Image courtesy AR15.comUntil the recent bans on normal-capacity magazines, the Saco Crossfire may have been the ultimate long gun for California shooters in the late 1990s. Consisting of a 4+1 round 12 gauge shotgun superposed over a 5.56 carbine fed by AR magazines, the Crossfire deftly dodged semi-auto gun bans because both actions were manually cycled by its sliding pump fore-end . . .

The idea of a combination rifle/shotgun is nothing new, of course. Billy may have bought the farm fairly early in Predator, but who can forget his combination M16/Remington 870 rifle/shotgun? Savage sold piles of break-open rifle/shotguns for decades; after a long hiatus they’re finally making new ones in .22/.410.

Somehow the Crossfire never capitalized on the utility and popularity of simpler combo guns. Maybe it was the high price tag, or the clunky looks, or the mechanical complexity, or the obese size and weight. Or the recalls.

Few were built and fewer were sold, and the remainders and recalls occasionally hit the market for liquidation. If you’re really interested, a batch of them has landed at www.cdnninvestments.com for $1000 each. But don’t say I didn’t try to warn you.

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31 COMMENTS

  2. Too much modernism. I want a semi-auto crossbow such as was used by Van Helsing to kill vampires.

    • I think Jorege from the Slingshot Channel on Youtube made one actually. I love his work.

    • How about a full automatic crossbow?

      [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QS4RKoRyTik]

  4. LOL. I just saw that in the CDNN flyer yesterday. Pretty ridiculous!!! Chris, there are NO videos of the thing on YouTube that I can find. Yes, that’s a challenge to go fix that problem.

  5. I was under the impression that the vertical fore-grip would have DQed this in Kali even before recent legislation. Interesting.

    • It isn’t a semi-auto, which exempts it from most legislation of the AWB variety (in CA, Federally, or elsewhere)…

  7. Robert, I appreciate your high culture things you slip into this, that there, whatever. Don’t stop what you’re doin’, baby!!

    Now THAT thing… aside from about six degrees of ugly, I can see a niche market for it, maybe. A VERY SMALL niche, but nonetheless, a niche.

    [INTERNAL MONITOR TO BURKE: YOU HAVE REACHED YOUR LIMIT of borrowed French words for today; you used “cuisine” and “merci” SOMEWHERE today, though I can’t seem to locate the logs…]

  8. The only combo gun I want is whatever the Marines were using in that alien movie. I would settle for the new Savage .22/.410.

    • Standard 10mm high explosive caseless armor piercing with a 30 mm grenade launcher. Schwing!

      • AKA the Colonial Marines M41A Pulse Rifle.

        It’s just a matter of time before that’s an actual gun. There’s so much that’s right about it that people have been making shootable facsimiles for years now.

        The integral magazine fed pump-action grenade launcher might be a bit much for the civilian market, however.

        • What goods a pulse rifle without the grenade launcher? Sorta takes all the fun out of it.

      • my inner geek salutes you JWM.
        i believe there was an actual licensed kit to fit a real steel Thompson and 870.

        you’d have better luck convincing Piers Morgan to change his mind on gun control than you would trying to find one though.

        PERSONALLY, based on the youtube vids ive seen of it, its not that great because it DOESNT HAVE THE PULSE SOUND FROM THE MOVIE!!! that sound MADE the gun for me. Without it, its been reduced to a phaser from star trek…

  9. Hmmm… I’m amusing myself with the visual of it cycling both actions with each pump, irrespective of which one actually needs it.

    “Just lemme finagle with this adjusting nut for a moment, Mr. Robber…”

  11. The idea could actually be interesting if someone ditched the whole “tacticool” angle, and just made a pump-action shotgun/22LR combo – that would make for a very practical survival rifle, being a worthy upgrade to classics like Savage 24C.

  12. I have one, it’s something of a piece of junk, the cycling arm has jammed on it and I haven’t been able to unjam it, It’s only benefit is being a pure pump gun so it gets under all the california laws.

  13. Interesting… I’m typing this literally a mile and a half from where it was made. That plant has been making weapons since the War of 1812. My wife’s grandmother made machine guns there during WWII. In the ten-plus years I’ve lived here I’ve seen them go through numerous ownership changes. I couldn’t even tell you what the name on the sign is now, and I drive past it every day.

    If you’re curious, it’s pronounced SOCK-oh.

  14. Says right in the CDNN flyer that these are for display only and should not be fired. Might be worth mentioning.

    • Also, he was the *Spoilers* the second to last to die; not exactly early in the movie.

  16. I’m sorry, there’s really only one reason for a combo shotgun/rifle, and that’s a “universal” hunting gun in countries where you’re licensed per-gun, which means that you want to get as much utility out of each licensing as possible.

    Hence the German’s fondness for drillings.

    Now, if someone here in the US made a drilling with a 20 ga. shotgun over something like a 7mm08, I think that could have some real utility.

  18. I remember after the Clinton AWB someone made a AR-15 clone that was pump-action. The forward guard was two concentric tubes over the barrel and you pumped the handguard to cycle the action. Externally, it looked like a AR-15A2 with a free-float handguard.

    Not sure how popular they were and how many were sold.

  19. As the previous(for a reason) owner of one of these beauties let me state for the record that you DO NOT WANT ONE OF THESE! To say that the design is flawed is an understatement of epic proportions. The pump is very difficult to operate due to the need to slam it forward to lock it in place…. among about 20 other problems I could list. The 2 best moments I had with the Crossfire were the moment I added a really cool oddity to my collection followed by the moment I traded off the abomination. If you plan to hang it on the wall it will perform that task flawlessly, aside from that you’re on your own.

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