reasonablenut

Movie quote

2010-01-16T03:20:00.000-08:00

"Why should God bless a Congress? King or Congress, doesn't seem to be that different to me."

Radio Interview

2010-01-10T20:37:00.000-08:00

The Old Man did his interview on Tom Gresham's Gun Talk show today. Here's the podcast link to the hour he was on. It's the second segment, so about 15 minutes into it.

Obviously, the topic of the interview was MMD Brokers.

Weekend Interview

2010-01-04T22:07:00.000-08:00

The Old Man (aka William Hopkins) is slated to be on Gresham's GunTalk radio program this weekend at 3:00 P.M. central time to talk about the MMD endeavour.

If you have the time, please tune in. This is the link for those of us who don't have a local station that carries this show.

Tom Gresham is a gregarious host and it should be an interesting conversation.

200+ Years

2009-12-15T00:15:00.000-08:00

Today is the the is the 218th(?) anniversary of the ratification of the Bill of Rights.

Didn't take that long to piss it away, did it?

Because we don't really give a shit anymore so we deserve what we get, like lemmings hitting whatever they hit once they're off the cliff.

Normally, I would consider this a day to honor. All of a sudden, I'm ashamed that our lily-livered asses could not even retain 10 basic freedoms.

Watch what you post on Facebook because those motherfuckers are paying attention I guess. And, if per chance, Janet Napolitano comes across this post, let me say from the bottom of my heart, go fuck yourself and go run Uganda or something.

Sebastian and Caleb (this is not Mormon gay porn)

2009-11-09T20:09:00.000-08:00

Admittedly, I've been out of this for awhile. I missed the passing of DuToit. Obviously I missed a lot of other things.

Several months ago we rolled out a product that we thought would do some good. Ensuing flame wars and whatnot, convinced me it wasn't that easy.

The original reaction was much like this. Caleb thought it was a waste of money. We fucked about in comments for awhile, but the CW was the chances of one having to actually use a firearm was so slim as to make this useless and duplicates the comprehensive firearms coverage included in every State Farm policy.

Sebastion backed him up, as did XRLQ.

Since then, Caleb had to fight off an attack from a homeless guy and Sebastian has decided you're more likely to have to defend yourself than get hit by a meteor.

Really don't know what the underlying philosophy is, but these two back each other up, even when it contradicts shit they've already said.

Good for them. People take them very seriously and, without a doubt, they know what they're talking about at the range.

I just question followers (both magazines and commentators.)

My New Favorite Idiot

2009-11-06T19:09:00.000-08:00

The manager of this site is a good looking woman. I wouldn't kick her out of bed for eating Puffy Cheetos.

On the the other hand, she's a fucking idiot. I hadn't run into this Newsweek blog before the Ft. Hood atrocity. It appears many people write for this blog and all of them are morons.

First off, it looks like they are of the opinion that there is such a thing as pre-Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder. This is so obviously stupid, that it almost need not be addressed. Of course this had nothing to do with Islam or the fact that maybe it's not a good idea to send a Muslim into a theatre of operations that is kind of, sort of about killing Muslims. No. Now the trauma of war can be felt and have deep psychological consequences before the subject even goes near a war zone. Pretty soon, newborns that come into this world at times of conflict will have pre-pre-Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder.

Today they follow up with something equally idiotic.

I never made the jump to digital/HD/whatever-the-fuck it is TV. I figured life without Matt Lauer couldn't be all that bad. I was more than right. I don't miss television at all. I'm beginning to think that certain web outlets qualify in the same way.

If not watching or reading these fucktards makes life easier, maybe I'll just steer clear of the whole ignorant mess.

RNS & CCW Insurance

2009-10-27T19:46:00.000-07:00

A comment from the Old Man (aka William):

We started MMD Brokers with an idea. We thought it was a good idea and completely new, not to be compared to any existing approach. It was a policy written by CCW holders tailored to the needs and liabilities of CCW holders. We believe it is an excellent product which meets the legal requirements that a CCW holder would think was their responsibility. We were naive as respects the "gun community."

We thought the need was obvious and our solution was the best available. We figured that gun people come up with products all the time that are immediately embraced by the community.
We honestly were not prepared for the immediate negative shit storm that we ran into. Negative comments, nit picking and completely ignorant comments. I have been doing this insurance thing for most of my life and I know the business. I also know what this product does and why it is needed.

And so we come to today. David at Random Nuclear Strikes has manifested the first ray of light that we have seen out of the gun community thus far. I know the post he put together was not an easy one to write. He has really put together all of the things that we wanted this product to be and the crucial need for this product. We feel that it is almost a necessity for the responsible weapon carrier and it was our intention in designing the product to meet the needs that David so painfully outlines.

Legal defense funds/networks are fine, I have looked at them all. I have not found an actual contract that outlines their responsibilities in the event of a self defense situation and accordingly I have viewed them as a less than adequate solution to the problems we face as concealed carry practitioners.

Make no mistake,we are in this to make money, but we also firmly believe in this product as the ultimate and best available solution.

I honestly want to thank David for his courage and also for giving us a glimmer of hope in what has been, thus far, a completely discouraging endeavor.

Comment from me (ReasonableNut aka Benjamin):

For a long time, I was giving David shit for not doing this post. This program became effective on July 1st, 09, and David had said he reviewed the material and thought it to be a good idea. He also said he'd do a post on it (obviously we are rabid for lawyers to look at this.)

Awhile went by, and still there wasn't any post. We saw each other in Reno for the first time in 4+ years and I asked him what the holdup was. He indicated that this was a topic he wanted to approach carefully.

Now that he's posted it, I think I understand a little better why this particular commentary took a little longer to percolate on than reviewing a new AR magazine or writing up a range report.

I want to thank David for his candour and honesty. Me and the Old Man discussed and agreed that he makes a better argument than we ever could.

It also comes with a dose of reality that is probably torturous, but that he's lived through and me and 99.9% if us have not.

That's balls.

My favorite .45 Colt shooter

2009-10-25T20:09:00.000-07:00

Ever since Reno, my new favorite shooter is Bea. Her grandson's blog is the link on the title.

This lady kicked ass for two days and never stopped. She was kind and probably deserved a lot more applause than she got.

Here's a picture of her chillaxing:

I wouldn't mess with this lady. Hard opinions and good aim.

And .45 Colt is nothing to sneeze at either.

Kirk finished his AR

2009-10-10T00:13:00.000-07:00

Kirk is finally done. For those of you that haven't followed the pilgrimage, it was a long hard slog, just like most of his gun projects. Maybe moving out of Maryland would help, but maybe not.

If anyone recalls, Kirk was lucky his Boomershoot rifle 4 years ago was actually done. I think he got to shoot it twice before he left for Idaho. If I'm wrong, he'll correct me.

Regardless, he ended up with a tits looking AR. I've never seen a "gold" trigger on one before. The contrast is striking.

Russian Mosin-Nagant 91

2009-09-24T20:33:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while, Big 5 Sports gets a load of surplus rifles in. Several years ago, we bought an Enfield that ended up being so nice a shooter, we shipped it off to have it refinished. It's weird when it happens, because you feel like your buying a pair of Adidas, or something.

In any case, we tend to shop the grocery store flyers on Tuesday and decide what Sunday dinner is going to be. In leafing through, Big 5 had an ad and were advertising Mosin-Nagant M91 Russian rifles for $99.99. I know a lot of people are fans of this gun, but I've never had any interest because being chambered in 8 mm is just too big of a pain in the ass.

We shot down Wednesday morning and scored this guy.

Much of the appeal was that it is chambered in 7.62x54R. The old man's Dragunov is chambered in the same round and the surplus remains cheap

He used to be true blue on WWII American rifles but then he bought them all, with exception of an HBAR.

Instead of Nazi shit, he decided to move on to Ivan's shit. All well and good.

To me, the sight is extremely unusual. You pop it up and set the range and then slap it back down and, theoretically, should be on.

On initial inspection, it just looked like the old 19th century graduated peep sight.

The bore was rust-free and the rifling looked intact, so I guess we'll see how she shoots.

According to what I've read, base on the rollmark, the rifle was produced in 1937 at the Tula Arsenal in Russia. Apparently, this plant was shut down for the latter half of WWII because of the German invasion. I'm not sure that this rifle is worth shit, but it seems to be a rarity.

Next up, I might be buying another Glock. But they all look the same so I probably won't post on what the old man calls "another stapler."

Cheaper Than Dirt was kind enough

2009-09-24T01:13:00.000-07:00

Cheaper Than Dirt was kind enough to do a post on CCW Insurance. Their blog is impressive, though hard to find. I think that will change.

Uncle was kind enough to kick us some linky love, as well. Greatly appreciated.

The Kingman Disaster Resolved

2009-09-21T21:46:00.000-07:00

This is all that I pulled out of my carry, after the extractor broke at the Nevada border. Looks like the thing snapped off right after the butt.

The other half got chucked into a trash can at the Silver Legacy after a dude from Hi-Cap checked it out. Crazy fucker though he might be able to fashion an extractor in under 48 hours.

Unfortunately, it wasn't in the cards. I had to use the old man's carry to compete. And using the word "compete," is generous, at best.

Nonetheless, got home and hit Brownell's on Wednesday morning. Sure as shit, the parts showed up Friday (I say parts because I got an extra extractor and a sear spring, because that broke on my old man's carry about 3 weeks ago.)

Wilson readily admits that their extractors are tight. The slot for the firing pin stop is shallow, so the extractor is extremely taut. As such, I had to take some material off of the right side of the firing pin stop. Of course, these are the things that my mechanical incompetence shows through on.

I started out using Emory cloth. In retrospect, I could have gone through about 18 sheets and still not accomplished the task at hand. Then I switched to a fine diamond file, when I should have used a coarse one. All in all, it took about an hour and a half to fit the extractor. There is some fine tuning that remains to be done, but I should have my pistolsmith take a look at it this week.

I worked a bunch of snap-caps through it over the weekend and it seemed to work fine. This is my carry, though. I won't be carrying it until it gets a complete workout at the range with live safety function checks and the like.

Molly scored another link

2009-09-21T01:56:00.000-07:00

That young lady impressed a great many people.

I don't know who provided Rawles with the link, but he posted it.

Blogger Rendezvous Pt. II - The Trip Out

2009-09-17T19:54:00.000-07:00

We disembarked on Wendesday of last week. Our route was rather simple: Take I-40 over to Kingman, AZ and then head north from there.

We soon found out that the gas tank's capacity was only 12 gallons. That makes for a lot more gas stops than I am used to.

Everything went fine until Kingman. I have a NM CCW and a Utah CCW. Well, right about the time we were making reservations and planning this trip, Nevada decided it would no longer recognize UT licenses. They never recognized NM.

So I unload and case in Kingman. The bitch was, my extractor broke while I was unloading. I brought a one-shot 1911 to Reno. Ended up using my dad's. Needless to say, I ordered 2 extractors upon returning home.

Then, at the Nevada border, we hit the Hoover Dam. If you read that link, it is word for word bullshit. There were no bypass signs posted, no indication of what kind of clusterfuck you were driving into, and no non-commercial route.

