Computer Bleg

My old computer blew up.  The recent power outages were just too much for it.  That's ok, as it was only doing duty as an email machine.  That can be transferred to the new primary maching with little effort

The old one DID have an ancient copy of Photoshop on board.  It was what I used to crop and condense pictures for this blog.  Now I am sans image editting software and I'm wondering if there are decent alternates to Photoshop.  I did very little layering and cloning before,  I just really need something that converts 3000x5000 550 MB jpgs to decently sized and cropped 700x500 100 KB gifs.

Slim .40

For my 2012 or 2013 pistol...

I'm sorta in the same boat as JayG.  (And so many other gunnies for some reason...) He's trying to cover the supposed gap between a pocket revolver in .38 and a regular size carry pistol like a .45 or .357 with something in between.  He's looking at the new mini-9mm offerings that are starting to eclipse the mini-.380s

I'm in the same boat.  But I don't want a small 9mm because I have no OTHER 9mm and don't want to introduce a new ammo type.  So I want a .40.  I've discussed this before.  A single stack .40.  So Kahr, unless the other gun companies catch up soon.  I wonder how quickly they will catch up to my line of thinking?  They never caught up to .45 carbine ideas.  To the point where I see less utility for a pistol carbine. 

(Sorry for the sparse comment, but internet connectivity has been sparse since the storm.  The storm wasn't abnormal, it's the competency of the various service providers in this country as we slowly slide into 3rd World category when it comes to various utilities.  Seriously.  Spotty utility service, ordered to boil municipal water in nearby jurisdictions, cholera in Massachusetts, malaria making a comeback locally.  This isn't 2011.  It's not even 1911.)

Goin to the well again

Yet another request to ask my readers.  Both of you.

I have a guilty confession to make.  I bought Monster Hunter: Vendetta when it came out, but haven't read it yet.

I know, I KNOW.  I enjoyed the first book, but haven't yet been in the mood for a ripping, fantastic, gun filled, violent adventure.  You can understand when you know I just finished Wodehouse's Code of the Woosters, Allistair Cooke's America, and David Sedaris' latest offering (not sure what I was thinking with this last...)

See what I mean?  I don't think I have it in me to take on Correia's work.  It'd be a shock to the system.

I need encouragement.

Thunder!

We had Thundersnow this week.  Sounds cool, don't it?

Getting to thinking... few words are NOT made better with the addition of the word "Thunder!"

I'm thunderguessing a lot of you could think of some good examples.

The NY Jets endured a Thunder-beating last weekend.

THUNDERBACON!  (I'd thundereat the thunderhell out of THAT.)

I'm thirsty, but do I want thunderpunch, or pop open a tall cold-filtered bottle of thunderbeer or 9 and get absolutely thunderdrunk.

I think only the word "thigh" is not improved with "thunder."  Maybe if you added volcano to something it would be cooler.  Oooo!  Thundercano!

And with that, thunderbye everyone!  Gonna try to do that thunderbeer thing now as an experiement.

(gun content?  Thunderboomers, of course.)

Also... power went out repeatedly during the last unpleasantness.  Some of the 'lightning' I saw was actually transformer cooking off when tree limbs laden with wet snow fell on them.  Sporadic connectivity may curtail a post or two.

What is Primer Wipe

Glad someone asked that question and got it answered already.  I was beginning to wonder and getting ready to do the whole internet search thing.

Just like I already did for the strain screw on a revolver.

Series 80

NOW I now what a Series 80 is.  Besides something that can break.

Or, Now that I own one, I see what is meant by 'Series 80 1911s.'

There it this little spring loaded button underneath the back of the slide.  And a little bit of metal pop up to engage this button from the frame.  Methinks that this is some sort of firing pin block.  And it looks kinda delicate and easily broken.

The purpose of this modification is keep a sharp blow from making the gun go off.  So, I think that little pinny bit sticks up when the thumb safety is engaged, thus depressing the slide button, thus blocking the firing pin, no?   It might be up at other times, blocking the firing pin, but I haven't figured that out yet.

