The original Harrington and Richardson gunmaker in Worcester Massachusetts made what I consider the coolest of all US made FAL style rifles – the T48. It was put up against the T44 which would eventually become the M14 service rifle.

The story of the trials and the politics behind the selection has been covered extensively over the years so I won’t go in depth about it now. Suffice to say the FAL went on to be the most successful 7.62 NATO battle rifle ever made, by a country mile, and the M14 as a service rifle was a failure. With the exception of a designated marksman’s rifle. (DMR – some would say sniper rifle in this context) where it served admirably for many years, it has largely been relegated to history.

Fast forward to today and the H&R T48 has been reborn for the US civilian firearms market. The Harrington and Richardson of today is not related to the original, and long out of business , in any way. Palmetto State Armory of South Carolina picked up the abandoned H&R brand in a very wise move. In doing so they took a page out of Springfield Armory of Illinois book and brought a historical brand back to life.

You will see online the new rifle mentioned as the ‘H&R/DS Arms T48’. That’s because DS Arms, the most well known manufacturer of all US made FAL rifles, was contracted to build the T48 for H&R who now calls West Columbia South Carolina home.

The resulting prototype T48 rifle has been shown at trade shows for awhile now with a ‘coming soon’ tag line attached to it. Well the first batch was released for sale recently on the Palmetto State Armory website and they sold out in under 10 minutes. As I understand that was 50 guns in the first batch. New rifles were offered at $3300 and ‘blem’ ones were offered at $3100. This is not expected to be the last batch of rifles to be released but it will be interesting to see how many rifles are released next time and how quickly they sell out.

The price was in line with what I had been told by a friend who works at PSA so I was not surprised. That definitely wasn’t the case for many FAL enthusiasts on the internet. Some were not surprised at the price where others thought the gun would come in at $1500-1800. Clearly those people are off their meds as a gun like this at that price would not be worth owning – the FAL has never been a cheap gun to make and that is certainly the case now – especially a non standard collector grade rifle such as this.

Overall i think H&R/DS Arms did a great job on this 2026 semi automatic only T48. With one notable exception that has serious FAL fans scratching their heads. I’ll get to that shortly.

The good stuff about the gun, and there is a lot of it, is a legit select fire original H&R T48 was used to copy the pieces and parts for the finished product.

Things like the gun is parkerized vs a spray on/bake on finish. This is a huge plus as skimping on this key feature would have seriously detracted from the final product.

Key features copied from the original included the stripper clip guide top cover with correct bullet guide ‘studs’ at the front of the ejection port at the top of the receiver. The folding trigger guard that is housed in the pistol grip when folded is there and well executed. And what I think is the most significant component of them all is the Browning Automatic Rifle inspired charging handle which was unique to the H&R T48. There are many other details that are well done that add to the overall package. I see three differences of note with the last one being the more notable.

The flash hider is the long slotted version but the one used is the FN Belgium type with a tapered front where as the original T48 flash hider did not have the taper- it was essentially shaped the same is the T44 later to become the M14.

The selector used in the 2026 version is a semi automatic ‘R’ marked selector whereas the original did not have the ‘R’ making

The biggest difference I see is the use of a FN FAL type ‘B’ wooden stock vs the original T48 had the type ‘A’ wooden stock. This difference jumps out at you if you know what you’re looking for. The type ‘A’ extended forward slightly on both sides of the lower receiver whereas the type ‘B’ does not – it mates up flush against the rear of the lower receiver with no forward portion of the wood extending past the rear of the lower.

Not sure how or why this was missed as it would have been a relatively easy modification and aftermarket US made wooden type ‘A’ stocks are available or having DS Arms current vendor copy one should have been an easy task. Like I said this part is a head scratcher.

With all that being said I give the H&R/DS Arms a solid A grade as I think it’s the neatest rifle to hit the market in a long time .

But then again I’m an FN FAL fan since reading about them in Soldier of Fortune in the 1980’s and their use in the African bush wars – in particular Rhodesia

Well there you have it – my take on the 2026 T48. It ain’t cheap but nothing of quality ever is these days.

Stay safe

LAV out