A weekday off means the opportunity to go to my club range. I loaded 200 rounds of .45 ACP last night, planning on shooting my Colt MarkIV Series 70 (which hasn't been shot in years) and my 45 Shield. I also had some old reloads, both purchased and my own to burn up. I wanted to do some more work with my two current carry guns from holster draw. The long guns were mostly going to be for fun banging the gongs, except my sniper type rifle. That was going to entail some scope range changing, as well as a comparison between my precision hand loads and commercial ammo.
PISTOLS
First up was my Colt Mark IV Series 70. When I bought it in 1983, it was pretty much in standard government type issue, just like a 1911 marked "U.S. Property" would have been, but with a shiny blued finish. Mine now wears adjustable sights, a rubber Pachmyr grip, has a slide stop bushing, all new springs, pins and screws, and a barrel bushing compensator. Internally there are some bits from Chip McMormick. Skeletonized trigger and hammer, a high rise beaver-tail safety, and a sear set. I had forgotten how well this gun performs. After reacquainting my self with some target practice. I easily whacked the swinging plates at 25 yards, and then went to bowling pins. My hard hitting 200 grain flat point rounds hit the pins on the blue "American Bowling Congress" shield and took the pins cleanly and completely off where I had them sitting. This was my pin gun from back in the day, even before I tweaked it. I won my share of matches back then, maybe I'll get back into it.
Next up was the S & W 45 Shield for some draw and fire practice from both my OWB and pocket holsters. 7 yards at a B-27 silhouette using some older Hornady Critical Defense rounds I had put aside for this practice session. Recoil is only slightly more than my target rounds and easily manageable for me.
The last pistol I shot was my Ruger SR9c with some draw and fire practice from my On Your Six Designs OWB holster. I was going to do a full "Dicken Drill", but since I didn't have a shot timer and was trying more than 7 yards for the first time with a carry gun, I opted to start at 25 yards. I did OK, and am confident I could take out a target from behind cover, especially if I can brace myself. I then went to holster draws at 7 yards using a B-27 silhouette target. I did notice that I never had one instance of fail to fire with light primer strikes like I did on my last outing. Amazing what gunk inside the slide in the area of the firing pin will do to reliability. This is the first time firing it since I did that thorough cleaning. I only fired my 115 grain round nose copper plated hand loaded target rounds. I did not shoot the (ghost gun) other pistol in the case, or the Ruger GP-161 I had loaded on my hip for the day.
RIFLE
Another member and his guest showed up to shoot. The member has a S & W M&P 15-22 he brought just to plink with, but his guest was looking to verify zero on a Winchester Model 70 in 7mm Remington Magnum. I put my shooting on pause because he asked for my assistance. As far as he knew, his rifle was zeroed and he was just going to verify zero and holds. Well, something was amiss, because he wasn't even on paper at 100 yards and he asked me to try it out. First off, that rifle has a much stiffer trigger than I was expecting or used to, but at 100 yards I was holding on the center and should have been at least on paper. Nope. Then he started fiddling with the scope and things did not improve. I recommended they stop trying until they can shoot against a large sheet of paper to see where it is really hitting. They agreed and packed it in. The guy said the ammo was $47.99 for a box of 20. YIKES!
I brought several rifles with me but only fired my sniper type rifle. Rather than try precision shooting, I decided to engage targets as though they needed to be quickly eliminated, which would be more real world. I started at 200 yards with the 5 remaining rounds of PPU commercial ammo in the box to give me some more fire formed brass. At 200 yards it would have definitely been a kill, but the group was large and to the right of center. That was to be expected, since the commercial ammo is loaded with .308" bullets and my barrel slugs out to .311" I put 3 rounds on paper and whacked the 200 yard 12" gong twice. Then I switched to my precision loaded ammo using .311" Sierra MatchKings. Much tighter group at 200 yards and in the center of the target. I then dialed the scope back to the 100 yard zero setting and put 3 rounds right in the center of the target at 100 yards. Dialed back up the needed two inches of elevation and easily plugged the 6" gong at 200 yards, which makes a distinctive sound when hit. Back down to the normal setting and 2 rounds dead center of the 12" 100 yard gong (I saw the paint removed where the bullet struck) and that was that. There was no need to burn up any more precious ammo. I am confident in my ability to eliminate long range targets. Right now my dope card for actual fired rounds only goes to 200 yards, and until I can shoot at longer ranges, I have the estimated required elevations.
I packed everything up and spent the rest of the afternoon at the clubhouse, hanging out with several of the other members.
SECOND AMENDMENT NEWS
In the wake of the tranny club shooting in Colorado and the Walmart in Virginia, the demented meat puppet at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is ratcheting up his anti-gun rhetoric being pushed by his string pullers against all semi-automatic firearms, no longer just dreaded black rifles. HEY FUDDS & BUTTERS: think your favorite hunting firearm is safe from the gun-grabbing hoplophobes... HA!
Keep your powder dry and rope nearby.
Expect the lame duck congress to pass a massively restrictive bill before January.
ReplyDeleteSeveral RINO's will cross the aisle to help the commie left succeed. It's what
they have been wanting for years and now they can do it with little political fall
out because the lame duck congress will be blamed and the people taking office in
January will not be blamed....even if they were part of the problem. The American
voter is generally an idiot. Easily fooled.
Your .308 mikes .311?
ReplyDeleteYes, most of the Russkie barrels do. The Finnish versions are .308". The bore is shiny and not worn out or pitted from corrosive ammo. The .311" bullets make a huge difference in accuracy.
DeleteI figure that it doesn't take much of anything for FJB to call out for gun control. And it is possible that they could pass something, before the holiday break. There is one thing that we can hope will stop them.
ReplyDeleteThe ever present, and particularly well written Bruen decision that came out of the SCOTUS in the last session. Any attempt to place a ban on not just evil black guns, but all semi auto weapons completely, would likely be fast tracked to the Supreme Court, for an injunction. And no doubt there would be enough support there to stomp down on that, in a hurry.
The biggest issue with this is that we know that the Republicans can't get out of their own way. Even after the next term of the house begins, and the Republicans take control, there is a definite possibility that they will fuck things up so badly, that we actually end up worse off than before the election. I just hope that they understand that they have control of the one thing that counts in D.C. The purse strings. And they have to have the balls to shut the entire government down, in order to stop the Democrats from killing the nation, which is a very real and plausible threat, from where I sit.
Sadly, over the past years, we have seen that the Republicans are nothing but wimps, who fold at any threat of the Democrats to make them vote to shut down the government, and take the blame. I say, shut the damn government down, take the blame, and then expose the Democrats plans and why they are doing their underhanded BS.
As for the guy with the Model 70, in 7mm mag, I would think that a proper bore site is in order, before firing another round. I am assuming he is using a scope, of course. I have a friend here in Michigan, who always hunted white tails with a 7mm mag. Most of the shots that are taken here in the middle lower peninsula are less than 150 yards, so I never could figure why he wanted that recoil.
Stay well, and stay alert.
@pigpen51: In reference to the guy with the Model 70; he said it was boresighted when the scope mount was changed and he made it sound like he was just verifying his zero and holds. He called it his deer rifle. But here in Kommiecticut, most whitetail shots are at 100 to 150 yards using lever guns in .30-.30 or .35 Rem., or bolt guns in .308 or .30-06. I had never fired 7mm before and you're right, the recoil is substantial. Seems like overkill to me, unless he's hunting elk or sheep out west at longer distances.
Delete