BarryinIN

Anticipated attendance: 70,000 Actual: 75,267

My friend Andy Langlois of Andy's Leather. A good guy making good slings, holsters, ammo cuffs, etc. Boberg Arms XR9 and XR45. OK, I walked past this one a few times before looking. Once I did stop and look, I think it was the most innovative gun there. Maybe the most innovative in a while. That's not to predict success or failure, but it had a lot of different ideas, that's for sure. It has a "fork" that lifts the top cartridge from the magazine and holds it in line with the chamber. The barrel doesn't drop down to unlock; it rotates to lock/unlock similar to the Beretta Cougar or the old Savage pocket pistols. The cartridge is fed in a straight line to the chamber. The designer says this lets him cut the chambers tighter and with full case support (no feed ramp) which lets them handle higher pressure ammo. The .45 ACP model is rated for .45 Super ammunition (28,000 vs 21,000 psi). You should be able to see the fork there. It is a single piece that is pivoted by the slide traveling over it and pressing the back end down. Pretty simple. There are more odd things like the recoil spring being in the upper corner of the slide. It's different all over. A Leupold Custom Shop rep was laser engraving scope turret caps for free. You could choose from wolf prints, deer heads, etc, from their catalog or they could copy something. An idea hit me. I brought the caps from my Scout rifle and had them engraved. Since Jeff Cooper came up with the Scout and Gunsite, I felt the Gunsite logo was fitting:

I went once before. 25 years ago. I hate it took so long to get to another. Next year's is in Nashville. That's not that far... Gunny must have read that because I awoke at 4am with him yelling in my face to start doing PT. Day 3. Final day. I'm sad. It took three of them to drag me out, though. I attended a workshop for clubs and states associations that was very informative. As anyone who has ever used it knows, it's a mess trying to find anything on NRA websites. First, I learned that club support is under NRA Sports. I also learned the NRA has a lot more support for clubs than I knew was available, and how to get it. Now the fun stuff- FNH precision rifles: DSA 58 (FAL) pistol: The obligatory Barrett photo: Kahr gold plated and engraved Tommy gun: Magpul says "bye" to Colorado: No comment:

More celebrities from the gun world. Walt Berger, benchrest champion and founder of Berger bullets: US Shooting Team member (rifle), Sarah Beard, who is from a town about 12 miles from here: The man who made her rifles, Jochan Anschutz: A very poor picture of Todd Jarrett, probably wishing he was at a match somewhere: The Cold Steel guys were sparring every time I walked by. I'd stop for a minute to watch, then 30 minutes later have to tear myself away. Quite a sight: Some actor or something:

Here's some more. The very first Les Baer: The world's slimmest revolver: The goofy thing is a three-shot .38Spl. Two chambers at top and one at the bottom of the flat cylinder. Fire the first two, roll the cylinder around and fire the last. I kid you not. From the provider of fine firearms, Century International Arms. Big brother to the Magpul minibus from yesterday: 5.9 Cummins diesel, leather interior, very large bar, and a full armory in the back complete with water cooled Browning. It even comes with a 1950s cigarette girl (the "cigarettes" in the packs were .223 dummy rounds): Here's a scoop I got from Colt's go-to guy in their 1877 Bulldog Gatling gun: They are going to make a run of 1903 Pocket Model pistols like the the General Officers issue. They have a list of all the original serial numbers issued to Generals and will duplicate those numbers with a new prefix. They will come in a glass topped wood case with the name of the General who originally had that number. Nifty. Now that gat. Colt 1877 Bulldog Gatling gun. Around 400 pounds and $40,000. Your choice of 5 or 10 barrels. The rep said they are actually selling approx 50 per year. That's over twice as many each year as made originally. Poor pic of the new Sig P320 .45. It was drawing a crowd. One of the weird KelTec .223 bullpups promised 4th qtr of 2014 but expected 6th qtr 20nunya: It's a bottom eject, and they had a diagram showing how they did it. The hammer is U-shaped and straddles the ejection port, or chute. The action is long, but being a bullpup, it doesn't matter. I bet I can predict the first club member who owns one. First highlight of my day: This is Mr Russell Gackenback. Mr Gackenback was a navigator on the B-29 "Necessary Evil", which was the photographic plane for Enola Gay. He took the picture, which I've seen and will look up later. He was also the navigator on Enola Gay when it went ahead as a weather check plane over Kokura few days later when Bockscar nuked Nagasaki. Kokura was the primary target. Second highlight: I met my first Medal of Honor recipient. This is SFC (ret) Sammy Lee Davis. He looks like he could walk out on the parade ground and start barking orders right now. A very nice man, and we had a nice chat. He received the Medal of Honor for actions in the Vietnam War in 1967. In the movie "Forrest Gump" when Gump receives the Medal of Honor, it's actually the footage of SFC Davis' award ceremony with alteration. He lives in Indiana. A somber moment: The NRA had some guns there from their museum, like a pair of Annie Oakley's guns but one moved me. I saw a scarred S&W J-frame under glass and had a look. It was the backup gun of an NYPD officer who died in the World Trade Center named Walter Weaver. Rescuers found it in the rubble. I had to walk off for a while after reading about it

