I have a great fondness for the Gauge. And when it comes to The Gauge, I am a firmly in the House of Remington and consider the 870 to be where it’s at.
I’ve considered and examined and have fired all the Semi Autos out there. The M4 is certainly the Mercedes Benz of the class. However at it’s price… a Thousand Dollars more than most everything else, is it worth it? Man, I don’t know. It’s cool… but I am not sure its a Grand More of Cool.
You know what gun I keep coming back to? The 1187. Reason? I like the position of the Bolt Release. To unleash that bolt on a Tactical Reload, it’s center bottom, easy to get to and faster than a tiny little button that everyone has positioned in the worst possible place. A small button with no geographic reference point on the gun… just alone in the field of the receiver some place where your hand can get struck by the charging handle if you don’t get it out of the way. Every semi auto in current production that feeds from a Tube does this and they are all wrong… all save for the Remington 1187.
I believe this to be a key advantage. Because regardless of how many shells your tube gets stuffed with, its going to go dry and you are going to have to do a fast tactical reload. I think this is a winning position. Not only that, but the 1187 can run the same iron sights that you can on the 870, making it scary accurate with slugs.
This is why my pick on the Semi-Auto Shotgun for fighting… the 1187. For impressing other guys, the M4 remains just fine.
You guys may remember how I rescued an old abused Glock. It cost me 200 bucks, which is about 50 bucks more than a Hi Point and a Box of Ammo.
Well, if you don’t remember, I was working at the gun store one day when a fellow brought in a ragged old Glock that was just beat to hell. We gave him far too much for it on Trade In. The thing was so bad, it wouldn’t be able to be resold. In fact, it didn’t even function. The Trigger wouldn’t reset. The slide… well, the dude tried to polish off all the Black and make it shiny. He failed. The frame looked like a Pit Bull’s Chew Toy.
So I filled out the 4473, purchased it from the store and took it home. It was mine.
The trigger needed new parts. I had a small collection of such parts. Some aftermarket, some Factory Glock. I replaced everything in the trigger mechanism. The result was more than satisfactory. I like it a great deal. After test firing, I was satisfied in the gun’s function. But I hated to look at it. Since I couldn’t hurt it anymore than it had already suffered, I modded it.
This was what it looked like when I got it. Nasty. I cut down the frame from 22 length to 23 length, then I ground off bits and sanded bits and then stippled it. It now feels nothing like a Glock in the hand, and it fits my hand perfectly.
This weekend at Crusader HQ, I took that slide and gave it a fine Media Blast to remove all the problems, old finish, and to rough up the slide so the Cerakote could stick to it better. I took my time on this and really made sure I got everything nice and even.
Then Joe hit it with some Cerakote in a new color I really dig… “Magpul Flat Dark Earth”. This is a darker flat dark earth or Coyote Tan color than is the norm. Looks really good.
The completed gun, better view.
The gun feels better in the hand than it looks. Feels slightly smaller, grippier, and comfortable. This Glock is becoming a personal favorite. I really like the results. If I pick up another model 23, I might chop it down to 27 length. Just for fun.
Marlin rifles have always been a favorite of mine. It was depressing when their quality took such a drastic nose dive.
I’m happy to say that the quality is back. Not only that, but their service department seems to going the extra mile.
We had a customer who’s rifle was damaged in an auto accident. To include ejection from vehicle into river. Lots of damage and broken forend. Marlin fixed everything, good as new, and didn’t charge a dime. That was above and beyond and impressed the hell out of me.
So Marlin gets full marks in their Centerfire Lever Actions again.
The Rimfires… Not so much. In the last two days, we’ve replaced two firing pins in 39As. Both guns suffering misfires. One came back from repair for that reason, and Marlin didn’t fix it… so we did. Problem solved.
In the BMW S1000RR comments, the German 88 was brought up. Great weapon system that. 88mm, or 3.4 Inch, it was a big bore gun for Anti-Aircraft work, but it also served very well in both Field Artillery and Anti-Tank roles. Especially since our tanks were not burdened with an overabundance of Armor.
They used the 88 for everything… mounting it on everything they had that needed a big gun. The concept of the 88 was used by us, in the form of our 105mm guns. But still, the 105 as good as it is, especially in Smooth Bore versions, just never had that same Jack of All Trades utility of the 88.
On trains, on tracks, direct fire, AA, Arty, on wheels… And the fact that they could all fire the same shells made Logistics a breeze. Simple and Multi-Role effective. And at the time, allied forces didn’t really have anything quite like it.
Oh, a Circuit Judge in .22 Magnum? Okay, I’m down. “It wont let leave you hanging.” Oh, that’s good. Don’t want to mess with a Hanging Judge! LOL, Rossi… Using your knowledge of Western Lore… Your Crazy.
Oh man… AND it can shoot .45 Colt and .410 SHOTGUN TOO! It’s MAGIC! Those Wacky Brazilians… They can do anything with Voodoo Magic these days. Even turn a Kenyan into a Hawaiian. You guys are crazy.
That’s it. I’m ordering one. Hell yes. A .22 Mag than can also throw down some wicket .410… I’m in. Give me one, Rossi! I’m holding my breath over here!
DAFUQ? Discontinued? It’s the first featured product on your Web Page? Discontinued! WTF, Rossi? I want this! What can I do? I’m going to call customer service!
Wait. What was I going to call them about? Ah screw it… it will come to me… I’ll just stare at this picture of this adorable blonde girl while I try to remember.
The subject of Lever Action Rifles has been stirring a lot more emotions lately. And it’s not my fault. I blame Tracy for this. Tracy is a local cowboy out here that comes out to Crusader Training using his Lever Action rifles.
