Throwin Lead

Perhaps another thread for another time but I'll bet those who have been DQ'd because the RO "thought" he saw the finger in the trigger guard when moving will disagree.

From what I have read in this thread while a person was shooting the RO heard a "pop" instead of a "BANG" and stopped the shooter instinctively thinking that it was a squib. I think we are all in agreement that "If it goes POP you must STOP" for the sake of safety. Apparently after ULASC it was proven that their wasn't a squib and and from my understanding the round in question was recovered and found to have either a sideways or reversed primer bringing up Flex's question of "What is unsafe ammo?" If I had to have a match official go through my ammo looking for MORE flipped or sideways primers and finding some I honestly think I would have to call it a day & declare a DNF for the match. The reason being is a lot of what we do on the range is based on mutual trust amongst ourselves. I certainly would not want to be the guy that had a KB that injured another person let alone my self because of my error that originated on my reloading bench. Some answered in this thread that they case gauge, check for high, low, or no primers,flipped primers, sideways primers cracked cases etc. the point being they in their own way have some quality controls they build in their ammo production before they come out and play with the rest of us. They not only want to produce top notch ammo for themselves, they respect the fact that we are all playing a game with a loaded gun & have sense enough to remove the questionable rounds, maybe for their own performance, maybe for the safety of others or both. I understand stuff happens but how did the round in question get into the ammo box hence into the mag in the first place? I think that those of us that reload owe it to ourselves and our competitors to have some sort of quality controls in place for the handloads we produce. Even putting rounds primer side up in a 50 round factory tray before dumping them into the Crown Royal bag or Tupperware container is better than nothing. To answer Flex's question about unsafe ammo. This is the subjective part - If I was the RO charged with going through somebody's ammo and found more rounds that were not up to par I think I would have to err on the side of caution and pull the ammo from the match. It would appear to me that the person didn't have a good day on the reloading bench or wasn't responsible enough to QC his lot of ammo. What's the worse thing that can happen? The guy takes a DNF, takes his ammo home, trusts it enough to use at a practice and it either works or it doesn't? I would probably never know if indeed the guy's ammo was safe after the fact but I would know that I did what I felt was necessary for the safety of others as well as myself at the time. Granted a hard lesson to be learned. Sure feelings get hurt, tempers may flare, you may even lose friends but the reality of it all is what we do for fun and recreation should not be taken lightly especially when there is a safety concern. Just my dimestore novel on the matter. Mike

I have ESS ICE glasses with a RX insert. They are both ANSI rated and Mil Spec rated. They are reasonably priced and come standard with 3 lenses, clear amber and charcoal grey. You can purchase a rose-copper lense for about $12 as an adder. The rose copper lense really make those paper targets stand out! The basic glasses with the 3 lenses cost about $50 + shipping. They deserve a look for anyone looking for shooting eyewear. http://www.esseyepro.com/ICE-2.4-Eyeshield_24_detail.html Mike

No shame in using lead these days. If you purchase a few K of bullets and don't like them PM me and I'll take them off your hands. I use lead for practice and club matches and use moly for the larger matches. I clean my gun after about 500 to 700 rounds but I do run a dry boresnake through after each use - practice or match. Sometime there are signs of leading, more so shooting minor velocities than major. A few strokes with Hoppe's #9, a worn bore bursh with a piece of copper chore boy pot scrubber mesh wrapped around it KO's the lead rather quickly. I shoot a full size M&P. Check out mastercast.net. They have a quality lead 180 gn bullet. If you are looking for some diversity as far as lead bullets regarding weight check out Penn Bullets pennbullets.com. Bob offers a wide range of 40 cal bullets. He has a 165 gn bullet that makes a nice round. You may want to check out S & S casting too. Jim Stinar is the owner and advertises in the USPSA classifieds - log on to view classifieds. S&S has a 220 gn bullet that makes the softest major load! Imagine making 170 PF at 770 FPS! There is another thread here titled HEAVY LEAD discussing the 220 gn bullet. S&S also offers a 175 gn SWC. I have not had much luck getting the SWC to feed reliably, maybe 1 FTF per 30 rounds. You are right on with your powder choices WST or S1000. I have developed major and minor loads for each using lead bullets. They both run about the same velocities per charge weight and make a nice clean, low smoke load. I use WST because I can find it easier locally. One thing you may want to do with any caster these days is to call and inquire about their stock. You may find that some are behind while others can fill your order right now. Just the nature of the beast for the casters right now. Keep us informed as to what direction you decide to go. Mike

