Top 5 Guns To Buy Before A Ban

We may have lightly touched on some political issues in some of our past topic, but rest assured that the channel remains neutral as far as politics. Whether or not we have the right to own certain types of guns and certain accessories is not something I would bother debating about, as I believe these types of debates are pointless and best left to the politicians.

But for young people who haven’t heard of it, there was a so-called Assault Weapons Ban in 1994 which made it illegal to purchase a variety of semi-automatic guns by name, various gun accessories, as well as magazines by round count. This ban expired some 18 years ago, which is why there are many youngsters these days who haven’t heard of it. 

And before anyone asks, the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban is non-renewable. Still, the threat of another Assault Weapons Ban exists, the most recent one was proposed by California Senator Dainne Feinstein not too long ago. If the Biden administration signs it into law, it’ll be like the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban all over again, only much worse if you look at the exhaustive list of all the guns and accessories that will be banned. 

So what guns and accessories should you buy if this new Assault Weapons Ban is signed into law? And are there any other reasons to buy these besides the ban? If you’d like to know more, stick around to the end of this topic. Without further ado, here’s my list of the Top 5 Guns To Buy Before A Ban.

1. The Kalashnikov Rifle

Everyone recognizes an AK-47’s silhouette when they see one as the gun has become easily recognizable over the years, due in part to its popularity among several country’s military, as well as the notoriety it gained thanks to Hollywood and the mainstream media’s combined efforts. To those of you who always seem to ask yourselves what the letters A and K in the AK-47 stand for, it’s Avtomat Kalashnikova, which in Russian, literally means Kalashnikov’s automatic. 

Like most other firearms, the AK-47 was aptly named after the person who designed and developed it, Mikhail Kalashnikov. Rumor has it that it was based on more than a few different automatic rifle designs that predated it, the most influential of which to Kalashnikov was Germany’s Sturmgewehr-44. 

Commonly referred to as StG-44 for short, the Sturmgewehr was the first real fighting man’s mid-range rifle. It wasn’t designed to shoot a heavy round but it was capable of a sustained high rate of fire. Mikhail Kalashnikov supposedly designed the AK-47 to perform the same as the StG-44, but after many revisions, somehow ended up developing a simpler but far superior weapon. 

The AK-47 is user-friendly, easy to use, doesn’t take much effort to repair, is quick to unjam on the rarest of occasions that it does jam, and needs very little maintenance. If an AK-47 is able to chamber a cartridge, it’s almost guaranteed to fire no matter what situation the operator is in.

The AK-47 has a lot of things going for it, which resulted in its rise to military popularity, and much later on, its notoriety. It’s a painfully long story but the short version is, AK-47s were manufactured en masse by the Soviet Union and upon its collapse, many of the stockpiled AK-47s went to all sorts of different places. Some of them eventually fell into the wrong hands, among which are radical Islamist terrorist groups which I wouldn’t bother naming because everyone knows them these days.

The AK-47 is one of the guns most vilified by anti gun people so it’s no wonder it easily made its way to the top of their list of guns they want to ban, and it’s also why it’s Top 1 on my list of guns to buy before there’s a ban. Assuming you were able to purchase one before a ban, you can either keep it as a grandfathered piece for home defense, or you can sell it for profit. 

In case you find the prospect of purchasing one appealing, the most affordable model in the original 7.62×39 chambering is a brand new Century Arms VSKA listed at GunBroker.com. At the time of this writing, one of those is selling for a paltry $779. Bonus tip, if you’re buying one of those Century Arms VSKAs, you may want to include a couple of Magpul 30-round magazines to go with it. It shouldn’t be too difficult to resell the whole rig for four to five times the money you spent on it after a weapons ban. 

2. The AR-15

If the AK-47 is so good, then what’s the point in having an AR-15? While I have no doubt that most of our viewers already know the answer to this question and have a preference for one over the other, and while I don’t want this topic to be an AK-47 versus AR-15 type of topic, I have to give my two cents on the matter for the benefit of the very few who might not know.

When comparing industry-standard ammo loads for each of the platform’s default chamberings which are the 5.56×45mm for the AR-15, and the 7.62×39mm for the AK-47, the AR-15’s chambering is slightly weaker as far as muzzle energies due to its use of smaller and lighter bullets. But the AR-15’s chambering is also capable of flatter trajectories and consequently, higher effective range, if we’re comparing bullet designs and ballistic coefficients.

As far as recoil, both platforms have low recoil but due to the AR-15’s slightly weaker chambering, it also has a slightly more manageable recoil. Finally, as far as reliability, both are plenty reliable and will get the job done, but the AK-47 is known to edge out the AR-15 due to its looser tolerances. The AR-15’s tighter tolerances make it much more accurate but also a bit more prone to malfunctions.

So depending on what you’re going to use a semi-auto rifle for, one may be slightly better than the other but for all intents and purposes, one can just be as good as the other if you have the right accessories, the right chambering, and the right ammo load. In short, they’re not too different from each other. And if anti gun groups vilify the AK, they hate the AR with every fiber of their being. In fact, to most of them, AR stands for “Assault Rifle”, without regard for the fact that a quick Google search will tell them it’s short for ArmaLite Rifle. 

But if there’s one thing about the AR platform that AK-type guns don’t have, it’s the modularity. You can buy a stripped AR-15 receiver for around $40, then later on buy yourself a lower receiver, a bolt carrier group, the parts kit and magazines for the chambering you want, and once you have all the necessary parts, you can build your own custom AR Frankenstein for really cheap.