At the dam, we got a little freaked out. It looked like they were searching every 5th car. At that particular moment, we realized that we had a Russian sniper rifle in the car, along with a shitload of Russian ammo, and I was smoking Ukrainian cigarettes. Luckily, we weren't the on in five, or whatever.

Nonetheless, it took an extra hour just to get through a fucking dam.

That put us in Vegas right around rush hour. We're from New Mexico; we're a couple of hicks, at this point. It freaked me out.

We agreed that we would stop at the first good looking place north of Vegas. I didn't realize that there is pretty much nothing between Vegas and Reno. ZERO.

We finally stopped in a town called Beatty and it was a lot better than I thought it would be. We ate and drank (and smoked) at the Sourdough Saloon, which was 100 feet from the door of our motel room. I don't understand why anybody would be in Beatty, but if you are, the Sourdough has the best burger I've had in several years.

Past that, we arrived and fucked around with valet parking and dyslectic bell-hops.

More to follow.

Confession and Evidence

2009-09-17T19:17:00.000-07:00

Much like Uncle did, I need to admit that this blog now has a vested interest in a commercial enterprise. So on the issue of insurance and firearms, consider me fairly biased.

That being said, the above linked "enterprise" caught a lot of shit back in July. People seemed to think that their existing insurance would cover a self-defense situation.

Well the California Supreme Court has spoken. As goes California, so goes the nation. And for a California court to take the side of an evil insurance company is unheard of.

Here's the link. Read it and think about it:

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/west/2009/08/05/102768.htm

Given, this is not a case of the use of a firearm, but the doctrine holds.

Blogger Rendezous Part I

2009-09-16T20:26:00.000-07:00

I'm not going to post my recollections in a consecutive stream. I'll post what strikes me when I sit down for the next week or so.

My biggest shout out is to the West Nevada Pistol League. They provided the steel for the pistol match. I could have not shot and had a great time. I got my ass kicked by a pre-teen girl and an old guy.

Regardless, the range had some really cool shirts. Actually, this is my favorite shooting shirt now. It doesn't seem like anybody else noticed them in the range check-in. I thought they might me online, but, apparently, are not.

If you make to Reno, buy a cool shirt.

Rare Book Review

2009-09-02T02:06:00.000-07:00

I read The Road last weekend.

I need to qualify this post by saying that I have had experiences with Cormac McCarthy, and, in my humble view he is a complete cunt as a human being. I think he's a vain, hypocritical motherfucker that is badly in need of a really good ass-kicking.

All that aside, I thoroughly enjoyed this novel (while pretending somebody else wrote it.)

It is not, as most reviews say, an "apocalyptic" novel. More a post-apocalypse apocalypse novel. The premise being that the earth cannot grow anything and all wildlife is dead. Survivalist shit doesn't really have anything to do with it.

With the continent or planet (he never specifies) in that state, it comes off as more a race to the end or who can outlast who. Regardless, it is clear there is no goal beyond tomorrow.

To go any further would probably contain spoilers, and I ain't down wit that.

The novel can be read in about 2 hours flat, given the font size and spacing.

If you can borrow it from a friend, I highly recommend this book. If not, I guess you might have to add to this asshead's coffers.

Did I mention that I don't like Mr. McCarthy?

Creeping Up

2009-09-02T02:01:00.000-07:00

I guess the Rendevous is a mere two weeks away, or less. We've got the rental car and all that shit. I'm still trying to figure out Nevada gun laws.

I'm Tired of Arguing

2009-08-05T19:44:00.000-07:00

Since MMD went into business a month ago, I've argued a lot of bullshit. At times, I've lost my temper. The temper can be seen in my reaction to "Luke."

The other partner is a bit more even-tempered than I am. Here is his response to the multiple, ignorant criticisms of this program:

WHY YOU NEED THIS POLICY IF YOU CARRY A CONCEALED WEAPON

Engaging in an act of self defense will involve two separate and distinct legal processes – criminal procedures and civil actions. These are two different areas of law and specialized to the extent that many criminal lawyers will not take civil work and visa versa.

If you are involved in shooting another person, make no mistake, you will be arrested and your weapon will be confiscated. The time involved to establish your innocence will vary from a few hours to months or even years. A criminal lawyer should be retained as quickly as possible and this will involve legal fees and retainers. YOUR HOMEOWNERS POLICY OR YOUR UMBRELLA POLICY WILL NOT RESPOND TO ANY OF THESE EXPENSES. You are on your own. With a favorable result in your criminal defense, our policy will reimburse this expense to the limit of our liability on the policy. (Note that this reimbursement will be twice or five times what the NRA policy will reimburse depending on the limit your choose.)

If you do injure or kill your adversary in an act of self defense you will be sued by some interested party. Even if your state has a castle doctrine, you will still be sued and will have to go through the legal process of defending this suit until it is dismissed in court. It is doubtful that your homeowners policy will respond to these suits due to the definition of occurrence in those policies which includes the requirement that the occurrence be "accidental’ and also because of the intentional acts exclusion. Once again, our policy will respond unequivocally in defense and payment of these suits up to our limit of liability.

"The chances of this happening are so remote that I don’t need insurance."
If the chances are so remote of being involved in a self defense situation, why do you bother to carry a concealed weapon at all?

"This insurance is written on a surplus lines basis and accordingly must be expensive for what your get."

Surplus lines carriers write coverages that are not available in the standard market. Standard companies will generally not insure any liability exposures that involve firearms – ammunition manufacturers, gunsmiths, ranges, shooting clubs and instructors are all written on a surplus lines basis. The liability coverages involving firearms offered by the NRA are all written on a surplus lines basis. Rates in the surplus lines market are established in the open market and are in a lot of cases much more flexible than standard lines rates which must be filed with each individual state.

"The policy is redundant with my other insurance – homeowners, personal liability, umbrella."

None of the liability policies you currently carry will respond to any expenses on the criminal side of the equation, which can be expensive even if it is a righteous shooting.

"My state has a castle doctrine and I can’t be sued for an act of self defense."

First, your act of self defense must be legally determined to be a lawful act of self defense before it would fall under the castle doctrine. Secondly, anyone can sue anyone for anything and accordingly you will be sued castle doctrine or not. A defense of this civil suit must be mounted until the court decides that your case falls under the provisions of your castle doctrine. Thirdly, in most cases, the castle doctrine only applies within your own residence and does not apply to acts outside of your own premises.

CCW Violation: My experience and trial in a court of law.

http://ohioliberty.blogspot.com/2009/07/ccw-violation-my-experience-and-trial.html

After the Shooting Stops: Dealing with the Aftermath of a Lethal Encounter

http://www.usconcealedcarry.com/public/227.cfm

Aftermath of a Shooting

http://www.neshooters.com/miranda.pdf

After a shooting, What to reveal

http://www.tactical-life.com/online/combat-handguns/after-a-shooting-what-to-reveal/

Self defense or Unjustified Shooting?

http://law.jrank.org/pages/10128/Self-Defense.html

Homeowners Policies and Acts of Self Defense

http://www.irmi.com/expert/articles/2006/cooper01.aspx

"Reasonable Actions to Protect Persons or Property
…In the case of Cooperative Fire Insurance Association of Vermont v. Bizon et al., 693 A.2d 722 (1997), the superior court held that even though the insured’s shooting and killing an intruder may have been done to protect his property, the policy contained an unambiguous intentional acts exclusion and there was no question but that the action was intentional. And in the case of AutoOwners Insurance Company v. Harrington et al., 565 N.W.2d 839 (1997) the supreme court of Michigan held that "to except injurious action taken in self-defense from an intentional acts exclusion would impermissible disregard the clear language of the exclusion…"
Homeowners Coverage Guide, Interpretation and Analysis by Diane W. Richardson

PayPal, EBay, et. al.

2009-07-30T23:23:00.000-07:00

Kevin over at Smallest Minority is also planning on attending the Gunblogger Rendezvous in Reno this fall.

Unlike me, he took the initiative and donated a gun to raffle off to benefit soldiers.

Typically, the pussies at PayPal balked at the idea and canceled the raffle to benefit our finest.

Truly shameless, but I guess that's we've come to expect.

Hell, we're such pussies that Chicago and Baltimore are becoming war zones, due to our and our politician's complacence.

Hit the header and read the whole story from Kevin.

Your Homeowners Policy Does Not Cover Shooting People

2009-07-19T23:11:00.000-07:00

Ever since this program was introduced, and linked to by Joe, SayUncle, and Gator (all of whom threw it out there as an interesting concept, without qualification), there have been some occluded conversations about the nature of this policy in certain circles. I hope this post serves to rectify the misunderstanding that seems to be abounding.

A) "Intentional Acts." A standard homeowners policy or umbrella excludes all intentional acts, without exception. If you think a court or a jury of your peers will not view the decision to pull a trigger, whether inside your home or without, as an "intentional act," you are deluded. Your homeowners policy, essentially, provides no coverage. If it is a high profile case or there are other extenuating circumstances, they may choose to defend you under a "reservation of rights."

B) "Criminal Defense Reimbursement." This coverage doesn’t exist under any homeowners policy. But, according to all of the experts on the intertubes, District Attorneys are inherently a fair-minded crowd, who would never prosecute you for, what in your mind was, a justified shooting.

Also, if you want to call me a fraud or a scam-artist, have the balls to do it to my goddamn face.

Dragunov

2009-07-12T01:56:00.000-07:00

The last rifle the Old Man purchased was a Romanian manufactured Dragunov.

Needless to say, it had the bog standard Eastern Bloc furniture with a shitty wood finish. We didn't take before pictures. The Old Man does furniture and I have no idea how he refinished the wood.

It's a bit of a weird rifle. The thumbhole stock is a lot shorter than what you consider necessary for any kind of sniper rifle. It also has a metal butt-plate, which can hurt like all hell.

The other strange feature is the scope. I believe it is a 3x Commie scope. Originally, they were tritium illuminated, but that burned out a long time ago. It also has some weird Ivan ranging system built into the reticle that we haven't figured out yet.

If you look at the picture, the scope appears to be enormously long, and not afford enough eye relief.

In reality, about two inches on the rear of the scope is a gasket or rubber extension. This ensures that you do not need to train people about eye relief, length of pull, etc., as the rubber eyepiece guarantees you're not going to get popped.

The best feature of this rifle is the ammo. As can be seen, the 7.62 X 54R has remained relatively cheap as compared to any other .30 comparable cartridge. I keep telling the Old Man to stock up on this shit, because who knows how long it will last.

The rifle was purchased from J&G Sales, and they didn't fuck around with it. The whole process took about 10 days, once they had the rifles in stock.

SHTF (You might see more of these)

2009-07-09T02:55:00.001-07:00

I thought this was a pretty insightful article into the possibilities and the levels of preparedness. We're currently on a radio kick, as the weapons issue is probably resolved.

CCW Insurance

2009-07-06T21:30:00.000-07:00

Admittedly, even since my announced comeback, posting has been erratic at best.

