Innholdsfortegnelse for September 2017 i Guns & Ammo

WHAT SEEMS LIKE A LIFETIME AGO , I was working in radio broadcasting when I first heard the unofficial motto of rock ’n’ roll: “Some is good, more is better, too much is not enough.” Back then, handgun bullets were simply made of lead and copper. Bullets were full weight, and they didn’t move all that fast, at least by today’s standards. Now we ask: When is there enough bullet velocity? When is there too much? For some, that is not a question but a challenge. Currently, there are three high-speed factory loads that can be found in volume on store shelves that stay within SAAMI pressure specs. They are from Liberty Ammuntion, PolyCase and Super Vel. Why should we bring SAAMI into this conversation? Simple: You can do all…

THE OLDER I GET, the less I like to spend money. That’s likely a byproduct of having lots of time to think about how I’m going to afford kids and a mortgage for the foreseeable future. I suspect many of you share my concerns. Since I have to pay attention to the family finances, I always get excited when I find a genuine good deal. Price is not the only indicator of a potentially good deal. A low price can mean a good deal, or it can mean something is cheaply made. I try to avoid the cheaply made stuff because I’m also trying to clean up my language, and cheap stuff doesn’t help with that. A good deal I stumbled across recently came from Warne Manufacturing Company. It’s their…

A tiny tribute to life in the 1860s. NAMED AFTER the North American Arms gunsmith who originally developed it, The Earl is a five-shot, single-action mini-revolver that’s chambered in .22 Magnum. Though diminutive in size, it was designed to resemble an 1860s-era percussion-fired revolver with its octagonal barrel, top-strap sight channel and blade front sight. Also sending our thoughts back to the Old West is its spur trigger (like the trigger on some vintage Colt revolvers) and the faux loading lever, which is used here to secure the cylinder pin. Mechanically, this lever exists more for aesthetic reasons than safety or function, but the extra steps involved with working the lever to remove or install each cylinder contributes greatly to the fun factor of using this handy rimfire. The…

HERE IN THE UNITED STATES, we cling to the English system of measurement: inches, feet, yards and miles. But you have to admit that there’s simplicity in the metric system: millimeters, centimeters, meters and kilometers. Generally, European bullet diameters are simple, clear and usually expressed in millimeters or half-millimeters, as in 6mm, 6.5mm, 7mm, etc. There are exceptions, but you get the idea. Americans have been more random, seeming to pick bullet diameters out of a hat: .257 inch, .277 inch, .308 inch — none of which make metric sense. In 1925, when the .270 Winchester (bullet diameter .277 inch) was introduced, America already had two good metric calibers: 6.5mm (caliber .264) and 7mm (caliber .284). Sandwiched between them, the .270 offered very little. But it was the Roaring Twenties,…

ÒIÕLL GIVE YOU A GRAND for that AR,” a stranger at the range offered after watching me shoot. I looked down at my Frankenrifle, and for the first time I didn’t see parts or accessories — I saw dollar signs. When I later told my wife that a guy offered a grand for it, she looked confused and asked, “Why not take it?” Now that the gun-grabbing scare is at a pause, I’ve relaxed my gun purchases. So, I decided to take on “more affordable” do-it-yourself projects. During a trip to a hardware store, I noticed a clearance sale on Mag Tactical’s magnesium alloy lowers for $45 apiece. So, I bought two. Of course, I also had to have a set of lower parts, which meant that I also picked…

NEW FOR 2017 from Galco is the second-generation Scout inside-the-waistband (IWB) holster. The original Scout, which was Galco’s first rough-out holster, has been in the lineup for 25 years. To those who live by the concealed carry lifestyle, the Scout is a familiar open-top holster with a neutral cant, made of steerhide that’s reinforced at the mouth. (The black reinforcement leather serves to keep the mouth of the holster open for easier holstering.) Its J-hook belt clip accommodates up to a 1½-inch-wide belt. Even though we now have a Scout IWB Gen 2, Galco has no plans to discontinue the original. Both generations of Scout holsters are recognizable for the rough-side-out, smooth-side-in folded and stitched piece of natural tan leather. The rough-side-out gives the holster an inherent friction quality against…

TAKE A MINUTE and reflect back to the days when we all had the same guns. We ran what we had because there hadn’t been a lot of innovation in many years. All of a sudden, out of the gate jumped the next generation of pistols. The old-school boys weren’t happy; they were content with what they had. “How dare someone change the future?” “Who would want to carry a pistol made from different materials and with different controls (or the lack of)?” “Something different? There will never be a pistol better than what I have.” “This is what Dad carried; he was a cop for many years and it worked for him.” “I want to carry what the top military units carry. Why should I want something different?” “No,…

WE ALL GO THROUGH the same progression: “I need as big of a gun as I can comfortably carry.” “I need more rounds than I can fit in a revolver.” “Is modern .380 ammunition still too small of a caliber?” According to sales research available through the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), last year most of us ended up carrying a reasonably compact 9mm pistol — many of which were single stack. “Reasonably” compact? The smallest pistol to carry can easily be the most difficult to shoot. And difficult to shoot means that practicing for proficiency isn’t fun, which means that practice won’t happen. And we all know what happens when you don’t practice: Your skills fade. So, for the new XDE 9mm pistol, Springfield Armory designed it to be…

REMINGTON-BEALS POCKET REVOLVER Q: We have what I believe to be a Remington-Beals No. 1 revolver. It has been to a gunsmith and had parts fabricated to make the cylinder rotate, as they were missing. We were told that it is shootable, but it is unlikely that it will be shot, at least by us. What would the value be in this condition? Do you think you could shoot it? S.J. Maine A: You definitely have a Beals’ First Model Pocket revolver. Some 4,000 or so of these interesting little.31-caliber five-shooters were made between 1857 and 1858. The distinguishing feature of the Beals’ Pocket line (ultimately there were four variants) is the external pawl that rotates the cylinder. Your pistol has seen better days. There appears to be no…

IN THE CONSUMER ELECTRONICS MARKET, good products become great products when they provide the end user with choices. Consumers that care about the use of their firearms demand that the products they depend on conform to their personal preferences — not the other way around. As far as firearm-mounted electronics are concerned, LaserMax strives to pioneer its market segment. The company recently debuted a new GripSense Activation technology and infused it with the CenterFire light-and-laser combo for compact defensive handguns. The initial release was designed to fit Smith & Wesson’s ever-popular M&P Shield and Ruger’s LC9 single-stack pistols. Each model is available with either a red or green laser paired with LaserMax’s dimmable mint-green light-emitting diode (LED). How it works: A detection zone beneath the triggerguard, just forward of the…

IF THERE IS A JUGGERNAUT in the suppressor industry, that giant is SilencerCo. Last year alone the Utah-based company produced 120,000 suppressors, owning an estimated 70 percent of the national market and generating some $68 million in revenue. That equates to 600 percent growth since 2013. SilencerCo’s dedication to education and advocation for silencers is matched only by its penchant for innovation. The company has developed the lion’s share of recent new suppressor technology, including asymmetrical silencers, modular silencers, shotgun silencers and — undoubtedly its most seismic evolution yet — the integrally suppressed Maxim 9 pistol. Built of 102 U.S.-manufactured parts, the Maxim 9 is at its core a polymer-framed, high-capacity, striker-fired 9mm with a fixed 4.38-inch barrel and integrated modular, asymmetrical suppressor baffles. Why a $1,500 suppressed pistol? Admittedly,…