I don't think there is any other differences, other than the half cock hammer positioning, deep in the lockwork that I can't see.  I'm sure a commenter will correct me if I am off base. 

Well, that little lawsuit alleviator is a bit disappointing.  As something that could go wrong and lock up the whole works and make the gun fail when I kinda want it to work. 

I said 'disappointing' but I don't think it so disappointing that I necessarily need to take any action to removed the fiddly bits.  I don't know how easy it is to remove the stuff anyway and whether or not I should chuck the pin or the button or both and whether I need a gunsmith's help.  Perhaps someone can enlighten me here, too. 

I also need to figure out what else I need to do to detail strip the slide for yearly cleaning and if that Series 80 bit changes that procedure.

I called it a lawsuti alleviator, but this gun may end up being my go-to carry gun in an unsecured IWB holster, someday.  Maybe it's not such a bad thing to have this extra safety meant to help avoid discharges when a pistol falls out of a holster onto a cement mens room floor...   I'd rather read about cops getting NDs in the bathroom than having one of my own.

~~~

Whole nother thing... If the Series 80 safety parts fail, how do they fail?  I mean if they fail and all it does is make it possible for the gun to go off if dropped off the roof onto the driveway... just don't drop it off the roof.  But if it can fail and lock up the gun thus rendering it inoperable...  That's a whole different ball of wax. 

Like a car, if the radio fails, I can still drive it.  That failure is unfortunate, but I can still go thousands of miles with that failure.  If the brakes' master cylinder fails instead, or the timing belt, or the fuel pump, or what have you, I can't drive that car 1 mile.

Yet Another

Yet another pro-gun article from the ultimate in Metrocon Media Organs.

It's about the horrid and injust performance of the state of New Jerseys.  Good on National Review.

If they keep this up I may have to re-assess the appropriateness of the the semi-perjorative term, 'Metrocon.' 

A song in your heart

Or maybe in your head.

At the range Sunday, Saucy Trollop was shaking the cobwebs off.  She hadn't practiced in a while.  And it showed.   She improved quickly over the session, as usual.

She shared a little secret that helped her improve.  She had an earworm running through her head and surrendered to it while shooting.  The song was Adam Lambert's What Do You Want From Me, but I don't think that's important.  Apparently singing the song in her head alleviated her standard anticipatory flinch. 

I may have to explore this technique.  See if it helps me any.

If you hear the following in the lane next to you, that's probably me:

 I learned the truth at seventeen BLAM!

That love was meant for beauty queens BANG!

And high school girls with clear skinned smiles BANG! POW!... BANG!  (mozambique...)

Who married young and then retired  KABLAM!

The valentines I never knew  POW!

The Friday night charades of youth Click.. Dammit, reload...


{Update:  Try not to pick a song you don't want witnesses explaining to a Jury at your trial after you end up in singing it aloud in an actual self-defense situation, "Yes your Honor, he was definitely singing 'Happy Birthday' as he cut down those muggers."}

.44 Light Strikes

So this can't be good...

Saucy Trollop, the ex, and I went to the range Sunday for some fun.  I brought both 1911s, and she brought her XD 40 and her GARGANTUAN .44 Magnum. 

About that .44, it's been getting worse over time.

I noticed when she got it, it would occasionally not go off when fired Single Action.  And since this is her preferred way of shooting that big revolver, she'd notice such behavior.  I try to train her to do the "wait 30 seconds before trying again" thing in case it cooks off late, but the lesson isn't always sticking.  I have nightmares about a round cooking off that isn't behind the barrel's forcing cone.  Especially rounds that big. 

Inspection of these duds shows a lighter than normal dimple on the primer.  Aha!  Light strikes. 

They always worked for me when I reused these and fired the cylinder double action.  Every time.  Except this last time.  We now got a .44 round with a full normal dimple on the back that didn't go off.  Damn. 

These issues have gotten more frequent over time.  Time to sideline the .44 from active service until the problem is addressed.