We've bought few new firearms. We did do a 2-day Tactical Rifle course the week before last. A full AAR will follow in due course.

Part of the reason the last few months have been so hectic is that we've been finalizing a CCW Insurance Program. The Old Man has been busting ass for the last 5 years to sell this product to someone at Lloyd's. They're Englishmen, for Christ's sake. It's like selling Kryptonite to Superman.

Anyway, it came together and was effective 07/01.

It has everything the NRA personal policy lacks. You can read how broad the coverage is by reading the actual policy language here. For now, we're writing in NM, CO, and AZ. TX will follow shortly, as soon as the paperwork bullshit is done.

Monday Morning Coming Down

2009-06-08T19:08:00.000-07:00

All of a sudden, I dread Monday more than I ever have in my life. It seems the government likes to fuck with shit on Mondays. Or they do it over the weekend when the news cycle is down.

Today:

Knives: Apparently Iranians can have nukes, but I can't have a pocket knife that only requires one hand to be opened.

Cigarettes: Once again, I can thank the government for looking out for my safety. Nevermind that smoking will just fucking suck from now on (or maybe that's the point.) These things are terrible. I like to smoke. I enjoy it. And once again the government is dictating what is "safe" and "acceptable." Pretty soon, they will have mandated instructions on how to wipe my ass.

When is this going to stop? When will they not dictate every aspect of my life (food, car, cigarettes, knives, guns, economy, etc.)

I think I've had enough.

Jimmah

2009-04-27T01:25:00.000-07:00

Here's a man who single-handedly, almost destroyed the American economy. I've always been keen to find out what his opinion of gun control is. Thank God he comes up with gems like this:

But none of us wants to own an assault weapon, because we have no desire to
kill policemen or go to a school or workplace to see how many victims we can
accumulate before we are finally shot or take our own lives
That means I bought a couple of ARs, because
my only intention could be to kill a fuckload of people. Thanks
Jimmy.

Bob Herbert is a fucking retard

2009-04-25T07:26:00.000-07:00

It always amazes me that, if these fuckers just throw a shit-ton of numbers out, they are to be believed. I'm not going to fisk this op-ed because it would take days to contradict the statistics he's throwing out there. The only number Bob seems to not have in his statistics spreadsheet is how many deaths, injuries, and crimes were prevented by guns.

Also, if anyone uses the Bradys as "a source", it's not worth responding to. None the less, this sycophantic crap pisses me off.

My Favorite Knife

2008-09-09T19:30:00.000-07:00

This is a gun blog. I have training with firearms. I have none with edged weapons. But, sometimes, I fall in love.

Before I started shooting or training or any shit like that, a friend of mine in high school had his older brother buy me a Mark II. I carried it to school and everywhere else for a little while. Needless to say, I was a problematic teenager and I became sure that my mother would find the knife. As such, I wrapped in plastic and buried on the side of the house, about 3 feet from where I'd buried my pot pipe several months before.

They built a shed over it. It's gone.

As far as I can tell, Gerber stopped making their most popular product somewhere in the early 90's. I managed to score one in 2000 for about a hundred and 20 bucks. I love this knife but not as much as the one I buried.

It's simply beautiful.

Today, an A.G. Russells catalogue came in and I was about to throw it away. Unfortunately, as I was about to toss it, I noticed that they were advertising the Mark II on the back page.

Now, I've spent about $4,000 this summer, just trying to get some dead fucker in the ground. I haven't bought any guns and I damn straight haven't bought any knives. But take a look at it.

It surely is beauty to behold. And it has a blackened blade (or whatever technical shit it is.)

It's a lot of money to me, right now, and Russell is listing it as temporarily unavailable; nonetheless, I don't think I can resist this temptation.

Cool Tool

2008-09-03T20:15:00.000-07:00

As my shooting has been intermittent, at best, the last six months, once I began to shoot again I remembered that you have to clean the fuckers, as well.

Firstly, I've basically only shot pistol for the last 9 months. That being said, I do own AR's that I keep close in the event of reset-button, zombies, home invasion, Red Dawn, etc. Well, I haven't actually broken those down in awhile to see what kind of shape they are in. I did last weekend.

I have no photos of that to post, because it is embarassing to let a firearm deteriorate to that state. Needless to say, my dining room table was covered with patches, solvent, brushes, rods, oil, etc. I still have black shit under my fingernails that I can't get out.

The item I'm pointing out is toothbrushes. If you clean ARs you need them. I realized, though, that the average nylon toothbrush only lasts as long as it takes to clean a really fucked up, abused, and ignored AR.

The Old Man found a solution and actually gave me one.

Hoppe's makes a bronze toothbrush. I figure that should make it through a few ARs before crapping out.

There's a link at the top, but it's backordered at Midway. Maybe try Brownell's.

S&W JM (don't ask me what frame it is)

2008-08-05T20:46:00.000-07:00

As the leave of absence has left us with a lot of new guns, I'm going to work backwards.

The Old Man owns a S&W 25. It's big; it's accurate; but you can't really carry it in New Mexico summer heat.

As a carry revolver, he chose the S&W JM. I looked it up, it's the Jerry Miculek 625.
Believe it or not, I haven't shot it yet, so I can't attest one way or the other.

As opposed to standard S&W fare, the butt is rounded off. The Old Man bought a Mernickel cross dwaw holster.

All reports have been positive. I will report back when I've shot it.

Couple more pics.

Here's the video: (keep in mind, moon-clips are sweet)(and that's not my dad.)

Oddball Ammo

2008-07-23T18:41:00.000-07:00

Over the last 4-6 years, I have let my domicile degrade into a complete shithole (Kirk can attest to this, as he's seen the chaos.) Over the last 6 weeks I have been doing some heavy cleaning and a complete overhaul.

As a result, I've found a shitload of loose rounds. I don't know if their commercial or reloads; I have no idea why they were left alone as opposed to being catalogued with their collegues; some might be hot, some might be weak.

Regardless, I've decided on a potpourri shooting day to clear this shit out. I found .45, 9mm, 12 gauge, and .223. I'm taking a Mini-14 for the .223 because I think that has less risk than shooting weird shit through an AR. 12 gauge is, well, 12 gauge. I figure a Glock should work for the 9 and my H&K USP (designated for +p+ rounds) for the burnoff .45.

All in all, shooting the crap should take about 20 minutes. If there are squibs or other problems, it's going to take longer.

I should clean my house more often.

Thanks

2008-07-23T18:39:00.000-07:00

Thank you for the welcome return. There are fuckers out there that I didn't even realize they ever read my shit. I appreciate the warm welcome and the condolences.

Good people, I guess is all I have to say.

Hopeful Return

2008-07-19T04:30:00.000-07:00

This blog has been dead.

Hat-tip to people who've kept me on their blogroll for the last 8 months. I've swapped out computers and lost links, so I had to find my blog again. The email account expired and had to be re-established. Any mail from the last 4 months is probably lost.

Anyway, apologies. I got lost on a dying thing. Finding out someone is going to die, taking care of them until they die, watching them die, and then figuring out what the fuck to do with them. On top of that, dealing with the, oh so, compassionate fuckers that just make this sort of thing more difficult.

I haven't shot a whole lot since April. We've got a lot of new hardware and worked in a tactical pistol course at Whittington, so I've got plenty of shit to report on.

Hopefully, this blog will come alive now.

Whittington II

2008-02-04T19:08:00.000-08:00

First day up there was high-power rifle. My father, brother, and me were all shooting .308 rifles. At the time, I was waiting for some work to be completed on my .308, so I used my father's .308 Remington Classic with a Nikon scope.

The Old Man was shooting his replica M40 with a sweet Leupold Mil-Dot on the top.

My brother was shooting a Remington 700 with a composite stock and a sweet Leupold, as well. The barrel isn't that heavy...yet.

We scoped the 1,000 yard line to begin with and then started at a more modest distance and worked our way back. Whittington is actually an old coal mine, so all of the berms are made of shitty, reject coal shards. That's why the ground looks weird. I would also recommend that you take a mat, as they are a bit uncomfortable to lie on.

This was the view from the 1,000 yard line. 100 stations and 100 target stands. 4 guys had it all to ourselves for the whole day. It cost $45.

This is my brother and I at a distance I don't remember. I'm the asshole on the left and he's the guy with a sweatshirt over his head. I have since bought him a Tubbs hat that I originally saw modeled up at Boomershoot.

The boy shot that way all day; and he didn't do bad. Better than me and the Old Man.

My brother trying to look like Muhjadeen again.

The facility was top notch. Target stands were in good shape, the pulleys were completely functioning, and they even had tape to paste your targets up.

I cannot recommend this facility enough. The staff were helpful and concerned. They weren't range-rule frenzied and only came by to make sure everything was working and your day was going as planned.

End of the day was picking up steel. After that, we cooked some steaks and drank some beer and bullshitted on the porch. Everybody was out by 10:00 at the latest.

All in all, it was a good day. The instructor didn't really know what we wanted to learn, probably because we never told him. He was a bit of a glorified spotter.

We worked our way back from 300 yards to 1,000. At the point we were at 1,000, my brother banged steel twice and I banged it once, with the Old Man's rifle. The loaner I was using (with the Nikon glass [which is fine under 700 yards]) ran out of MOA somewhere between 700 and 800.

The Old Man was knackered and didn't hit on shit. There's this year, so I'm not worried about. And this time we're not starting at 300.

Anyway, that was the first day of three. More to follow. Video, if I can figure that shit out.

Whittington I

2008-02-04T00:59:00.000-08:00

I can't actually post the whole thing. So here is the beginning.

We signed up for a 2-day course and a fuck-around day at the long range.

This post is about the lodging ($24 a day, per head.)

The shower was better than the one in my house. There was a fridge, stove/range, coffee maker, and the beds were immaculate (although I rolled off once because of a dream or...well, something.)

The first day we shot at the the 1,000 yard high-power range.

This was our view of the range off of the back porch of the cabin. It was a 90 second drive to get there and the instructor said it was better than Fort Perry.

It is a 100 station range, measured to a 1,000 yards, and we had four guys on it. Pretty fucking cool.

Evenings, we would grill some shit and hang out on the patio. One night we screwed around with a long range training program on a laptop.

As I smoke, and that is verboten in the cabins (especially with weirdo Barrett people around ((more on those fuckers later)) I spent a lot of time on the porch. The stars were beautiful and I like the fact that no one could fuck with me.

Evenings you'd see all kinds of game wandering past. I think the second night, we saw a wounded antelope going by at 60 mph. All bets were the poor fucker wasn't making it through the night.

Whatever your interests are, I think Whittington can accomodate you. It's a good fucking time. The best vacation I have ever taken.

Rest of the report to follow.

Mea Culpa

2008-01-28T00:13:00.000-08:00

Admittedly, I've been incommunicado for about 6 months.

I've had some weird shit to deal with and couldn't find the time to blog.

I think that's done.

We've got a ton of shit to post if I can get off of my ass. I hope that happens, but I can't promise it. See how she goes.

