What Scamp is thinking in this time of war and impending civil war. This is also a place where what can/should be - will be discussed.
Monday, March 01, 2004
Some interesting lessons from the Shooting competitions this year.
The two that I really like are SOF’s 3-gun match in Las Vegas and the “End of the Trail” shoot in SoCal - they both occur within a few months of each other and are two Centuries apart in technology.
SOF’s 3-Gun match is a pistol - shotgun - and battle carbine match which is considered by some to be a top test af tactical shooting and agility. Most competitors in the money have top of the line colt 1911s with some type of auto loading shotgun [most looked like remington 1100s] and a AR-15 carbine with optical type sights... usually an illuminated dot. This is a serious combat-style event this is the venue of the cutting edge tactics and tools.
SASS [Single Action Shooting Society] also uses three guns - pistols, shotgun, and a carbine... only they have to be manufactured before 1898 or be a replica of such a firearm. The SASS also encourages people to dress in period clothes - history is stressed. This also happens to be the fastest growing sport in the shooting fraternity. Which is, especially with “cowboy shooting”, becoming a Sorority... yep, women seem to like the shooting of olde tyme gunnes...?
Now the really cool thing is to watch these events - you learn a lot - even if you don’t want to.
This year I have been back in Appalachia to help my Dad. So I have been far from these events and was only able to watch them on TV... still very instructive.
The 3-Gun match was held in the Southwest desert of Nevada and they had some wind... alot of wind... and on that wind a lot of sand. This sand has the capability of adhering to most lubricants and forming a goo that has all the lubricating properties of lapping compound. The footage of the shoot was amazing. I saw had the effects of this environmental hazard graphically demonstrated.... massive ‘Malfs’ of almost everyone's guns... several of the top contenders were knocked out of the running and one out of the completion by jammed and broken weapons. One fellow was working so hard to clear his AR that the charging handle broke!
These weapons all autoloaders were all adversely affected by the fly dust and sand... some catastrophically. There was close to 15 minutes of what amounted to blooper footage... person after person stopping fire to clear a jammed weapon. some taking as long as 15 seconds to fix a problem - some just out of the game with a jammed weapon... high tech and unreliable.
The SASS match was held in a similar environment but the just as accurate 100+ year old designs had one great advantage - they don’t jam! Of course they are not quite as fast to shoot (Remember: you cannot miss fast enough to win a gunfight) and they are definitely slower to reload... so you have to learn to make every shot count (good mindset anyway).
The great thing about this is the weapons of the JBTs are the kind that are jammable and finicky and while they are nice and Tom Swiftian they are only and improvement in the sense that they are mechanically easier to reload and give you a higher fire rate. The accuracy - power - lethality all lie with the older guns and their larger caliber heavier bullets and more reliable designs... they are the guns that were used by citizens not JBTs to found and tame this country - they are my type of guns.
It takes longer to get proficient with these weapons but they have a bigger operating envelope... It may take 2Xs as long to get good with revolver - but once you are up to speed you can work on shooting at 100m with your revolver. A pistol is easier to shoot well sooner.... but it is extremely hard to shoot 100m with a pistol... it can be done - but to get to this level requires a skill level that most do not have - with a revolver and enough practice anybody can get to 100m shooting. With shotguns and carbines they only differ on two levels speed of reload and reliability - for my money I will go with reliability over reloadability... and I will save 70% of my $ which can go to buying reloading equipment which will let me practice 3Xs as much as before.
Remember one thing you can do is practice more - realistically you should be shooting 3-4Xs per week with about 1000 rounds per week. The JBTs have NO concept of what a firearm can actually do.... it is up to us to show them. [remember to tune up your body - you can’t shoot better than your physical condition... 30 min. of calisthenics will do wonders for your shooting.]
One aesthetic concern is that I do NOT want to have the weapons of the enemy - and dispute this if you will... I think that our people will naturally relate to patriots who fight with cowboy type weapons while wearing their own ‘street’ clothes rather than someone in cammies with a black rifle. And it is how I will fight... to each his own.
