S&W integral trigger lock failures
They're being discussed at the Smith & Wesson Forum. Quite a few reported -- trigger lock engaging under recoil, if dropped, etc..
Link via Xavier's Thoughts, reporting his own gun lockup.
Hat tip to reader John M. Maraldo, who adds: "puts me in mind of the differing attitudes gunnies and gunphobes have as to safety. Ask a gunny what safety is and they'll relate the rules of safe handling and safe shooting. Ask them what safe design is and they'll tell you it is a design that makes the gun shoot when the trigger is pulled, but not when the trigger is not pulled. Ask gunphobes what safe design is and they'll tell you it is a design which makes the gun unlikely or difficult."
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Civil War collector killed by140 year old shell
Story here.
When I lived back there, I'd see lots of civil war cannon projectiles for sale. Collectors would roam the old battlefields (only tiny portions of which were parks) with metal detectors. I read about one who had invented a remote controlled drill press, with water cooling of the bit and a closed circuit TV, so that he could drill into and deactivate them while staying a safe distance away. And gad, this was a 75-pounder.
UPDATE More on the issue, this time from the experts, including a picture and CAD images of the naval fuses. Some news stories suggest that he was grinding rust off the outside of the shell, but I can't see anyone trying that without deactivating it first; he must have known how spark-sensitive black powder is. Just from the size of it he would have known it was a naval shell (for land use, 6-12 pounders were standard, and a 32 pounder was heavy siege artillery), and I'd assume knew about naval fuses.
Hat tip to reader Bill Bailey....
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Sen. Coburn on the M4
Senator Coburn raises questions about the M4 rifle.
I've no experience with one. I know that its predecessor, the M-16, had serious jamming problems in Vietnam, and I've read reports of jamming in Iraq, but no idea whether those were common or rare. While I do an AR-15 type firearm, and like it, I've always been a bit suspicious of direct gas impingement, esp. in a setting where you might have to fire off hundreds of rounds without cleaning. Might any readers have experience, or know of those with it, in this area?
UPDATE: I'd agree the cartridge is a big problem -- and least likely to be fixed soon. Changing over is a major operation (and requires coordination with NATO). Consider that in 102 years, we've only switched twice -- from .30-06 to .308, a modest change after nearly half a century, and then to 5.56mm (with lots of .308 weapons still in use).
I was involved in the Waco civil trials, and one exhibit was a revolver carried by an agent as backup. It took a hit square on the sideplate while he wore it, from an AR-15, with the old 55 grain projectile. It blew a star-shaped crater in the sideplate, a little over a half inch in diameter and maybe an eighth of an inch deep. The revolver was probably still usable. The hit knocked him down, he got up and was moving again without injury. You wouldn't see that with a .308. Of course they've switched to a heavier round with a steel penetrator tip, but that just gives a tradeoff. More penetration, but less stopping power. You can use your limited energy and momentum one way or the other.
ANOTHER UPDATE: the problem with Vietnam M-16s was the lack of a chromed chamber, and also a switch in propellant. The rifle was originally tested with tubular powder. Then they went to ball powder. As I recall the issue, the ball powder had more retardent, and thus more fouling. Jams became so frequent that they added the bolt assist to force a jamming round into the chamber (as one user remarked, how come Kalashnikov never had to add this sort of thing to the AK?)/
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DARPA testing new scope
Interesting scope design that would use lasers to assess wind conditions downrange. I rather doubt they'll allow it in competitive shooting!
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Video special on Front Sight Academy
A four-part video report on training at the Front Sight Academy is available via VBS TV.
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Fun at Knob Creek
Video here.
Link corrected -- thanks...
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Winchester 70 is back!
Press release here.
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New Army sniping rifle
It's a variant of the SR-25 semiauto. 7.62 NATO, and quite accurate (.65 MOA average, I assume firing standard match ammo). Capable of carrying a suppressor, which has proven useful in the past.
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Rising ammo prices
Dallas Morning News has the story. Time to oil up the reloading presses!
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Shotguns for the disabled
An interesting idea: the fellow in charge of NRA's disabled shooting program has created a shotgun for persons who have the use of only one arm.
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Camp Perry results online
Right here.
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Interesting page on early 20th century handguns
Over at The Unblinking Eye. It covers Walthers, the 1908 Bayard, the Browning 1910 and its imitators, not to mention grips, holstermaking, etc.
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A Double barrelled bolt action rifle?
Video here. I guess it's for hunters of dangerous game who (1) like the reliability of a double, but (2) wish it had the 3+ firepower of a bolt. Or else it's just German gun designers who like things REALLY complicated.
Hat tip to David McCleary...
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VERY interesting book on combat
By Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, covering both police and military combat. Available here.
