Brain Fertilizer

(If you don't, you should)

The question is which gun?

So probably the best place to start is by asking yourself what you want a gun for. For what you want a gun. You know what I mean.

If you want a gun for home or personal defense, that will lead you in an entirely different direction than if you want to shoot at paper targets a few times a week, every week.

A shotgun is supposedly best for home defense. A pistol is almost as good, and can also work well for personal defense outside your home.

If you want to have fun making holes in paper, you probably want a .22 rifle, because you can plink away at distances up to a hundred yards for about a penny a shot, and the rifles themselves don't cost much, either.

If you want to hunt large game, you need a rifle, probably bolt-action. But the cost of the rifle is only the first consideration, because the more you shoot, the more ammo you need. You can expect to spend between $.10 and $.40 a round to practice. Some rifles will be more expensive with cheap ammo, some will be cheap with expensive ammo, and some will be cheap with cheap ammo. Cheapest is best, right? But the reason for variations in price is different rifles will vary in accuracy, recoil, reliability, workmanship, availability…

Let's look a little closer at the issues:

Home Defense.
Most people claim that a shotgun is best for home defense. When you consider that a shotgun spreads out a great deal of lead over a wide area, but the power of that lead drops off rapidly with distance, that line of thinking becomes clear. You increase the chance of hitting the intruder and hurting him badly without much risk of the shot penetrating walls to injure a family member or neighbor. Yes, some powerful rifle rounds will penetrate the outer walls of a home.
But it's not that simple, because some people cannot handle the recoil of a shotgun. You can't keep a shotgun in a nighstand drawer very easily, and the length can be unwieldy if you have to cover more than one person. It's also not as convenient for outside the home.
So if you consider a pistol, you have to still consider that the larger rounds can still easily penetrate the inner walls of a house. Again, some people may not be able to handle the recoil of a larger pistol. If you decide on a really light round, like a .22, you get a pistol that is easily controllable and precise in shooting…but you risk not being able to actually stop the intruder with one or even multiple shots. Generally, a 9mm represents the best combination of stopping power and lightness of recoil.
But don't just go out and buy a 9mm pistol! If you are going to keep the pistol by your bed without using it for months or years, then reliability is an issue. Even the best automatics sometimes jam or fail to fire. The best thing about a revolver is you can neglect it for years, but when you pick it up and squeeze the trigger, it still fires.
But that's about all I know about pistols. Your best course of action is to go to a gun store related to or collocated with a firing range, one that will let you try out guns before you decide to purchase. Even simple things like the angle of the grip or the convenience of the safety switch may help you decide which is best for you. Some guns are better for people with small hands, some are better designed for bigger people. Try out several before you finalize your decision.

But I know rifles a little bit better.
As I've said before, if you want to just make holes in paper, a .22 is your best bet, mainly because they are cheap and reliable, and the ammo is cheap. But they are useless for anything else. Sure, you could use a .22 rifle for home defense, but the problems of stopping power, jamming, unwieldiness due to length, etc, would make a .22 revolver far better for that sort of thing. A .22 rifle should pretty much just be to work on marksmanship skills, because you can shoot quite a bit for pennies.
But there are other choices, as well. NATO ammunition is plentiful enough to be pretty cheap. Both 5.56mm and 7.62mm NATO can be found for about $.10 a round, so you can get a good amount of shooting in for less than $5. (Although you may need to buy in bulk of several thousand rounds to get the price that cheap).
Unfortunately, most of the rifles that fire fire NATO ammunition of either size are fairly expensive (with a few exceptions I will detail below). This is because they are semi-automatic modifications of military weapons for civilian use, but retain the military reliability and reputation. M-16 clones will cost you in excess of $800 new; M-14 variations will cost you more than a thousand; semi-automatic Stery Augs and FN-FALs can cost more than $2000. To me, that's a high price to pay for cheap ammo. But you get good quality rifles, so it's a personal choice.

I prefer pre-WWII military surplus bolt-action rifles. They are plentiful due to being mass-produced for various armies. Ammo is generally cheaper for the same reason. They have a tangible sense of history attached (they aren't making 50-year-old rifles anymore). They use ammunition that is powerful enough for hunting or militia/apocalypse scenarios, and are usually quite accurate.

A note on accuracy: Generally, bolt-action rifles are more accurate than semi-automatic. Further, 5.56mm rifles are usually accurate to about 400 yards. Larger rifles, including 7.62 NATO and the various WWII-era calibers are often accurate enough for use with a scope up to 1000 yards! To tell the truth, you usually cannot see a human past about 300-350 yards without some sort of magnification, and even most deer are spotted and shot at less than 150 yards, and you wouldn't want to try a shot beyond 200 yards unless you are very experienced *and* skilled. So long-range accuracy is perhaps not that important…but I like the idea.

