Museum The IMA warehouses

major bill

Brev. Brig. Gen'l
Forum Host
Joined
Aug 25, 2012
Just loaded on a bus to go to the IMF range where we will fire weapons from their collection. We spent the morning eating free donuts provided by IMA and wandering around their warehouse. Tons of weapons, blades, and military uniforms and equipment. Some of our arms collectors were very impressed with the arms. Plenty of Civil War rifles, pistols, and swords. Not too many Civil War bayonets. Kind of like a museum where everything is for sale.
 
A safe full of pistols but pre Civil War.
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Pardon my ignorance, but what does IMF and IMA stand for?
International Military Antiques. They sell antique arms, equipment, and that kind of thing on line. So a warehouse full of rifles, sword, pistols, helmets, and such. They had a few machineguns and a couple of cannons as well.
 
Sounds like a fantastic and rare opportunity to handle and fire some really special weapons.

Really great if you could fire them and not be tasked with cleaning them afterward 🤔😀

What weapons (if any) were different about their firing experience than you expected?

What weapon did you enjoy firing the most?

Were you able to choose a certain number to fire from a group of weapons or were you limited to specific ones?
 
Sounds like a fantastic and rare opportunity to handle and fire some really special weapons.

Really great if you could fire them and not be tasked with cleaning them afterward 🤔😀

What weapons (if any) were different about their firing experience than you expected?

What weapon did you enjoy firing the most?

Were you able to choose a certain number to fire from a group of weapons or were you limited to specific ones?
I liked the M1. I had not expected the level of getting my hands dirty from firing the Brown Bess and Enfield.
 
Did they have automatic weapons M60, Maw Duce etc?
 
I liked the M1. I had not expected the level of getting my hands dirty from firing the Brown Bess and Enfield.
I LOVE my M1's though I don't get to fire them as often as I would like. A wonderfully accurate weapon developed at the right time and still packs a wallop. These are the favorites of my collection.

When I live fire my Enfield or Springfield at a range session my appearance after firing 20 or so rounds is equivalent to an adult playing in the mud. Face, hands, shirt filthy no matter how much I try to wipe them on cloths. Of course the Texas heat contributes a lot of sweat. Is a dirty hobby for sure but a lot of fun and it sure draws a crowd at the range.

Amazed at how quickly my barrel fouled after just a few rounds and how difficult it became to ram charges home. I've often wondered how the soldiers in the ACW overcame this. I've read of where they used rocks and trees to assist but in their absence how else did they accomplish this task?
 
Did they have automatic weapons M60, Maw Duce etc?
None I saw but the did have German WW2 machineguns. I am not sure I visited every back room at the warehouse so could have missed if they had a machinegun safe.
 
I'd flat love to get a reproduction miquelet lock Spanish "trabuco" or blunderbuss... Availability is practically zero, and affordability is also rather prohibitive...

These homely guns were very popular indeed in the early 19th century, and widely used by travelers aboard ships, along the stretches of bad roads, on wagons, or on horseback...And also nefarious uses too.
 
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