Solutions?  I recommended she get another ammo type.  She has Remington now.  I think she might get better performance if she had Federal types.  American Eagle and the like.  Federal has a reputation for light primers.

But that's not enough.  I am going to take this puppy to my local gunsmith and get the gun inspected.  Perhaps the firing pin has worn from use or some other adjustment can be made.  Based on how the Double Action trigger feels this used gun is well worn in, methinks.  Is a very nice DA.  And it never fails to attract attention.  One of my favorite range days is for her to accompany me, me with my snubbie S&W 640, her with the hand cannon 10" S&W 629.  Her gun always attracts attention at the range.  Moreso when they learn the little gun is mine, big burly me, and the artillery is little ol hers.

But yeah.  Gunsmith.  Definitely.

Another Zed Site

MORE glorious zombies.

I was tipped off to that by the World's Most Dangerous Librarian.  Who has a GREAT pic up of a group of Irishman that wouldn't cotton to the undead, no sir. 

Heinous Civil Rights Injustice

FREE John McNeil!

A man wrongly imprisoned on a trumped up charge for defending himself with a gun.

Commander Range Report

First, the trigger is crisper but firmer than my Springfield.

I had 4 failures in the range day.  What do you expect?  1911 suck, I've been told, and jam a lot.

Thing is, the brand new Colt Commander shot 100 rounds without a hitch, but the Ceiner .22 conversion, IT had the failure.  2 FTF, and 2 FTE on the last round failing to extract.  I was using OLD .22 ammo in one of the milk container cartons they sold back when.  Filthy ammo, too.

I figure 100 more .45 in the new gun and it can be considered broken in.  Ooo, and I have to test the hollow point ammo in it too. 

The mags don't fall free as easily as with the Springfield.  Let's see what a little more time does for it.

Hefting the Commander in the hand makes it seem front heavy.  Might be in my head, thinking about that plastic mainspring housing.  I don't notice a balance issue when gripping it to shoot, however.

How did it shoot, accuracy wise?  The same as when I shoot the Gov't size Springfield.  Lousy.  Low and right.  Damn flinch/anticipatory/bad-finger-placemet.  I don't need new guns, I need a new shooter.

Here is the first target:

And I did better after that practice on the second target.  Better is relative:

You can see the last magazine in amoungst the .22 holes on the right.  Meh.

After the shoot, parts arrived.  A new 'Bulletproof' slide lock and a nice chainlink pattern Ed Brown mainspring housing, and the regular length guide rod with matching recoil spring plug.  Easy peasy install.  It's like I know what I'm doing.  I didn't mung up the pins or struggle with the mainspring like I have in the past.

I was pleased enough with my new purchase that I think I'll hit the range again with it.  I mean again again, I went 2 days ago (report to follow) and 5 days ago.  What the heck, I have plenty of .45 practice ammo.  I need to order some more .40, actually.

Well... I done done it

You guys on the internet didn't do a very good job at talking me down off of buying a Colt Commander.

Things that clinched the whole scheme... The grip safety didn't have that little bump and there was no little keyed lock as part of the gun like many manufacturers have these days.  (frex: Springfield has theirs in the Mainspring Housing.)

So I got a new heater.  This goes to my "Buy a Gun Day" purchase for the upcoming April 15th gun holiday.  I doubt another heater could tempt me in the meantime.

So, first things first.  Shoot it to see how it runs.  Then modify it to suit me.  Nothing permanent, of course. Slim grips will be tried.  I'll probably take it in to get the thumb safety ground down on the left side of the gun to more closely look like the classic safety, but not right away.  I don't use that side, and it's just something to catch on things as far as I'm concerned.  I might swap out the Slide Release with a forged one.  Oh, and the guide rod will go toward the classic regular length.  The mainspring housing is, indeed, plastic, so that get's swapped.  Then shoot it again.  See if those few changes screws anything up in performance or feel.

Future items... I'll need another decent holster at the earliest convenience.  In the meantime the Galco IWB or Serpa will have to do if I carry it.

