Innehållsförteckning för May/June 2020 #48 från Recoil

It’s easy to see why every kid dreams of owning an Italian supercar. A piece of art that looks like it can break the sound barrier is the apex of what life is all about. But age creeps up, and words like practicality, frugality, and comfort enter the vocabulary. This point of deterioration is where minivan and Prius — the bane of automotive existence — sales come from. For some, the idea of horsepower and torque are forgotten, whereas others use those metrics to measure life. Eventually, automotive enthusiasts fall into one of two factions: those who prefer to buy their car and those who want to build one. Bought or built? The bought comes with the prestige of ownership that you’ve worked hard enough to afford something lavish. This…

Twenty-two caliber rimfire rifles have long been the go-to for teaching new or younger shooters. For many, it’s the first rifle they learned to shoot, plinking or hunting squirrels. However, the last few years has seen an explosion in the popularity of these small-caliber rifles, leading to the development of new equipment, adaptation of equipment from other shooting disciplines, and even the creation of new sanctioning bodies for competitions. As Tony Gimmellie, a scout/sniper and Team Hornady shooter says, “I compete, or have competed, in almost every shooting sport, with the exception of trap and skeet, for the last 20 years. I have never had as much fun in shooting as I’m having with these 22s.” For those looking to get in on the fun, or better yet get their…

FOOTWEAR, GLOVES, AND TECHNICAL APPAREL PURPOSE BUILT FOR YOUR DAILY GUNFIGHT GO TO WWW.VIKTOS.COM FOR MORE EDC: EVERYDAY COMBAT Life is a daily gunfight. On occasion, that gunfight is a live-ball shit-show. But most days, it’s just dealing with a society gone off the rails. Viktos believes in prepping for this reality with unique designs not found in the tired offerings of our predecessors. Leading from the front, the Kruger jacket ($240) is a blend of performance outdoor fleece and tactical features to keep the lo-vis operator fully operational. Keeping a blaster close at hand, the Upscale CCW Slingbag ($65) carries a full-size pistol, mags, med kit, TQ, and other critical carry in a discrete silhouette. Footwear is covered with the newest iteration of the Johnny Combat Ops boots ($110) featuring…

The 22 Long Rifle cartridge came on the scene in the late 1800s and has remained the most commonly used cartridge among hunters and recreational shooters alike. It’s often thought of as the go-to caliber for young or beginner shooters, but it’s so much more than that. Leaps in engineering and ballistics allow us to stretch the capabilities of this little cartridge to distances that were previously unimaginable, and with the NRL22 series kicking off in 2017, followed by the Vudoo Rimfire series in 2018, precision rimfire shooting is quickly gaining popularity. With virtually no recoil, not only are .22 rimfire rifles easy to shoot, they’re quiet, too. Add in affordability and the allure of the 22LR is obvious. You might think that if you’re already shooting precision rifle in…

In 2010, a standoff with police in Hoonah, Alaska, on the northeast shore of Chichagof Island led to a shootout that resulted in two officers being killed and the suspect barricading himself inside a house. Alaska State Trooper Rodney Dial responded to the call that day and came to a sobering realization — local law enforcement needed an armored vehicle. Alas, not one could be found in the entire state. After the situation came to an end, his search began for a platform that could be used to respond to similar confrontations in the future. Rodney took it upon himself to research this category of vehicles and quickly discovered how cost prohibitive it’d be to get a modern one with all the bells and whistles better-funded departments had. That led…

There seems to be a nebulous atmosphere of gloom and doom circulating in America today. Politicians and TV pundits claim our government is on the brink of collapse; Time magazine’s scowling teen slacktivist-of-the-year thinks we’ll all be fighting over newly formed beachfront property soon; keyboard commandos on social media are certain of a forthcoming civil war. Any rational person takes these pessimistic perspectives with a huge grain of salt. Still, it’s never a bad idea to insulate yourself from a variety of worst-case scenarios according to the essential mantra of preparedness gear, better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. With this in mind, we set out to build a rifle that might serve as a one-sizefits-most tool for the types of…

As a teenager growing up in New York City back in the ’80s, I had a lot of friends of the Jewish persuasion who’d go to Israel for their mandatory service in the Israeli Defense Forces. Being a gun nut in training who couldn’t own a gun at the time, I wanted to hear all of their stories about shooting and firearms. They made the Galil sound like the ultimate military rifle, combining the best aspects of the M16 and the AK-47. According to them, it was more accurate, rugged, and reliable than either. It was one of those rifles I yearned to have, yet political circumstances dashed that dream several times in the past. WHAT’S SO GREAT ABOUT THE GALIL? Yisrael Galili and Yaacov Lior designed the Galil in…

We all know that guy who cleans his gun after every range trip, and we also know that guy who has never cleaned his gun. Neither are right or wrong but one thing we should all agree on is cleaning your silencer is unneeded, right? Well, sort of. Here we dive into some best practices about silencer maintenance, dos and don’ts, and the reasons behind them. Silencers are becoming very common place in today’s firearms industry and rightfully so. Everyone should want less sound, improved ballistics, and to look cooler. The market is larger than ever before, and the number of cans is staggering. So, once you pay your $200 and wait your four to 15 months, how do you keep that silencer in tip-top shape? The best way to…