First of all +1K for the Uniquetek powderbar micrometer. It is worth it's weight in gold! No more frustration of dialing in a charge weight. You know the drill - Oops too much - darn too little and so it goes. I played with TG and .40 minor loads and ran into the same problem with powder fouling and erratic ES & SD. I switched to WST and found good results at lower velocities. I also tried Solo 1000 and found it to be similar to WST but harder to come by in my area. Both burn clean at lower velocities & produce accurate minor loads. Mike

I played around with S&S 220 gn in minor and major. What worked well for me in minor was something in the 150 ish range too. Anything less and the gun was sluggish. I worked up loads using Solo 1000 and WST. Both powders worked well and produced similar chrono results - I use the WST because I have a lot of it. I think I was at 2.8 grains with each powder was in the neighborhood of 148 to 152 PF out of an M&P. Nice soft shooting round. Clean and no leading to speak of after a club match.

+ 1 on the mastercast.net bullets - Quality product for sure! I use their .40 180 gn TC a lot. You might want to give Jim Stinar at S&S casting a try. 230gn LRN are $63.45/K. I bought some 220 gn .40 from him earlier this year and he supplied a great product. Check out his ad in the USPSA classified section - you will need to log in to view.

That's a great idea! Feel free to post them there. Mike

I have been following a few threads where BE members have been looking for scaled down targets. I had some free time at work today so I made a 1/4 scale and 1/2 scale version of the metric target in CAD. The 1/4 scale will print to standard 8.5 x 11 paper. The 1/2 scale will print on an 11 x 17 paper. If you don't have access to a printer that can print 11 X 17 the Staples store in my area quoted a price of .17 per copy - $17.00 per hundred, $8.50 for 50, $4.25 for 25. If you don't have means to get the file to Staples such as a disk or jump drive you can upload it to a store near you and pick them up at your leisure. I have read where some of you have cut targets out of cardboard. These will make good templates to that with as well as taping them over the cardboard target as printed to make white no shoots. I thought that the 1/2 scale version would do well in most dry fire areas of the house where 20 ft would equal 40 ft, 30 ft = 60 ft etc. Perhaps these targets will make DF practicing those long shots easier? As for the 1/4 scale targes just divide the distance by 4. A target at 20 feet can be set to 5 ft. When I get some more free time I will make some standard & mini poppers and post them here. Metric_Target_11x17.pdf 1/2 scale Metric_Target_Letter.pdf 1/4 scale

Phil Clark put together a very nice slide show of Summer Blast. The art work on the stages was outstanding! It can viewed here: http://www.photodex.com/sharing/viewalbum....1&bm=163345 You may have to download a plug in to get it to run. Phil is the Sponsor Coordinator for Area 8 - he also has a neat slideshow of the Area 8 match held in May at East Huntingdon, PA on the same page. Thanks Phil for all of your hard work! Mike

I understand that 4.3.1.5 & Appendix C1 section 6 outlines that the steel must fall & C1 gives the shooters 3 choices but in this case doesn't the popper used as an activator now become a mechanically operated device? Should the RO stop the shooter and declare a range equipment failure? If the RO watches the shooter hit the popper several times dead nuts - assuming the steel has been painted between shooters - and it doesn't fall wouldn't that in itself be reason enough for the RO to stop the shooter declaring a REF? Rule section 4.6.1 - "the malfunction of mechanically or electrically operated equipment" Under this rule wouldn't the failure of the activator popper qualify as stated in the above rule? I would think if this is a stand alone popper - not an activator - then the provisions set forth in 4.3.1.5 & appendix C1 apply. Maybe I'm thinking too much?

Just did a search on google and found it $10 cheaper at $29.99 but didn't read shipping costs. I would be careful - you get what you pay for but you never know - this may be one of those "sleeper bargains". I use a Jennings Mack scale and like it a lot. I was right around $100 shipped from Will Knot Scales.

Try contacting Bobby McGee - sales director. His email is bobby(at)blade-tech.com I'm sure he can help out. I met Bobby when working at this year's Area 8 match. Great guy and offered a 10% discount on a holster purchase.

