The list of guns that I regret selling is actually pretty short. Probably because I tend to buy and hold. But, there are a couple I really wish I’d kept. Probably the number one is an HK93A3 that I bought in 1986 for the princely some of $600. I was a poor 19-year-old college kid and this was a major purchase. It was the best 5.56 gun I’ve ever owned. It was accurate, utterly reliable, ate even the crappiest ammo, and was fun to shoot. Unfortunately, even in 1986, spare mags were spendy and I eventually traded it off for a CAR-15 which could be fed with $5 magazines. I have regretted selling it ever since.
However… I did not regret it enough to buy another one. These days, a clean HK93A3 with a few mags is easily north of $4-5k. While the .308 version, the HK91, has been cloned by various makers, some good and some really ungood, the HK93 was never really copied as much. Special Weapons, Vector, and Century have dabbled with them in the past, but they are rarely seen. And…most HK clones are just not very good. It’s tough to match the German stuff when theyve amortized the startup costs years ago and have literally decades of experience, versus some little shop that has to start from scratch.
How did PTR do it? Well, in Victor Kiam fashion, they bought the company. See, when a country adopts a weapons system like a rifle or pistol, they often require it to be made in their country. (Waves at SIG USA) Portugal wanted to arm itself with G3’s, so HK built a plant in Portugal. When the G3 was no longer used or supported by Portugal, some guy went in and bought the factory, boxed it up, and shipped it to Connecticut…HK tooling, HK parts, HK everything. Thats the easy way…don’t re-invent the wheel; buy the wheel factory.
Thing is, no military ever really adopted the HK93 ( or its various guises….43, 53, 33, etc) in any major numbers, so there was no big factory to switch to consumer production. But…the Turks managed it, apparently. MKE produces MP5 clones and is out there with a ‘pistol’ version of the HK93. See, you cant bring in the rifle version because of import bans…but you can bring in a ‘pistol’. What you do with that pistol, regarding a stock or arm brace, once you get it in the US…well, thats between you, your credit card, and HKParts.net.
One of the big headaches of the HK93 was magazines. Few and far between. And expensive when found. Well, MKE makes the gun so they may as well make mags. As a result there are polymer mags out there that are very derivative of the G36 mags in style and appearance. And AC Unity, who seemingly came out of nowhere a few years ago, makes a whole range of HK items including HK93 mags. So with mag availability out of the way….maybe it was time to get back into the HK93 game…just for the nostalgia of my misspent youth.
Eforms are faster these days and the SBR on this jewel came back pretty quick. A quick trip to the engraver and it was done.
Its not 100% faithful to the HK93. For one thing, there is a paddle mag release which the original HK93 rifle that was sold in the US never had. And the lower is ‘push pin’ rather than ‘shelf’, which is true to original full-auto HK rifles but definitely not something you see on semi-auto versions. Thread pitch on the muzzle is also different than the metric used by HK. But other than that, its pretty much a clone.
Its purpose? Well, same as any other SBR’d .223…..fun gun and a one-in-a-hundred time when an SBR is exactly what you need over a carbine full size rifle. It is, in fact, virtually identical in size to my MP5 clones. In fact, quite a few MP accessories will work on this thing..most notably the forends.
Honestly, for me, this is mostly just a ‘fun gun’. Even if it were an original 93 it wouldnt be my first choice for fighting the invading zombies…its a logistical outlier. It may be better, in my opinion, than an AR15 in some uses but at the end of the day I can find mags and parts for an AR quite easily whereas it would be a long and often fruitless search to find parts and mags for the HK if I had to.
By the by, this ‘pistol’ is marketed as the MKE AP53 (imported, but not made, by Century). It scratches an Itch I’ve had since I was 19-years-old and so far its been fun to shoot. I’ll be replacing the tuning fork muzzle device ASAP, though. Accuracy? Once dialed in, I could hit the steel at 100 yards which is about as far as I’d really expect an 8.3″ barrelled .5.56 to be used. (To be used at? To be used for?….English, man.)
I would be remiss to fail to mention that PTR makes a version of this (the so-called HK51) in .308. Thats right, a .308 in an 8.3″ barrel. Sometimes referred to as ‘the semi-auto flash bang dispenser’. Not for me.
I do believe I’ve now hit the roller-locked trifecta – 7.62×51, 5.56, and 9mm…call it ‘the HK Hat Trick’.
I fired the HK 53 for familiarization while on an exchange with the Danish army, I really liked it. Jaegers had all the fun toys, they used every HK product back then including the PSG1. Except the pistols, the SIG P210 was the issue sidearm.
When I was a teenager, I became enamoured of an HK-91 that a local surplus (sort of) store had. They’re long gone, but would have the oddest things in there – a dummy AIM-2 genie missile (a real training aid,not a mock-up), a Sidewinder, this and that. A very odd store: It had things on display, but if you wanted to touch them or buy them you had to ask a sales clerk, who would disappear into the back for it. Also, they kept their AC at arctic levels (It was in the wilds of the northwest San Fernando Valley and in the summer it would be HOT, and my VW didn’t have AC so…you’d walk in and icicle’s would form instantly
One thing they had was the HK-91, from the factory. Fitted wooden case (tactical, not stylish), long and short barrels, all the accoutrement that HK made for it – sight tool, bipod, sling, cleaning kit, forward grip, all sorts of odd things.
At that time, it was essentially three months salary for me (in excess of $2k, in 1976 or so dollars). For a long time it remained at 2-3 months salary, and I just couldn’t justify it to myself.
I finally got my HK-91s though, in PTR flavor. It helped that Cheaper than Dirt had mags for less than a dollar each, and the PTR-91 was my families MBR for a decade or so before switching to AR-10 formats. Still have the HK jones though. Never was attracted to the 5.56 versions, for some reason.
I know at one time Century said they were going to sell the handgun with a 16 inch barrel, we all know what they would get turned into. But I think Batfeeces put a stop on handguns with barrels over 10 inches.