Slipping on by on LSD, Friday Night Trouble-Bound

2008-01-27T23:43:00.000-08:00

Tony Couldn't Fly, Tony Died

2008-01-18T20:17:00.000-08:00

NY Times BS

2007-10-22T23:09:00.000-07:00

I've been away for awhile. Just because I haven't blogged doesn't mean I haven't done a shitload of really interesting shooting.

This awoke me from my slumber. The New York Times has decided to not charge money for access for its opinion page. I'm not sure that was a good idea as far as my personal mental health goes.

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/23/opinion/23tue3.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

Dumbass sentence #1:

...a groundbreaking measure signed into law earlier this month by the state’s Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, offers a realistic hope for bringing more murderers, gang members and other armed criminals to justice.

Think they have those weird, ESP bitches from "Minority Report?" Think they have the future mapped out like those outlaws in the "Terminator" series?

Alas and alack, no.

"Under the new measure — the Crime Gun Identification Act — manufacturers of semiautomatic weapons will have to equip new guns sold in California starting in 2010 with inexpensive technology known as microstamping. This process involves using lasers to create microscopic markings that record the make, model and serial number of a semiautomatic handgun onto its firing pin and other internal surfaces. These markings automatically transfer onto the bullet shell casing when a gun is fired, providing a valuable lead for police investigators when, as commonly happens, casings from the shooter’s weapon are found at a crime scene."

Holy Mother of Jesus, I feel better. God knows it would take a PhD to defeat any of the measures the Kindergarden Cop and his leftist cohorts have devised for the criminal element. I'm sure I could never figure out how to use a file, especially if I didn't have a job and could devote whole days to the endevour.

Why are people who write for newspapers so stupid?

Range Report

2007-08-30T19:46:00.000-07:00

Just because we haven't been blogging doesn't mean we haven't been shooting or scoring.

We got out this afternoon in anticipation of the Whittington thing. We brought 3 rifles, but ended up only shooting the M-40. We ran handloaded match 168 grain and 175 grain (both Sierra.) Both were flawless. Based on advice I've received lately, the 175 is better for long distance. My experience today did not back that theory.

In addition, we shot Aussie, South African, and Lake City rounds (all 147 grain.) The Aussie did great, as it has consistently shown in both bolts and sem-autos. The SA seemed to be a little hotter, but wouldn't extract. Lake City was acceptable, but nowhere near where the Aussie was.

All were accurate, but that's not a reflection on the cartridge; more the gun.

I've broken down and started loading for a single gun. I like chamber-blown Federal Gold Match and then I can load it for the rifle in question.

The Creedmoor spotting stand is something I should have bought years ago. It is stable and has adjustment knobs you won't find on standard tripods.

More to follow.

Whittington & Creedmoor

2007-08-28T20:48:00.000-07:00

We missed Boomershoot this year. It's a really long drive and we did it straight through last year. New Mexico to Idaho is about 1,000 miles flat and the Old Man can't sleep in a moving vehicle.

As such, we missed vacation this year. In lieu of that, we've scheduled 3 days at Whittington. Ironically, this incredible site is a mere 2 1/2 hours away from where I live and I've never spent the effort to go there.

We're doing a customized class, instructed by this gentleman. We're doing three days (the Old Man, my brother, and me.) First two will be a practical pistol course and the the third is "long range precision target shooting", or something else I might call it.

Given the occasion, and what I learned at Boomershoot last year, we realized that the spotting scope stand we are currently using is largely useless in the Southwest.

Thus, I actually forked out some cash and got a Creedmoor stand (ala, the God Scope, for those who know.)

Whittington reports should follow regularly, as I seem to be out my, what Porta's Cat calls, "I don't want to blog, so kiss my ass." phase I seemed to be going through.

.45 Bullet Shortage

2007-08-26T22:49:00.000-07:00

There seems to be an extreme shortage of .45 bullet availability. Midway has zero FMJ bullets. Every other outlet I've checked is out as well. One can't blame this on the war or law enforcement, as that seems to be entirely 9mm.

So where the fuck is all this .45 going?

Merv Griffin & Dairy Products Gone Bad

2007-08-12T13:31:00.000-07:00

MAJOR UPDATE: First post in a month and I completely fucked up the facts. Ed McMahon was the asshole with the dead moldy dog. Apologies. The comic is still cool, though.

With apologies to Deb, I've been on a bit of a hiatus. Call it dog days of summer or whatnot, but I just haven't been that interested in writing. Shooting-wise there is a buttload of shit I could be blabbing about. Just haven't been in the mood.

In any case, the passing of Merv Griffin made me wistful. I'm an insurance adjuster and he was the first front page motherfucker that sued an insurance company over a mold claim. Mold killed his dog. KILLED HIS DOG.

Then I got a bit more remiscent and remembered one of my favorite underground comics of all time:

Hopkins Flag (or Gadsden)

2007-07-07T23:31:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Joe's Crabby shack, I've found that it appears that a man bearing my family name, might have been partly responsible for this:

I guess Benjamin Franklin also contributed, in his way, to the promulgation of the rattlesnake as an American icon. Fucking weird; read about it.

Sportsman's Warehouse Sucks

2007-07-02T19:17:00.000-07:00

They really are the worst.

A few weeks back, we needed Large Pistol Primers. We checked with the local retailers and they were all out. Thus, you figure you hit the big box. I mean, everybody uses Large Pistol Primers. Shit, most guys who load just do it to cut down on .45 cost. Well, Sportsman's Warehouse didn't have shit. We took it as a token that it was not meant to be.

Fast forward a month. The Old Man and I went down there to pick up an emergency box of .45 round nose. They didn't have it, of course. I also noticed the primer section was even more eviscerated than when we'd last been there. Do you have a buyer? Do you stock?

Fuck you anyway. You wasted shitloads of my time and you are useless.

When is Cabela's opening?

Enfield refinish

2007-07-01T20:27:00.000-07:00

About a year ago, the Old Man bought an Enfield for about $160 from Big 5 Sports. It was consistently a great shooter, even though it was the cheapest rifle we've ever bought. As such, there was some knashing of teeth on how much money should be spent refurbishing it. Finally, it was decided that such a good shooter could not be left to degenerate further and we shipped it to Dean's Gun Restoration. Following are the results.

If you have the means and an old military rifle that shoots like a motherfucker, I can't recommend Dean's enough. Fair price for some really awesome craftsmanship.

Cops

2007-07-01T20:24:00.000-07:00

Our boys in blue seem to do okay if an old lady leads them to the crime. Otherwise, I'm not impressed.

If the link demands log-in it's "bh3323899" and the password is "bthopkins"

CMP Carbines - Furniture Re-Store

2007-06-23T10:54:00.000-07:00

As previously, Ben and I both got CMP carbines. First step was to do something about the stocks as they were both pretty ugly at first look. Ben’s was Italian birch, pretty badly dented. Looking at mine, I couldn’t tell what is was - it appeared to have been varnished and was completely black

The Italian seemed to need the most work so I started with that. Stripped the original finish with Formby’s finish remover (great stuff as is conditions the wood along with stripping any old finish).

Next step was to take out dents as much as possible. Used a damp cloth and a steam iron and that raised most of the dents with the exception of the really bad ones. Left the damp cloth on for a couple of hours, not enough to soak the wood but just enough to keep it damp. One last iron session and we were good to go.

I had originally wanted a lighter finish, but the stock had a lot of hand sweat stains and other water stains all along the stock, so I would up using a Spanish Walnut, which is an extremely dark stain. The first pass resulted in an almost black rifle. Left it a day to let it dry and we were on to the final finish.

I personally prefer a Tung Oil finish versus boiled linseed or any of the various oil finishes. The low gloss Tung gives a satin finish but also a harder surface finish that resists water and sweat stains. If you need to fix it a bit after time, you just apply another coat and steel wool it, turns out good as new.

After four coats of tung oil, light steel wool in between, we had a much better looking stock and about as well as we were going to do with the Italian stock.

On to my stock which was by far the worst looking of the two. After the application of the Formby’s finish remover, we found that we had an original GI black walnut stock! Needless to say, this did not take any stain. We just smoothed her out with some fine sand paper and steel wool and were ready for the final tung oil finish. Word of caution - if you want to preserved the cartouches on a stock you have to less than enthusiastic with the sandpaper and steel wool.

Four coats of tung oil later, and we had a damn good looking walnut stock.

Sometimes the ugly duckling turns into a swan. Start to finish about one week for both.

The Old Man

CMP M-1 Carbines

2007-06-12T22:40:00.000-07:00

My carbine came in Monday and the Old Man's showed up yesterday (Tuesday.) There were were marked differences between the two Inlands and the one my old man scored a few years ago.

These were the deliveries. The top one is the Old Man's and the lower one is mine. His barrel seems to have more rifling evident and his receiver is tighter in its stock than mine is. His furniture was in a bit shittier state than mine was. The Italians actually varnish rifle stocks. So much for the whole Italian craftmanship thing.

We checked both muzzles with .30 carbine rounds and both seemed to check out. As many dinks and shit on the stocks, the muzzles appear to be well taken care of.

The stocks come without the oilers (what I would call a sling detente) or slings.

I think the Old Man is thinking about doing extensive furniture work on these guns, i.e. sanding this wood down to grain and building the oil finish back up from there.

Regardless, our order was in to CMP the second day they were accepting orders. They sold out of rifles about 18 days later. This was only the sale of Infields (of which 40% of WWII carbines were manufactured by.) Later in the year they plan on releasing Saginaws, IBMs, Rockolas, etc. Given the price and time frame that the Inlands were dispensed with, if anyone wants a shot at the lesser manufacturers, get your checks ready and make sure your CMP status is up to date.

S&W Update

2007-06-10T03:58:00.000-07:00

Scroll down to understand the original problem.

Smith sent me a label and I got it out a week ago Thursday. I got delivery on the pistol this last Tuesday, and I was thinking "hot shit, these people have customer service down."

However, when I opened it, the pistol did not have an installed plunger tube.

Needless to say, I called. The lady on the phone was really nice and admitted that they fucked up. Got a new label and sent it off again. Will report on future developments.

S&W Troubles

2007-05-30T19:57:00.000-07:00

As promised, we made it out to the range last week. I only brought 1911s. It was a good day and we got some work done as far as sighting.

The Smith (aka S&W SW1911PD) started locking the slide after every shot. The old man shot in without a hitch. The conclusion was that I like touching guys butts and that I was riding the frame with the slide, i.e. making me a likely John Edwards voter.

As I sat down to clean the gun on Friday night, some shit popped off. The staked plunger tube had shorn off of the frame. The reason it worked for the old man is because he doesn't shoot with his thumb on the safety. I however, apply pressure which apparently locks the slide back once your plunger tube is no longer a part on your gun.

Needless to say, it is a new gun and I don't want to screw around with it, as much shit as I have on my plate. I contacted S&W and they sent me a UPS label. Vague on time, but I'm reserving judgment.

It is still a beautiful gun and I want it back as quick as possible. I use this as my back-up carry gun and I don't like it being out of the house or not on my persons.

