Innehållsförteckning för July 2017 från Guns & Ammo

AGING AMERICA Weaker eyes demand different gun sights. Getting older goes along with diminished reflexes, weaker grip strength, balance and musculature degeneration. These issues demand guns that are lighter, safer, easier to use, simpler to maintain and free from teeth-rattling recoil. Still, they must offer aging users lethal force. This brings me to my question: Is anyone working on a handgun specifically designed for seniors? Len Boswell Email As of now, we are unaware of a company marketing to older shooters or designing handguns for this specific demographic — perhaps they should. There are pistols that work well for shooters with certain degenerative conditions. For example, I know of two elderly women in my family with arthritis who use a Beretta 21 Tomcat and the similar Taurus PT22/25. Though the…

REDUCED-SIZE CARRY PISTOLS are always hot sellers. As the world turns increasingly violent, the capability to defend ourselves becomes increasingly necessary. Under these conditions, a pistol remains a critical component to a defensive strategy. The first rule is to have one, and the second is to know how to use it. Acquiring and learning how to use a pistol requires time and money. Since those two commodities are always in short supply, it’s best to be efficient with both. Return of the .380 Developed by John Browning in the then-new Colt Model 1908 hammerless pocket auto, the .380 ACP continues to enjoy a wave of popularity that began building momentum a few years back. Many consider the cartridge to be sufficient for self-defense use, and it works well in compact…

HIGH THREAT CONCEALMENT (HTC) is the creation of former U.S. State Department high-threat personal security detail members James Overton and Adam Garrison. To meet the demands of their jobs, they set out to produce a thin, lightweight and scalable belt system that was slimmer and tighter fitting than the traditional nylon battle belt. The gear had to be concealable beneath a sport coat or an untucked button-down shirt required for many low-profile operations. All components had to be tailored to the user’s preference, which includes the orientation of magazines and where they are positioned along the belt. In speaking with Overton and Garrison, they reiterated that HTC gear is not constructed of Kydex but rather a higher-strength thermoplastic called Boltaron, a substance that is impervious to heat, wear and cracking.…

COMPETITION IMPROVES the breed. It is fashionable in some circles to mock competition as unrealistic, but the problem-solvers who compete drive improvements from which we all benefit. In this case, the driver was the U.S. Army and its Modular Handgun System (MHS) program. The M9 was said to be long in the tooth, and a lot has changed since its adoption more than 30 years ago. The Army wanted something different. They wanted something that would work with suppressors, a pistol that could be easily reconfigured for various hand sizes and missions. And along those terms, the Army also wanted a pistol flexible enough to host lights, lasers, slide-mounted red dots, etc. The specs of the pistol are pretty impressive. The Army insisted on a 90 percent or greater chance…

FACETIOUS COMMENTS about France’s supposed lack of martial ardor get quite tiresome. One only has to look back over the centuries to witness many examples of French valor: the Gallic Wars, the battles of Poitiers, Crécy, Marengo, Solferino, the Marne, Verdun, Ypres — these are just a few that immediately come to mind. To be sure, not all were victories, but the mettle of the individual soldier in all these affrays is undeniable. Granted, the French resistance to Germany in 1940 was less than stellar, but after suffering such heavy casualties in the Great War — almost 1,400,000 deaths, or about 4 percent of the total population — a large number of which were suffered on French soil, the will to resist was severely compromised. This is not to say…

“WHY WOULD SOMEONE WANT ONE?” I’ve been hearing that question a lot lately with regard to the new M249S that FN loaned Guns & Ammo. Weighing 17 pounds without ammunition means that it’s heavy. At $8,500 retail, it isn’t an affordable purchase for most of us, and that “S” suffix means that it’s semiautomatic. What fun is a belt-fed that shoots only one round for each trigger pull? As I went on a public tour of ranges with the M249S, I realized that these are the first responses from the shooting public. All of them had something in common: They hadn’t shot it. I’m not going to start this review by dismissing those points. They are relevant. I also realize that it isn’t as cool as the original FN Minimi,…

THE GP100 WAS introduced in 1986 as the most durable, longest-lasting medium-framed .357 Magnum duty revolver to be had. It was intended to withstand a steady diet of full-house .357 Magnums, which, in the then-new lightweight hollowpoint offerings, had proven to be tough on other medium-framed revolvers. Unfortunately, 1986 was the beginning of the law enforcement’s race to transition to autoloading pistols, and the solid, dependable GP100 was left out of that equation. Now, 30-plus years later, there is a renewed interest in revolvers as daily carry guns and as dependable camp guns. Along with that renewed interest comes a desire on the part of some shooters to move up in bore size. Some may find a high-capacity 9mm pistol comforting, but you can carry a bigger bore in many…