Another future item... A bit honking tritium front sight.  That would be gunsmith work, too.  Might get a white bar rear sight instead of the 2 dots, but we'll see.

So, more money poured into an expensive gun, but none such needed to get it running.  Just preference.  Lots of money.  ~sigh~

Lazy Sunday

I'm heading out to the range today.  I gotta try something out...

It takes all sorts of critters

To make a batch of Farmer Francis' Fritters.

You know how we get upset when people think it's a good idea to dispense with inalienable rights?  We get kinda salty about such transgressions, yes?

There are people out there equally passionate about, and just as against, the use of some Fonts.  Chief targets of their ire include Comic Sans, Papyrus, and Copperpot fonts.  And I mean they are violently opposed.  Enraged enough to consider kicking their cat, just because they laid eyes on the offending print.  And, conversely, they love plain old Helvetica.  I don't understand the enthusiasm, but more power to em.

Strange world we live in.  They oughta sell tickets.

Jam-Omatic

So there are folks down on the 1911.  I don't understand why. 

Their biggest complaint is that "they don't run."  Granted.  I believe people when they say they experienced lots of jams with the pistol.  Generally the cause of this jam is a munged up pistol done in by an amateur home gunsmith, or a cheap 1911 I'd never rely on except as a butterknife, or from hollow point ammo in an older 1911 that wasn't built with a barrel and ramp with hollow points in mind.

If people had been routinely took a Dremel tool to the ramp of their Glock, in some misplaced self confidence, and had been for decades, you'd think Glocks jammed a lot is my guess.

Ok, adjusting and allowing for all that in the experiment... I still believe people when they say their 1911 jammed a bunch.   At least in comparison to the 'plastic' pistols.  Why?

Obviously, I don't know.  I'm still quite the n00b.  But I do have theories.  There is more handwork in the older design compared to modern pistols, and that can lead to variance between pistols.  You rarely hear of a lemon S&W M&P, Springfield XD, or what have you, but I'd think that lemon frequency would be greater in Brownings pistol variants because the design necessitates more 100 year old skilled fabrication work. 

Is that what accounts for the jammin rep? Human error?

Also:  I need to get rich and buy and fire 500 hydra-shok hollow points through my 1911 just to see if I can experience the problems others have claimed.

[Update:  Inspired by the comment...  I wonder what MBtGE would experience if he ran nothing but quality $25 aftermarket magazines through his currently 1 in a 100 jamming $300 RIA Filipino 1911...]

The A Team

So I watched that A-Team movie with Liam Neeson as Colonel Hannibal Smith.  This isn't a full review.  It was enjoyable for a fantasist action movie.

I won't get into the suspension of disbelief needed for the flying tank scene.  This is a gun blog, not an cargo plane and armor drop blog.

But the movie started OUT with a stetch. 

Hannibal is handcuffed to a chair by Mexican narco bad guys.  When they go to execute him with his Para P-14 Limited, it fails to fire.  There is no firing pin.  So they leave him for the guard dogs to eat to death.  But, Aha!  Hannibal has the pin in his hand and uses it pick the handcuff locks.  Ok, that is semi-feasible.  But then, before the dogs get to him, we see him quickly insert the pin into the pistol, presumably restoring it to full function. 

Uhhh... What? 

Perhaps someone with a Para will chime in and say "sure!  It's very easy to install the firing pin that way.  Just pull the hammer back and slide it in til it clicks."  If true, I'll be good and gobsmacked.

It takes me 15 minutes on a good day to put a firing pin into a regular old 1911, assuming it's assembled for some reason, sans pin.  And I have to be careful the sproinged pin doesn't slip and shoot into my eye and an alarmingly high rate of speed.  I'd also need a screwdriver to help push the thing down.  And be lucky and get it right the first time I tried.  That doesn't mean the Para needs that much effort, but, again, I'd be surprised if it took less time to do.

30 round mags