A note on power: a 5.56mm round is usually considered too weak to kill a deer. If you are going to hunt large animals, you must have something larger, usually at least the Swedish 6.5x55, even better to have something in the 7.5mm (.30 caliber) range. That's a little simplistic, though, because the bullet weight and cartridge powder capacity have as much effect as the bullet diameter… The most important point is that the 5.56mm rifle is generally considered to be best for varmints, marksmanship practice, and suitable for use against humans in a survivalist/militia/apocalypse situation.

You'll hear me mention "mauser" many times in talking about rifles. This is because Mr. Mauser designed what is nearly the perfect bolt action system more than 100 years ago. If you purchase a modern rifle, brand new, with all the benefits of 100 years of experience and computer-assisted design, you will get a bolt action system virtually indistinguishable from a German K98 Mauser.

For all the above reasons, and particularly the reasons of cost and historical significance, I like the pre-WWII military surplus bolt-action rifles.

They have demonstrated their effectiveness against humans (obviously), but are also excellent for hunting larger game. There is some variation, in that the Swedish Mauser in 6.5x55 is too small for larger deer and elk, and the largest rounds (the German 8x57mm) might be too big for smaller deer, but pretty much every caliber is versatile enough for multiple functions.

(I apologize for my continual reference to killing humans. However, most large cities are less than 48 hours from mass starvation, and thus collapse. Plus, The Turner Diaries presents a chilling view of what armed white supremacists plan to do, and I want to make sure there is an armed force to oppose such idiots)

So pretty much any old military surplus rifle will do? Not much difference between any of them, right? Not so fast.

Right now, I have 8 distinct old military rifle types (12 total rifles), and their respective strengths render me unable to bear parting with any of them. Here's why:

Russian M44, 7.62x54r
This is a good rifle, durable, reliable and essentially the same rifle used by Russian snipers in WWII…and while it is not one of the ones chosen as being of top-notch accuracy, it is surprisingly accurate. Lots of cheap ammo available, but the ammo is corrosive. The best part of this rifle is it has an integral bayonet, so I like it as a Civil Chaos weapon. Strong recoil, though. I have to use a recoil pad with it.

Swiss K-31, 7.5x55
I have two of these because the price was right. These rifles have a reputation for astounding accuracy, of sniper level quality. If you are a good marskman, you can hit at 400 yards with iron (open) sights what other rifles would need a scope to hit. It's made like a, well, Swiss watch, and if you built a new rifle to this level of tolerance, quality, and accuracy, it would cost you close to $2000. But you can get 'em for as cheap as $120...
They have never made corrosive ammo for this rifle, which is a nice bonus. If you like the historical angle, while these rifles haven't been used in war, they do have the name, unit, and sometimes home address of the reservist soldier who used it last (and took it home with him). Some people have been able to make contact with these people.
It is in the .30-06 class of round, quite powerful, and a pretty good recoil. Ammo is fairly expensive, though, so I'm planning on handloading rounds myself to save money.

Argentine Mauser, 7.65mm
I can't let go of mine because it is an 1890 rifle, 114 years old!!, and yet in still beautiful condition with unmarred wood and new-looking metal. The nice part about it is, from my viewpoint, that even though the bullet is slightly larger, the recoil I feel shooting it is much milder than the Swiss or the Russian.

Swedish Mauser, 6.5x55
When they talk about this rifle having the best workmanship, they aren't joking. Often, the wood of the stock might be beat up, but the action is smooth on all three of my Swedish Mausers. 5 years ago you could have bought excellent condition Swedish Mausers for less than $100. The first one I bought was purchased at a time when no one selling, though, and it cost me $300. The 2nd, a shorter-length M38, was also $300, but had a new stock and was drilled and tapped for a scope, so it was worth it. The third one was purchased after someone dropped a bunch of 'em on the market again, with badly scarred stocks. I found one that wasn't that bad, with a near-perfect bore, for just $240, so it was worth it. I expect to wear out one of the longer rifles by shooting it bunches, and having the second rifle as a back-up. I'll add the scope to the M38 for my only scoped rifle.
The recoil of the 6.5x55 is quite mild, but the rifle is designed for a very long, heavy bullet, so it is still a very useful bullet for deer. Or people. Ammo is pretty cheap and plentiful, too. When you combine the extremely light recoil for such a legitimate battle cartridge with the excellent workmanship, you end up with a weapon reknowned for accuracy. Not as accurate as the Swiss K-31, but not as hard-kicking, either. While the Swiss K-31 can make groups smaller than 2" at 200 yards, the Swedish Mauser would be more like 2.5". Most other rifles would be within 3-4" at 200 yards.

