Archive for the 'Firearms' Category

TFB: This guy is saying he has built a rifle that is pulling .4 MOA at 600 yards, or in other words, he is repeatedly pulling 2.4″ spreads with the .224 Valkyrie at 600 yards.  I know that the cartridge already has a reputation for being long range and accurate, but I don’t know if I believe this.

Ammoland: Big bore air rifles now legal for deer hunting in Arkansas.  From what I understand, the muzzle velocity is around 800 FPS for these types of rifles.  I don’t know if I believe this ensures an ethical kill.  I think I’d stick to a higher muzzle velocity.  Or in other words, a real firearm.

Proliferation of rifles a danger to residents and officers:

The chief said the initial investigation by the department’s Criminal Investigations Division shows Davis was shot multiple times in the back with a high-powered rifle. They were able to find the suspected shooting scene on Pettus Street, where multiple rifle casings were recovered.

Collier said they also found several 9 mm rounds near the scene. A 9 mm semi-automatic pistol was located beneath the victim’s body. The only suspect information is that two black males wearing dark clothing were seen running from the scene north on Pettus Street.

“At this point, we believe there was an exchange of gunfire,” Collier said. “However, it appears the victim fired his pistol at the suspects as he was fleeing.”

… the proliferation of rifles in Selma by criminals as the weapon of choice is both a community problem and an officer safety problem.”

So let me get this straight.  The proliferation of rifles is the problem, not the criminal?  And the victim was shot multiple times in the back with a “high powered rifle,” but still managed to get off several 9mm rounds at his attackers?

I don’t know if I believe this account.

Bloomberg Editors:

When law-enforcement agents seek information on guns found at crime scenes, they call the firearms tracing center of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Agents at the tracing center, in West Virginia, then try to establish a chain of custody based on the gun’s serial number, manufacturer, distributor and retailer.

The agents pursue this task in the most inefficient, wasteful and time-consuming manner imaginable, manually searching records — about 800 million of them — because federal law purportedly prevents the center from organizing them into a searchable digital database.

This absurd prohibition needs to be lifted.

Well, in order to prevent this kind of inefficiency, I suggest dismantling the agency altogether as it serves no constitutional purpose and has no legitimacy.

If this isn’t acceptable, then I would suggest an alternative.  Every employee must be required to walk or ride a horse to work every day, and home again, and the time left in his work day can be spent fulfilling requests from law enforcement.  No, on second thought, no horses.  Walking will reduce the probability I have to fund their medical care with my tax dollars.

Bernie Kuntz:

Three or four years ago I moved each of my firearms, one at a time, to a cleaning table where I had my gun vise and my green gun pad set up for cleaning. It took me more than two weeks but I finally got them all cleaned to my satisfaction.

You’ll have to visit his article to see his last step.

Well, I don’t go through anything that elaborate.  My procedure involves Hoppe’s No. 9, lot’s of patches, brushes, mops and the like, and then oil.  But I don’t have the equipment he does either.

Should I be doing what he’s doing?  Post your own procedure in the comments.  In particular, I don’t use a Copper remover in my cleaning process.

Orlando Sentinel:

With a single shot from his AR-15 rifle, a Lake County deputy sheriff quickly put an end to a large alligator that had a teenage girl trapped in a tree for nearly an hour, authorities said Monday.

Jordan Broderick, 15, was eventually able to climb safely down from the tree, according to a sheriff’s report.

Just after 3 p.m. Friday, the Sheriff’s Office received calls from Michael Henderson of Titusville and other family members, saying that his daughter couldn’t come down from a tree near a boat ramp because a 10-foot alligator sat at the base of the tree hissing at her for more than 30 minutes, the report said.

“My daughter’s stuck in a frickin’ tree and there’s gators surrounding her!” the teenager’s mother said frantically to a 911 operator. “Oh my God! Please hurry! Please hurry!”

Jordan was floating on a raft in the creek near Forest Service Road near Alexandria Springs park when the alligator quickly approached her, authorities said.

That’s when the girl grabbed a large branch hanging over the water and climbed into the tree, according to the report. The alligator then waited in the water at the base of the tree underneath the girl hanging from the branch.

When Deputy Mitch Blackmon arrived, he found the girl in the tree screaming that she was tired from hanging on to the branch, the report said.

“My presence failed to scare the alligator away, and it began encroaching on my area at which time I fired one single 223 round from my Bushmaster AR15 killing the alligator,” Blackmon wrote in his report.

The alligator sank into the water and did not reappear, the report said. A Lake County marine biologist confirmed the alligator had died, according to authorities.

Wait!  I thought the 5.56mm round was worthless (he calls his ammo .223, little difference if he’s correct)?  I thought it was good for nothing except inflicting mass innocent casualties?  I thought no one needed such a thing?

Followup thoughts: I hate to jump on Mr. Michael Henderson after a traumatic event like this one, but where is your AR-15, sir?  What kind of man says this? [My] “daughter couldn’t come down from a tree near a boat ramp because a 10-foot alligator sat at the base of the tree hissing at her for more than 30 minutes.”

No offense, but head to the nearest gun store and spend a little money.

In no certain order, these discussion crossed my path this week.

