lee blackman

Start the match with your best ammo, and use your best magazines first. This seems redundant to say that, but a casual and somewhat repeated observation has me pointing this out, much in the manner of advising brand new shooters to download their "reload" magazines on their belt by a round. More than once over the years, more so in the days of the horrible Clinton era magazine ban of anything over ten rounds, I would see a new shooter show up to a USPSA match with a mixed lot of ammunition and magazines for their gun. On the first stage they would have repeated hick-ups and malfunctions, and/or would be doing emergency slide lock reloads early in the stage. Come to find out they had one standard capacity magazine and two other low capacity 10 round magazines. They were starting with the ten round magazines and saving the high capacity one for last for whatever reason. Along with the mix mash of ammunition of which they were shooting the lowest quality stuff, and saving the factory boxed cartridges. One could easily see the frustration piling on for the shooter. Recently a regular customer of mine (I own a gun store) passed away. He would commonly buy cheap guns online and transfer them through my establishment. In a given year he probably bought a couple thousand dollars worth. He would always look at or point out something like a Colt Python and say "I would love to have one." I asked why he didn't buy one, and he always had some random lame excuse. I mean after all, he was spending it on cheap guns. Then after hearing of his passing, it made me wonder, if he knew he was going to pass, would have bought the Colt Python. It clicked to me that its a mentality. Things are a trophy, save the best for last, etc.... And its counter productive. In the realm of reality life is finite, just like a match or a stage. You shoot it, and its done, thats your score. If your there for fun, thats fine, but I want to bring do my best, even just for fun. Otherwise whats the point. I'll sacrifice getting two or three lesser guns for the collection to buy that Akai or SVI (and I did, more than once.) Because its alot funner running that race car, than it is that pickup truck on the race track. You might not wanna spend that money on that high end division specific CZ, Tangfo, Staccato, etc.... But seriously why not, if you can afford it. Thats why we shoot USPSA, IDPA, 3-Gun, PRS, etc, to get the most out of the experience and have fun. Its worth it. Don't be left wanting, cause we don't get to shoot forever. Things change, and life happens. Take advantage of the opportunity while you have it, and get the most out of the experience. Just a school of thought, Lee

Wow this is an old post brought back from the back catalog isn't it. Thats crazy seeing how much has changed in just a year. I remember when carry optics was nothing more than production with an optic added, and now its a whole division of its own right. I have to say its growth in popularity makes sense. In all honestly, I see it replacing Limited. What was a limited gun a decade ago, generally speaking, was a tricked out service gun of the era. Extended magazine, magwell, tuned trigger, etc. Now a modern era tricked out service gun has a slide mounted optic. So perspectively carry optics IS the new limited.

For the money, I really like the Safariland 773’s. They are pretty simple too, they don’t really break or come loose on a ball joint like some waaay more expensive pouches. Sometimes there is just to much going on and it’s easier to keep it simple to focus on other things.

I shot that one before, I think was 2016 or 2017. They have a great match and an awesome prize table.

The last time I saw them was on the rain6 website, that was a little bit ago. I just looked and don’t see it anymore.

Incentives and deterrents.... this is how your direct people to do or not do something. I’ve seen my local club change a lot since I shot my first match in 1998. Not just the membership, and leadership, but the shooters themselves. The competitive nature of our sport deters the weak “everybody gets a trophy” crowd, which is a heaven send more than we realize. I’ve shot with slot of different clubs, and slot of different matches over the years. Some places are strong and viable, constantly bringing in new shooters and growing or maintaining crowds. Other seems to struggle for various reasons. But it’s the long term members, the guys who show up every match, volunteer their labor, and run things who make or break a club. If you can find or build a good crew, then your ok. But finding talent willing to work for free is getting harder to come by. That volunteer spirit doesn’t seem to be as abundant as it once was. And yelling at shooters or harassing them into helping after they paid a fee to shoot, especially new shooters, can kill turn out. The answer may be better organization and financial incentives. In other words, delegate and assign specific duties. Folks who show up the night before to put up stage props and help from beginning to end get match money kicked back to them. Folks who down show up for setup and tear down but do other tasks like RO, Score Keep, Past, or Roll Brass and sort it on the tables for everyone maybe get to shoot for free or reduced fee. Everyone else pays full match fee but you can literally show up, shoot, and leave. And not just anyone can do it, you have to earn your way into it, as a reward for service to the club. Incentives... and deterrent would be it’s a lost brass match to all consumer only shooters. Just an idea. I think staff volunteers and RO’s should be rewarded for their hard work. Just expecting everyone to step up and do their part in generals, especially since everyone is paying the same amount isn’t really the best model for success. It seems to be the way it’s always been done but it’s short comings are obvious by this topic post alone.

