#Bullpup

Walther is entering the centerfire hunting rifle market with quite an interesting offering that the company says is the future of hunting. The new Walther RS 3 is a bullpup straight-pull rifle. As hunting with silencers is becoming increasingly popular, the main reason Walther went with a bullpup design is to keep the rifle compact and well-balanced when a suppressor is attached without sacrificing the barrel length. The RS 3 rifle actually comes with a Walther QSA silencer and with that suppressor attached to the 23” (58cm) barrel, the overall length of the rifle is 41” (104cm).

It’s no small feat designing a new firearm and it's arguably even more complicated recreating one. It has to look right, it has to feel right and you’re working within the confines of expectation. This year at SHOT Show Murdoch & Co. launched one of the most ambitious clone projects I’ve ever seen. Murdoch & Co. describe their EM-85 as an improved, remanufactured semi-auto SA80. The name EM-85, is a nod back to another classic British bullpup rifle, the EM-2.

Palmetto State Armory has officially released the Olcan, a long-anticipated bullpup variant of the JAKL rifle chambered in 5.56 NATO or .300 AAC Blackout. Built around a 6105 monolithic rifle-length upper receiver, the Olcan relocates the JAKL’s fully captured buffer system into the upper, allowing for its compact bullpup layout while maintaining the platform’s rigidity and operating characteristics.

Welcome back to TFB’s Small Business Spotlight! In this weekly article series, we talk about small firearm-related businesses. In today’s edition, we’ll take a look at Atlas Engineering, a company that is designing a new bullpup rifle.