Introduction to the smoothbore carbine "Vepr" VPO-221 Lancaster

The products of gunsmiths from Vyatskiye Polyany have earned undeniable respect among hunters of any level of training and specialization. One of the most reliable models was the VPO 221 Lancaster, which forms a real symbiosis with the Lancaster cartridge. In this article you will learn “dry” facts and interesting nuances about the technical parameters, design features and operating principle of this truly brutal weapon.

General information

The VPO-221 carbine is suitable for both commercial and amateur hunting. A wide range of applications would have been impossible if the designers from Molot-Weapon had not managed to achieve an ideal balance of the following characteristics:

• ease of use - shooting from this carbine is simple, pleasant, comfortable;
• ease of transportation - disassembling the gun does not take much time, it is done quickly and without any particular difficulties;
• optimal physical indicators - we are talking about the weight of the gun and its dimensions, which will be discussed later.

A huge advantage is that you can purchase the VPO-221 Lancaster carbine with a smoothbore license. There is no need to wait 5 years for handling smooth-bore weapons, but the Vepr has many advantages of rifled weapons.

If we talk about the two most striking indicators of the VPO-221 carbine, then these are:

• accuracy;
• range.

Zeroing the Vepr carbine
This could not have been achieved without a well-functioning trigger mechanism. The designers relied heavily on the experience gained after the release of previous models of the Vepr series, and specifically the VPO-221 is produced on the basis of another smooth-bore self-loading gun - the VPO-213-19. The difference between these two carbines, among other things, is the caliber - 366 TKM.

Reliability in handling is one of the main advantages of a carbine. This is also reflected in the fact that in many respects the principle of operation was borrowed from the famous RPK-74 light machine gun. Thanks to this, the carbine practically does not fail or misfire, and also demonstrates amazing resistance to external negative factors.

It was noted above that the VPO-221 gun has good accuracy indicators, but an important explanation is required here. We are talking about shooting at medium distance. When hunting at a distance of over 100 meters, there is a significant loss of efficiency, and this can be explained by the design features of the carbine.

Basic technical data and completeness

Domestic designers were forced to expand the bolt group of the gun inside the receiver, minimizing the friction area and creating a large bolt. This decision had both its pros and cons. Among the advantages it is worth highlighting:

• increased service life, which is important for many hunters who are looking to purchase a budget carbine and are not ready to invest heavily in maintaining its performance characteristics (of course, with the exception of regular cleaning and basic preventative maintenance of smooth-bore weapons);
• wear resistance, which is especially important in the harsh Russian climate, when winter is unusually cold and autumn is rainy and damp (the carbine is resistant to both factors, which gives the shooter confidence in the shot).

Technical data of the VPO-221 shotgun
Unfortunately, the improvement of some indicators led to the deterioration of others. Indeed, the accuracy of the VPO-221 shotgun has decreased significantly compared to other examples of the well-known series, but in general this does not bother the owners. With good shooting skills, the VPO-221 carbine allows you to hunt even large animals at a distance of less than 100 meters.

Ease of use is largely due to the automatic nature of the gun. The reloading principle is based on the removal of powder gases from the barrel channel. The gas piston is characterized by a long working stroke, and the channel itself is locked with three stops by turning the shutter clockwise. The longitudinal axis is used as the center - a standard solution for a shooting mechanism of this type.

To fix the lugs, there are characteristic cutouts on the receiver. As for the rotation of the bolt, this is affected by the protrusions with a figured groove located on the rear surface of the bolt frame. Because of this, the shutter rotates in the longitudinal direction.

The forend and butt deserve special mention, since they are made of:

• whole and well processed nut;
• army plastic.

VPO-221 with plastic butt

The VPO-221 carbine is available for sale in both wooden and polymer versions. In general, this is reflected in the design and tactile sensations (some prefer smooth wood, while others prefer a rough plastic surface). This does not in any way affect the shooting performance of the gun.

A huge advantage is the shape of the butt, which has an anatomical notch for the thumb. The standard pistol grip simplifies handling of the carbine, allowing for targeted shooting. Other elements contribute to this:

• shock absorber butt plate;
• rubber cheek.

Vepr Lancaster stock with shock absorber.
A well-designed balance of the carbine also plays an important role. In general, all of the listed design features help to hold the weapon while aiming and to raise it. An inexpensive and quick conversion of weapons specifically for left-handers can be a pleasant bonus.

