Innehållsförteckning för February 2018 från Guns & Ammo

THERE ARE THINGS you read and think, I’ll never get to do that. Such as drive 200 miles per hour in a race car; date a supermodel; or perhaps shoot a rare and historically significant firearm. For me, I recently checked one of those three off my bucket list. Back in the first decade of the 20th century, the U.S. Army was playing catch-up. It had finally gotten a modern service rifle in the M1903 Springfield and was in the process of selecting a new service sidearm. The U.S. wouldn’t be up to the rest of the world in machine guns until after the Great War, but in that first decade machine guns were still not seen as something other than light artillery. The U.S. Cavalry, however, wanted a new…

I’VE BECOME QUITE THE FAN of Savage Arms within the last 10 years. Savage has spent a ton of time and effort continually improving and refining their rifles. Three features unique to Savage that I like the most are the floating bolt head, the Accutrigger — that every other rifle manufacturer now copies — and the Accustock. The Savage Accustock has long been one of the best-performing factory stocks available. It has a rigid aluminum bedding system about which the rest of the polymer stock attaches. The result is a very rigid and light stock that uniformly supports the action, ensures the barrel remains free-floating, and keeps the internal or a detachable box magazine anchored in the same place relative to the receiver. No factory stock offers more performance for…

AN AMMUNITION BOX is a container designed for safe storage and convenient transport. Since the 19th century, militaries have been using boxes made of metal or crates of wood. But times and materials change. OK, plastic boxes are not new. Neither is the Minneman family’s MTM Case-Gard company. The Minneman’s have been developing clever ways to use plastic to make their lives of shooting, collecting and reloading easier since 1968. And we’re the ones that benefit. Everything you can do with a surplus GI ammo can, you can do with MTM cans and crates. The difference is that they are steadier to stack and much easier to fill to capacity. Plastic may not be as rigid as steel, but that can be a good thing. MTMs are lighter with better…

THE MAIN ARTICLE, “Scientific Buffalo Hunter,” published in Guns & Ammo’s second issue described the exploits of Civil War-veteran Frank Mayer. Mayer used a .45-120-550 Sharps fitted with a German-made 10X scope to allegedly kill thousands of bison until he re-enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1875. He retired 35 years later as a colonel, then served as a law officer in Colorado. He continued hunting until he turned 100 in 1950. A short sidebar to the article spotlighted another Sharps used by famous buffalo hunter and lawman, Bill Tilghman. His second wife, Zoe Tilghman, was photographed holding the rifle and was quoted, “With it, he killed 7,500 buffalo; hunters kept accounts daily. He wore it out until the barrel was smooth inside, sent it to the factory and had…

A POLICE OFFICER AND FRIEND, sent me a text message: “Truck shoot on November 12,” he wrote. “And it’s cheap! $15 gets you two runs. There are 80 targets, so you’ll usually shoot around 160 rounds per run. You shoot from the bed of an old pickup that’s pulled by a tractor. Trust me, it’s a lot of fun. Go online and sign up.” The match was being held in Havana, Illinois, and I saw 1911-legend Dick Heinie’s name had been squadded to shoot on the website’s registration page. That made my mind up to be there. In preparation for the truck shoot, I found an old YouTube video. The event could be called a tractor pull since it had one towing a springless bed salvaged from a mid-’60s Ford…

DUE TO AN ESCALATION in societal violence, the need for armed, law-abiding citizens appears to be increasing. My grandfather would never have dreamed of needing personal protection while attending Sunday church service, but that mindset is reasonable by many right now. As a full-time police officer, I prefer to carry a firearm off-duty that closely resembles my issued sidearm, which I’ve trained with and feel comfortable handling while under stress. I am not interested in attempting to defend my life or my family’s life with a small and unfamiliar compact pocket pistol. Since my current duty gun is a Glock 22 with a Stream-light TLR attached, I like to carry a similar set-up when not working. The challenge is dressing around a full-size pistol with a light attached. There’s a…

I FIRST BECAME FAMILIAR with Black Hills products while serving on a U.S. Army Special Forces A-Team. The ammunition available to us at the time was the standard Army-issued M855 (green tip) and Mk 262, which was available only to Special Operations Forces. The weapons sergeant on the team kept track of exactly how much Mk 262 we had on hand, and said when and where we were allowed to use it. Perhaps needless to say, we never shot Mk 262 at the range. Little did I know then, Mk 262 was developed by Black Hills Ammunition in the late 1990s and they have been loading it for the military for almost 20 years. Along the way, they’ve learned a thing or two about what it takes to make quality…

EASE OF INSTALLATION and tight tolerances are two descriptors not often used together, especially when referring to firearm parts. However, there is one company that has stood out for years: Geissele Automatics. Almost 13 years ago, Bill Geissele developed his first product, which was a match AR-15 trigger used by high-power rifle shooters for competing in Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP) and NRA matches. It didn’t take long for soldiers in the U.S. Army’s Marksmanship Unit (AMU) and then-U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) to take notice of those triggers on the firing lines. It even made its way into the legendary Mk12 rifles. Geissele’s popularity within those communities became contagious. Thanks to Geissele’s attention to detail and do-it-the-right-way attitude, requests for other products were made by those same military units. Geissele’s…

“I eventually became deadly with this rather heavy little .22. I loved that gun.” TO SOME FOLKS, they would look at my upbringing and say I led a sheltered life growing up on the prairies of South Dakota with a constant 20-knot wind and gophers galore. But to a young man who didn’t know any better, I thought I had it licked. Riding a horse for 10 miles to count cows was a treat for me. This meant three things: One, I would get to ride a horse, which was always a plus. Next, I would get to take a can of pork and beans with me to have as my chow. Lastly, I was never once told to stop shooting gophers. As a matter of fact, at some…

WHILE INTERESTING ON ITS OWN RIGHT, the integrally suppressed SilencerCo Maxim 50 muzzle-loader with a suggested retail of $900 is generating extraordinary foment because of what it does. It sidesteps all of the National Firearms Act (NFA)-related red tape, government forms, taxes and wait times. Here’s how the muzzleloader does that. National law considers muzzleloaders antiques — or at best “antique weapons” — and not firearms. By definition, a suppressor is only a suppressor if it attaches to and muffles a firearm. Thus, a suppressor-like apparatus permanently attached to a muzzleloader isn’t technically a suppressor, and the NFA suppressor laws don’t apply. Sound sketchy? It’s not, and SilencerCo has an official letter of approval from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) stating — and I paraphrase —…