Will report back on the S&W treatment.

M-40

2007-05-23T23:19:00.000-07:00

The rifle I referenced in the previous post, is an M-40 Marine Sniper rifle. Remington did a limited run of about a thousand, (not that there are that many originals.) It was weird, in that they didn't advertise this, even on their website's "Special Edition" spot.

The Old Man found one. It is .308, with a huge barrel, and a steel butt-plate. The box it came in is probably a collector's item and we tried to stay true to the spirit by mounting a Zeiss 3-9x scope (with Army mils, but you can't have everything.)

Hopefully, trial run should be tomorrow, unless there are 25 mph crosswinds. No point in sighting in those conditions.

Regardless, I'm shooting something tomorrow.

Scope Mounting

2007-05-21T20:37:00.000-07:00

I planned on making this a multiple post feature, but it didn't work out that way. New computer and I took a lot of pictures that were formated. This is what remains.

Here is the picture of the rifle in the rough. It is a bull barrel bolt, chambered in .308. This is, apparently, what Scout-snipers carried in the Vietnam war. I will attest that the barrel makes it inconvenient to shoot off-hand or even from a braced position. It is so fucking heavy, I don't think one could shoot it from anything but a rested position.

The barrel is like nothing I've ever seen. It is huge, unwieldy and demands a rest.

Originally, the point of this series was to show people that you don't have to waste the money to
take your rifle and scope to a gunsmith. Depending on who your gunsmith is, you will probably do a better job.

Pictured are alignment rings. These allow you to verify that your rings are matched to the diameter of the scope. I hoped to picture lapping tools and a piece by piece progression of the mount and rings.

Final pictures and range report will follow.

Range Report w/ Sights Bitch

2007-05-13T21:19:00.000-07:00

We made it out on Thursday. Good day all around, but before I get into details I need to bitch.

I brought out the Carry Gun (that's what it is called, it is actually a Colt XSE) and I intended to do a 300 round workout. I wasn't working on marksmanship, I was working on handling. Well 3 magazines into it, the fucking back sight came loose. No I didn't have the right Allen wrench and no I couldn't improvise; so it was useless to shoot it.

I'm not limiting it to the Colt, although I've yet to own a Colt that came out of the box with reliable sights. It seems most companies don't really give a shit about sights, at least on a civilian level. We've beat pins, loc-tited screws, and stippled dovetails. We've corrected most of them, but anything purchased in the last year is subject to scrutiny. The kind of scrutiny where one might question if you would bet your life on this gun.

It pisses me off that the civilian market is held in such contempt. Yes, we are not a big government contract and, yes, a lot of us wouldn't recognize the flaw if we owned the gun for 30 years. But some of us actually try to educate ourselves and know we're not hitting shit because the manufacterer refused to pay due attention to sight quality and installation (I'm especially talking about Colt.)

As such, I shot the carry for about 10 minutes. After that I shot my Glock 17 which worked the same way it always does. Reliable, but not a lot of fun to shoot.

My Old Man brought out the Model 29 and the Model 25-2; both of which were a lot of fun. The 25 was basically sighted in and he practiced double action shots, the idea being that a short, depressed man in sunglasses is not going to give you time to cock the fucking thing. His groups were good enough for me. Last time, it was about a 4 or 5" group at 12 yards. That should do the trick.

Also, I've taken to shooting at steel, whether the practice is rifle or pistol. I set up an 8" gong at 20 yards or so, and just practiced presentation and mostly reloads. Of course I was pissed off about the Carry sight, but blowing through 10 Glock magazines is a bit of a salve.

Finally, I scored the Carry sight when I sighted it in. As such, it was a matter of loc-titeing(?) the set screw into it. Hopefully that does the trick.

In other news, I bought the same gun Xavier did (the SW1911PD) and performed a lesser review than he puts out. I still don't understand the pinned extractor, but then I'm old school.

S&W Model 25-2

2007-05-09T22:33:00.000-07:00

The April Buy a Gun Month was still in full force up until the 30th. The most recent handgun purchase was a 70's production (verified by serial number) with a claw hammer and chambered in .45 ACP.

Tomorrow is range day and we will be giving this guy a shot. The Old Man scored hollow-points and moon clips. VTech had a bit of an effect on the old guy. This is the official office gun.

As always, it's got the nice thumb rest for you right-handers. I anticipate the recoil to be less than a 1911, given the size of the frame.

.30 Carbine Order

2007-05-01T20:35:00.000-07:00

We got our CMP Carbine orders out yesterday, via FedEx. They arrived in Alabama today. What I didn't anticipate was the mad rush on the shit that would occur the absolute first day they were for sale. CMP posted a picture of their first day of orders.

We (mostly the Old Man) have bought a lot of guns this month. Pics and details will follow.

And Boomershoot happened last weekend and, as I've been in attendance for the last two years, it pains me that I wasn't able to make it. I hope everybody had as much fun and learned as much shit as I did.

Gun Control Debate

2007-04-24T20:09:00.000-07:00

I have to post this, as it will be the only time I will ever get link love from an liberal, professor's blog.

I actually watch bloggingheads.tv sometimes. I know no one else does, because it is just pundits swapping spit. Last Friday I tripped over this interchange between John Horgan and George Johnson commenting on the VTech massacre. Obviously, they don't agree with most concealed-carry laws.

I looked up Mr. Horgan's email address and followed up on the issue. We had a very civil discussion, via email, and as he has seen fit to post the interchange on his blog, I will reciprocate. He did clear the post with me before throwing it up.

Here's the exchange that was cross-posted at his site. He edited certain things but the he only deleted maybe 1%:

Mr. Horgan,Of course, you must live on the east side of the Mississippi.
It’s always a wonder to me that it is only liberal, “gun-control” people like
you that will use phrases like “blow them away” (in reference to Kaus’s
commentary.) Every pistol course I have ever taken stresses the de-escalation
angle in any given situation. Your argument that a concealed-carry holder would
have resulted in a “gunfight” or something, is just as adolescent as your
accusation of the pubescent obsession with firearms. A trained, licensed firearm
owner could have ended that hell a lot quicker than the police were able to do.
In fact, if you look at it objectively: Did the police prevent anyone from being
killed? Did they actually stop the perpetrator? No and no. He killed at will and
killed himself when he decided he was done. The police merely held the doors for
the EMTs who were getting the wounded off-scene before the police performed an
all but unnecessary investigation, which is ongoing. Ben Hopkins, Albuquerque,
NM

Ben,I teach at a college, and Kauss’s suggestion that maybe we should put
more guns in the hands of these hormonal, stressed-out kids going through sexual
and career identity crises and coupling and breaking up and consuming buckets of
booze every weekend–well, it’s beyond stupid. Also I’ve known some very
experienced gun people who’ve suffered from horrible gun accidents through bad
luck, or because someone in a fit of rage grabbed a gun, and incidents in which
good gun folks get bad guns folks breaking into their homes or whatever are
vanishingly rare and in no way counterbalance the harm guns do. But hell, I’m
just a pansy east coast bleeding heart liberal dove, so I’m not gonna sway
someone like you. John

Mr. Horgan,Touche on the point about college kids being armed. I failed to
consider that these are exactly the kind of people who can take a normal event
(i.e. sexual rejection, social slights, etc.) in an extremely exaggerated way.
Hell, we were all that age once and I, for one, did not hold a concealed carry
license until I was into my 30’s. I’m not sure the same argument would apply to
professors, though. As an example, Israel has encouraged if not required certain
teachers to carry concealed since the ’70s. Previously, Arafat’s thugs loved
nothing more than terrorizing a school full of Israeli children. One never hears
about these things taking place in Israel anymore. I’m not saying arm
second-graders, but a teacher/professor who shows the willingness and skill to
responsibly carry may well deter future events. Best regards, Ben

Ben,Academics, who are among the most neurotic, embittered people on the
planet, especially when they’re up for tenure, packing heat? Maybe it makes
sense in Israel, but I sure wouldn’t want to be at a school where profs carry
concealed weapons.John

John,Empirically, I would have to agree with you when it comes to
professors. The only professor I actually know is retired professor Richard
Berthold. If you recall, he was the UNM professor who said after 9/11 that “I’d
vote for anyone who could fly a plane into the Pentagon.” I still think that if
the education community would take appropriate steps, they would be able to find
responsible adults to be armed. Thank you again for the exchange. It is rare
nowadays to have an intelligent difference of opinion that is argued civilly
without degenerating into the normal internet flame-war, or insult-fest that
seems to be the staple on both the left and the right.Ben

It was an interesting conversation and I'm not
sure that either one of us conviced each other. Nonetheless, it was
interesting to talk civilly with a person who disagrees with me so fundamentally
on an issue we both felt strongly about.
Maybe there is hope.

First, Last and Only Words on Vtech

2007-04-24T18:40:00.000-07:00

There were no heroes, only victims.
The Old Man

Delusional Blue States

2007-04-22T06:50:00.000-07:00

Recently I've found that, whether conservative or liberal, it depends on the area of the country you are from whether you even have a view of guns that couldn't be considered completely ignorant. Case in point, I don't live in New York City or Seattle, so my opinion on a Mass Transit Authority isn't as authentic as a consevative or liberal who lives in that context.

Some conservative asshole from New York probably couldn't drive my pick-up truck and wouldn't understand why I would want a gun in said truck.

Case in point is this bloggingheads.tv interchange between Robert Wright and Mickey Kaus. I respect both men but they have no idea what the hell they are talking about. Watch the first 3 minutes of the video and you will understand that certain people, based on culture and geography, are just not qualified to comment on this sort of thing.

Range Report (Model 29)

2007-04-22T05:09:00.000-07:00

Thursday was range day. I initially seemed like a quiet affair that would only involve the Old Man and me, and maybe my brother. As it ended up, a soon-to-be private citizen army guy we know showed up at the office. After loading up and hitting the range we found that my brother was shooting with two friends as well, bringing the party's total to six.

Needless to say, we started by sighting in the Model 29. The factory sights were pretty close but took some adjusting to get a solid zero. Damn near everybody out there shot this gun (it's easier on the hand than the Ruger .44 Redhawk) and the reports even drew witnesses from another nearby range.

The range we were on was about 40 yards long, allowing you to sight while other people plinked at the same time. A mistake was made in that a frame was allowed to sit 20 yards beyond the plinking targets (plastic coffee cans, waterballs, etc.) None of us geniuses realized that the hopping bullets would rip the shit out of the target frame. By the end of the day, my brother's friend's target stand had been shot to shit.

In total, between six of us, we had an AR, a combat shotgun, 2 1911s, an XD 9mm, a CZ P-01, the aforementioned 29, Glock 21, Glock 19, and one or two other pistols that I didn't shoot.

As an aside, the P-01 is pistol I've never taken that seriously. After watching several people perform with it and trying it at longer distances myself, it is a very able sub-compact gun. It has been my office desk-drawer gun and will remain so.

