What did the Aussie SAS do to the L1A1?

Comments · 942

• AN

  @anthonyburke5656 · 1 year ago

  The author of “The Odd Angry Shot” was the Corporal in our Q store, notorious for having a house in town. I’ve never seen the film! I do comment that the weapons shown ARE NOT what we carried in SVN, the barrel is to short, no-one put a Flash Suppressor back on the barrel, we liked the flame and noise! We believed it intimidated the opposition. We did paint them, we used green, black and tan. We mostly used twin 20 round mags rather than a solo 30 round mag. I taped 2 mags together, separated by a wedge, so I had 40 rounds “on the weapon”. The L1A1 / SLR was DESIGNED to be a selective fire weapon to be used both semi-automatic or fully automatic, it was an “administrative” decision to issue the weapon as only semi-automatic! I once fired one of our “bitches” and put 900 rounds through it on the range, the barrel glowed red hot, I leant it against a bench afterwards and the barrel bent! I did get a new barrel. The “Classic” example of the modified weapon was that one carried by Bob Kilsby, prior to him, it was carried by one of the Kiwi SAS (often unmentioned) who were on “The Hill” with the Australian SAS. Bobs weapon was mounted on a plaque and presented to Seal Team 2 in 1971.  I had the foregrip “offset” at an angle of 15 degrees from the vertical. This gave a more comfortable carrying position AND allowed a XM 203 to be mounted underneath the barrel. Btw EVERY SAS SLR had the carry-handle removed. Never pictured is that we always patrolled with muzzle covers on our weapons, plastic bottle caps taped over the muzzle.

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• AN

  @anthonyburke5656 · 1 year ago

  Yes, I’d forgotten about the mag hold open, you’re correct. Regarding the foregrip, it was done via a band on the barrel, the “wood” was carved to position the grip, it was only 15 minutes basic work, I used to check the grip after each time I fired the weapon. On return from patrol, I’d tear down the weapon completely, bath it in a cut-down 44 gallon drum of solvent and re-assemble the weapon checking each part. I’d also mention, I had the gas setting dialled up, to avoid any “soft” feeds and any soft ejection. On the question of webbing, I had a Sailmakers Palm, twine soaked in beeswax and a heap of the US nylon rip-stop to manufacture tailor made pouches. You do realise quite a few Australian SAS went on to fight in Rhodesia (also die there) and they took a lot of the “lore” picked up in SVN to the Bush War.

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• DA

  @dagoelius · 1 year ago

  As an Aussie it pains me that our country is not one of the top leaders in weapon R&D and exporter to the world, considering our innovative designs and combat history. Our useless Government really missed out on a potential high revenue opportunity.

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• RG

  @rg8956 · 1 year ago

  As an American you get a like for mocking Grand Thumb mate.

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• CO

  @ColinVance-q8u · 1 year ago

  As an old Aussie who briefly carried an SLR with the Army reserves I have always had a soft spot for the L1A1.<br>Ten years as a resident in Texas I owned a variety of military rifles that would make an Aussie firearms buff weep but the one that I loved the most was my FN FAL- nothing quite like the SLR!

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• FA

  @fatcat3211 · 1 year ago

  After seeing the The Odd Angry Shot over a dozen times, the mystery of what is a Passiona is finally revealed. 🤔

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• DU

  @dudemandropbear · 8 months ago

  To all the fellas who served in the comments thanks for your service lads 🫡

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• PY

  @python27au · 1 year ago

  Having trained with the SLR. The idea of a fully automatic L1A1 gives me nightmares.

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• MI

  @mikebampton2657 · 1 year ago

  At OCS Portsea in 1971-72 as officer cadets being trained to be platoon commandeers, we were shown how to convert SLR to Auto by our Regular Army classmates (and sometimes by some Field Instructors [additional practical skills for young officers, we thought]). We were also taught to manage firepower, and conserve ammunition as you never knew how long a &quot;contact&quot;/firefight would last.<br>Thanks for the YouTube. &nbsp;Those who forget the learnings of the past are bound to have to re-invent them. &nbsp;Thank God for our innovative soldiers. <br>Loyalty &amp; Service

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• JU

  @julianmorrisco · 1 year ago

  “To achieve relia…. ah, some degree of reliability”. <br><br>When talking about a shortened gas system. Made me chuckle.

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• CO

  @ColinVance-q8u · 1 year ago

  The Bush technique to turn an SLR from semi-auto to full-auto involved a matchstick (or twig) and took all of two minutes.<br>It was also technically a chargeable offense for the average rifleman.

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• JA

  @jaimiehardy5652 · 1 year ago

  Nice video. Served 25 years with the British Army and had the SLR for a time. Great to see correct non American hand signals and the &apos;little&apos;sniff&apos; when you took a knee!

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