Arcadia Machine & Tool, better known as AMT, was a niche firearms manufacturer from Irwindale, California. Perhaps best known for the Automag series of pistols, ranging from .22 WMR up to .50 AE, AMT produced interesting guns. The Backup was a no-nonsense pistol that proved to be one of the company's more popular models. The gun's intent is in the name -- to serve as a backup gun, mainly aimed at law enforcement. It's marketing slogan, "The smallest and most powerful backup weapon available," must have stuck because there are a lot of these guns floating around the used market.

This small gun has a long, heavy double-action trigger pull and no sights on the slide, truly a BUG if there ever was one. When it was introduced in 1978, it came chambered in .380 ACP but has since been made available in everything from .22 LR to .357 Sig. The user had a choice of black plastic grips or walnut grips with the black plastic most prevalent. This 5+1 capacity gun has a heel mag release and a 2.5-inch barrel.