I've read it twice, and it is excellent. Most people don't understand that fear and combat have been the subject of much serious study. The earlier work was probably du Pict, who was killed in the Franco-Prussian War, and who based his studies on interviews of Napoleon I's veterans. Then there was Lord Moran's "On Fear," based on his observations as a battlefield doctor in WWI. S. L. A. Marshall's study of WWII and Korean firefights (where he found interestingly that only 15% of men fired if they saw the enemy, and which led to revisions in training away from bullseye targets, to get soldiers conditioned to fire at enemy rather than round bulls). Then there are quite a few more recent studies.
This work essentially integrates all that data, and adds quite a few original insights, and then lays out practical principles of training. I can't do it justice in a blog post, but will try in extended remarks below.
Continue reading "VERY interesting book on combat"
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Swiss shooting competition
150,000 competitors. That's serious!
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Hatcher's Notebooks
The Gun Nut has put online a segment from Julian Hatcher's Notebook on guns (an invaluable source), dealing with what happens when a bullet is fired straight up.
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Sounds like a heck of a squad auto weapon
A webpage for the Ultimax SAW. I'm happy to see American inventors trying their best, although politics too often matters more than good weapons design. It's amazing to reflect how many American military firearms are the result of individual inventors, or small firms... the government tends to struggle on with overly complex, overly expensive space-age tinkering, while individuals work on things that ... well, work. The last purely government design that I can think of is the M-1/M-14, and even that was the work of a brilliant individual, John Garand. And of course the Soviet AK-47 breakthru was the work of one bright tank officer who figured he could make a better gun than any in use.
Hat tip to reader Spiker for this link.
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Shooting matches
A basketball game ends in riot.
"The fight then spilled into the streets, and at one point shots were fired, police said. CBS 2 has exclusive video of hundreds of fans fighting in the stands and of NYPD officers racing through the streets in response to continued violence. Cops reportedly made 21 arrests, though that number could still grow as the details of the melee are finally sorted out. "
I once asked a buddy ... what would be the concept of sports hooliganism at the National Matches?" He replied "Two spectators were given dirty looks after they muttered 'Semper Fi" too loudly.'"
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Happiness is a warm gun...
Especially in the bands of a 10 year old. This is Nathaniel, my youngest, burning off bursts from my full-auto Thompson.
By the time we put 250 rounds thru it, it was more than warm -- the barrel was quite hot!
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Guns with 200 mile range
The Navy is creating guns fired by electronic pulse, which might give a 5" gun a range of 200 miles. At long range they'd take advantage of the effect discovered by WWI Germans when they built the Paris Gun -- when you put rounds thru the stratosphere, wind resistance falls off rapidly! The idea is to combine modern targetting technology with this, and get the equivalent of a missile, at the price of a shell.
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This is just going too far...
I can see shooting the AKs, but paying $500 to obliterate a cow with an RPG is just going too far....
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Article on infantry and marksmanship
There's an interesting article in Infantry magazine on the subject. The thrust of it is that the Army has neglected marksmanship, due to (1) emphasis on high-tech weapons and (2) the tendency of past wars ('Nam) to be fought in jungles at close range. Whereas WWII soldiers were trained to engage out to 600 yards, whereas today emphasis is on 200 yards and less. Also the Army (unlike the Marines) have a shortage of first-rate marksmanship instructors.
And now we're fighting in the desert and mountains, where people can see and shoot from longer range.
[Update: link corrected. Thanks...]
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Expanded interactive guide to shooting ranges
MapMuse has it. Click on the map, or enter your zipcode to find private and public ranges.
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Now, THIS is just going too far!
The Smallest Minority has images of a Glock tricked out with bayonet, muzzle brake, bipod, flashlight, and scope.
Glad I'm a traditionalist. If John M. Browning didn't design it, I'm not taking it to a gunfight.
[Oops--typo corrected]
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Associated Press writer on basketball stars with guns
An AP writer, dealing with professional basketball types who have guns, lets his feelings/bias flow.
""It's a pretty, I think, widely accepted statistic that if you carry a gun, your chances of being shot by one increase dramatically," Stern said earlier this week during his preseason conference call," runs one quote.
I would note in response that many studies have shown more than 94.5% of statistics are made up on the spot.
I have to admit that, while respecting the *right* in each case, I have a different visceral reaction to "NBA players carry guns on trips" and "NRA members carry guns on trips." I tend to associate the latter with firearms being carried by people who know how to use them, wouldn't use them outside of sport unless someone was advancing on them with a knife or attacking another decent citizen, and whose idea of getting wild is having a few drinks and telling war stories, rather than getting a snoot full of cocaine and figuring they're a deity and can break the law.
