
is in no way a forgotten weapon, because this is
in fact still a standard issue weapon with the Italian military
and a variety of Italian police forces.
In fact, you'll see these things all over Italian cities if you walk around there.
So this is a 9x19 standard cartridge submachine gun.
Weighs in at right about 6.5 pounds, 3 kilograms.
Fires at about 550 rounds per minute.
And it is the result of Beretta moving away from the designs of Tullio Marengoni.
Now Marengoni had designed like everything Beretta made,
at least in pistols and submachine guns, for many decades.
He was responsible for Beretta's whole line of automatic pistols,
and also the submachine guns that they had
from basically the end of World War One up into World War Two.
So ... the Beretta 38/42/44 series, very well-liked submachine guns in World War Two,
those were all Marengoni's design.
After World War Two, however, the buck passes and a new designer takes over at Beretta.
A guy named Domenico Salza, and he starts working on this.
And through the 1950s he develops this, which would become the Beretta Model 12.
Now, I do want to step back and point out nomenclature-wise
up until World War Two Beretta was naming these things after the year
that they were manufactured, Model 38, Model 42, Model 44 etc.
After the war, because of geopolitical economic circumstances,
people kind of wanted to look forward to the future and not back.
And so Beretta changed its nomenclature.
... Well the first one, it took the Beretta Model 38/49
(which is really that same gun they'd always had, just simplified a bit),
and they renamed it the Model 1 because that sounds futuristic and new.
And from then on, all of the new developments would be named with iterative numbers.
So by the time 1958 rolled around and this gun was ready for market, it was the Beretta Model 12.
Technologically the Model 12 ...
has a number of advantages over the old Marangoni pattern guns.
Mainly it's more controllable and it's a lot more compact.
And the reason that was possible was because
Domenico Salza used what we call a sort of a telescoping bolt design.
This is something that you would also see in the Czech Pattern 24 and 26 submachine guns,
and most famously in the Israeli Uzi submachine gun.
So why don't I just take the bolt out of this one, and show you what that looks like?
So the Beretta is a very nicely finished gun,
despite the fact that it is ... basically a stamped-tube receiver submachine gun.
But ... a good deal attention was paid to the fit and finish here.
Now the classic question with a submachine gun is what prevents it from firing
if you drop it on the back end. That's the classic safety issue with these sorts of guns.
And the answer on the Beretta is this trigger right here, that is a grip safety.
And when it is not engaged it actually locks the bolt if it's in the forward position.
So I cannot pull the bolt back unless I depress the grip safety.
That is what prevents accidental discharges with the gun.
Now we also have a manual safety here which is full-auto, semi-auto, and safe.
And in the safe position it simply locks the grip safety so that you can't depress it.
That's a simple and effective way of making the gun safe.
The original Beretta Model 12 actually had a push button safety.
The 12S is the more modern upgraded version with this rotating lever safety.
All of them, however, have a paddle magazine release right here at the back, that comes out.
A very good magazine design, it is a double-feed magazine.
And then to extend the stock we just push this button, which allows us to unfold it like so.
And then this button here allows the butt plate to fold down.
If there is a not particularly great feature of the Beretta 12, it is that stock.
It is offset, so it's really only comfortable for right-handers.
And it's a pretty thin and kind of uncomfortable stock to use.
It does work, but it could be nicer.
Now there are two stages to disassembly here, we have to take both ends off of the receiver.
So I'm going to lift this spring-loaded tab up,
which allows me to unscrew the rear cap.
This will spring off under tension from the mainspring, if you let it.
We'll pull out the mainspring.
Now I've pulled the bolt back, and I can now take off the front receiver cap.
We have another spring-loaded keeper, which is this,
which I'm going to pull down.
It's a little hard to do it where you can see it on camera.
Alright, there we go.
Once the front cap is off I can remove it.
And then, depressing the grip safety and the trigger,
I can pull the bolt and the barrel out of the front of the gun.
Once I have the bolt out, we can then tip the barrel out of it.
Wiggle it a little bit and there we go, the two come apart.
So when someone talks about a telescoping bolt in a submachine gun,
this is typically what they are talking about.
The thing is very long, and the actual breech face is at the back.
What this does is it allows you to position a lot of the material forward.
And that helps keep the gun controllable.
What it means is the centre of balance of the gun is going to be further forward.
And instead of the mass all coming very far back in the receiver,
a lot of it is going to stay up front.
So that reduces muzzle climb, and just makes the guns nicer to shoot.
You can see the barrel here, there's our full barrel length.
And the bolt comes out to only ... just short of two inches short of the muzzle.
So, when you combine the forward mass of the bolt with a vertical forward pistol grip,
this gun really is a remarkably controllable gun.
It's generally well liked by the people who use it.
Of course, all submachine guns really do require quite a bit of practice
to become very proficient with.
But the Beretta 12 is a pretty good one if you've got your choice.
I believe there are some modern adaptations to allow it to use optical sights.
In this standard original configuration it's iron sights only.
But even that, at submachine gun ranges, is really not that much of a problem.
This is ... really gorgeous, looks like virtually unused.
I'm sure it's been fired a little bit, but not a whole lot, this thing has been babied.
A great example of a Beretta PM-12.
And these really are a quite good modern submachine gun.
... It is coming up for sale here, but the downside is it is a dealer sample.
So if you have the licence to purchase and possess a post-sample machine gun,
then take a look at the description text below.
You'll find a link there to Rock Island's catalogue page on this guy, and you can look at
their pictures, and description, and everything else necessary to place a bid on it.
If you are just a regular dude like me, and you are only able to own transferable machine guns,
you might be interested in taking a look at this one anyway just to
get a feel for what some of the dealer sample guns look like and sell for.
Thanks for watching.