Not birds, snakes, and aeroplanes, but rather face eating monkeys, zombies, and now Terminator robots. Add to that all the whackos who think that Obama’s going to suspend the Constitution, and that there are going to be massive infrastructure breakdowns and riots, and I feel like it’s 1999 all over again, and we’re stocking up for Y2K.
Sings: It’s the end of the world as we know it, it’s the end of the world as we know it
I had a fun conversation the other day with a gun friend of mine – we were talking about firearms reliability in light of “guns break” threads going on over at Tam’s place. I keep a decent sized whack of spare parts on hand for any gun I shoot in competition or carry, because I assume that eventually that gun is going to throw a pin, or a spring will break, or whatever – plus I do regular maintenance to try and avoid that kind of stuff.
However, that brought us around to the topic of ammo reliability; he wanted to know if the gun in question (my Gun Blog 9mm) was “reliable”, to which I asked “well, what do you mean by reliable?” He wanted to know if it would feed 124 grain hollow-points from some maker (I think Speer), and I said “how would I know, I only shoot 147 grain rounds through it.” This followed into a conversation about that I don’t then if my gun is “really” reliable, because I haven’t tested it with all kinds of ammo.
I don’t understand that line of thinking, because to me, if the gun feeds and fires the ammo I want to shoot through it, it’s reliable. If all I shoot through it is Wolf Gold 147 grain HP and Winchester Ranger 147 grain JHP, then I don’t need to know if it feeds 124 grain Golden Dotted SaberBlade hollow points, because I’m not going to shoot them out of that gun.
“Oh Caleb, you’re just an elitist, what about 115 grain ball ammo?” Well, I will say that if I bought a 9mm that wouldn’t feed 115 grain ball ammo I’d send the thing back to the factory because it’s broken. I have shot that out of the Gun Blog 9mm, but for competition and carry, it’s 147 grain all the way. Unless I get my hands on some of those Fiocchi 158 grain subsonic loads, because I’m aching to whack some bowling pins with that round.
Sebastian has completed his pin collection for indoor silhouette, rifle. Metallic Silhouette is one of the “shooting sports” disciplines which is completely contrary to my competitive nature, focusing on “accuracy” over GO FAST. It involves hitting teeny-tiny targets that are very far away, sort of like bullseye shooting except even more difficult.
Congrats to Sebastian are definitely in order!
Indiana SB11 passed the Senate two days ago with a serious majority. Again, this bill allows Hoosier gun owners to store firearms in their locked vehicles. I tend to disagree with Sebastian on this issue, as I feel as though my vehicle is an extension of my property wherever I go, a little island of Calebland adrift in a sea of cars.
As such, I’m pleased to see NRA supporting these bills, both in Indiana and with the recent victory in the 10th Circuit, upholding a similar bill. The Indiana Bill will now proceed (I believe) to the Indiana House. I’ll keep you posted on developments as I hear them.
It is totally okay to compare Former President Bush to a chimpanzee, however if it is even remotely plausible that you’re comparing President Obama to a chimpanzee YOU’RE A HORRIBLE RACIST.
I can’t deal with the Obama veneration any more, I seriously can’t. In fun news, the number of Americans that disapprove of Barry’s job performance has jumped from 16% to 26%, which I guess means either the poll had a more accurate sample size this time around. If I were to get really hopeful, I’d believe that it meant that people were smelling the coffee, but that I sort of doubt.
And that concludes my political post for the month, now back to gun stuff.
Over at the Gun Nuts Radio Blog, there is the first instalment in a new, continue series called “Shooting Sports Vocabulary”. Today’s entry: Barney Magazine.
One of the pillars on which IDPA is built are the “3 IDPA Approved” reloads, which are as follows:
The idea behind the last two reloads is that if you’re in a running gunfight, you’d not want to leave any ammo behind, just in case. This contrasts to the most common reload in USPSA, where you just dump the magazine, empty or otherwise, jam a fresh one into the gun and keep going, not worrying about leaving bullets behind.
Die-hard IDPA shooters say that retaining your ammo is a good idea, and the die hard IDPA-haters say that it’s a silly idea because it slows you down. Now, where the debate gets interesting is if you read the IDPA rule-book, which has the following two items in it:
HQ urges course designers to draft scenario courses that do not require tac-loads or reloads with retention to be performed “on the clock”.