what this guy said... someone smarter than me explained how the little sensor works in digital scales, and they do require time to warm up or they will shift reading weight as they do. I’ve been running an RCBS chargemaster for probably a decade now, and there has always been about a .2 gr shift after warm up.

I don’t think it matters after it goes thru your 38super sizing die... Sure factory 9x23 ammo (if there is such a thing) might have an issue. Like you ever notice when you size 9mm brass thru a carbide die its no longer a tapered case... does anyone even make a non straight wall sizing ring full size die for 9mm that leaves it tapered? Basically if you size it smaller than your chamber, it fits, it shoots... the issue you might come into is ejection or extraction, pending how picky your gun is. Ive been amazed at what kinda brass has run thru my super 1050, fired in my gun, and ended up reloaded again. 38 super, supercomputer, TJ, 9x23, 9 supercomp. It all ends up in my practice ammo that I don’t even bother to case gauge check. Does it feed and cycle, I mean I have more problems with 38 super brass stamped armscor or a-USA than 9x23. I’m not paying to much attention, I clear the malfunction and keep shooting, so I’m not claiming it’s always 100%. But can you run in in a 38super and safely, of course.

Way to bring back an old post and an old show... is it still running? I completely forgot the show. Started watching FTWD, which really seemed to do a little better, then at the end of whatever season I never picked it back up.

Best thing I ever did to my Rem 700 SBS tactical 20” was throw the hogue stock in the dumpster where it belonged, drop the gun in an HS Precision I picked up used off this forum, recrown that barrel, and drop an old adjustable factory Remington trigger on it. I went from an extremely inconsistent 2ish moa pain in the rear to a solid sub minute rifle.

Assuming the scope has a 1” tube a low .275” rings will put your objective lens on the barrel. A medium .375~.400 height ring should be just right.

Make sure that the gun your looking at fits the division and game your planning on competing in. The best recommendation I can give you is show up at the local match, befriend some fellow shooters. Learn everything you can about the divisions, and think heavily on which division would best fit you. After you decide on which division, find out what the predominating platforms for that division are. That is the platform I would recommend investing in. All to often I see people go out and just buy something without researching, then get to a match and get stuck in a division they really can't compete or even learn in with the gear they purchased. Wasted money would have been put to better use buying ammo for practice.

Squatch, the issue doesn't look like the dies. From what I see your probably using the standard F size dillon powder funnel which has a straight angle to it. Its for most 9mm, but from the pictures I'm assuming your running 147gr projectiles which are very long, so the bottom of the projectile is caught by the taper of the case. Instead of changing all kinds of sizing dies and messing with stuff that probably won't help and just cause more issues, I'm going to recommend changing to the D size dillon powder funnel, which is designed for the 38 special/357 mag. Mess with the depth to get it right, but I have a theory this will fix your problem.

I used to irritate folks who picked up my 9Major brass. It would crunch and not resize because the web was blown out to much. Then the stuff that somehow did make it thru the sizing die and ended up a reloaded cartridge wouldn't pass a case gauge. For future reference and simplicity sake, you could always buy off the shelf new brass and load a batch, just to eliminate that as a variable, but I'm almost certain that the brass is not your issue. And if it passes a case gauge it should chamber in your gun. That said, The case head isn't going to "swell" outside of spec when you fire it an additional time and cause any type of extraction issue. Extraction issues are often related to the extractor in a 1911... And we all know 9mm's, more so 9Majors are more sensitive on having the extractor tuned just right. And if its an open gun with a sight mount covering the top of the ejection port while the slide is open, tuning the ejector is also critical. There are a ton of forum posts about tuning extraction/ejection for 9 Major to reference.

I've had better luck with Autocomp than 3N38 for 9Major. There is plenty of load data on the forum here if you go back and search.