American Hunter:

There are other benefits to the .224 Valkyrie aside from the availability and component standpoints. The cartridge feeds from a 6.8 SPC magazine and requires a 6.8 SPC bolt—parts that are common and easy to place in an AR-15. Other aspects of the case design make the round desirable, too. Measuring 1.6 inches long, the .224 Valkyrie case is .16 inch shorter than both the .223 Rem. and the .22 Nosler. Yet, the .224 Valkyrie case’s extra neck length of .025 inch allows for more flexibility in bullet lengths and changes in seating depth. This aids in fine-tuning loads and allows for more bullet weight options while keeping the jump to the lands minimal. The .224 Valkyrie willingly accepts long, heavy bullets with high ballistic coefficients, while keeping overall cartridge length within the dimensional limitations imposed by the AR-15 magazine. Most case dimensions are very similar to the 6.8 SPC, including body taper, so magazine capacity is not inhibited in any way. Federal recommends a 1:7-inch twist rate to stabilize the 60- to 90-grain bullets typically loaded in the cartridge.

We had discussed the .224 Valkyrie earlier.  From an article earlier in the year, Andrew Tuohy writing for Omaha Outdoors (in a very long discussion) loves the Valkyrie round.  As we speak, it looks like Savage and CMMG jumped quickly and are offering the best Valkyrie guns, both manufacturers at a reasonable price.

American Hunter on how to build the perfect Western big game hunting rifle.

• 6.5 Creedmoor: Great for youth and recoil-sensitive hunters. Fantastic for Coues deer and pronghorn. Somewhat light, but with careful bullet selection and shot placement, adequate for elk. A bit anemic compared to other cartridges on this list.
• 6.5 PRC: Hot new round that is superb on lighter game and adequate for elk. Fast and flat, and comfortable to shoot. Be sure to choose a tough projectile when hunting bigger game like elk.
• .280 Ackley Improved: Very good round that is perfectly adequate for anything from Coues deer to elk and moose. Boasts almost the same performance as the 7mm mag. but with greater efficiency and slightly less recoil.
• .28 Nosler: Fast, flat and very hard-hitting, the .28 Nosler is one of today’s finest. It’s hot, though, so not ideal for recoil-sensitive shooters.
• .300 Win. Mag.: Less ideal for the small species like Coues deer but great for the big stuff, this cartridge is a thumper—on both ends. Tons of projectile and load options available almost anywhere in the world.

This is a rather odd article to me.  There is little discussion of the traditional big game hunting rounds like .30-06, 7mm Magnum or .270 Win, all of which are more powerful than any of the above except for the .300 Win Mag.

But you be the judge.

Tim does a nice job figuring out what’s happening and troubleshooting a solution.  I confess I didn’t know that striker drag for smallish sub-compact 9mm pistols is a thing.  Then again, I don’t shoot striker fired guns, and I don’t shoot 9mm guns.

TFB:

What a difference a year makes. Last June we announced that Gemtech was breaking ground on a new world headquarters. Last night we learned that in six to nine months Gemtech will no longer exist in Idaho. At a company meeting yesterday, the remaining Gemtech employees were told that the facility would close and that all business would be moved to Smith & Wesson’s headquarters in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Some manufacturers are so tone deaf it amazes me they’re still in business.  S&W has been told time and again by me and literally everyone else that they need to move operations completely and with prejudice away from their current state and come South.  Or West.  Idaho would be fine, or somewhere in the Northwest redoubt, or South would be better.

Leaving the liberal politics behind would be a requirement, of course, but instead of doing this, S&W is buying smaller companies and moving them to Massachusetts.

Procedure: [1] Find the worst possible thing you could do to alienate your customer base, and [b] do it.  If you’re dumb.

Following up this post, this video documents the legal response to the Miami Beach Police Department thus far.  The LEO point that they are allowed to point weapons at armed men even if armed legally (for the purpose of officer safety) is idiotic beyond belief.

If that’s true, they should go around pointing weapons at everyone since anyone could be concealing a firearm.  At any rate, this point of logic will be lost on LEOs since .. well, just because.

Via reader JoeFour, this link is an veritable encyclopedia of knowledge of the 1911.  I intend to print it out, read it, and keep it handy.  In the mean time, it would be nice if readers would peruse the contents and lift the important things out for us here, or merely the interesting things to you for commentary and discussion.

Shooting Sports USA has an interesting article on changing barrel lengths and the necessary adjustments to everything else.  I confess I had never thought of most of that.  There is this interesting deliverance of their testing.

Accuracy testing with a six-inch barrel resulted in an approximate 30 FPS drop in velocity when the same barrel was shortened to five inches. Surprising to some, accuracy actually improved by ⅜ inch (.375) with the shorter barrel. This was likely due to a balance of velocity and stabilization.

I’ve got a trip into the bush coming up soon and this is the rig I’m carrying.

I like the 5″ barrel and the weight added by the tactical light and the Wilson Combat magazine.  To me it assists in stabilization versus shooting .45 ACP from a 4.25″ barrel (which takes me a little longer to recover sight picture due to muzzle rise).

American Rifleman:

The review was positive all around, just like mine of the CMMG PSB .45 ACP.

What I find particularly interesting is that they found that the 16″ barrel supplied a non-trivial additional muzzle velocity compared to pistols.

What I would like to do is get a chronograph and meter velocity with the full length carbine barrel, my CMMG PSB and my 1911s, with standard ball ammunition, PD ammunition, and the faster .450 SMC round.

Alas, that all takes money.