Sal Glesser is president and founder of Spyderco Knives. He’s a modern success story and a portrait of the American Dream. Coming from humble beginnings, he and his wife, Gail, built their company from the ground up with little more than determination and a love for knives. What started out in a bread truck became a multimillion-dollar manufacturer and a leader in the blade industry. Spyderco could be said to be the granddaddy of the modern EDC or tactical knife. The features we have come to associate with a tactical folder, the pocket clip, serrations, and thumb openers, were first introduced by Spyderco Knives. Often criticized for their looks, but respected for their simplicity, reliability, and ergonomics, Spyderco has a long-standing reputation of function over beauty. RECOIL: Can you tell…

1 MTHD’s (Mountain, Tundra, H2O, Desert) Aphelion is a mid-layer jacket that keeps you warm while recognizing your body benefits from different materials in different places. The front torso is insulated with a breathable, lofting insulation and covered with a durable, lightweight nylon 20D ripstop face fabric. Areas that need to stretch and breathe a bit more are made from an abrasion-resistant fleece with moisture-transporting qualities. The result is a jacket that blocks wind up front while shedding excess heat from the back and allowing mobility in the sleeves. A few touches take the Aphelion to the next level of utility with mesh-backed hand-warming pockets, interior stash pockets, ninja sleeves, and a DWR finish that makes the whole jacket shed light precipitation. MAKE: MTHD MODEL: Aphelion Hybrid Full-Zip Jacket BODY…

Call them what you want: Persians, Kwaikens, Sabers, Pesh Kabz, trailing points, or a host of other names fit to print. The upswept blade design may be one of the oldest blade designs, dating to the time man first made knives from metal. Some say the design was inspired by the shape of the horn of a rhino, ibex, or some type of antelope (perhaps a Mudhorn in a galaxy far, far away!). The CRKT Clever Girl was inspired by the curve of a velociraptor’s claw, for example. Personally, I think the initial design was born of convenience. I noticed this firsthand a few years ago when I learned the process of forging a blade from ABS Master Smith Michael Quesenberry. As I heated the steel in the forge and…

The recent explosion of interest in precision rimfire rifles feels new, but the fuse was lit more than a decade ago. That’s when guys began scouring shops and shows looking for rare 22LR Remington 40x repeaters, or less rare single-shot 40x actions that could be converted into repeaters. Shooters wanted sub-caliber clones of their .308 bolt actions that dropped into their Remington 700 footprint stocks for inexpensive, effective training. But few wanted to drop the thousands of dollars it’d take to get there. At risk of sidetracking this article, we have to acknowledge the godfather of the 40x repeater conversion is Mike Bush. He’s the guy who figured out the most effective way to feed the tiny 22LR round in the larger 40x/R700-sized action was adapting a modified AICS-dimensioned magazine.…

Oddball firearms pique the interest of any firearms history enthusiast. Derringers, pin-fire revolvers, lever-action shotguns, most of what was developed in the infancy of modern firearms from the mid 19th century to the early 20th. Some represent stepping-stones or milestones toward modern designs, others make you wonder what the designer was smoking. There are endless dead ends and failures, and a few stand out as feats of engineering genius. The S333 Thunderstruck by Standard Manufacturing falls into that last category. This is an eight-shot revolver chambered in 22 Magnum with two barrels that fires two rounds with a single pull of the trigger. Known for their high-end shotguns ranging from $14,000 to $95,000 in price, the parent company, Connecticut Shotgun, has been turning out some of the finest double-guns in…

Olympic 50-meter pistol shooting is perhaps the purest, accuracy-driven discipline of all the pistol sports. In it, shooters attempt to send sixty, 22LR rounds into tiny groups at 54.68 yards … riveting stuff. Which isn’t to detract from the undoubted skill required to apply the fundamentals of marksmanship on a consistent basis, in order to rise through the ranks of any competitive sport. But we have to wonder if one of the hurdles the athlete has to overcome is to stay awake on the firing line. While it has its roots way back in the code duello, the sport evolved over the years to embrace Flobert’s radical new invention — the rimfire cartridge — before being adopted as an official Olympic sport in 1896. The International Olympic Committee, being a…

When Ruger announced it was getting into the 5.7 game with a new handgun, the gun-buying public let out a collective, “Err, what?” No doubt seeing that FNH had the market to themselves for years and were able to charge a premium as a result, Ruger’s head shed decided that they too would like a piece of that action. Their solution wasn’t to simply shoehorn the 5.7x28 cartridge into an existing handgun design, but to come up with an entirely new platform, albeit one that draws from an unlikely source. In its civilian guise, the 5.7 has always suffered from a critical deficiency. Bowing to the concerns of regulators, FNH itself has served as a gatekeeper when it comes to effective ammunition, and mere peons have had a hard time…

Elsewhere in this issue, we recapped our top picks for interesting and innovative products in the RECOIL Best of SHOT 2020 awards. The awards themselves were provided, in part, by the company behind this installment of Veteran Vices: Green Feet Brewing. For those unfamiliar, the symbol of Green Feet has been the calling card of Air Force combat rescue since Vietnam. The HH-3 “Jolly Green Giant” helicopters used by combat rescue units at that time would touch down in muddy rice paddies, leaving impressions in the mud that looked like footprints. Scott Peterson, owner and operator of Green Feet Brewing, spent nearly three decades in the USAF combat rescue community as a Flight Engineer on MH-53J Pave Low and HH-60G Pave Hawk helicopters. In 28 years of service, he’s deployed…