Gun Talk

[StoleIt]

Just finished this today. It's my second AR, but first "budget" build:

PSA 14.7 LW mid-length CMV MP upper with YHM diamond rail, low profile gas block and pinned YHM-28 5M2 muzzle brake

PSA Gadsden Stripped Lower

PSA LPK

PSA Charging Handle with latch

BCM BCG

Magpul MOE Stock, MBUS, Trigger guard, AFG-2 and MOE Grip

PA Micro Dot

Nice build. What's the barrels overall length? Is it 16+ inches w/that muzzle device or an SBR?

[ChkHandleDn]

With the pinned and welded brake, it's just over 16 inches.

[Hacker]

Nice build. What's the barrels overall length? Is it 16+ inches w/that muzzle device or an SBR?

The 14.7" barrels are constructed at that length specifically so an A2 flash hider would take the length to 16".

[HU&W]

Opinions?

[M2]

$559 for a .22LR? Sorry, I love .22s; but that's a lot more than I'm willing to spend on one especially considering that you can get a GSG-522 from Bud's Gun Shop for just over three hundred bucks or even a used 10/22 for $150-200 easily.

For that money, you can get a much bigger caliber rifle and really do some damage!

Cheers! M2

[Beaver]

Opinions?

If you are looking for an AR-style .22 made by Umarex I'd go with the Colt M4 Ops for ~$50 less.

[HU&W]

Fair 'nuff. Admittedly I like the idea of an all-metal GSG and I've always loved 22LR. Now onto something a little more interesting.

Today I got my hands on this little gem. It's Ruger's new takedown 10/22. I fired a few hundred rounds through it via a Ruger branded 25 round clip. I was a bit hesitant because I've had bad misfeed experiences before with aftermarket 25 rd clips from other manufacturers in the 10/22. This was a joy to shoot. There were no misfeeds, FTL, or FTF in over 200 rounds (including rapid fire). I found the rifle to be extremely accurate to 50+ yards with the iron sights, and repeatable even when taken apart and reassembled between sets. Disassembly is a matter of simply moving a lever and twisting the barrel. Assembly is the reverse, literally taking 6-9 seconds. It even had a nice backpack designed to fit all the parts. This is one of the nicest and easiest to use takedown rifles I've personally used.

Now just have to buy one for myself.

[brickhistory]

New-ish Old School: S&W Model 21-4

note: photos from the Gunbroker auction I won. Not my personal photos.

Added this to my collection and took it to the range for the first time today.

I can't find the specs on it; the instructions are generic S&W revolver ones, but here goes anyway:

I like blued guns with wood grips. I like the classics in both revolvers and semi-autos.

This time, it was a revolver's turn. I'm also a fan of the .44, in this case, the .44 special.

This revolver has a four-inch barrel, the square butt grips which do well in filling the palm to handle the recoil, but then the heavy mass of this thing does that as well.

The sights are distinctly old-school, the rear is simply a channel in the top of the frame while the front is a blued half-moon that to my ageing eyes tends to disappear without a vivid contrast behind it. I intend to change the front site with some sort of gold dot which will help as well as adding one more touch of "bling" to the gun since it has the Thunder Ranch logo in gold on the right side. Normally, I'm not a fan of any sort of advertising or safety inscriptions on the weapon other than an understated manufacturer's name and the caliber, but I have to admit to kinda liking the gold on the blue.

I didn't really put a lot of rounds through it because .44 special both in stores and on-line is damned hard to find if you are looking for bulk (50 rd boxes) of jacketed ammo. The cowboy loads are reasonably plentiful, but just trash the barrel, so I don't like using it. The self-defense stuff is great, but at approaching .75 to $1.00 a round, it's prohibitive for a range session.

That said, I like this gun. It shoots great; DA pull is a little heavy compared to my S&W Model 29, but not unbearably. The SA is like "buttah," just like most S&W's are.

The practical value of the gun is somewhat limited. It would be just fine in the nightstand or even as a holstered carry, but it is heavy and bulky. There are better, higher capacity self-defense guns available and I'd never use this for either method of use/carry.

