They were made by Charter Arms after Armalite sold the design and Henry has made them for the last 15 years or so.

I’ve had both an Armalite and a Charter Arms over the years. Both performed about the same.



The magazine quality is poor and reliability will depend on the magazine. The barrels are light but not particularly stable and the rear sights adjustment is limited and not conducive to great accuracy.

It is compact and it does float when packed in the stock. If you don’t like the stock there are aftermarket options available. You lose the self contained stock capability but save some weight and bulk and it’s a better pack rifle.

A downside of you ever leave the US is that it’s a semi auto and the Canadians are not semi auto friendly.



But there are much better choices for survival rifles. Springfield Armory marketed the M6, which was produced by CZ, and CZ sold it after SA stopped selling it. You can replace the front pin with a ball detent pin to make it easy to separate the halves which makes it a bit more compact to store.

They have been produced in. .410/.22LR and .410/.22 Hornet combinations as well as .45 Colt/.22LR and .45 Colt/.22 Hornet. There are pros and cons.

The smooth bore .410 barrels are useful on birds, although being a .410 the effective range is limited to 15-20 yards (based on my pattern tests with it). In that regard the .410/.22 LR and .410/.22 Hornet are good all round survival rifle choices. I have owned Both and greatly prefer the .22 LR. You can pack a lot of ammo in not much space or weight and I have found the M6 to be quite accurate for the type (about 1” at 50 yards). In contrast the .22 Hornet I owned wasn’t stable and would walk each successive round about 3” high at 25 yards. That pretty well erased thoughts of 100 yard capability under anything but ideal cold bore conditions, and the cold bore shot wasn’t all that predictable.

The rifled .45 Colt/.410 barrels make poor bird guns as the rifling destroys the pattern. They are more or less close range snake guns. On the other hand the .45 Colt does give you medium game taking potential and is far better performing than a .410 slug (which has the terminal ballistics of a .380 ACP, and isn’t accurate beyond about 35 yards in the M6).




Another option is a take down gallery rifle like this 1890 Winchester. Reasonably light, reasonably compact and has a great deal of utility as a plinker as well. Nice 1890s are pricey but you can find a less nice 1906, a similar Remington, or a Rossi reproduction for a lot less.



My favorite to carry in the baggage compartment of my Citabria or Pacer is a 9422. If you add a saddle ring take down pin, takedown becomes a tool free operation.

They are not particularly light, but they are accurate, reliable and carry very well with excellent balance.