I could only stay about four hours today, but it's a start. First, here is the entrance off Capitol Ave at 1:30 when I left: Five minutes later, the car radio is telling me about protesters out front. Where? I guess you had to look for them. Really look. Itty bitty safe: They said they delivered one to a house (mansion) with a front door big enough they wheeled it right in. The first gun in was valued at $40,000. Colt is no longer shy about selling ARs: I've been trying to find some RL-15 powder for almost a year. Notice Alliant didn't even have an empty display can: Seminar- Defensive Shooting Skills Development, by Rob Pincus: Very cool moving target system. I didn't ask the price. Savage "B-Mag". New rimfire with twin rear bolt lugs, and barrel attachment nut and head spacing like the 110, except more streamlined. I only saw .22 Mag and .17 HMR. Why would a VW bus have a Magpul logo instead of a VW logo? Here's why: Springfield Armory has a new version of the Range Officer 1911 (lightweight Commander type- very handy). They also gave away T-shirts. People- Lones Wigger- Olympic shooting team 1964, 1968, 1972, 1980, team coach, Olympic gold medal winner (2x), silver medal winner in Smallbore prone and 3-position: Maj John Plaster- Army SF Vietnam, author of "Ultimate Sniper", "SOG", and several others: Jerry Miculek, world's fastest revolver (and other stuff) shooter:

I keep seeing great reports on the Bushnell Elite series scopes on precision shooting forums.

Magpul to make AUG mags. http://magpul.com/pmag25lr_shipping.html. (Second item down) I could say some things about their radical new polymer mag with window, but will be nice and say its good to have more mags on the market.

aka the NRA Convention. It starts in three days, and I'm standing about 200 yards from the site right now. I'll be there early and often. Anything anyone wants sought out or asked about?

My shooting buddy got the short threaded barrel version recently. He seems pretty happy with it except for the limp Savage stock, but it doesn't seem to hurt anything. He has me thinking about one myself.

I've learned that the current model AUG has matched sales numbers of the original pre/ban AUGs (8,000 each). I'm not sure what that means, but it stuck with me for some reason. If I remember right, the original AUG started showing up here in early 1982. It was banned from importation in mid 1989. Just over seven years and 8,000 rifles. The current A3 went on sale the last few days of August 2012, or 19 months ago. Selling four times as fast. Yay.

Cool! Counting almost 31,000 holes though? I don't know about that little pleasure.

Not just Indiana carry permits, but lifetime. Welcome, Overkill!

This is getting serious.

I'm not a .40 fan for a few reasons, but I wouldn't let the need to keep another type of ammo around keep me from carrying what I consider a more effective caliber. Some inconveniences are worth it. What do I carry concealed? Browning HiPower (9mm) or 1911 (.45) IWB and a Kahr P9 Covert (9mm) in front pocket. In addition, off and on, a S&W 442 (.38) in an ankle holster.

Saturday, the 1911 will turn 103. Celebrate accordingly.

Class is over. Three things: 1) I don't see me saying "It's just a stick" for a long while. 2) I talked a friend into going. We had a plan to go shooting this week, but the new plan consists of us checking with each other to see when the soreness subsides enough. 3) I hope the author got good pictures of me for the S.W.A.T. magazine article he's writing on the class.

I have another Tarani class coming up. Two day combined Cane/Walking Stick defense (I use a cane some) and handgun/long gun retention/disarm. I'll report afterwards.

Nice. Glad it went well. People either enjoy learning their idiosyncrasies or don't want to mess with them at all. I plan to sometime spend a week or two at the range just fooling with the trapdoor. That should let me figure out little things like how it likes to be supported for best groups. It's made it pretty clear that little changes matter. The cleaning rod will jump out about an inch and a half on mine when fired, and if I don't re-seat it, the next shot will be a flyer. There are probably several things like that I've yet to discover.

Good to hear. It sounds like you got a good inspection, too. If they even knew what the Buffington sight was, they were way ahead of most people and probably knew Trapdoors better than the average gunsmith. I wish the wood on mine was free of cracks and dings! When you shoot it on paper, remember a couple of things. For some reason, the trigger feels twice as heavy when you are squeezing it at the bench trying to get a really good hit. It's strange to me. I know I've shot guns with heavier triggers, but the Trapdoor seems to take more concentration to keep pressing instead of giving a good yank. And when it goes, that heavy hammer makes it jump a little before it goes bang. Have a good firm hold on it, or it may jump off target a little. These things seem like nothing until you are sitting at the bench trying for a precise shot.

Another: http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewItem.aspx?Item=390452311 Currently at $8,000.

With the caveat that everybody who ever owned a gun seems to have a different theory on cleaning, I'd say a little discoloration on the patch is OK. My feeling is there is a point of no return in cleaning, where the effort to get a little more out can cause more risk of things like the cleaning rod dragging along the throat, the patch "blossoming" at the muzzle and causing wear there, etc.

There is one guy who provides the majority of my SHOT Show scoop each year. Usually he has a fountain of info for me to pick through, but I only got a little from him this year. Then I found out why things were so scarce from him. He didn't get to go this year. Couldn't get away from his real job. What he did pass along what he heard from others, though. So that's why I didn't bury the forum with pics and descriptions this year. Not that we see 90% before the next show anyway. Or the next. Or the next. That's OK, this year's NRA Annual Meetings are a few miles up the road.

Give me time.

The Professor died.