The recoil when firing the 9.6/53 Lancaster cartridge is quite noticeable. To minimize it, the designers equipped the butt with a rotating cheekpiece and a shock absorber butt plate.

Now we suggest taking a look at the standard equipment of the VPO-221 carbine, which includes:

• documents for smooth-bore weapons and passport;
• standard detachable magazine holding 5 rounds of 9.6/53 Lancaster caliber;
• warranty certificate (a good bonus for domestic consumers);
• shooting protocol, which contains all the necessary information;
• Spare parts kit, thanks to which maintenance and care do not present any difficulties.

Self-loading carbine in a box with a magazine
In addition, the Molot-Oruzhie enterprise actively produces a lot of additional devices that ensure the safety of the Vepr series carbines. For example, you can purchase a case that will protect the gun from bad weather when transporting or carrying it.

Smooth in law: Lancaster has become terribly popular

Photo by the author.
Why did hunters begin to actively buy weapons with Lancaster barrel drilling and what are they used for?

Let's figure it out.

But first, let’s remember what a Lancaster drill is and why it is interesting.

The peculiarity of the design is that the barrel of the weapon remains smooth, due to which, taking into account our legislation, this weapon can be sold as a smooth-bore weapon, therefore, there is no need to wait the notorious five years to purchase it.

And at the same time, Lancaster drilling has its own characteristics: in cross-section, the barrel bore is sort of oval, not cylindrical, but slightly elongated to the sides or flattened.

But that is not all! This “oval” is not constant along the length of the trunk, but seems to be twisted around its axis. What does this give?

If you shoot not with shot, but with a bullet, then the latter is compressed in the barrel under this oval and, thanks to the configuration of the barrel, it twists in it as if it were passing along a rifled barrel. As a result, we get a formally smooth-bore weapon, but its bullet twist is like a rifled one.

Lancasters appeared with us quite a long time ago. So, in Izhevsk, attempts to make such barrels were made about twenty years ago, but all of them were carried out on standard smooth calibers - 12 or 20.

The results were interesting options that gave a slight increase in the accuracy of the gun when firing a bullet, but in essence it was a smooth-bore weapon.

A small digression. The internal ballistics of a smooth-bore weapon is significantly different from a rifled one, this is due to many factors, but now it is important for us to note that the pressure in a smooth-bore weapon is much lower than in a rifled one, which naturally affects the speed of the bullet and especially its trajectory.

The energy of a smooth barrel can be significantly higher than a rifled one, but this is explained by the monstrous (compared to a rifled) weight of the projectile that flies out of the barrel.

So, experiments with smooth-bore Lancasters were interesting, but were not particularly popular: the weapon did not differ in appearance or characteristics from smooth-bore ones. But there was no other option.

At that time, the phrase from the weapons law “You cannot use cartridges for rifled weapons in smooth-bore weapons” meant only one thing: no similar cartridges could be used.

But later the situation changed, and it turned out that the above phrase can be interpreted differently: you cannot use already created cartridges, but new ones are welcome. As a result, a new .366 TKM cartridge and weapons for it quickly appeared. Let's just say it was a breakthrough.

Judge for yourself: the cartridge, developed on the basis of the 7.62x39 cartridge case, made it possible to remake weapons from army stocks; SKS, AK, AKM easily accepted the new caliber when changing the barrel and modifying the magazine. But that’s not even the main thing.

In terms of energy, the caliber surpassed its ancestor - 7.62x39, and the result was a very good weapon for hunting medium-sized animals, as well as a wonderful weapon for shooters who love the military style, but did not have five years of experience to buy a clone of their favorite AK.

In terms of flatness, the caliber was slightly inferior to its progenitor, but in terms of accuracy it was close to it. In other words. we received a full-fledged carbine, the characteristics of which were similar to a rifled one, but at the same time it could be purchased under a “smooth” license.

Actually, the latter is the secret of the explosive interest in Lancaster calibers in the new 9.6 mm form factor.

Inspired by success, the developers of the new caliber moved on. The intermediate caliber 7.62x39 is known to be effective when applied to objects weighing up to 70–80 kilograms; larger objects required more energy. So we thought about a more powerful cartridge.

It became the 9.6/53 Lancaster cartridge. As we can see, the developer even in the name tried to emphasize that the cartridge is “smooth”.

Let us recall that the traditional designation for rifled calibers is through a dot or “x” (7.62x51 or .308), and for smooth ones through / (12/70 or 12/76). The cartridge was completely new, based on the 7.62x53 cartridge case, which is the most popular in Russia, and, frankly, it surprised.