No, I got this just because I wanted it. It will strictly be a range queen, likely only taken a few times a year unless ammo gets more plentiful, but damn if it doesn't just look great. I'll keep the supplied display case in a closet, but the revolver itself will take pride of place in my big gun cabinet.

Edited September 16, 2012 by brickhistory

[Timbonez]

Brick, nice review. Have you considered handloading? It would make shooting .44 special a lot more economical, especially for range use.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

Edited September 16, 2012 by Timbonez

[brickhistory]

Have I considered it?

Yes.

Am I gonna?

Probably not.

When my father passed away some years back, he had been a life-long shooter, amateur gunsmith, and, due to economics, a handloader as well. From casting bullets to scrubbing brass to assembling a cartridge, it was his hobby and his man-cave room with all the presses, dies, powder, workbench, etc. etc.

I helped but found it tedious.

When he passed, none of us wanted the hassle of toting several thousand pounds of gear during PCS moves, or they didn't have the room in their current house, etc, etc etc.

I know the state of the art has progressed significantly since then, and the process is much faster depending on how much $$$ one wants to sink into the proper equipment. I just don't want to devote the time and money to doing it. I'm at a point where I can afford the ammo, but remember the days in the past where every dollar mattered. Old habits die hard, but now it's a time vs. money thing. I'll buy store-bought and save that amount of rapidly decreasing time left to me for trigger time and other stuff versus reloading myself.

But kudos for those that do. It's just not for me.

Edited September 16, 2012 by brickhistory

[brickhistory]

Found a Springfield Armory XDS in black at Cabela's yesterday, so I snagged it.

First, it and the M&P Shield are kicking the market's ass. The Walther PPS I had wanted for a while had been drastically reduced in price, no doubt to somewhat compete.

The XDS sold (I should've waited) for the same price as the PPS.

I debated a while about what I wanted and what I liked about the three - XDS, Shield, PPS.

It finally boiled down to....

it is a freakin' .45 in the same size as my .380 PPK/S which has been my go-to pocket/summer carry!

Ultimately, size matters.

No opportunity to fire it yet; will write something up when I do.

UPDATED with firing report: note: not my photo

Ok, so I took it to the range today. Fired 100 rounds of generic 230 gr. ball and 50 rounds of Speer gold-dot hollow point, 200 gr. +P

Distance ranged from 7 to 50 feet using a B-27 standard silhouette (sp?) target.

This is a snappy sumb1tch to fire. Although I can hold it with all fingers on the grip, the pinkie is only about half-way and I found it sliding to underneath the magazine when pulling the trigger. It flips with recoil, not unexpectedly, but damn noticably.

Sights are big for the size of the pistol and I really like the red fiber optic front sight and used that exclusively when practising for speed and initial shot placement, i.e., put the red dot center mass and fire. From 7 to about 15 feet everything went into center mass, 8 ring or better. I fired 15 rounds at 7 feet and 10 rounds at 50 feet using slow aimed fire. All 10 of those went into the cranium part of the target, so it's possible to shoot accurately using the sights as designed. The rest were at 15 feet, rapid fire (well, up to six times per...)

But, this is a self-defense pistol designed for easily concealability and everything seemed to be sacrificed for that. Which is ok, it is what it is designed to be.

After 100 rounds of the ball ammo, my hand was tired. After 25 rounds of the hollow-point +P bullets, my hand hurt. The last 25 were painful. The 4x4 off-road tire style grips did their job of staying put, but at the cost of a raw-ish palm at the conclusion of the day.

Obviously, this is not an extended fire-fight type weapon, more for the get the immediate threat away/down with the first shots. And it does that job exceedingly well, grip grabbing and all.

As I noted in my initial post, this is the same size, to within a gnat's hair, of my PPK/S which is in .380. So a trade of two rounds of .380 for the bigger hole-producing .45, especially as winter approaches and big/bulky clothing suppling some inadvertant protection for potential bad guys, and I'll take the .45 every time. (Again, I do not intend to sound all Dirty Harry and street tough. I avoid, if possible, situations where I'll be the odd man out, but you never know being in the world what could happen. This evens those odds should something bad occur.)