(This is referred to as an MOA (minute of angle) measurement. If a rifle is of MOA accuracy, it will spread 1" for every 100 yards, i.e., 4" at 400 yards. A sub-MOA rifle would be very accurate, and the K-31 is one such rifle. Most bolt action rifles come close but don't reach MOA accuracy, and most semi-automatic rifles are about twice that, spreading 2" for every 100 yards of distance)

Egyptian Mauser, 8x57
This is my most powerful rifle, and this rifle itself is in nearly unused condition. I may want to hunt elk someday, and would want the most powerful round to make sure I don't fail to get a kill merely because of the bullet size/power. It's also nice to know that this will be my rifle from start to finish. I think everyone who wants to collect and hunt with old rifles needs at least one 8mm rifle. German 8mm Mausers (the K98) were quite popular, and there have been Russian-captured German Mausers claiming to have all the markings and being in excellent condition for less than $200, but for the most part, it seems as if the genuine surplus German rifles have all been purchased, meaning the price for a good quality one is approaching or exceeding $500. Not worth it to me when I can get Czech or Yugo or (as I did) an Egyptian Mauser for less than $200.

Spanish Mauser, 7.62 NATO (.308)
I actually did attempt to sell this one earlier as superfluous…but when it didn't sell immediately for the price I wanted, I withdrew it from consideration, because it could eventually be useful or even vital to have a rifle that can fire such an inexpensive and easily found caliber. I'll probably be buying a case of 1000 rounds for less than $90 soon; once I use that all up, there most definitely will be a positive effect on my marksmanship skills!

British SMLE, .303
The round isn't anything special. It isn't especially inexpensive, or amazingly accurate or anything. It is a good, proven rifle, though. The action on the SMLE is smooth and fast, to the point that when used in battle, some opponents thought the British were firing a semi-automatic rifle! A nice extra bonus is that most of the WWII-era rifles have only 5 or 6 round magazines, but the SMLE has room for 10! I can imagine that in some situations it might be nice to have 4 extra rounds without reloading.

AR-180, 5.56mm
Inexpensive, plentiful ammo. Not good enough for hunting anything edible, nope. But a good round for tactical situations. The only thing about M-16/AR-15 rifles is that they tend to jam if not taken care of well, because the action system uses the gas directly from the barrel to push the bolt back. That means that all the soot/carbon gets blown right on your action, and the tolerances are so close that it doesn't take much before your rifle won't work anymore. The AK-47, on the other hand, uses the gas to push a piston that pushes the bolt, so you don't have the blast of soot/carbon in your chamber to gum up the works. The AK-47 was also made with very loose tolerances in order to be reliable (and cheap)…it also made it far less accurate.
The AR-180 combines the best of both worlds. It has tolerances tight enough to be quite accurate, but uses the gas piston system from the AK-47 so it doesn't jam so easily, even if you don't clean it for several hundred rounds. Recoil is quite light, but still enough stronger than a .22 that you can get used to how the recoil affects your shooting. Plus, it cost less than $600.

I had considered trying to get a WWII/Korean-era semi-automatic rifle, like the US M-1 Garand or maybe a Russian SVT or German, but they all cost in excess of $600. Sure, I could get a semi-auto SKS for less than $150 or AK clone for less than $300, but they have accuracy issues and feature a lighter/weaker round than the aforementioned battle rifles. I feel I'm better off with the AR-180 than an SKS or AK. However, there is one great deal in powerful, accurate, semi-automatic rifles:
The French MAS 49/56, 7.5x54
Despite the jokes made about the French and their weapons, everything I've seen says that this semi-auto rifle is excellent. It was used in French Indo-China, Algeria, and other colonial regions for decades, so not only is ammo plentiful and cheap, but the rifle is tested and well-respected. It does use the direct gas impingement system of the M-16, so I would expect you need to be careful keeping it clean, but if you want a good, strong cartridge in a reliable semi-automatic firearm, this would be your best choice. Because it's cheaper than the others with cheaper ammo…and because the Garand cannot be reloaded until you've fired the entire 8-round clip, whereas the French MAS 49/56 takes a 10-round removable magazine (and 20-round magazines exist out there somewhere…). I may get one someday, if I still feel the lack too keenly. Some are chambered for .308, which makes ammo even cheaper….
Just be careful, though, because there is a MAS 36, and that's a bolt-action rifle of good quality but no clear advantage over any of the other WWII-era bolt-action military surplus rifles listed above, and worse in many cases than most.