Well, perennial civil rights deniers are putting up a 30 round magazine ban Bill in the House that has zero chance of passing.  Especially now that keeping and bearing has been enshrined as an individual right, which a darn sight more settled compared to the last time a magazine ban came through the Congress.  This one Bill currently contemplated won't grandfather older magazines so if you own one of these magazines after a certain date, you are a felon.  Let's pretend, as a sort of a mind game, what this would mean to me if it DID pass.

I have a couple dozen 20 round magazines for the M1A, so no problem their.  I have a half dozen 12 round magazines for my Sig, so no problem there either.  And the state of Maryland knows only about two, the ones that came with the SIG pistol that the State allowed me to buy.  There is really no other mechanism for them to track anything else, and they might not even consider those.  I have 4 magazines for my .22 converion kit that hold 15 rounds, and 8 magazines that hold 7 or 10 .22 for rifles of mine.  Another half dozen 8 round .45 mags and a bunch of 8 round en bloc clips for the Garand.  But this is a ban of 30 rounders so no skin off my back.  Sure Maryland or the Feds could find out who New Jovian Thunderbolt is with warrants or cheating, I know that.  But this propose law doesn't apply to me so... no worries, right?

Except it's NOT a ban of 30 rounders.  Non-gunnies don't consider that, fixating on the '30' number because that is what that crazy dude in Arizona had, and thus a bad guy had the 30 round magazine so they must be bad things, right?  Except there is no proposed law to ban 30 round magazines as some seem to think.  It's the banning of magazines holding more than 10.  Because if you have more than 10 in your gun you can only use that for murder, the anti-2nd Amendment folks claim.  Of course police are exempt from this law.  I guess they need to murder folks or something... 

Why don't they say that?  It's an 11 round magazine ban.   Any way, I'm in Dutch with the Feds for possessing 40 of those. 

Back to the subject of the mind game...  if the Bill did... is this the line in the sand for gunnies everywhere? Not just the purists with blog screeds even scarier to Democrats than mine, but average ordinary gun owners.

The 'line' is easy when they announce they are going door to door to round up all the firearms, but that isn't likely to happen and both sides know it.  Too many would resist such overt tyranny.  So the anti-civil-rights side uses incremental approaches.  Banning magazines bigger than 10 is one of these incremental approaches.  But is that sort of ban enough to get the relatively few of us gun enthusiasts to say, "No, we won't comply."

Well, I have a little story.  Remember when Obama got elected and there was a run on the gun stores.  People bought AR's and AR clones in record numbers and it was months before they were available again.  It is the most popular gun model for home, sport, and serious target competition already.  There are a lot of lever action hunting rifles extant, but that's not the most popular rifle anymore.  And hunting isn't the most popular reason to own a rifle anymore.  People were toying with the idea that the AR should stand for America's Rifle instead of the original Armalite (AR only stands for Assault Rifle in some Leftist's fever dreams)

Guess what sized magazine is standard with the AR15 rifles?  Right!  30!  There are a bajillion ARs out there and umpty bajillion magazines with them, because folks buy spares just for normal casual plinking use.  You don't have to be a militia survivalist type stamping out you manifesto in a tar paper cabin in Montana to have a handful of 30 round magazines.  Even in Maryland, where purchase of magazines more than 20 rounds is not allowed, but possession is no issue and perfectly legal.

Beyond ARs there are pistols.  6 shot revolvers are the popular shooting iron anymore by the even GREATER multitudes of pistol owner in the country.  And the most popular pistols these days are composite framed semi-autos just like you see on the belt of a police officer.  Most of these hold 12 or 15 or a few more rounds in the magazine, standard.  Most pistols come with 2 in a briefcase sized plastic box with the pistol, nestles in a little cutout in the cushioning egg crate foam.     