This thing can be a pocket gun, definitely a comfortable IWB carry. I like it a lot and can replace my seasonal carry of cold weather Bersa .45 and warm weather PPK/S with one gun year round. Better for training, better for muscle memory, better for nearly everything it could be useful for.

PRO:

- Size; already covered.

- Red front fiber optic sight makes engaging close and quickly much easier for me.

- Standard appearing and functioning magazines. Although they are only 5 rounds, the supplied magazines look like any other standard semi-auto magazine. It's probably just me and I'm sure it could be overcome with training, but every time I handled (sts) a Shield or PPS in the store and inserted the extended capacity magazines - 7 or 8 rounds - just looking at the design of it made me initially insert it backwards. Dumbassness on my part, certainly, but add adrenaline to needing a reload and I'll take a lizard-brain solution every time.

- Size of magazines means I'm more likely to carry a reloacd than I was previously. These things are small. At only 6 rounds in the first go, a reload is probably a good thing anyway, but I always figure that an extended bad session means I'm likely to have a bad day anyway. Still, good to have the option.

- I had no issues with jams, etc. True, 150 rounds does not make for a real reliability test, but it sure is a good start. From reading here and on-line the XD line has a good reputation for reliability but to be honest, until this one, I found them just butt-ugly (don't ban me, bro'!) and couldn't make myself buy one with so many other choices out there. BTW, I feel the same way about Glocks for looks and the blocky grip angle doesn't work for me anyway.

CON:

- Tough to have a 300round range session for regular practice. Doesn't mean I won't, and I will, since this will be my well-dressed gun, but I won't be thrilled about it. For some, this could be the difference between practicing at all. I will have to experiment with lower-powered ball ammo and definitely for self-defense loads. The +P was all I had, but it was just too much to be comfortable. No doubt wouldn't be a factor come showtime, but I think I can do better and will keep looking.

- Only six rounds at the ready. Most likely, won't need any more, but you don't have the option. Trade-off, again, between capacity and concealability.

- About 1/4 - 1/2 inch too short for a full-fingered grip. A company called Pearce makes pinky grip extensions for other short magazines and is supposed to introduce ones for the XDS in October. I will trade the minor loss of concealability for a major, for me, gain in controllability/comfort.

- I thought the price was a little steep. It is a seller's market right now as everyone wants the new toy and supply is so far scarce. But I think I paid about $100 more than I should have. But that was my choice so it's not the gun's fault.

It is my new carry gun. Or will be once Nebraska sends me my CCW which I had to wait until today to apply.

Edited September 20, 2012 by brickhistory

[HU&W]

I'm not partial to the black either. Except for my AR, I've sold every long gun with a synthetic stock. If I thought I could modify a nice laminate wood stock to work with the takedown, I may have to buy one.

Here's a modded one from rimfire central. Pretty much the setup I'd go for.

[Beaver]

I stopped in my local gun shop and they had just gotten one in. I spent a while going over it. Very nice. This particular one was a USA Shooting Team Special Edition with a blue stock and a red backpack. There was no way I was going to buy a gun with a blue synthetic stock. Hideous.

I'm not partial to the black either. Except for my AR, I've sold every long gun with a synthetic stock. If I thought I could modify a nice laminate wood stock to work with the takedown, I may have to buy one.

I've got a laminate stock that I took off without ever using if you are interested.

[BigFreddie]

I remember a while back reading on here that some of your guys had a SCAR17--just wanted to see if there are any updates on your opinions? Specifically how the stock is holding up and if you're using any after market items?

Also, does anybody have a Krebs AK? I've been researching both the SCAR and Krebs (specifically in 5.45) a lot recently and will probably be purchasing at least one of them in the nex couple of months (and yes, I know they're quite different firearms, hence the two separate questions).

I've had my SCAR for over a year now but don't have anymore than 500 rounds through it.