I guess we could solve the reporter's problems by making NBA players "prohibited persons" under the Gun Control Act (subject to provisions for restoring their rights after they retire). But maybe the sport and the reporter ought to look at a source of the problem, as his article notes:
"The NBA made it through the post-Jordan era in part by marketing itself to the hip-hop generation. It was edgy cool -- Allen Iverson with his checkered past and rebellious present, and high schoolers who thumbed their noses at tradition to become instant millionaires.But then things started getting a little seamy. Kobe Bryant was accused of rape. The Americans looked more like spoiled brats than a Dream Team at the Athens Olympics. The Brawl at The Palace in the Detroit made fans wonder if they should fear for their safety at a game.
Edgy had gotten out of control, and the NBA has been working overtime to clean up its image."
Guess what? If you start marketing your sport (which is what was done, for the bucks), maybe the players will believe the marketing?
I love the closing quote: "After all, this is the NBA, not the NRA." Coming right after a description of a case where a team was out partying until 3 AM on the training night, and one faces a felony rap for firing five shots in the ceiling of a bar, I'm glad for that.
[Inside joke, refering "soccer hooligans" who riot -- "Camp Perry officials condemned "National Match hooligans" who muttered "Semper Fi" after a Marine competitor finished shooting. The officials stated that the muttering distracted other competitors and blasted it as "displaying a lack of the personal discipline we expect."
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Minor error when boresighting
This slide show serves as a reminder... when boresighting, remember to remove the boresighter before firing.
(I'm amazed the barrel split that far back, from an obstruction in the last few inches).
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High speed photography
Here's some high speed video of projectiles (they look to be handgun bullets) going through anything the videomaker could find.
Here's a page with theory and images.
here they amuse themselves photographing .22s as they slice cards edgewise.
And here's some more stills.
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New Action sport
I predict this will quickly replace skeet. (Streaming video file).
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Interesting new product
Basically, a 10-22 hellfire that works (and is a lot more expensive).
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Ithaca shotgun co. reviving
Today's Gun Week reports that Craig Marshall of Sandusky, Ohio, has purchased Ithaca Guns and has moved the firm to Ohio. They have a website here.
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Memories of handloading
Just came across the first reloading manual I ever used, back when I was 16-17 and loading with a Lyman tong tool (don't think they make them anymore, but I still have mine). It's P O Ackley's Pocket Manual for Shooters and Reloaders, 1964 edition.
Quite a look back, to the days when the .22-250 and .25-06 were wildcats, and the .223 so new that he doesn't have a table for it, just a note that Remington's chief designer say 22 graints of 4198 is close to max with 50-53 gr. bullets.
Tons of older wildcats that you'll probably not see today, most developed in the 1920s and 1930s when small bore centerfires had few factory cartridges. .22 K Hornet, .218 Bee, Mashburn Bee, .219 Zipper and Zipper Improved.
For you young'uns, the Improved cartridges stem from the 19th century practice of designing cartridges with lots of body taper, long shoulders, and long necks. You improved them by designing a chamber with little body taper, a steeper shoulder and shorter neck. When you fired a factory cartridge it expanded to fill the chamber (with some losses when the brass couldn't take it). Since the newformed cartridge had more internal capacity, you could then handload it to greater power. It worked a lot better with rimmed cartridges, since the rim held them in place. With rimless it could get dicey, since there was only modest contact between shoulder of the factory cartridge and shoulder of the chamber.
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Thoughts on IEDs
Off-topic, but always hoping somebody in DARPA or suchlike would pick up an idea I've had.
From what I hear, most IEDs are detonated by cell phones or walkie-talkies. Thus if you had a detector for these, you would have a passable IED detector.
Radio receivers actually radiate a bit. Processing the signal requires moving it up and down in frequency (some functions are best handled at high frequency, some at low). You have crystals generating a radio signal and mix it with the incoming signal. This means that the receiver also transmits. I seem to remember that shortwaves gave off 455 h or maybe khz. This is, btw, why they make you turn off cells at takeoff. A cellphone should thus give off a characteristic frequency, as would a walkie-talkie (dunno if they'd be the same). I also believe a cell gives off some signal so that the stations can keep track of just where you are in case there's an incoming call. That signal would be fairly powerful. There are also very broad spectrum receivers that search for ANY radio emissions nearby at any frequency. They're used to search for bugs and are cheap (since they have no tuning section).
Simplest proposal: detector on a pole, like a long metal detector. Use it to probe suspicious packages. If the guy detonates it, at least you're 10-20 ft away rather than opening it.
More elaborate: a directional Yagi antenna can focus reception and improve range by a factor of ten to twenty. At high frequencies like this, it'd be quite small. You might be able to spot a cell phone from a good distance, and know its direction (just sweep back and forth, listening for the strongest signal). Might even have enough range to spot the phone of the guy waiting to set it off. A continuous sweep could spot anything in the road ahead. Might be able to get ranges of hundreds of yards, if cell phones emit signals to tell the system where you are. Cost of antenna is under a hundred bucks, mfrg cost probably five bucks.