It turned out to be not only powerful in its most “severe” version at 4500 J, but surpassed in power its rifled counterpart - 9.3x53, which does not even reach 4000 J. Rifles for the new caliber turned out to be powerful and accurate.

There are already examples of the successful use of weapons of these calibers on bear hunts. According to user reviews, the caliber is an excellent stopper, that is, it stops the animal where a bullet hits it, and is accurate enough to be used at distances of up to 200 meters.

Well, what else do you need for a forest carbine? Hunters even began to receive requests to release a weakened cartridge for carbines of 9.6/53 Lancaster caliber, because 4500 J is not always needed.

Tekhkrim responded to this request by releasing a cartridge with a reduced amount of gunpowder and a lighter bullet. Visually, this cartridge is distinguished by the application of green paint to the primer of the cartridge case.

More recently, another version of the cartridge was released - grapeshot. This is interesting: 4 buckshots placed in a silicone container can show an interesting result. In addition, since theoretically the buckshots lie one after another, they will twist around the center of gravity and should not fly apart much.

But this is a bare theory; practical testing still awaits its researcher.

As we wrote earlier, the .366 TKM caliber, with 2500 J, was criticized for its insufficient power for hunting, and the 9.6/53 Lancaster caliber, with its 4500 J, was criticized for being too powerful. As they say, there is no happiness in life, and the client will always find something to complain about.

In addition, weapons produced for the popular .308 caliber in our country remained uncoated, which is also a problem.

In general, as you would expect, since the market demands it, get it and sign it. Based on the .308 cartridge case, a new .366 Magnum cartridge has been developed and is being prepared for release.

According to the developer, the entire range of bullets will be produced for it, and apparently these are the same bullets of .366 TKM caliber, and its power is in the range between .366 TKM and 9.6/53 Lancaster, that is, somewhere between 3000 and 3500 J.

Let's just say that this is a rather interesting statement, so the cartridge should turn out to be quite good. From my point of view, this is simply an expansion of choice, since the reduced power 9.6/53 Lancaster cartridge falls well within these boundaries. Perhaps this is aimed at semi-automatic weapons, of which there are very few in caliber 9.6/53 Lancaster.

This is easily explained by the problems faced by designers trying to combine semi-automatic operation and a sleeve with a rim (welt).

It’s interesting that he announced the purchase, or rather, the receipt of a contract for the disposal of a large number of German 7.92x57 cartridges, the geometry of which is close to the .308 cartridge case.

Since Molot is a co-creator of Lancaster cartridges, there is hope that the price of the new cartridge will not be exorbitant and we will receive good quality cartridge cases of the new cartridge, suitable for reloading.

It must be said that the designers’ thoughts do not stop only at rifle calibers. More recently, we were introduced to Lancaster pistols.

This has an indirect relation to hunting, only through a certificate, and we will not talk about them in detail here, but we note that an analogue of the “nine” based on the 5.45x39 cartridge case has already been certified and soon weapons for it and the cartridge itself will appear on sale. It will be of interest to practical shooters whose experience does not allow them to buy rifled weapons.

Unfortunately, all Lancasters in Russia have one very unpleasant feature - a high price. That is why hunters who shoot relatively little find them to be of some use, but shooters who shoot up to 1000–1500 rounds of ammunition per training cannot afford such carbines.

Judge for yourself: the price of a Lancaster cartridge is 40 rubles and above, while the calibers they imitate cost 9–12 rubles. The difference, as they say, is obvious, especially with large rounds.

In conclusion, let's talk a little about the sad. Lancasters are already loved by our hunters, especially those who while away the time for rifled weapons, but it happens that those who have rifled weapons buy 9.6/53 Lancaster, because in this factor, for this money there is no alternative today. And this doesn’t give anyone peace of mind.

Thus, A. Khinshtein came up with the initiative to equate weapons with a Lancaster drill to rifled weapons. What does it mean? For Lancaster weapons and cartridges this is death.

This weapon is popular only in Russia and only due to the peculiarities of the legislation; in real competition with rifled weapons, there is practically no chance of its survival.

Such statements look especially strange against the backdrop of the plight of our arms enterprises. Let's face it: equating Lancaster weapons with rifled ones will simply kill our Tekhkrim and . Who needs it?