I've added the Tango Down charging handle (still undecided - probably not a required accessory), Tango Down stock latch (worth the money), and a 7.62 Battle Comp which should come with the rifle (most of the recoil reduction with less than half the blast/concussion of the OEM brake). I'm running a Blue Force/Vickers sling with Blue Force loop on the rear and a QD swivel on the rail up front.

In my opinion, if you want a 7.62 battle rifle, this is the one to get. It has very respectable accuracy and shoots very softly for a 7.62 (compared to M1A, HK91, FALs I've had). I've got no issues with the stock and I don't think anyone outside of living on the frontlines somewhere would. The number of stocks I've heard of breaking is very, very few. There is a replacement stock for it in the works if it worries you...

If you want decent accuracy and aren't looking for match-grade/sniper rifle groups, I can't think of a better set up for the money...

BF

[HeloDude]

I've had my SCAR for over a year now but don't have anymore than 500 rounds through it.

I've added the Tango Down charging handle (still undecided - probably not a required accessory), Tango Down stock latch (worth the money), and a 7.62 Battle Comp which should come with the rifle (most of the recoil reduction with less than half the blast/concussion of the OEM brake). I'm running a Blue Force/Vickers sling with Blue Force loop on the rear and a QD swivel on the rail up front.

In my opinion, if you want a 7.62 battle rifle, this is the one to get. It has very respectable accuracy and shoots very softly for a 7.62 (compared to M1A, HK91, FALs I've had). I've got no issues with the stock and I don't think anyone outside of living on the frontlines somewhere would. The number of stocks I've heard of breaking is very, very few. There is a replacement stock for it in the works if it worries you...

If you want decent accuracy and aren't looking for match-grade/sniper rifle groups, I can't think of a better set up for the money...

BF

Thanks man! Appeciate you and tac airlifter responding to my questions. I recently found a site that has them for $2480 which is the military/LE price. Right now they just have them in black and if I'm going to spend that kind of cash, I'm wanting to get exactly what I want and that's in FDE. Unfortunately they're out of those, but I think I'll pull the trigger when those come back in stock as you can't beat the price.

[M2]

I was bopping around the local gun show with my teenage son a few weekends back when I hear a young lady working a booth say "We think it's Polish, but we're not sure what it is!"

Obviously, that got my attention so I walked over and saw this...

A Polish NSP-2 night vision scope. I start talking to the young lady and some other guy working the booth, and he tells me he bought from some dude who found it in an abandoned storage locker (ala Storage Wars). He also lets slip what he paid for it ($80), so I offer him $100 and he says he doesn't know how much it's worth but he'll take it.

It's not pristine but it's also not in bad shape for a 1960s first generation night vision scope. It's missing the battery, but what little I have found I've been able to find some folks say a 6v battery will work.

The upside? Well, like I said it was an insane deal. After I got home, I found that in this state, these usually run about $300. Plus, the cool factor is high.

Still, I would like to see if it is operational...I know this is older technology, but it should still work.

Here's a pic of it on my Saiga...

It weighs a freaking ton and is monstrous compared to the red dot I normally run on this AK!

Cheers! M2

[Beaver]

If you've got any documentation let me know and I'll run it past a couple Polish guys in the squadron.

[HU&W]

If I find a black takedown 10/22 at a reasonable price, I might talk to you about it.

I spoke with the gun guy at the BX last week and he quoted me $280 to order the 10/22 takedown. Much better than the $360-$380 everyone seems to want downtown.

[brickhistory]

Further to

I picked up the 7 round extended magazine today.

And now I have, essentially,.....wait for it....

a 1911.

That said, this is now my all season/all purpose CCW gun. If able to conceal with a sweater or the like, the longer magazine makes for a better grip and more rounds available.

For summer or other times when size does matter, in goes the 5 round magazine.

No more .380 in summer and different .45 in winter.

Still like the gun; trying to refine the best self-defense round for me. Went through five different types yesterday, some more manageable with the smaller magazine/grip than others. Pretty much +P stuff is out, and the Hornady 200 gr. seemed the best compromise for power and not killing my hand, sts.