To run a Lever defensively, you need not all the modern accessories… the gun is serviceable as is. You needn’t run it with your support hand far out in front as is the modern style. These are not modern guns so you keep your support hand in a location where you find balance and support to work the action. You run it under the same theories as you run your tactical shotguns… fire one, reload one. Fire two, reload two. Keep the gun topped off as much as possible. Standard rifle tactics apply other wise. I find it best to keep ammo not in individual loops like is popular, but in a pouch so you can carry more ammo in bulk rather than a small fixed amount. I like to keep this pouch on the Strong Side, not the Support side like is popular with Shotguns. Reason being is that it’s easier to reload with your Strong Hand than it is the Support Hand. Easier and more efficient. This might be counter to other’s doctrine, but this is what has been working for me for some time now.
Winchester pattern guns or Marlin pattern guns both have their Pro’s and Con’s and one is not clearly better than the other in Rifle Calibers. But I must say that I am quiet fond of the Winchester 92 Pattern guns for Pistol Calibers. But that’s just a Flavor Preference and not a Technical one. I do like the ability to drop a cartridge into the open top if you’ve run the gun dry.
As far as caliber selections… you can argue the benefits of all the options. .44, .45, .357 and such… all fine and well. I’m fond of the .45-70 for my Big Medicine. But don’t discount the Classic .30-30 Win. Ammo is cheap enough an it’s enough gun to drop an Elk let alone Deer or Assorted Baddies. And as far as trajectory goes, the .30-30 offers about the best there is. Especially with LEVERevolution ammo from Hornady.
Crusader Weaponry will be teaching a Lever Action Focus Course in the near future. If you are interested and serious about training with us… Post such below and Emails will be kept for organizing the class. We’re looking at this Fall.
Last Saturday Headshot Willy brought out one of the new SIG P938 pistols. I’ve posted about it before… how cool I thought they were.
Well, at the Range, I was finally able to try my hand with it. The gun shoots as good as it looks. It was accurate and the recoil was plenty mild enough in 9mm. Very controllable.
My target was a small melon sized rock on a berm. 6 out of 6 hits. Plenty good enough for defensive use, and to convince me that one of these days I’ll have to own one of these pistols now.
I’ve always scoffed the use of .22LR for Self / Home defense. But consider the following.
The HK MP5, in .22 LR.CCI Stinger, a .22 round at 1640 FPS.
A combination such as the above as a lot of potential for a .22LR House Gun or Truck Gun. The Stinger is pretty much the hottest thing going for .22LR that I know of. It claims 1640 FPS, which is smoking for these little Rimfires. Put 25 of those little suckers in a little carbine such as this HK MP5, or an S&W M&P15-22, or even a good Ruger 10/22, and you just might have something there.
I know I don’t want to catch any of these Stingers, and certainly not 25 of them. That’s a pretty goodly amount of fire power in a package that even a small child or frail adult or very strange ladyboy could handle with little problem.
We’ve nodded at the value of a training analog using such rimfires to offset the cost of ammunition with 5.56mm and the like. Ammo is expensive, but luckily .22LR can be had in bulk at the average price of 20 bucks for 500.
As a survival tool, .22LR is a clear winner for sure. Packing 500 rounds is pretty easy compared to 500 rounds of anything else. Lots of ammo on hand, cheap ammo, it has a lot going for it.
.22LR is a very lethal little round when used with good accuracy. It’s killed quite a few things over the years. And it’s been used with success as a defensive tool as well. However the point of Defense is not to Kill. The point of Defense is to Stop A Threat. The mad man with the knife is the model often used as an example, and perhaps this is unfair for the rimfire, as it’s also unfair to most handguns… only thing that really works there is a 12 gauge anyways and even then you are going to use multiple shots, so what chance does your 9mm have let alone a .22? The most often “Defense Use” of a weapon is pulling the gun up, pointing it at the Threat and saying “STOP”. This usually works because even stupid bad guys don’t want to get perforated regardless of caliber. And a scary looking .22LR like the picture posted is probably going to be every bit as effective for this purpose as anything else. If not, you have 25 bullet points in your argument to present… I am thinking that this might be convincing enough.
Wild animals don’t speak English, and can be unimpressed with your fancy gun regardless of caliber. Noise often scares them away and any gun shot can do the trick quite often. Having a high capacity here is a very good thing though because if the warning shot (ONLY FOR WILD ANIMAL THREATS OUTSIDE OF THE CITY) fails to send the critter running away, it’s going to come at you. Some animals are much tougher to stop than others. Badgers for one. I hit one with a car and then a .45 and it just got pissed. (I was the one that ran away! Evil little fucker!)
The key here with a .22 LR for Defense is ammo. You want to use the good stuff for this. And I’m talking STINGERS or VELOCITORS. I’d not use anything else. The cheap bulk stuff is good for plinking and practicing, but for serious use, keep your mags full of the quality made stuff. Mini-Mag HP’s are the Minimum. Shot Placement is more critical than ever here because the stopping factors such as hypovolemic shock are not going to come into play here. The hotter rounds as mentioned are your best bet for penetration and tissue/organ disruption. Hollowpoints are advised as well. Not because they expand, because they rarely do reliably… but because the flatter ogive cuts more tissue instead of pushing it apart out of the way. To get the Shot Placement that is so needed, practice becomes very important and again, the .22LR lets you do this. So if you are practicing all the time with your .22 and you can make 5 fast hits in a blink at the sound of the buzzer… that’s a pretty solid defensive response.