And
Slide Lock reloads are the recommended type of reload in IDPA. Statistics show that this happens in the real world, regardless of intention or training. Tactical reloads and reloads with retention are intended for use during lulls in the action and should not be required on the clock.
There are a few ROs I’d like to show that section of the rule book to…but that notwithstanding, the fact that the IDPA rulebook itself clearly states that Tac-loads and reloads with retention shouldn’t be done on the clock would seem to indicate that they’re not really a great way to put extra magazines in your gun.
So why do ROs put these reloads into COF and have them done against the clock? I think it’s a combination of two factors. The first reason is what I call The Dark Forces factor. The name comes from a video game I played a lot as a kid – the later levels of the game ramped up the difficulty not by throwing challenging puzzles at you, but by pumping wave after wave of nigh unkillable superbadguys at you. Instead being creative to make the game challenging, they took the easy way out. That same principle applies to the reload issue with IDPA. People are looking for ways to introduce challenges into COFs, and so they throw a tac-load or RWR.
The second reason I think you see these loads on COFs is revolver shooters. I love the wheelgun guys to death, but IDPA’s dedication to being “revolver neutral” is nuts some times. A compassionate RO can see a course of fire, and call for “any IDPA approved reload” after six rounds. For the wheelgun guys, that’s no problem, because they’ve got to reload anyway. But for everyone else, they’re going to have anywhere from 2-5 rounds left in the gun, and now they have to dump that mag and perform a complicated and time-costly reload.
Of course, all ranting aside, I don’t think reloads with retention are going away. For better or for worse, ROs will continue to put them in COF on the clock, so as much as I may not like it, I need to practice it. Now comes the gamey part for you guys out there. The IDPA rule-book makes no differentiation between a tac-load (slow) and a reload with retention (less slow). It also doesn’t say anything about not putting an extra, empty magazine holder on your belt for that spare mag. I use the Blackhawk single and double stack magazine holders, which have this huge, wide mouth on them. That means that for a reload with retention, I drop the empty, catch it, slam it into an empty magazine holder, and now my hand is right next to my fresh magazines, so I can continue my reload. It’s actually quite a bit faster than the tac-load, is completely legal, and allows you to utilize roughly the same muscle memory that you’d use for a standard, slide-lock reload.
Ultimately, that’s the best solution to the “IDPA approved reload” question – practice. If you can master the above technique for a reload with retention, when you see those COF that involve that particular skill, you won’t roll your eyes in frustration – you’ll get excited to do your new, speedy-gamer reload. For your ease of training, here are the steps to the fast RwR.
Lather, rinse, and repeat for best training results.
Now here is a match that I’d kill to go to. October 9th-11th, in the Bay Area, the California State IDPA championship match. 12 Courses of Fire, open to a 150 shooters, registration is $100, plus an additional $10 if you want to participate in the “head-to-head” side match on Sunday. According to their website, the non-sanction “head-to-head” match has a cash prize, so you could in theory win your entry fee back.
If you a California/Bay Area resident, and you feel like shooting some IDPA, now’s the time to start practicing.
In my never-ending quest to read everything I can about Bianchi Cup, I stumbled across this very old (think 13 years) article in Gun-Tests about how to build a revolver for open division in Bianchi Cup. Unlike a lot of shooting sports, Bianchi is one game where the revolver is not handicapped – all strings of fire are six shots or less, and there are no “on-the-clock” reloads in Bianchi Cup. That means that if you can master the trigger pull on your wheelgun, you’re in just as good a competitive positition as someone with a 1911 or what-have-you.
In fact, at last year’s Cup, Jerry Miculek almost won the Metallic Division with a revolver, being edged out by one “X” by the winner.
There’s also another advantage that a wheelgun has (so does a true DAO auto, for that matter) – dry fire. While “ammo” isn’t usually a problem for sponsored professional shooters, for the average joe the expense of shooting can add up. However, if you competitive gun is a wheelgun, you have the advantage of being able to practice every aspect of a match except for recoil control from the safety and comfort of your own home.
Check out the Gun Nuts Radio Blog for information on the Benelli M4, which is now approved for use by LAPD. If I had an unlimited budget, that gun would be near the top of my list for “defensive shotguns”.