Sergey Smolnin September 24, 2022 at 10:12

Characteristics and modifications

The carbine is available in three modifications, which differ only in barrel length. Technical characteristics are shown in the table:

The indicated weight is calculated without taking into account ammunition, which should be taken into account when preparing for the hunt. The standard sighting range reaches 300 meters, although in reality the most effective shooting should not exceed a distance of 100 meters.

A dovetail mount is provided for installing optics. In general, standard sighting devices are sufficient for comfortable shooting:

• front sight, adjustable in two planes;
• sector sight with metric scale.

Optical sight mount for Vepr Lancaster VPO-221

More details about the cartridge itself

Lancaster 9.6/53 was developed by the Russian. The base was the cartridge case of 7.62x54 mm R. Molot Oruzhie LLC participated in the project, specially creating the team “new cartridge + weapon for it.” The ammunition was certified in 2016, and since 2022 it has gone on sale en masse, now honorably occupying a pedestal in the domestic market.

Description of characteristics:

• cartridge length – 7 centimeters;
• true bullet caliber – 10.3 mm;
• powder charge weight - 3 grams;
• test barrel length – 600 mm.

It is possible to use two types of bullets, which have different masses, initial bullet speeds and energy. Thus, an FMJ bullet weighs 14.8 grams, flies at a speed of 750 m/s and has an energy of about 3800 Joules. "SP18" has a mass of as much as 18 grams, an initial flight speed of 650 meters per second and an energy of about 3900 Joules.

The sleeve parameters are characterized by the following values:

• length – 53 mm;
• neck diameter – 10.8 mm;
• shoulder diameter – 11.61 mm;
• barrel diameter – 10.3 mm;
• base diameter – 12.37 mm;
• flange diameter – 14.48 mm.

The sleeve has a bottle shape - one of the most aerodynamic of the existing ones.

A whole range of Russian-made weapons can be powered by Lancaster:

1. Rifles with manual reloading – VPO “220”, VPO “223” “Taiga”, KO-44 Mosin rifle, a rifle based on the Mauser K98.
2. Semi-automatic shotguns – Vepr VPO 221, VPO-222 based on the RPK, TG-3 from Kalashnikov.”
3. Single-barrel fitting TK-518.

According to the manufacturer and designer, the Lancaster is intended for hunting of any type (amateur, seasonal, commercial, preventative) for medium and large game.

Design and principle of operation

The principle of operation of the gun is simple and well known to most experienced shooters. Equipped with a safety lever, the trigger mechanism allows you to fire one shot, after which the carbine is automatically reloaded.

For greater resistance to corrosion, the manufacturer chrome-plated the metal parts. This also provides additional resistance to chemical reagents that are inevitably released at the time of the shot. The following were subjected to the alloying procedure:

• gas chamber;
• stock;
• barrel channel;
• chamber.

Design of the bolt mechanism Vepr-221

The barrel itself was made using the well-known technology of cold rotational forging. The channel has a characteristic oval-helical drilling, the parameters of which do not exceed the norms permissible under Russian legislation.

Safety and preparation for shooting

For the necessary safety, the design of the VPO-221 carbine provides a safety lever. It is located next to the trigger mechanism and has an additional protrusion that allows, if necessary, to quickly and conveniently put the weapon on safety, thereby preventing an arbitrary shot.

An additional safety measure is the hammer, equipped with a spring inside the barrel channel. This eliminates the possibility of an accidental shot due to the inertial heating of the primer.

To put the weapon into firing position, simply insert a loaded magazine and remove the carbine from the safety catch.

Maintenance

Cleaning the VPO-221 is simple, and its principle itself will not cause difficulties for shooters who have experience in handling smooth-bore weapons. If necessary, you can look at the instructions and familiarize yourself in detail with the rules for disassembling the carbine.

Disassembly and cleaning of VPO-221

VPO-221 is an excellent carbine, suitable for hunting small and medium-sized animals. Another advantage is the moderate cost - about 41-51 thousand rubles. If you have good shooting skills, then you can safely take it for hunting or recreational shooting at the range.

Cost and equipment of VPO 221 Lancaster

VPO 221 is one of the most budget-friendly among the entire line: its cost is in a narrow range from 41 to 44 thousand rubles.

Standard equipment includes the following:

• the carbine itself;
• passport and other “personal” weapons documents;
• warranty certificate;
• shooting protocol;
• store for 5 combat units;
• Spare parts kit for weapon care.

Hammer Weapons LLC from Vyatskie Polyany has always paid special attention to the safety of products, so even those items that can be purchased without a license (care products, covers, etc.) are sent via Russian Post in especially durable and protected containers.