KRISS Vector SMG

The first time I had a chance to shoot the KRISS Vector I had no idea what I was holding, all I knew is that it was really cool. A customer brought one in and let me run a few mags through it, nothing out of the ordinary when you spend your life behind the counter at a gun range.

The first day at SHOT Show 2011 opened my eyes to exactly how “cool” the Vector really is.  This is a .45 ACP submachine gun that uses a new operating system to reduce felt recoil.  Below you can see how little muzzle climb the Vector actually has when I was shooting it on burst:

The other neat thing about the Vector is how simple it is to use.  It was my second time picking up the gun but Caleb had never seen one outside of videos and magazines.  Knowing this, watch him own this full auto mag dump:

The statement at the end of the video, “Took you one magazine to understand the weapon”, is accurate. This little SMG is extremely intuitive and easy to operate and shoot. Although my favorite part of this stop was the look on the KRISS rep’s face when I told him I’d already shot one.

13 Comments

  1. Honestly, it could be the awesome-est, most bleeding edge SMG in the world, but it’s still 25 years too late. Even cops have figured out that intermediate caliber assault weapons are the way to go.

  2. A friend with one said that they require some sort of buffer to run, which wear out after a few hundred rounds and have to be replaced. It was a “problem they are working on” when he complained. Not sure if it’s fixed.

    Also, that seems like more muzzle-rise than an AR-15 with a good compensator.

    It’s a neat gun, but I think it’s the Judge of rifles.

    1. A friend of mine has a SOT and owns one of these as a demo weapon for police officers. I got to shoot it, and I must say it is very controllable for its size and weight… There may be more controllable full autos out there, but not in a package like this.

      Also, the day I shot his it had gone well over a thousand rounds without cleaning or maintenance. We didn’t have any issues…

    1. They offer a mag extension for 30 rounds. The extended mag still works in a Glock 21 – though shooting it in a full auto KRISS is much more fun ;).

  3. There’s no shame in adding to the mix Rob! Here’s video of me from Media Day shooting the KRISS…

    http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1434257191572&saved

    My only complaints would be that the controls are VERY poorly placed. Very difficult to fully rotate the safety without using the thumb on the left side and then the right index finger (unless you like removing your hand from the grip to actuate it) and we won’t even talk about the fire mode selector switch which, if you’re going to place it so far forward, would be better off on the opposite side of the receiver (or ambi) so you can manipulate it with the support hand. Otherwise it shot great and from what I understand the chewed through about 5,000 rounds without any issues.

    Too bad that, like Jeff the Baptist said, the subgun isn’t really a viable market anymore. We need to get one in as a demo just so I can play with it though!

    1. Yeah, I couldn’t figure out the weird placement of the controls either. It reminded me of the setup on the Thompson SMG, and that’s not a good thing in this case.

      An AR style selector would have been much better.

      1. They specifically seperated the safety and selector, so you could put the gun into the mode desired, and have no risk of inadvertently overrotating the selector to “AUTO” or “BURST” when you just wanted to go from “SAFE” to “SEMI”.

        Considering their target market (LEO entry gun), it’s a reasonable design choice.

        Of course, there is no good reason to have the controls poorly placed, if they are (I’ve never fired one, so I’m going off your opinion as to placement.)

    2. Actually their fire mode selector is ambidextrous on the Vector SMG – however, I agree that it’s not so well placed.

      On the other hand their prototype had the selector and safety lever combined and within reach of the shooting hand’s thumb. Let’s see when it comes out.

Comments are closed.