Or mount the detector on a toy remote controlled car, and run it up to the package.It'd be close enough to spot radiation from a walkie-talkie in that event.
UPDATE in light of comment: you could probably reduce false positives. The local detector on a pole or remote control toy car could be set to only alert if a cell is within five or ten feet. Sensitivity of one connected to an antenna could be set to alert only if a cell is in the direction the antenna points and within, say, fifty yards. If the antenna is pointed at a person when it alerts, it probably is a false positive. If it's pointed at empty road or a trash bag by the side of it... bingo. The rig could be built for a lot cheaper than a cell phone jammer. (I note the Warlock systems jammers look like they cost $15,000 each. This could be made for around a hundred. And wouldn't just jam the system while a convoy is near it, but would alert you to its location).
Further nasty thought: for the cell to tell its tower where it is, the signal it sends must identify itself. If you could intercept that signal, with help from the wireless phone co. you could determine its number. Post someone to watch it. When someone comes to retrieve it for relocation, dial the number.
FURTHER update: I found a British company that sells a cellphone detector for about $200. Says its good to 40 ft., and you could extend that greatly with the right directional antenna. Here's another, said to have a range up to 30 meters. With regard walkie-talkies ... I think they have a limited number of frequencies. Rig a transmitter that will sweep across these, link to a directional antenna, and you might be able to detonate the bombs ahead of you. At least until they start putting in countermeasures, requiring that the detonating signal convey some information, etc.
While I'm at it, a tip from Vietnam days. Chain link fence does great against RPGs, but they ought to invent something to defeat them. All it takes is a small dent in the nose cone. RPGs detonate when a piezoelectric crystal in the nose is crushed on impact and sends out an electrical signal. The signal passes via the outer casing to the detonator, then back via the inner shell. Dent the outer shell a bit and it shorts out. Stop it without anything hitting the nose and it doesn't function. I've wondered if an armored vehicle couldn't be protected by narrow metal slats pointing outward, maybe a couple of inches apart. If the RPG hits a slat square, it'll still detonate, but if it hits between them it might short. I've tried to figure out how to send a radio/magnetic pulse that would detonate one (now wouldn't that be fun--set off any RPG round in the launcher) but don't have the expertise to figure a way around the fact that it's basically two coaxial conductors, which is pretty resistant to a pulse.
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Now, these are serious ballistics!
The 120mm gun on the M-1 shoots a depleted uranium fin-stablized round. Nice pics here. Weight of projectile is about 10 kg (22 lb) and muzzle velocity upwards of 5,400 fps. I read somewhere that, due to its incredible ballistic form, it's still going upwards of 5,000 fps at a mile range.
Here are some tales of its use ... one shot going thru two Iraqi tanks and destroying both, a shot right thru the cover (a sand dune) to nail a tank on the other side (its exhaust was seen by the heat imager).
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Women on Target
The Birmingham News has an article on the NRA's Women on Target program. It notes that surveys show over 4 million American women go in for target shooting, and 2 million hunt, and 23,000 have participated in the NRA program.
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Colt v. Bushmaster lawsuit
A Federal Magistrate has issued a recommended decision (it has to be reviewed by the District Judge) in a lawsuit between Colt and Bushmaster (pdf file).
A quick read of the 70 page opinion indicates Colt is suing over trademark and related doctrines, regarding Bushmaster's use of terms such as "M4", "AR-15," etc. The magistrate recommends ruling in favor of Bushmaster on most of the suit, on grounds that the terms have become common usage (and M4 is a term assigned by the government). Colt also asserts a sort of "look and feel" argument regarding design of the M-16 and AR-15. The magistrate rejects that for a number of reasons (the look and feel must not be related to function, but to appearance, etc.). The Magistrate does allow one claim to go forward, related to false advertising (Bushmaster's statements that it hold government contracts and makes to mil-spec).
There's also an interesting legal history of past disputes over the M-16 and M4, how the M4 contract came to be, etc. (Although the discussion may be the official and somewhat sanitized one: I've heard it said that Colt was outbid on the M-16 contract, and for political reasons was then awarded one, sole source (no competitive bidding) for the M4, which is essentially an M-16.
[Thanks to Mark Gruver for the tip]
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Weekend relaxation...
For those who think you can't control a Thompson in full-auto, here's a 16 round burst. (I counted 16 cases in the air, might have missed a few). And my subgun is one of those early WWII variants that is out of milspec -- it fires at 900 rpm instead of the expected 600, but the military had to waive compliance because it needed the guns. Note that the cumulative recoil pushes me back a foot or two, but the muzzle stays level.