There are around 50 different AR-type gun models specified in the Assault Weapons Ban bill I mentioned and I don’t have a particular bias toward any of those models so I wouldn’t recommend you purchase any of them. Rather, I’d recommend you buy an AR-15 receiver because they can be really cheap. 

And if you have more money to spare, I’d recommend you purchase a couple more of them, along with maybe a couple of AR-10 receivers and all the high-capacity magazines you can buy for whichever chamberings you may want. After a ban, you should be able to sell each of those receivers and magazines for up to ten times their original price. Or you can just build yourself an AR for whatever purpose you may have.

3. Any MAC-10 or Uzi-type Gun

Pistol caliber carbines have been all the rage for several years now and the growth in demand for these guns doesn’t seem to want to come to a halt. And there are a lot of good reasons why: quicker target acquisition and more precise follow-up shots, lower recoil, more room for attachments, and better mileage for any spare pistol caliber ammunition the owner may have lying around. 

Assuming you have a handgun chambered in 9mm and you have boxes of 9mm ammo that you want to make the most out of, there’s no better way to do so than getting a pistol caliber carbine chambered in 9mm. And since pistol caliber carbines typically have a longer barrel compared to their handgun counterparts, they’re able to push pistol cartridges way past their limits as far as ballistics. Simply put, if you have a handgun and you want something bigger, you’ll get more bang for your buck if you choose a pistol caliber carbine over a rifle. But long before any pistol caliber carbine was a thing, there was something similar. 

People in the industry collectively refer to these as the guns that made the 80s roar. More commonly known as machine pistols, these are the MAC-10, the Tec-9, and the Uzi, guns that are bigger than pistols but smaller than rifles and capable of fully automatic fire from an open bolt. These are usually chambered in either 9mm or .45 ACP, but there are models chambered for .380 Auto.

Like other guns on the proposed bill, these machine pistols gained popularity and notoriety, subsequently, because of Hollywood movies. These would have gone the way of the dodo as the Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986 declared all open bolt guns illegal if a company called Masterpiece Arms didn’t come up with their own closed-bolt semi-automatic version, the MPA-10, which is legal to own for civilians. If the proposed Assault Weapons Ban bill is signed into law, all guns that are similar in design and appearance will be banned.

So should you buy one of these before a ban? Yes, for the exact same reasons why you’d want to buy a Kalashnikov or an AR-style gun. These are guns that have a much higher resale value because they’re on the list of banned gun models. Granted, these have a much higher barrier to entry compared to stripped AR-15 receivers, but not everyone likes the DIY approach as there are some who prefer buying something that can be used out of the box. And because these are practically pistol caliber carbines, just in a different form factor, you can always keep one for home defense.

4. Pistol-grip Shotgun

If you didn’t notice, the pistol grip is one of the things anti-gun politicians absolutely love to hate, something they have on their mental checklist of things to look for in all guns they want to ban. I can’t be sure, but they could see a pistol grip on any firearm as something that will make it much more deadly than it already is.

I’m of the opinion that a pistol grip doesn’t make any gun more deadly. Other than making it look bad-ass, a pistol grip just makes a gun a little easier to aim and the trigger a bit easier to pull at best. Without a pistol grip, any gun that can reliably chamber a cartridge and ignite its primer upon the operator pulling its trigger has the potential to destroy whatever’s in its line of fire. But we clearly don’t see things the same way. If we did, then there would never be a ban.

All the guns I recommended to buy so far, the Kalashnikov, the AR-15, and the MAC-10 and Uzi types, all of them have a pistol grip. Shotguns with pistol grips are no exception. But since there are very few shotguns that have a pistol grip baked into its original design, it’s easy to recommend shotguns to buy before a ban. 

The Franchi LAW-12 and Franchi SPAS-12, the Sentinel Arms Striker-12, and all variants of the SAIGA 12 will all be banned so they’re all guaranteed to turn a huge profit should you decide to buy any of them before a ban for resale later. 

Alternatively, you can look at the possibility of buying several aftermarket pistol grip stocks for semi-automatic shotgun models that don’t already have a pistol grip installed out of the box. Mesa Tactical’s Urbino pistol grip stock for the Remington Model 1100 costs $100 a piece but you should be able to sell those for much higher if the new Assault Weapons Ban is signed into law. 

5. Any Belt-fed Gun

Belt-fed guns in my opinion are pointless and probably some of the most impractical guns for any non-military person to own. There are three reasons why I think this is the case. The first is, unless the country’s at war or there’s civil unrest, I wouldn’t care to bring any belt-fed gun to a gun fight as they are heavy and unwieldy. If I would ever buy one, it would last a couple of lifetimes without getting used, as no country in the world would dare go to war with America now or in the foreseeable future.

My second reason is these things are useless in the range. They can burn ammo quickly due to the fact they don’t require frequent reloads. And this is true even for semi-automatic belt-fed gun models. I can imagine my trigger finger getting sore from all the trigger pulling I would do, but regardless, I would still be able to shoot hundreds of rounds in a minute and that would be a total waste of ammo.

And finally, they can be prohibitively expensive. The FN M249S, a semi-automatic belt-fed gun that is legal to own for civilians in 38 states, is selling for $10,000 flat.

Still, I decided to include belt-fed guns in my list for one specific reason: they’re included in the proposed Assault Weapons Ban bill. As with all the other gun types I’ve touched on so far, assuming you have the money, you can buy an FN M249S and still sell it at a profit if there’s a ban. I doubt you can sell it for four or five times its original price like you can with stripped AR-15 receivers or magazines, but if you can sell it for one and a half times its original price, you’d still make a handsome $5,000 profit.