Kicking the tires on a vintage Dutch contract AR-10 (VIDEO)

Larry Vickers and Tyler Grey stumbled across a Guatemalan-contract, Dutch-produced AR-10 and put it through its paces.

With the armies of Free World chasing 7.62x51mm caliber battle rifles (the T44E5 which became the M14 in the U.S. and the FN FAL/CETME/Sig Stg.57 families in Europe) in the 1950s, the Johnson-Sullivan-Stoner alloy and plastic rifle dream team at Armalite were working on a fresh battle rifle that accommodated the new NATO round.

This gun, the AR-10, was gas operated, using a modified Ljungman-style direct impingement action with a rotating bolt. The ambi charging lever was atop the upper receiver, hidden under the now iconic elevated carrying handle, which held the high-line aperture rear sights. All exposed metal surfaces were given a thick anodized/parkerized finish.

Select-fire and capable of being rattled off at a blistering 650-750 rounds per minute– capable of emptying a “disposable” 20-round waffle mag in just two seconds– it was still controllable due to a distinctive coke can-sized flash suppressor/compensator and the overall high bore axis of the ported 21-inch barrel. Although the Pentagon didn’t bite, Fairchild talked Dutch state arsenal Artillerie Inrichtingen into a five-year exclusive contract to produce the guns overseas starting in 1957 and Armalite salesmen went circling the globe looking to seal the deals.

One of them was with Guatemala for about 500 rifles, the variant of which Larry V has in the above video.

Produced the original compensator swapped for a pronged brake, watch for the recoil.