By the mid-1960s the French military had been in search of an assault rifle for a number of years with many of the major French state arsenals developing designs. In 1967, the French Army requested a new infantry rifle to replace both the MAS 49/56 rifle and MAT-49 submachine gun.
Under the direction of Paul Tellie Manufacture d'Armes de Saint-Étienne (MAS) began work developing a new rifle in 1969. A year later, following ballistic testing the French military selected the new new 5.56x45mm cartridge. MAS carried out an ergonomic study and decided to develop a bullpup rifle.
MAS chose a lever-delayed blowback action which removed the need for a gas system and theoretically made for a simpler, more reliable weapon. MAS built the first prototypes, designated the MAS A1, in 1971. A series of development prototypes followed until the French governent halted the programme in 1974, to test foreign rifles including the HK 33 and the FN CAL. The A4 prototypes struggled with reliability issues during testing and the MAS programme was placed on hiatus for further testing of other designs. The foreign designs, however, also failed to meet the French Army’s requirements. As a result the MAS development programme resumed in the summer of 1975.
The first of the many FAMAS prototype’s developed c.1969 (source)
MAS continued to develop prototypes with the A5 and A6 attempting to fix problems with reliability and barrel wear. In 1977, a decade after the French military had called for a new rifle, the army tested the new the A7 prototype. The army solved the problem of the MAS prototypes’ continued failure to have a reliable 3-round burst capability by abandoning the requirement. Despite this MAS continued to experiment with the 3-round burst system.
In August 1977, the French Army adopted the MAS A7 as the Fusil d'Assaut de la Manufacture d'Armes de Saint-Étienne 5.56 Modele F1 - or FA MAS F1. By 1979, MAS had developed a reliable burst system and incorporated this into the F1, with the rifles already produced retrofitted. The FAMAS first saw action in 1983 in Chad during Operation Manta.
The FAMAS has a steel alloy receiver inside a plastic-fibreglass shell. Its unusual lever-delayed blowback action stems from designs by John Pedersen and Pál Király. The bolt is not conventionally locked during firing, instead, it begins to move rearward and an H-shaped lever at the centre of the bolt slows the travel of the bolt. This allows pressure in the chamber to drip to safe levels before the action opens enough to extract the spent case and load a fresh cartridge. The FAMAS isn’t the only French weapon to use the lever-delayed blowback action, the earlier AA-52 also used this system.
Manual diagram showing the FAMAS’ bolt using the lever-delayed blowback action (source)
The lever-delayed system has its positive and negative characteristics, it makes the weapon relatively simple but it also introduces issues with variation in ammunition with the initial F1 designed to fire 55grain 5.56 ammunition. Additionally the FAMAS favoured steel-cased ammunition as this removes the threat of burst cases due to over pressure. The F1 also uses a proprietary 25-round magazine, as France left NATO in 1966, they cannot use the standardised 30-round STANAG magazines. The G2, however, can use NATO-spec magazines. Unlike the British SA80, the FAMAS can be set up for left-handed users. The charging handle, located on top of the receiver inside the carrying handle/sight mount, can be easily cycled from either side. The direction of ejection can also be altered as the ejector can mount on either side of the bolt. Ergonomically, the ejection port can be covered on either side by a detachable cheek rest.
The F1, unlike its contemporary the Steyr AUG, uses iron sights mounted on its carrying handle. The FAMAS also has an integral bipod and a rifle grenade launching muzzle adaptor. It’s bayonet firs onto the top of the barrel so it doesn’t project beneath the rifle. MAS assembled the FAMAS from parts made by a variety of state and private manufacturers.
In 1995 the French Navy adopted the improved G2 variant of the FAMAS (see image #2). This rifle feeds from standard STANAG magazines, has a larger AUG-style trigger guard, a slightly different stock profile and 1/9 rather than 1/12 rifling.
French troops with new FAMAS rifles during Operation Manta (source)
The FAMAS has seen action with French forces around the world in a number of African interventions, the Gulf War and in Afghanistan. MAS, and later GIAT, produced approximately 500,000 FAMAS rifles during the course of production. Over the year the French military attempted to update the rifle with the retrofitting of optics rails on the carrying handle and the more elaborate FELIN programme which incorporates sights, sensors and communications equipment.
In 2016, the French government announced that the French Army would replace its F1s with the Heckler and Koch’s HK416F. Placing an order for up to 100,000 416Fs with HK to deliver 16,000 annually. The replacement of the FAMAS will take some years as this initial contract will not entirely replace the 400,000 rifles currently in service.
Images: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Modern Military Bullpup Rifles - T.B. Dugelby (1984)
The FAMAS Assault Rifle, Small Arms Review, J. Huon
French FAMAS F1, Forgotten Weapons, (source)
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