Also, the Smith and Wesson SW1911PD was out. Xavier has a much better review than I can provide here. He makes me feel a lot better about the external extractor that had initially so worried me. Additionally, the light-weight canard about recoil and durability seem to be in effect. Also, the PD is extremely LH friendly.

All in all it was pretty much a good plinking day. I didn't plan on shooting with so many people I'd never shot with before, but it turned out alright. They want to do it again on Thursday at the 800 meter range and focus on AK, AR, FAL, M-14, and accurized bolts. Seeing as Boomershoot is coming up and I will not be in attendance, that may be apropos.

Virginia Tech

2007-04-17T20:47:00.000-07:00

As with everyone, our thoughts and prayers are with the victims, families, and friends. I'm not going to try and make a point out of anything, as I retired from political blogging and am strictly technical.

However, most people have comported themselves in good taste throughout this event. Notable exceptions are dunces like Rosie O'Donell and the Brady Campaign. I doubt anyone is that surprised.

The most vile and tasteless opinion journal I've ever seen occurred today in the NY Daily News, by an asshole named Michael Daly. This man sickens me and I hope there is a room in hell reserved for his ass. I almost emailed the man, but then considered that a degenerate like this is probably beyond argument or redemtion.

You, however, can email him here: Michael Daly.

BAG Day Gun

2007-04-14T23:50:00.000-07:00

This year the BAG day gun was a bit of an impulse buy by the Old Man. Several weeks ago, he noticed that S&W was doing a limited run of Model 29 .44 Magnums, in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of the gun. The actual cartridge dates a few years before '57.

Several Sundays ago he showed me a couple of these for sale on GunBroker. I responded that if he had the cash, fuck it. He replied that it would take some "financial rearrangement" before he could seriously consider it. The following Monday it was ordered by 8:30 AM, we received confirmation, and received the shipping information. Actual shipping took place on Tuesday. Our kitchentop FFL (who live two blocks away from us) called on Thursday and we were in receipt of the gun by 5:00 PM the same day.

As it is the 50th anniversary edition, it came with the nice presentation box. S&W does not officially recognize the debt they owe to the Dirty Harry movies in popularizing this pistol. Indeed, this was a great motivator for the Old Man to purchase on of these. I took the position that, if you were buying this gun in homage to Harry Callahan, it would border on apostasy to purchase a model that wasn't blued. Alas, the Old Man's love of stainless won out over the purist argument.

Of course, the moment we were in posession, Mother Nature decided that winter wasn't quite
over with, and proceeded with rain, snow, and 50 mph wind gusts. To date, the gun has not been shot. This situation will be rectified at the earliest possible date.

BTW, it seems that this year, Cowboy Blob is the general host of bag day affairs. Hit the link and check out other people's scores. I would also bet that Blob would post non-blogger pics if you'd send them to him.

To all of you who didn't buy a gun: do it soon. I like BAG day in theory, but money and desire do not always align with actual dates. Any day is a good day to buy a gun, even if you have to mortgage yourself to do it as I have done on several occasions.

And Now For Something Completely Different...

2007-04-11T21:31:00.000-07:00

No guns. Sailor suits and bubbles. And Jagger's hips. I love this song and video.

Condition 1 Carry, Reconsidered

2007-04-07T02:16:00.000-07:00

In the past, I've made arguments for carrying in this way and so have others. Thus far, I have run into 2 mitigating circumstances; one personal and one professional.

First, the personal. In NM, where I reside, even with a CCH, it is illegal to carry a loaded firearm if there is even the slightest tinge of alcohol in your blood. Hell, I'm so freaked out about cops, I won't drive after using mouthwash. Nonetheless, it is legal to carry an empty pistol, regardless of your condition (and when I beat my wife while I'm drunk, I usually use my fists, but they haven't regulated my hands yet.)* So if I'm walking to my parents house to have a couple of beers, I keep the 1911 cocked, but without a magazine. Being able to perform a speed-load will help in this case, because it is far easier to rack the slide when the hammer is already back.

Second, I'm an insurance adjuster by trade. I climb roofs. Sometimes, the wind blows down your ladder or people make you use a dubious method to gain access to their roof. In both cases, I tend to just jump off of the roof. Land, don't lock knees, and roll. Easy-peasy. This happened the other week and I started thinking about gravitational effects on the firing pin. I concluded that, if I want to do my "land and roll" routine, Condition 1 is not safe.

In conclusion, while I'm an advocate, it doesn't work all of the time if you drink beer or have a job.

*I'm joking. I don't have a wife and if I did I would use a bat.

Night sights

2007-03-29T23:33:00.000-07:00

We're back from Texas and I have a buttload of pictures to post of the re-enactment. I'll get around to it this weekend.

What I wanted to comment on was night sights. The night before last I took a Commander (painted sights), a Colt Gummint (rip-off Novak's), and the S&W 1911 (real Novak's) and tried flash sight shit in a dark room. The results were surprising.

Best in show was the Commander with, what I thought, was a Hillbilly-Bob paint job on the sights. Lights out and they were clear as day. I contrasted by putting yellow-green on the rear dots and orange on the front. Both showed up wonderfully.

The other two basically sucked. I could see the Colt, but in a bad situation it would be a hindrance not a help. The Smith (with real Novak's) I couldn't see at all.

Of course, I'm over-zealous and felt like repainting every handgun sight in the house. I held off to see if there some advantages to unpainted sights that I am yet unaware of.

UPDATE: I forgot to link to the original post and the Brownell's page that I scored the shit off of. Apologies.

Range Report and Weeklong signoff

2007-03-14T22:58:00.000-07:00

Made it out to the range last Thursday. Overall I was very pleased with the S&W 1911. I had several failure to extracts, which is what I was afraid of. On the other hand, the gun is the tightest I've seen as far as an out of the box 1911. I think further shooting should vindicate the gun, but I still have my hesitations about a pinned extractor.

As to the Taurus Thunderbolt, that was a resounding success. The first time we took it out, the Old Man's .45 Colt reloads were taking as many as 3 hits to fire. That lot was loaded with the Large Pistol/Magnum Winchester primers. Loaded a batch with CCI's in the mean time and there didn't seem to be a problem.

Other than that, we are shipping out in the morning for a weekend hiatus in a small town in Texas. There's a WWII memorabilia swap meet, a full fucking re-enactment of a battle (3 hr.s), and there is a national gun show in a neighboring town.

We'll be back on Tuesday and post pics and links.

Took the leap...

2007-03-05T20:46:00.000-08:00

And bought a S&W 1911. I've been warned off the new designs because they have not undergone sufficient market scrutiny.

I've had a SIG obsession for a couple of years, but after Christmas, my brother bought one. It's a nice gun but differs not at all from other Euro-de-cocking pistols. I've never strayed from Colt and Springfield as far as 1911s go, but I was looking pretty hard at the SIG or a Kimber.

Picked the Smith up from the FFL today.

It's a full frame, with ambidextrous thumb safeties and a memory bumb grip safety. Grips are rubber and it's a pretty comprehensive beaver-tail scoop. The trigger has a bit of over-travel, but feels good outside of that.

The extractor is what weirded me out.

It's an exterior extractor. It doesn't even show up on the back of the slide.

The only thing that really worries me about this is that the extractor is not held at the back of the slide. Instead, it appears to be pinned halfway up to the ejection port. In my experience, pins in this area have a tendency to loosen or just plain abandon ship.

Obviously, the mounting rail made a difference in my choice. On the other end, I was pleased to find it fits a standard holster, even with the rail.

Range day should be Wednesday or Thursday and a full review will be up after that.

Extractor fitting

2007-03-04T23:37:00.000-08:00

The 1911 build actually had its first bit of progress this weekend. The extractor I've been trying to fit for 3 months finally went in. As I quickly dispatched it to the Old Man, I have no pictures. However, I have learned some lessons.

Needless to say, this took a lot longer than it should have. It's a fucking extractor for crying out loud. I sanded away at it, weekend after weekend, to no avail. This is what I learned.

-Use a Sharpie and darken all of the contact points on the part. Ram that motherfucker in until you have positive points of friction. Rub there and nowhere else. Rinse, repeat.

-Emory cloth gets tired quick. If you are rubbing a part with worn out paper, you are wasting your time. The shit's cheap so use it while you are actually taking metal off and then discard it. I found myself using month-old cloth for hours on end. It doesn't do any good.

I screwed around with this part for months and finally watched a video. Within 48 hours I had it done.

Next up, I'm fitting the trigger and the Old Man is dinking the slide parts to fit. To the best of my knowledge, I should be done with slide work.

Hopefully, I'll be able to post on actual progress with this project on a more regular basis.

Range Report (w/ new gun)

2007-02-25T20:24:00.000-08:00

We made it out to the range last Thursday. It's been weird with the snow lately, because any moisture causes the range to fall apart. The berms and roads fall apart; the truck has a hard time; you end up tracking mud back to the office, etc.

We got out and the range was fuller than I've ever seen it. 2 practice ranges, 3 action pistol ranges, and 2 rifle ranges were damn near full. We ended up settling at the short rifle range (200 yards) as we were trying out the Old Man's new Taurus Thunderbolt in .45 Colt.

It's a bit of a weird gun, in that it fires a pistol round, is a pump action, and has a 26" barrel. From the limited practice we had, it's a solid shooter. I wanted to do some more close range shit but we were stuck with 200 yards.

I shot 1911s and ARs. I'm the unimaginative one. One of my 1911's was failing to reset the trigger. The other one did fine.

I melted a case strap on the barrel of my AR carbine a couple of months ago. I came up with myriad solutions to the problem but ended up adopting the Old Man's remedy. He said to shoot it until it's as hot or hotter than it was when the strap melted and just wipe it off. That's what I did.

Offered without comment (non-gun post)

2007-02-25T20:15:00.000-08:00

My girlfriend wanted me to find the Tampax website. I didn't ask why. There might be a Zumbo of the menstruation world or something.

I found the site and one of the options was "Ask Iris." So I did.

This is what I found.

Dear Iris,Hi. My daughter wants to use tampons, but I'm afraid that it will
take away her virginity. I have heard that if you use tampons long enough and if
you do the splits and active stuff like that then you can lose your virginity.
Is this all true and should I let my daughter use tampons?Thanks,Wondering

Dear Wondering,Virginity has to do with sexual relations...not using
tampons or doing splits. Many young girls start using tampons early on because
they are swimmers or athletes. The hymen, which partially covers and protects
the opening to the vagina is so fragile that it is stretched or torn during many
activities. I see no reason why your daughter couldn't use a tampon if she can
read and understand the instructions for insertion and safe use. The decision is
yours and hers.Iris

Maybe we should die out as a species.

No Zumbo, and no pictures

2007-02-20T23:48:00.000-08:00

I have to say, I am not often critical of the gun blogs as a whole. But I have to hand it to just about everybody on my blogroll; stop freaking out.

Zumbo is an old school hunter who probably thinks the .30-06 is the finest cartridge ever made (I'd tend to agree with him.) The guy made one asshole comment about "terrorist guns" from some varmint camp at 3:30 in the morning.

