Define "Carbine"

Moose Masher

Moose Masher

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Is there an acute definition of a carbine or is a broad term for any short rifle.

What is a carbine to you?

Short barrel?
Short oal?
Both?

Does action type factor into it?

Is it pronounced carbine or carbeen?

Regardless of what they are called, I like short rifles.
I find with the right balance, 40" is about the longest I want a rifle to be these days.
I have some that go 42"-44.5" as well, I find i just don't use them much anymore, due to the length.

I know it's a matter of taste and some folks don't like them for whatever reasons, muzzle blast, velocity loss, what have you.

Not including 22's or my Savage 24, currently at 40" or under I have: Win 94, Ruger 77 RSI, 2 Ruger 1-A's, Ruger 1-S, Chopped Savage 110.

Thoughts?
 
I think when you see the term carbine it usually applies to a firearm that the manufacturer also offers in a longer barrel. Like you see a Remington auto Carbine and rifle but they dont call the short barreled Model 7 a Carbine becuse there is no longer barrel Model 7. As to who actually coined the phrase your guess is as good as mine but maybe someone here knows.
 
It's a French term that originally described a version of a service rifle built with a shorter barrel usually for cavalry use. Commercially it's used when both a longer barrel version (rifle) and shorter barrel version(carbine)of the same gun is available. Usually carbines have barrels of 20" or less these days.
 
As to how "carbine" is pronounced, that I believe has more to do with where the speaker is from rather than which is proper.

As has been stated, most associate the word carbine with a short barreled rifle, but in the some circles it has also been used to describe a short rifle which is chambered for a reduced cartridge like the 5.56X45 or the 7.62x39.
 
I believe carbine is pronounced to rhyme with wine. It is also pronounced carbeen. Use what you like.
 
I think the word carbine is generally accepted as a short barrel, as opposed to a long barrel. Sometimes words evolve a bit, even if away from their original definitions. When I hear the word carbine, I think short barrel.
 
Back in the days of horse cavalry, the word "carbine" had a precise technical meaning. It was a short shoulder weapon designed to be slung from a baldric and used on horseback, and it usually shared the same military styling as the infantry musket.

Take Winchesters for example. They were made in "rifle" and "carbine" versions.

The "rifle" version had all the styling cues of a contemporary sporting rifle: octagon barrel, buckhorn rear sight, half forestock with metal nose cap, crescent buttplate. If you squint, it looks like a lever action Hawken with a magazine tube instead of a ramrod. Shorten one of these to 20" and you get a "short rifle", not a "carbine".

Because the "carbine" was packed with military styling cues. Hold it up next to a Sharps carbine or a Spencer carbine and the similarities jump out at you. The shape of the butt and buttplate were copied from the Springfield. It had a ring on the left side of the receiver ready to be snapped to a carbine baldric. It had a round barrel. (The army doesn't use octagon barrels.) It had a distinctly military-looking folding rear sight adjustable for range. It had barrel bands. (Only military weapons had barrel bands.) The Winchester wasn't actually adopted by the US cavalry, but it was designed to look like it was ready to be!

(BTW, there was also a "musket" version of the Winchester with a 30" barrel, full length forestock, and 3 barrel bands. Apart from that, it looked just like the carbine!)

Winchester knew what they were doing marketing their carbines to a generation of men who had just carried Sharps, Burnsides, and Spencers for four years. It was like putting something with a black finish, a flash hider, and a pistol grip on the market today.
 
Can-down said:
Winchester 1894 20" is a classic carbine
Click to expand...

True enough, but some 20" such as Ruger Ultra-lights, No1 RSI, m77 RSI, Rem M7, Ruger Alaskan or RCM, or even my Sako Finnlight, are not referred to as carbine, but are all 20".

20" = maybe

<20" = definitely.
 
Short barrel is a Carbine, read that a Carbine is also a pistol caliber long tube of the same caliber of the side arm you carry... A 44mag 6 inches S&W pistol with a Rossi 16 inches 44 mag hard to mistake ammo... JP
 
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