Hi guys, thanks for tuning in to another video on ForgottenWeapons.com.
I'm Ian McCollum, and I am here today at Morphy's
taking a look at a special version of the Beretta AR70.
This is an SCS70.
It is a specific version that was introduced
for Italian special forces.
Now the Beretta Model 70 was sort of
the result of a collaborative project between Beretta and SIG.
But it was one that didn't really work out,
and this deal ended in 1968, the two companies each went their own ways.
SIG would initially come out with the SIG 530 and then the SIG 540.
And the 540 and the Beretta AR70
(which was Beretta's eventual product from this collaborative work),
the AR70 and the SIG 540 are rifles that have a lot of similarities,
although they are certainly not the same rifle.
Now Beretta came out with this in 1970 because,
well, they've been hoping to just get a licence to manufacture the M16.
Colt was not willing to give that to them, and so they ended up going,
"Well, I guess we'll just do our own rifle. We have that thing with SIG that we did,
so let's finish that up and put it into production."
That became the Beretta AR70.
It is a rotating bolt, long-stroke gas piston rifle, kind of like the SIG 540.
Now the SCS70 version here is the short-barrelled (it's a 12.7 inch barrel),
and folding-stocked carbine version.
Now, they did also make an SC70, which is
essentially the folding stock on a full-length rifle, but
this is the one that to me is particularly interesting.
So, let's take a closer look at it.
Really, who doesn't like cool little cute short-barrelled 5.56 carbines like this?
Yeah, they sacrifice a lot of velocity compared to a full-length barrel,
but they're just really neat.
If we take a look at the left side of the receiver we have the Beretta original markings.
And you'll note this is a Model SCS70/.223, and its serial number.
Beretta did not opt for a burst mechanism on these rifles,
so you have automatic, semi-automatic ("1"), and safe.
And just a little interesting point, if we drop the hammer - yes, it is empty -
you will see that the AR70 trigger group has that same quirk as the M16 one,
in that you cannot put the selector onto safe if the hammer is dropped.
You have to re-cock it,
and then it can go onto safe.
The stock locks in both the folded and extended positions.
So to open it or close it, you have to push this button,
you can then fold the stock out like so.
This does use the same magazines as the standard AR70s.
They are a proprietary nose-in rock-back magazine.
It would be with the 70/90 pattern, which we'll talk about in a moment,
when this changed to using the regular STANAG magazines.
The front end of the gun has changed a bit compared to the regular AR70.
We first off have a new style of handguard,
this was actually adopted in 1983.
And I believe it was applied to the AR70 as well as the SCS70s.
And then the muzzle area has changed as well.
So the standard AR70 and SC70 have rifle grenade setups.
So they have a longer muzzle extension here to accept a rifle grenade,
and they have a gas cut off for use with rifle grenades, this does not.
It does have the same sort of disassembly mechanism out front here though,
where we depress this lock catch, and then the muzzle device is simply threaded on.
On the AR70 that's a much longer device for a rifle grenade.
The other improvement here was the addition of pistol grip storage.
So we've got a little metal plate there.
And if I slide that off we have space.
And in fact this one still has its original little cleaning kit in the pistol grip,
which is exactly what that pistol grip storage is intended for.
So you have a 300 metre zero.
And if I tilt the rifle so that you can see it, a 150 metre zero.
With windage adjustment done on the side.
The front sight is just a post, a couple of short protector wings,
and that's threaded so you can screw it in and out to adjust elevation.
The rest of the disassembly of the SCS70 is identical to the Beretta AR70,
and I have that in a video already, so I won't redo it here.
I will just link at the end of this video to my AR70 video.
If you want to see the full take-down, you can check it out there.
All in all, not a whole lot of changes compared to the regular Beretta AR70.
But I think the folding stock and the short barrel make this a really neat little carbine.
It was of course used by Italian special forces until 1990,
when the AR70 family was replaced with the AR70/90 family.
... The 70/90 was a series of improvements that were actually originally developed
for Beretta's submission of a rifle to the 1980s NATO rifle trials.
Well, Beretta didn't end up getting chosen as a new NATO rifle,
but all of those improvements did go into a package that was adopted by the Italian military.
When they did that, they proceeded to make basically the same pattern,
the SCS70/90, with all of those 1990 period upgrades.
Anyway, this is the early version, the SCS70.
It is a registered pre-'86 dealer sample.
So this came into the country ... post-1968, pre-1986,
which makes it eligible as a dealer sample only. Hopefully you guys enjoyed the video.
Thanks for watching.