The guy is fat and old. He probably thinks the M-16 is a shitty rifle and that .223 is for plinking cans with your 8-year old son. He's never seen a pimped out AR varmint rig. He's ignorant and because of his ignorance he said something dumb.

Then you assholes bear down. I've never even heard of Outdoor Life magazine, but from the sounds of it, I'm the only prick in the Western Hemisphere who a) never had a subscription and b) isn't canceling that subscription as we speak.

There will always be divisions in the pro-2A camp. Dumbass doesn't understand you so you compare him to Brady. I read the whole comment thread following that post and not a single fucker had anything positive to say. If "Tactical Tommys" want "Elmer Fudds", or whatever the favored nomenclature is, to agree with them, then stop shitting on one another.

And more than that, it's boring reading 25 blogs bitching about some fat hunting correspondent I've never heard of. Do a fucking range report, you lazy fucks.

UPDATE: Carnaby didn't smell blood either. Anybody else I falsely impugned, let me know. Otherwise keep posting on the Remington statement and all of the other sponsorships you lot cost the poor old retard.

UPDATE II: Apologies to Carnaby's mom, as my language was a little caustic and scatalogical. No offense was intended.

UPS Guy

2007-02-15T20:30:00.000-08:00

Today we received a UPS order. It consisted of 1,000 rounds of .308 South African, 300 cases and bullets in .45 Colt, dies for the previously mentioned caliber, and a book my instructor told me to read.

Needless to say, it was a heavy stack of shit. The poor guy had to pull out a hand truck to get the load in on one trip. With the Old Man's new pup, it takes two of us to receive. One has to control the dog and the other has to sign. That was the case today.

Anyway, the UPS guy starts asking us about loading. Apparently, he owns a .300 Win Mag and the shit he's firing costs about $35 for a box of twenty. We lectured him a bit on the economics of loading and I emphasized that it really doesn't take that much space (White Lie.)

He said he slings the shit all over town.

I'm starting to feel like I'm in Fight Club.

1911 Thumb Safety

2007-02-14T22:02:00.000-08:00

Above is the safety I pulled out of the Commander. It appears that it may take massive reconstruction to make a new safety fit this gun.

I've become ever more confused by the 1911 thumb safety. I've replaced the ambidextrous portion on one pistol, but haven't worked the balls up to actually fit one myself. Here's the one I pulled out of a Commander:

I'm at a loss as to how one goes about fitting one of these. It seems that there is no standard, no principle, and no textbook when it comes to this sort of thing. They all look fucked up to me.

Legislature

2007-02-13T19:22:00.000-08:00

In New Mexico, these jerk-offs get together every two years for sixty days and try to solve "problems." While Albuquerque has banned cell phones while driving, the state is working on COCKFIGHTING. Yes, that is the august issue in this session and I'm deeply concerned about its outcome.

Otherwise, our gun lobbyists are really old men. One of them is my kitchen table FFL; another was my CCW instructor; and another is some guy I met in the course of business. These old guys drive up to Santa Fe every morning (call it an hour and a half commute) and then hang out until they get done what they deem necessary. If I'm that dedicated when I hit 70, I'll be thankful to be able to help.

There are two gun bills that have been introduced and pushed this session. The first one concerns carrying in a package liquor store. The way NM works, you can't carry (loaded) if there is a drop of alcohol in your blood. When they initially passed the CCW law, it contained language that bars you from carrying in a restaraunt or bar that serves liquor and also bars you from carrying in package stores. Therefore, as the law stands, you can't carry in a grocery store. Apparently the package-carry repeal stands a good chance of passing.

That doesn't concern me as much as what has happened with the second issue.

Castle Doctrine laws have passed in several states. A Florida-style Castle law has been introduced, but appears to be doomed. For those of you who aren't familiar, Castle Doctrine basically states that if you shoot a person in your home, the preponderance of innocence falls on you. Florida has passed the most comprehensive one (and blood has run in the street.)

This bill is stalled and faces little chance of passing. As DUI paranoid as this state is, I thought the booze thing had a better chance of dying. I mentioned this to my father and he cleared it up for me. Under Florida-style Castle, the fucking trial lawyers lose. Half of legislators are what?

The main asshole holding this up is a lawyer I ran into when he was in private practice. He was a shitty lawyer (he was on my side.) Now he's a shitty representative. He's killing the Castle bill.

If you feel like wishing him well, his name is Al Parks. The NRA lists his email as such:

alpark.nm@gmail.com

I'm also posting a test picture of an XD that really has nothing to do with anything.

1911 Build Update 2/4

2007-02-04T21:19:00.000-08:00

As recently stated, this project is going to last a good while longer than I anticipated and involve a little more cash than I was initially willing to commit.

In light of that, I continue to paper down the extractor to fit the frame. It still doesn't fit.

Today, me and the Old Man got the barrel link attached to the barrel. I've been screwing around with this for weeks. Sarco advertised that this frame was tight from the assembly line and the pin holes, especially, may need some work.

When we ordered the frame, I thought it was merely a stripped slide and lower frame. It ended up coming with a barrel. If the project works out, I might replace the barrel and trigger at a later date, but for now we were fucking with the Rock Island barrel and standard Brownells barrel link and pin.

I pounded on the barrel link for ever and got nowhere. I freezed the pin to contract it; oiled shit to where you could drive a Mack truck through it and it was all for naught.

We finally took a drill bit to it today. Fucking around, we figured it needed a 9/64 or 5/32 bit to rout out the hole. We're Americans and we think in terms of standard measurements, not metric. Doesn't matter anyway.

Turns out, we needed something closer to a 19/128 bit. My Old Man is an experienced mechanic and wood-worker and didn't even think this bit existed. Google changed that. Turns out, there are bits that match wire gauges and have number designations. There are also bits with letter designations, but I don't know what the fuck that is for.

Pulled up a table, and the barrel link hole matched up with a wire gauge bit. Ordered this set off of Midway and I'm hoping that will cover it.

Two questions: Can anybody explain the pin diameter standards?

Additionally, I was going to post a nifty picture with this post, but Picasa/Hello, or whatever the hell it is, died. Good photo posting freeware?

More Hmong Tragedy

2007-01-21T08:46:00.000-08:00

I hadn't heard about the new Hmong hunting incident until I got my copy of US News & World Report last week and a couple quiet moments in the can to contemplate the story. I didn't make a judgement.

However, this would explain the recent upsurge in nasty, illiterate comments on my posts of several years ago about the Chai Vang incident (this dude's name is Cha Vang.)

Link to the new Vang is here. Details of this one are very murky as it was two guys squirrel hunting. A trailer dude's story against a dead guy.

I will comment that I do not understand why we are issuing any kind of hunting licenses to people who don't speak English, as his wife has claimed. I believe one of the linchpins of safety is the ability to communicate quickly. Once reason I don't like shooting with deaf guys on a range, is they never hear the "cease-fire" command.

The posts from several years ago with all the new "Die Whitey" commentary is here.

Response from Customs

2007-01-21T08:26:00.000-08:00

In the post before last I noticed a US Customs employee cruising this blog for "trigger jobs" at 8:30 AM on a business day. I posted the log notes, but didn't mention that I hit their complaint site.

Here was the complaint:

Dear Sir or Madam,I noticed that I had a hit on a blog about firearms from
your New Jersey office. The hit was at 8:37 in the morning and originated from
the IP address 63.167.255.#.Seeing as you can't seem to do your job and are paid
with my tax money, what the hell are you doing searching Google on "trigger
jobs?"Best regards,
I included my name and phone number, as well. Much to my surprise, they actually responded:
We can not explain our enforcement activity, however there are many reasons why an officer, agent or employee may want to google (anything).We use any means necessary to determine what things are to assess the correct duty, to make sure that they are legal to enter the United States, to even decide on how to classify an object. We do this to protect the American Public. Thank you for your comment, but we have our own security office to make sure our employees do not abuse the luxury of having the Internet available to them.Thank you for contacting Customs and Border Protection's Customer Service Center. If you have any other questions or would like clarification on this response, please feel free to contact us either by calling our toll free number 877 CBP-5511 (227-5511) or if calling from outside the United States our toll number 202-354-1000 and ask for me. Our hours of operation are Monday thru Friday from 8:30am-5:00pm Eastern Time.
I'll translate for you: "Dear Citizen, Fuck you. We don't have to be held accountable to the people we serve and who pay us. If we want to uselessly fuck around on the internet while at work, we only have to answer to a bereaucrat, unlike you pusillanimous shits in the private sector who have actual bosses and criteria."

Concealed Carry Class Canard

2007-01-14T22:30:00.000-08:00

Several people have linked to this story about a responsible, Buddhist liberal who attended a CCW class in that awful state of Kentucky. I believe Kevin at Smallest Minority was where I first read about it.

This article fascinated me because it was almost the mirror image of my experience getting a CCW.

The gentleman who wrote this article seemed to be convinced that most attendees were blue-collar reactionaries who had maybe achieved a 6th grade education. They were overwhelmingly economically challenged and had no understanding of the rational tenets of democratic government. There were also a couple missing teeth jokes (the author is, undoubtedly, an intellectual.)

My experience was the opposite. Out of a class of 10 or 12, we had 1 minority in attendance. All attendants were in white-collar jobs. Most had spent more money on the guns they brought than most hillbillies spend on groceries in a year. They were probably half liberal and all drove better vehicles than me. And they all thought the government was dandy and that the CCW law was great. Obviously, given the burden of time and money that a CCW entails, well-off white people would be happy that they are the only ones that can afford to get it. They all sucked too.

My CCW qualification was probably the closest I've ever come to being shot. All these assholes with their expensive guns and they hadn't even racked them dry. One guy claimed to have a .45 Magnum revolver. The instructor looked at it and, of course, it wasn't (I don't remember what the hell it was.) I was muzzle swept and subjected to hours of the most idiotic questions I've ever heard ("Why can't you shoot a .22 LR out of a .223?")

In conclusion, I think the author of the linked article is full of shit. It is an expensive hobby to shoot nowadays. Poor people can't fork out $850 for a SIG Pwhatever. And if those hilljacks with no teeth wouldn't point their shit at me, I'd rather shoot with them any day than some spoiled liberal shit who's getting a CCW just so he can make fun of people he doesn't understand.

Go get another tattoo, asshead.

Paranoid

2007-01-09T01:14:00.000-08:00

I usually really don't check my log that much. If people read me, cool, if they don't then I'm just howling at the wind, which doesn't bother me.

But occasionally I take a stroll and see who might be reading. Tonight I find that US Customs is reading my posts from 2005 about trigger jobs.

WTF?

I pay for your broadband motherfucker so get back to work.

Log

New Year's Resolution

2007-01-08T21:43:00.000-08:00

Safety I always think is one of those things that can be strived for, but never perfected. I'm a safety pain in the ass (just ask the old man) and harp on people constantly about their perceived breaches of the safety code.

It being New Year's, I decided to look inward and solve some of the problems I have. If you refer to the picture, which is an average picture of my desktop, you will notice that there are .45 and .308 snap-caps sitting around with live .45 and .223.