Shot some stuff called MAGTECH that felt good, but had such a bright flash that even in a lighted range, it was blinding. Looked pretty, but not so much, I think for real-world uses.

[JarheadBoom]

Speer offers at least one loading (230gr.) of Gold Dot that's specifically made for short barrels. They're not +P. They work well in my XD45 Service, although I'm not a good-enough or experienced-enough shooter to tell if they're truly "better" than the standard 230gr. Gold Dot. Might be worth looking into, if you haven't already...

[M2]

Further to

I picked up the 7 round extended magazine today.

And now I have, essentially,.....wait for it....

a 1911.

That said, this is now my all season/all purpose CCW gun. If able to conceal with a sweater or the like, the longer magazine makes for a better grip and more rounds available.

For summer or other times when size does matter, in goes the 5 round magazine.

No more .380 in summer and different .45 in winter.

Still like the gun; trying to refine the best self-defense round for me. Went through five different types yesterday, some more manageable with the smaller magazine/grip than others. Pretty much +P stuff is out, and the Hornady 200 gr. seemed the best compromise for power and not killing my hand, sts.

Shot some stuff called MAGTECH that felt good, but had such a bright flash that even in a lighted range, it was blinding. Looked pretty, but not so much, I think for real-world uses.

Brick

Somehow I missed your previous post. Not surprisingly, I also picked up a XDs about two months ago. Been looking for one for several months, then suddenly Academy Sports had one in the case when I stopped by there to pick up some ammo. Once I held it, I wouldn't let it go...

I totally concur with your pros/cons, although I am actually surprised at how tame this little pistol is once you realize it is a .45 pocket gun! Sure, after shooting the .22 Neos it felt like a cannon, but on its own it is probably the best anyone is going to get at calming down shooting such a large, heavy bullet out of such a small package!

That said, I haven't shoved a couple of hundred rounds down the pipe in a single sitting. I also accept that there's some compromise given the thing was designed to be a easy-to-conceal or back-up gun. I love the fact that I can carry two pistols of the same caliber, and that caliber being .45 ACP!

I too snagged a 7-round mag but honestly I am not sure if I really like it that much! It removes the "smallness" which is its main selling point. On the XDs forum (XDTalk), many guys are using it as their second mag. That's probably how I'll go, as I like I can actually pocket carry this thing without a problem.

As for SD ammo, I'm using 230 gr Federal Hydra-Shoks JHPs same as with my XD-45. I put a box through my XDs without any problems, and I've had nothing but great results with it.

Now, the hunt is one for a good CCW holster. There's numerous discussions on that subject over on XDTalk, but I haven't decided which would work best for me yet.

Cheers! M2

p.s. Forgot to add, in case you haven't figured it out already, 1911 loaders work great on these magazines!

[brickhistory]

I'll look for the lighter charged Speer, thanks for the tip.

I found that the Galco STO 440 IWB is my preference. I also picked up a in-pocket holster designed for the Glock 26 that fits really well.

Edited October 4, 2012 by brickhistory

[cragspider]

I got one back in July and I love it. It replaced my bersa 380 for my summer gun and would probably be my winter gun as well if I didn't already have my xd45. I carry it in a MTAC holster and don't even know its there most of the time. I did run a mag of corbon 185 +p and it wasn't bad but would agree that a steady diet of those at the range wouldn't be to fun on the hand. Had no problem shooting out the center of the target or head shots at 3.5-5 yards. Maybe after my PCS to Germany I will add the 7 rounders to my xds and a new mag carrier.

[ChkHandleDn]

I spoke with the gun guy at the BX last week and he quoted me $280 to order the 10/22 takedown. Much better than the $360-$380 everyone seems to want downtown.

That's not bad at all. Best I've seen is $319 at Academy Sports.

[slackline]

So, I did a search, and maybe I just don't know how to search inside a specific thread, if that's even possible, but anyone have any experience with the Kel-Tech KSG? It looks like a pretty mean and capable HD shotgun, but for the price you could really set up a nice Mossy. Anyone have one, or shot one? Thanks.