As the resident Florida man, I have a soft spot for KelTec. I understand KelTec isn’t making Knight’s Armament-style duty rifles or Staccato-level handguns. I appreciate creativity, and KelTec is full of creativity. One of KelTec’s most successful rifles has been the SUB 2000 series. I’ve owned multiple SUB 2000s, and I say that without shame. I resisted buying a Gen 3 because I didn’t really need another folding carbine. Then they released the Gen 3 5.7x28mm variant, and I was sold.
The Gen 3 SUB 2000
I’m not a big 5.7x28mm fan, but I’m 5.7 curious. The KelTec SUB 2000 Gen 3 offered an affordable 5.7x28mm carbine, and it was cheap enough for me to say “what the hell” and grab one. The 5.7x28mm round has gotten cheaper. I can find cheap plinking ammo for 20 dollars per 50 rounds, which makes it more than 9mm, but still cheaper than 10mm, .45 ACP, and other handgun cartridges.
I grabbed one, and without shame, I can say I love it.
What’s Changed With the SUB 2000 Gen 3
The SUB 2000 series of folding rifles was always neat, but the folded design prohibited the use of optics. You could mount one, but you couldn’t fold the gun. This created a niche group of optics mounts from companies like MCARBO. A few years back, KelTec released the integrally suppressed CQB variant and introduced a new rotating rail.
The Gen 3 adopted that rotating rail system, which allows you to mount your optic of choice on your rifle and maintain its folding design. To accommodate this, you do lose your iron sights. That’s not a huge deal to me because the iron sights were also mounted so low that they were difficult to use.
I like that it’s optics-ready, but they could have done it better. It rotates from the 12 o’clock position to either the 3 or 9 o’clock position. I would have preferred it to rotate completely around to the 6 o’clock position. This would have put the optic on the same plane as the pistol grip and made a less bulky folded package.
The rotating rail keeps the format of the Gen 2 and mixes both M-LOK slots and Picatinny rails. It’s all polymer, but it works fine. I wouldn’t trust it to hold a precise laser zero, but the Venn diagram of SUB 2000 enthusiasts and Nightvision enthusiasts isn’t going to be substantial.
The 5.7 variant uses FN Five-SeveN magazines and comes with a garbage ProMag variant. Do yourself a favor and grab some factory FN magazines.
Why 5.7?
The 5.7x28mm round is neat. It reminds me of a modern .30 Carbine cartridge. It’s not quite a rifle cartridge, but not quite a pistol cartridge. The SUB 2000 Gen 3 is a blowback-operated firearm that’s basically the STEN gun refined. It’s famously got a violent recoil impulse with calibers like 9mm and .40 S&W, but the 5.7 famously has ultra-light recoil from carbines and even handguns.
Additionally, it allows this variant of the SUB 2000 to solve some issues with the older variants. Namely, it’s very easy to manipulate the charging handle. The old SUB 2Ks had some mighty strong recoil springs, but with the 5.7, they could let up and make the gun easy to manipulate.
SUB 2000s were never heavy, but the 5.7 variant trimmed some weight. It weighs a mere 4.36 pounds. A 4.36-pound semi-auto rifle that folds down to 16.25 inches is pretty handy to have. Plus, it holds 20 rounds of low-recoil, medium-range ammo.
To The Range
The 5.7 round has a bit more range than a 9mm round, so I used a 3X prism optic. The eye relief is tight, but it’s workable. The magnification made it easy to make hits out to 150 yards. Hitting a ten-inch gong from an off-hand position at 150 yards wasn’t tough.
I even went as far as 200 yards and used a fence to rest the gun. I couldn’t hit the gong consistently, but could ring an IPSC-sized steel target. Within 50 yards, I could put the majority of my rounds into an IPSC A-zone. While it’s accurate enough, it’s no precision weapon. The fact that the barrel separates from the receiver isn’t going to provide a ton of rigidity.
It’s not free-floated, and when it heats up, the accuracy falls apart. Your group size will grow substantially, and that should be noted.
I do enjoy the almost zero recoil and reliability of a centerfire cartridge. It’s capable of being fired quickly with awesome control. Sub-2-second low-ready Bill drills are the norm. If you needed a low-cost, low-recoil personal defense weapon, this would be an excellent choice. Ditch the prism for a red dot, and it’s a handy home defense weapon.
Reliability was fantastic, as long as you ditched the ProMag. When using the ProMag, I got a handful of issues, but zero when using FN magazines. Blowback actions aren’t fancy, but they’re reliable.
Another SUB 2000 For the Collection
Well, I added another gun to the Florida man collection. Try as I might to resist, I can’t help myself. Show me something kind of neat, kind of interesting, and then you make it affordable on top of all that. I like my little SUB 2000 Gen 3 and think the 5.7x28mm round is perfect for the platform.