My office is my "dry-fire" room and should be absent of any live ammunition, nevermind having the shit lying next to practice caps.

For all the harping about safety, this is an issue I badly need to cure before I put one in the wall. Keep live ammo out of your dry-fire area.

Desktop

"Grim Milestones"

2007-01-05T01:12:00.000-08:00

When a nation wages war, it incurs casualties. It's tragic and it's horrific for those families, but I have never ever heard the government say that war was cake or casualty free.

Christmas weekend I had the dumb-ass story about how Iraq casualties had surpassed the body-count on 9/11. What those numbers have to do with one another is completely beyond me. It's a terrorist attack and a war; so what the fuck does any of the media's reporting mean?

Then, last weekend, we had another "grim milestone" because casualties surpassed 3,000.

If the nation was in this condition 70 years ago, I'd be speaking German.

1911 Build Update

2006-12-31T01:38:00.000-08:00

Nothing to report.

We fucked up one extractor and had to buy a bit to get it the fuck out. I can't seem to fit a trigger or a barrel bushing. I installed a magazine catch that seemed to work fine, but that's not going to win me any prizes.

This project has cost more money than I originally thought, but I also think I will learn more than I first anticipated. Making a gun is not just assembling a bunch of parts. All of them have to be fitted to exacting tolerances. I've stopped believing in a "drop in" part; they don't exist and if they do, there is probably something wrong with it.

Outside of the frame, I've spent probably $400 (most of which was on tools), and the shit looks the same as when I first photographed it.

I'll hopefully have a progress report soon that...well...actually reports some progress.

Mean time, I hope your Christmas was good and Sadaam is dead, so somebody is looking out.

TV Christmas Movie Time

2006-12-21T23:40:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Podhoretz at NRO.

This sort of thing always reminds me of the startling amount of GenXers (or whatever you want to call them) who haven't seen "It's A Wonderful Life."

Several years ago, I was living with a married couple and the wife had never seen it. I bummed it off of my parents and she was an immediate convert.

Yet another Cheesedick modification

2006-12-17T11:27:00.000-08:00

On top of the other shit, I took a shot at installing a Wilson front strap this weekend.

First attempt was pathetic. the strap was installed to impinge on the magazine well, nigh well making the gun useless.

Once I realized the problem, I reinstalled it with a conscious consideration of the magazine well that is directly behind the grip panels/assembly.

We'll see if this helps or if it is a permanent installation, in that it looks a little sketchy to me. Find truth in the field.

Mag Well

2006-12-16T12:37:00.000-08:00

One of the problems I had at the class was reloading. I'm going to Dremel the actual well, but this seemed to be handy.

This was a drop in Ed Brown mainspring housing replacement. Took ten minutes and zero fitting. Can't beat that.

Twats

2006-12-16T12:21:00.000-08:00

In case I haven't mentioned it in awhile; fuck you ass-licking elitists.

Single Action shooters are more obnoxious than the old people who won't open up the aisle at the grocery store. They are self-absorbed and selfish. They should have their own range, because I hate dealing with the motherfuckers.

Take your $2,000 chaps and go back to California, where you belong, asshole.

Sight Paint

2006-12-13T21:12:00.000-08:00

Took my first venture into sight painting tonight. The first victim was the H&K USP, which is probably stupid in that that is the pistol that cost me the most.

Regardless, I scored a kit from Brownell's. This pistol is not generally considered defense in my household. Therefore, I wanted a nice contrast between the rear dots and the front sight.

We'll see if the shit falls off in 24 hours.

Goofy Vise

2006-12-13T21:04:00.000-08:00

Given the 1911 project, I recently purchased a Harbor Freight vise that can be easily attached and removed from the appropriate plane. It cost 10 bucks ($16 with shipping, but I didn't have to get off my ass.) It's perfect for gun work. The jaws are about perfect.

Unfortunately, most jaw pads are about 5" long. As seen in the picture, it looks kind of stupid and, although it works, is a little more work.

The Old Man checked it out and is buying the identical vise. Good for me, because he plans on making custom oak jaws, fitted to the actual vise.

Hopefully, it doesn't look as retarded by February.

Eye Protection

2006-12-08T20:03:00.000-08:00

An EOD guy I know came by the office this afternoon. He was a little shaken up, as a Steyr/AUG had blown up in his hands about 3 hours earlier.

He was a little rattled and I think his wrist was fucked up. He said that the forward grip messed him up more than any of the rear equipment.

Apparently some kind of investigation is going to take place on Monday. Of course, we idly speculated about what could cause a blow-up in a new Steyr. My bet (them being full auto) is that it was a squib. Semi-auto it is relatively easy to sound out a squip; especially if there is no plume of dust anywhere near the target. Full auto is a different matter, to which I am not qualified to speak about (but I will.) It seems to me that if the rate of fire is that high, you will never have any idea if you have a squib. Additionally, you might send 3 more rounds down the tube before the initial pressure causes it to explode.

In any case, he looked rattled and got more tired with every minute of conversation.

The point of this post is that the fucker would have been blind by this time if not for the right eye protection. It was a parade range day with brass, so instead of his Oakleys, he wore standard ANSI rated shooting glasses.

I'm buying some goggles. In addition to the normal crap, I'm left-handed. I have to deal with blowback, gas release, and ejection fucking with my sight picture. The last thing I need is a piece of crafted aircraft-grade aluminum sticking out of my fucking eyes.

Keep in mind, these were brand spanking new and my picture doesn't show the depth of the route on the right eye lens.

Use eye protection.

Unintended Hiatus

2006-11-30T22:48:00.000-08:00

It appears that I have not posted in the last 3 weeks or so. Unfortunately, our dog took a turn for the worse and ended up having to be put down. Add that up with work bullshit and training a new puppy, and I got a little bogged down.

Additionally, I haven't read any blogs for 3 weeks, so forgive me for not being up to speed on most things.

Below are pictures of the initial Rock Island frame purchase. We've begun to buy parts to assemble and looking into the do's and do-not's of assembly. As this project is officially underway, I will be posting pictures of the step by step procedures as we get to them. Brownell's is also making this thing a lot easier by offering their 1911 Armorer's Toolchest. It was a little pricey, coming in at over 50$ the cost of the frame and slide, but appears to be worth it, not just for building but month to month maintenance.

For shits and grins I Googled "1911 build" this afternoon. It pulled up a mere 4 pages and half the entries seemed to have something to do with the Panama Canal. Included, though, was a thoughtful thread from The AR15 Armory and a killer post from our own Xavier.

It's starting to look like a lot of fitting and small pain in the ass type stuff, but that should make it even sweeter in the end.

2006-11-30T22:47:00.000-08:00

Rock Island is a weird company. It seems to be a front for a Philippino company that has been producing 1911's since the 50's. Reviews have been mixed, but so far we are happy.

2006-11-30T22:46:00.000-08:00

The slide, ready with all of the necessary parts. The extractor appears to require some fitting which will be accomplished this weekend.

2006-11-30T22:45:00.000-08:00

I've got a Wilson Combat Trigger on hand now, and it actually appears to "drop-in." I'm not going to hold my breath, however.

2006-11-30T22:43:00.000-08:00

The Rock Island frame and slide came in several weeks ago. The fit seems to be acceptable, despite their reputation.

Range Report 11/02

2006-11-02T23:19:00.000-08:00

Made the range today.

Priority #1 was seeing how my .303 reloads in the Enfield. Unfortunately, he didn't bring the reloads.

Priority #2 was to see how the new cheek weld fit on the Old Man's M-14. Unfortunately, he forgot the cheek weld. The M-14 shot well without the weld.

I've been having some problems with ARs lately. I've come to realize that, by owning a Glock, I have systematically under-lubricated every other firearm I own. This is really bad with ARs, I discovered. Anyway, one was merely a lubrication issue, whereas the other is a case of me installing a carbine buffer spring in an A2 stock. It doesn't work to well. Most cartridges make it to the feed ramp, but never see the chamber.

Took the new 1911 out as well. Performed like a nice new factory gun. Tighter than shit, but on the whole seems pretty good. Got about 100 or so rounds through it. Need an intensive pistol day to actually break it in. One jam and one FTF.

All firearms used today (outside of the new Colt) have been sighted so it was just a fuck about kind of day.

We've also been working on an old Combat Elite. We took that out, but it is a much longer story for a later time.

Next up

2006-11-01T23:32:00.000-08:00

Me and a couple of guys have tentative plans to build ARs in the new year. If that doesn't happen I may be building with a retiring Army EOD guy. It sucks when all your guns are owned by Uncle Sam.

In current news, it doesn't seem that the 1911 craze is abating. I ordered a Rock Island frame and slide from Sarco today.

We're gonna build it one piece at a time. I figure this should keep me busy through Christmas. Also, this is a joint effort between me and my Old Man so some pretty interesting arguments should ensue.

I figure the best way to know as much as possible about the platform is to build one from the ground up.

I'll have real photos up once I'm in receipt (7-10 days.)

Deliberate Carry Purchase

2006-10-29T04:10:00.000-08:00

This pistol is my first purchase since being issued a concealed-carry license. Since then, I am a thorough 1911 convert, formerly being a firm Glock believer. Kevin has made arguments against the safety of Condition 1 and Chris has posted the opposite.

I don't think anyone would carry a 1911 except in Condition 1. When you bring it to half-cock, one eliminates a safety.

In any case, my father's opinion is that a carry weapon should be stock without modification. Even Southpaw mods would draw legal attention that would not have been necessary, in the event that actions are discussed legally.

As such, I tried to choose this pistol on its out of the box state. For awhile I was considering a Sig 1911 or a S&W 1911. After speaking with an ex-Marine, I decided on a Colt. The man advised that untested models (like they haven't been around for 25 years) he would consider unreliable. Therefor, look at a Springfield or a Colt.

To be frank, I have come to hate Springfield after trying to remove their Internal Locking System. I spent two weeks trying to figure this shit out while my father's GI was in pieces in a plastic bucket.

In any case, I decided to go with Colt, even though they really pissed me off with AR shit, because I own 2 and have never been disappointed.

It should make it to the range this week and a full report on the pistol will follow.

If you want to see Colt's shitty website, here's the closest thing I could find.

Colt XSE

2006-10-29T04:09:00.000-08:00

Obviously, ambidextrous safety is ultimately necessary out of the box. My GI would take drilling the frame in order to install an ambi. I'm not willing to drill the frame on a stock gun so the ambi was welcome.

2006-10-29T04:06:00.000-08:00

Sights are ideal for carry. I think they are Bo-Mar low rise, but I probably stand to be corrected.

Ambidextrous Magazine Release

2006-10-23T22:39:00.000-07:00

I received it last week. It's interesting that the LH market is so goddamn small. I think a lot of southpaws say, "Fuck it, let's get a Glock."

As the picture displays, the actual motion is drawing the magazine release out of the other side, as is it's normal path of travel. What Cylinder and Slide did, was come up with a way to utilize that motion.

Now that I look at it, it's obvious. You use the spring tension to create a levered pull instead of a straight push.