As adapted from an article on Orion Woods Brigade.

Continuing our discussion of good guns for the undead . . .

5. AR-180 – Built at the time to be a better weapon than the AR-15, this rifle has become a favored weapon by Armalite collectors, the IRA, and Terminator 1 fanboys. It is very reliable, easy-to-carry (integral folding stock), but unfortunately doesn’t take standard AR mags without modification. This ridiculous issue may have been an f-you to the Colt folks who got the AR contract, or may actually be for some other reason that I have yet to discover. This issue was thankfully remedied on the latest incarnation, the AR-180B, which sadly has omitted the folding stock.

Check out the StormWerkz aftermarket mounts to make this a really formidable intermediate sniper weapon.

6. Saiga 12 or 20 gauge semi-automatic shotgun – One of the coolest and least talked about AK-mods is the Saiga shotgun system. In its standard configuration it appears to be nothing more than an ugly, designed for import to silly American’s, how-can-we-make-this-using-our-same-tooling comm-bloc version of a shotgun. On first glance, you’d be right, but throw in some Mad Dog custom 12 gauge drums and the Tapco T-6 stock set, and you are really looking at a great, reliable weapon system to take you though to the EOTWAWKI. Eat your heart out, Mad Max.

Check out the article in the August 2008 SWAT magazine about the Krebs Custom upgrades. It really makes this system shine.

As adapted from an article on Orion Woods Brigade.

Continuing our discussion of great rifles for the undead . . .

3. AR-15 Series rifle – I know I’ll get a lot of flak for not making this number one on my list – especially with some of the crowd I run with. The reality is that there are way too many parts to go wrong on an AR to make it a truly reliable post-TSHTF type of weapon. However, since we are talking about taking head shots on half-rotted zombies, then the usually complaints about the AR’s less-than-manstopper round are not applicable here.

It gets lots of points for accuracy – nice to take care of zombies before they start shouldering into the side of your house and keeping the kiddies up with their incessant moaning – and the fact that you can carry a hell of a lot of ammo for it with minimal weight issues. Plus, the scrounge factor of .223 Remington is really high – especially in the parts of the country where we do a lot of hog hunting.

4. SKS – Despite being a cheaper, more accurate relative of the AK-47, the SKS gets points for being a much more civilized looking version of its notorious cousin. Maybe this will make the shell-shocked villagers less apt to take a pot shot at you as you make your way through their plowed field in the middle of the night. Also, because it is a more “old school” weapon it’s very, very robust and can be used as a club in a pinch. Most even come mounted with an integrated bayonet – which would be great for keeping the undead at bay while you are fooling around with the stripper clips. 🙂

It loses points for not being able to hold as much ammo (10 round stripper clip vs. a 30-rd magazine), but a user can be trained to load an entire 10-rd stripper clip into the rifle in the same amount of time it takes someone to load one round into a magazine. There are some after-market accessories for the rifle that allow it to have a larger ammo capacity, but I have never seen any of these that I would consider robust enough to take on a hoard of the undead. There were a few versions of the rifle that take an AK mag (the best of both worlds), but these are usually pretty rare.

Also a great choice for the zombie hunter on a budget.