If you are reading this at work (and I know you are...) and you don't work in a anti-gun enclave like DC, NYC, Boston, Chicago, or San Francisco and you sit in a cubicle and have never discussed guns with any of your co-workers, I can almost guarantee you that you can throw a stapler right now and hit someone with a AR or Glock at home with at least 2 30 round magazines or 2 15 round Glock magazines.  And in DC you have Virginia and Maryland Commuters so you can probably STILL hit someone with a stapler that would be a felon and kinda upset and maybe considering not complying if such a law was passed despite the felony rap penalty.  You can't throw all those otherwise law-abiding people in jail for wanting to exercise a human right in a way of their choosing.
    
If some bureaucratic trick somehow got this rule/bill/regulation out there with the force of law...  civil disobedience could get interesting.

Ask Not

So all the left of center wackadoos are so excited about the 50th anniversary of their Lord and Master, bestest President evah's, inaugural speech.  That's today, in case you don't listen to NPR.

"Ask NOT, what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country."

A call to service.  The Peace Corps!  Work a campaign for a progressive politician!  BECOME a progressive politician!  Volunteer at a soup kitchen!  A gummint job!  A non-profit!  Oh boy.

They concentrate on "what you can do for your country."  They assume that being an entrepreneur doesn't count.  That's selling out to the Man!  Or being a wage slave if you don't actually employ someone.  But they forget the value in adding to the country's GDP.  Trading value for value and both parties get more in return than what they give.  Be they an oil tycoon, the owner of a computer hardware manufacturer, a computer programmer, a plumber, a waitress, a bank clerk, a sales clerk, a janitor.  They assume they must eschew the miracle of capitalism because it's... icky capitalism.

But that's not the overlooked factor of the line in the speech I am concerned with.  This part is ignored even more.  "Ask NOT what your country can do for you."  Ask not what your country can do for you.  Period.  Full stop.  It's not "please Father Kennedy and all your successors, take care of me from cradle to grave.  Gimme free health care, free education from Head Start thru college and post grad, comfortable retirement I didn't earn, free childcare, free, Free, FREE.  Gimme gimme gimme."  No.  The cost is too high.  In monetary terms, and the regulatory squeezing necessary to achieve it that ends up throttling liberty.  Ask NOT what your country can do for you.  It's a command.  Stop asking.  Listen to Kennedy.  It's the part you pretend not to hear, liberal Democrats and many Republicans, but hear it you must.   Just stop.  Why?  It isn't free.  Your country doesn't just owe you something.  You get a lot for the happenstance of being born here, with relative freedom, you aren't due extra at the expense of the principles that brought you such good fortune.  It's holding us all back, this attitude with some.  Even if you are a net recipient of the 'free' stuff, it holds you back.  Ask not.  It's the smartest thing JFK said, and I don't think even HE heard it right.  But regardless, it's good advice.  Stop expecting the Daddy Government to come and rescue you from your plight and lift you to the lap of luxury.  It's not what they do, it's not what they can do, and it's not what they should do.  It's nice you want to selflessly serve, maybe, but expecting something in return if you serve or not?  Please.

Kimber

"Why didn't you buy a Kimber, T-Bolt?  Why a Springfield?  Why were you thinking Colt?"

Well, lots of reasons.  None of them nailed down indisputable one, either.

I heard on the the internet that they were bad at service after the sale at Kimber, and had quality control issues or they did when I was buying...

I heard Kimber I's were better but now that they offer II's, that aren't as good, according to the internet...

And I saw that Kimber was selected by California jurisdictions.  Good for them, but they did that in an environment where CA was tightening it's gun control regime, and Barrett was refusing to sell his wares to State entities in protest...

So, some of those reasons are almost unsupported irrationalities.  All I had to go on was the advice of internet forums (yikes!) and, more credit to me, on the word of a selected few bloggers I've come to trust.

Does that mean that Kimbers are bad 1911s?  Oh, I'm sure not.  I'm sure that most are just fine.  I bet most Kimber owners are ecstatic with theirs.  But it was the scuttlebutt that made me eschew the brand. 

Not just that brand.  I am wary of others, too, often for similar reasons learned from similar sources.  I'm human.  It's the nature of the beast.