ok guys im gonna get a little crude lol

this is the sten

looks like something i could build out of household junk right

but then thats kind of the point

lets go back to the beginnings of wwii

woooooosh

so europe has rumblings

pretty much everybody knows theres gonna be a big fight

and all the countries start collecting their stuff and gearing up

germany had been prohibited from having any military after wwi

and the allies took all their stuff

but in the end that just meant when hitler rebuilt the military in the 30s everything they had was brand new cutting edge

so germany started eyeing the people nearby and getting way too cozy like that creepy drunk guy you saw at the bar last week

and everybody else was playing catch up

one thing germany had was a pretty good submachine gun called the mp38

so the point of a submachinegun is it fires full auto

so its like a machinegun

except it fires little baby pistol rounds

so the weapon is actually small enough for one guy to carry

instead of a big honker that needs a squad of like three guys

it has a way shorter range than a regular infantry rifle or machinegun

like 100 m instead of like 1000 m

but they usually hold like 30 rds and go babababababababababababa

instead of five rounds that go boom

cock

pull back bolt

push bolt forward

lock it down

ow i got shot to death

so yeah up close fighting like in a city can be a lot easier with a submachine gun than a bolt action rifle

other countries had smgs too

the soviets had the ppd 34

they were fighting the finns who had the kp31

the italians had a different gun called the mp38

and of course america had the thompson

that was kind of the problem tho

the british had seen the tommy gun in the hands of gangsters over the past 20 years

and theyre like nah were no thugs

but then once things started heating up the british were more like

aw dang

so then they had to scramble because the royal air force needed something smaller for paratroopers and aircrews

the royal navy needed something to board and repel boarders that would fit in the tight quarters of a ship

and the army needed them for tank crews and stuff

so at first the british are like ok lets buy thompsons from the us

but thompsons are pretty complicated to build because they have all these machined parts that have to be milled out of solid chunks of metal

it takes a long time and is super expensive

meanwhile france just fell and the uk is probably about to get invaded

so the british are scrambling for something way cheaper and faster

first thing they did was start copying an older german design they captured from italians in ethiopia

but that was a stopgap

the big breakthrough was the sten

so the sten was created by two guys named shepherd and turpin at the enfield factory

shepherd turpin enfield

sten

thats how it got its name

the biggest innovation they did was to make a huge portion of the gun out of stamped metal and castings with as few machined parts as possible

this saved on labor and also allowed the weapon to have many parts constructed in very basic workshops

this is the biggest and most important strength of the sten

the receiver is just a tube with sheet metal box welded on

the only big machined parts are the bolt and the barrel itself

and even those are simple cylindrical pieces that can be made out of bar stock

the design was intended to be extremely simple to construct

and it was very successful for its intended purpose

it had a 32rd magazine and could fire at 600 rounds per minute

you could make 15 of them for the cost of one thompson

and the ability to make components in cottage workshops helped endure the blitz

overall they made like 4 million of them

the troops had mixed feelings about it tho lol

to explain why well look at the design

first off its a simple blowback locking system

we just talked about that last time with the ppk

big heavy bolt and powerful recoil spring pushing forward

since this is an smg and meant for two hands you can give it the extra weight needed for a blowback to handle 9mm

guys this thing weighs like 7lbs

kinda heavy for a pistol yeah lol

the fire control group is super simple

the trigger is connected to a sear

the sear hooks onto the bottom of the bolt

so when you pull the bolt back it locks open

this is called an open bolt design

this keeps the chamber cooler which is nice for a fast firing weapon

but its also super easy to make which is why we see it here

and the bolt has a fixed firing pin

it doesnt move at all its just a nub

super simple and very few moving parts

so simple in fact it only has full auto

hold the trigger down and it just keeps going

it doesnt really have a safety either

just a notch that kinda holds the charging handle

so if its cocked back and gets bumped the bolt can slip off and slam forward

and every time the bolt goes forward it will try to chamber and fire a round

so this was a problem

it got the wrong people injured and killed

another problem was the magazine

the british just straight up copied the magazine from the old mp18 they had captured in ethiopia

but turns out that mag had problems

so the mag is whats called double column single feed

double column or double stack refers to the way the rounds line up inside the magazine

if you make the rounds staggered you can hold a lot more ammo with just a little bit more width to the magazine

but see at the top where things start getting wonky

the magazine only has one feed point which means the rounds have a harder time lining up

this can cause jams

a more reliable solution is to open up the top of the magazine so the rounds can switch back and forth left right left right

this is called a double feed system

but the downside to that is its more complicated to make a weapon feed from both sides

you need more cuts in the bolt and the sten is all about minimizing as much machining as possible

and the sten is all about building it quick and easy right now

so we ended up with a weapon that was cheap and quick to build but not super reliable

and the hasty construction of early examples made it even worse

as a result troops preferred to give them all a test run before having to count on them in combat

the ergonomics were pretty poor too

the grip was just an angular piece of metal with a circle cut out to lighten it

the welds were messy but good enough

they made improvements as time went on

the mark ii had a t post for a stock

and the mk iii changed it to a stamped triangle

and the mk v had a wooden pistol grip and stock

after the war the design was further refined and eventually replaced by the sterling which uses a similar concept of stamped parts and simple open bolt blowback operation

the sterling also fixed the magazine by making it double stack double feed

but the basic crude unrefined sten design was so simple it stayd in use for decades in the british mikitary and was used by so many people

and the concept of stamped sheet metal open bolt submachine gun was so successful even nations that didnt adopt it often made something similar

as for buying one today

you pretty much cant

no new full auto can be made for regular people

you can buy kits but they will have their receivers cut and to rebuild them youd need to do modifications so its not open bolt

the atf is scared of you owning an open bolt because it is really easy to make an open bolt gun into full auto

and you having full auto would undermine the entire existence of a bureau designed to prevent you from having your rights oops

but as i mentioned its designed to be super easy to build even in a garage with the most basic tools

so if you want to build a fully legal non firing replica

grab your angle grinder and drill press

and follow these instructions

please use these insteuctions for educational purposes only lol

pewpew

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