Fun Hakim rifle facts…
The Hakim was begat by the Swedish Ljungman AG-42, designed by Erik Eklund around 1941.
Bored with designing guns for a country who hardly ever goes to war, Eklund later founded the pop group ABBA, where he had many fun escapades with that other guy and those two Swedish singer-babes.
Sweden later sold designs and tooling to Egypt as part of an All Middle East ABBA Mega-Tour. In return for releasing the Ljungman AG-42 design and 28% of t-shirt sales, Eklund insisted that the Egyptian government allow the pop group to sing “Fernando” in front of the Great Sphinx of Giza.
One of the design changes made to the AG-42 with the Egyptian Hakim was addition of a larger muzzle brake. The Hakim actually flies forward several feet when fired, while bathing the shooter with a refreshing mist of hot burning gas. This design feature makes rapid surrender almost effortless. Surprisingly, the French never expressed interest in acquiring the design.
The Hakim has the largest perceived weight of any rifle ever built, with most users assuming it weighs in at approximately 419 pounds. In actuality, the Hakim tips the scales at just over 10 pounds. Perception can be deceiving.
One of the reasons that only 60,000 – 70,000 Hakims were produced was weight. As the Hakim arsenal began to sink into underground oil reserves, production was halted as cleaning crude from wooden rifles is very time consuming and messy.
The Hakim features a unique bolt cover mechanism which was specially designed to allow the rifle to be thrown vigorously into the sand with an aggressive surrender motion, without allowing grit to interfere with the operation of the bolt.
Hakim designers anticipated collector interest in rifles that had never been fired before surrender, thereby preparing them for the lucrative gun show market. Collectors who know, know that Hakim’s will be squeaky clean inside due to their unique sand-proof design.
The Hakim operates via direct gas impingement, like the M16 / AR-15, meaning dirty and corrosive powder blast is driven into the firing mechanism. One primary difference between the Hakim and AR design is the addition of an adjustable gas flow regulator, which requires a special tool that is never around when you need one. Like in the heat of battle.
The Hakim fires the 8x57mm IS cartridge, otherwise known as the 8mm Mauser. This is generally a 192 grain projectile which used to be insanely cheap to buy until it rose in popularity after a series of wildly successful Billy Mays television infomercials.
To open the bolt of a Hakim, the user has to first push it forward in a closing motion, then pull the bolt carrier backwards. This counterintuitive design was apparently intended to prevent enemy soldiers with no musical training (think trombone here) to use captured Hakims against the Egyptians.
The Hakim was manufactured during the 1950’s and into the early 60’s. It saw battlefield service in the Suez Crisis / Sinai War of 1956 where large numbers of Hakim’s were thrown down in surrender in anticipation of a voracious military surplus rifle collector market.
And there you have it – an abbreviated history of one of the more interesting military rifles of the 20th century.
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