Yours in Freedom - Scott A. Campanaro
The two that I really like are SOF’s 3-gun match in Las Vegas and the “End of the Trail” shoot in SoCal - they both occur within a few months of each other and are two Centuries apart in technology.
SOF’s 3-Gun match is a pistol - shotgun - and battle carbine match which is considered by some to be a top test af tactical shooting and agility. Most competitors in the money have top of the line colt 1911s with some type of auto loading shotgun [most looked like remington 1100s] and a AR-15 carbine with optical type sights... usually an illuminated dot. This is a serious combat-style event this is the venue of the cutting edge tactics and tools.
SASS [Single Action Shooting Society] also uses three guns - pistols, shotgun, and a carbine... only they have to be manufactured before 1898 or be a replica of such a firearm. The SASS also encourages people to dress in period clothes - history is stressed. This also happens to be the fastest growing sport in the shooting fraternity. Which is, especially with “cowboy shooting”, becoming a Sorority... yep, women seem to like the shooting of olde tyme gunnes...?
Now the really cool thing is to watch these events - you learn a lot - even if you don’t want to.
This year I have been back in Appalachia to help my Dad. So I have been far from these events and was only able to watch them on TV... still very instructive.
The 3-Gun match was held in the Southwest desert of Nevada and they had some wind... alot of wind... and on that wind a lot of sand. This sand has the capability of adhering to most lubricants and forming a goo that has all the lubricating properties of lapping compound. The footage of the shoot was amazing. I saw had the effects of this environmental hazard graphically demonstrated.... massive ‘Malfs’ of almost everyone's guns... several of the top contenders were knocked out of the running and one out of the completion by jammed and broken weapons. One fellow was working so hard to clear his AR that the charging handle broke!
These weapons all autoloaders were all adversely affected by the fly dust and sand... some catastrophically. There was close to 15 minutes of what amounted to blooper footage... person after person stopping fire to clear a jammed weapon. some taking as long as 15 seconds to fix a problem - some just out of the game with a jammed weapon... high tech and unreliable.
The SASS match was held in a similar environment but the just as accurate 100+ year old designs had one great advantage - they don’t jam! Of course they are not quite as fast to shoot (Remember: you cannot miss fast enough to win a gunfight) and they are definitely slower to reload... so you have to learn to make every shot count (good mindset anyway).
The great thing about this is the weapons of the JBTs are the kind that are jammable and finicky and while they are nice and Tom Swiftian they are only and improvement in the sense that they are mechanically easier to reload and give you a higher fire rate. The accuracy - power - lethality all lie with the older guns and their larger caliber heavier bullets and more reliable designs... they are the guns that were used by citizens not JBTs to found and tame this country - they are my type of guns.
It takes longer to get proficient with these weapons but they have a bigger operating envelope... It may take 2Xs as long to get good with revolver - but once you are up to speed you can work on shooting at 100m with your revolver. A pistol is easier to shoot well sooner.... but it is extremely hard to shoot 100m with a pistol... it can be done - but to get to this level requires a skill level that most do not have - with a revolver and enough practice anybody can get to 100m shooting. With shotguns and carbines they only differ on two levels speed of reload and reliability - for my money I will go with reliability over reloadability... and I will save 70% of my $ which can go to buying reloading equipment which will let me practice 3Xs as much as before.
Remember one thing you can do is practice more - realistically you should be shooting 3-4Xs per week with about 1000 rounds per week. The JBTs have NO concept of what a firearm can actually do.... it is up to us to show them. [remember to tune up your body - you can’t shoot better than your physical condition... 30 min. of calisthenics will do wonders for your shooting.]
One aesthetic concern is that I do NOT want to have the weapons of the enemy - and dispute this if you will... I think that our people will naturally relate to patriots who fight with cowboy type weapons while wearing their own ‘street’ clothes rather than someone in cammies with a black rifle. And it is how I will fight... to each his own.
Yours in Freedom - Scott A. Campanaro