I not sure that is accurate advise. It's not really about feet and boxes. (although movement is defined in the glossary) I think you were closer to the mark with the rules you referred to earlier. What I tell my RO's to look for... - Is the shooter actively engaging targets ? - Are you 100% sure the finger was in the trigger guard? (I've seen plenty that were 99% sure.) Truth be told, our shooter need much better finger discipline. What I noticed working major matches as a RO is the the upper class of shooters(GM, M, A) seem to go out of their way to make sure that the finger is visible when moving. I noticed at Summer Blast one particular GM had his finger almost on the top of the slide while moving a good 10 yards to his left on a dead run. I guess that that upper class level don't want their day ruined by a RO "thinking" they saw a finger in the trigger guard - they hang it out there for all to see. If that mentality would only filter down......

Just a bump as a reminder for those forum members going to Summer Blast. Larry, I hope there is no truth to the rumor that "Radio Lew" is the "nice prize"........ Mike "name tag" ? what is this name tag? It's a word document found in a thread at the top of the Match announcements forum as a sticky for name tags. Just edit it to suit. link

Just a bump as a reminder for those forum members going to Summer Blast. Larry, I hope there is no truth to the rumor that "Radio Lew" is the "nice prize"........ Mike

Email Jim Stinar of S&S Casting snscasting(at)hotmail.com for current price list. You can also view his prices on the USPSA classified section - 6/25/08 posting date. I use Jim's bullets in .40 and they are a top shelf product at a reasonable price by today's prices. I think the bullets you are looking for are about $47/K plus shipping.

+ 10 I ordered a 2K lot of his 220gn bullets in .40. Makes a real soft major load. Bullets are of good quality, lube is firm and NOT sticky, and the best thing is you can't beat the price! If I can get the 175 SWC to run consistently in my M&P I'll buy a few K for practice ammo.

I had that problem with an XD-45 I used to own.It was some of the ugliest jams I'd ever seen.Something would catch on the shoulder of the top bullet in the mag and would just HAMMER it down into the mag.I'm suprised it didn't break anything!No one else I know with an XD-45 is able to get them to feed either. Don't feel bad - LSWC don't like M&P's either. I got a 200 round sample pack of them loaded them at 1.125 and had the worst jam I ever experienced in my MP similar to what you described. I could have got them then for $52/K and thought they would make a good practice round. So much for that train of thought!

Ideally,I'd like to find a 165gr TC,but nobody seems to cast them.I've checked most of the usual suspects,and it seems like all they do are 155 or 170 SWCs and 180 TCs.I'd be up for using the 155s,but if I have to use the 180 TCs,I guess thats what I'll be using. Penn Bullet Company near Pittsburgh casts an excellent lead 165 @ $76/k 165 gn TC bullets

I'm pretty stoked about that pic, gun is still on the extraction. You can follow the streak across Rhianna's glasses and Megan's hat. Look close at the second picture.....and look for a faint white line that starts at the head of the metric target near Megan and follow the line across the wooded background. I'm assuming that is "The Streak"? Alan you really got a lot of neat and interesting pix of the match. From our conversations at the match you had a tremendous amount of fun doing it! Mike

That's almost way too much graphic information........

As part of the staff I'd like to say thanks to the shooters that made the trip to Area 8. With the economy the way it is and a tank of gas costing almost as much as a case of bullets- thanks for turning out 300+ strong making the Area 8 match a success! A big tip of the cap to Ron Rodgers, Bill Warble, Phil Clark & the staff at East Huntingdon that did all the behind the scences work from securing sponsors & vendors, prizes, stage design, & all of the other things that go into a match before the first shot is fired. Thanks again guys for a job well done! You certainly have rasied the bar for Level III matches. Thanks to the ladies that gave up their weekend to do the adminstrative things at the match Kim & Darlene. Dennis thanks for putting in long days in the stats room crunching the scores & posting results in a timely fashion. Thanks to Gary Stevens who decided to be the Range Master this past weekend instead of "mowing the jungle I call a yard". I'm sure when you get on that mower you won't miss that radio in your ear! At least when you are mowing in back of the house you won't be getting a call to come to the front! Alan Meek "shot" more rounds than I did - and that's saying alot -with his camera and has posted and will continue to post action shots of those who he captured in the lense. Thanks Alan for some great action photos. Special thanks to my RO mates "Phed" - CRO Phil Williams & RO Ed Nielsen who mentored me as a RO on Stage 7. A very special thanks to the gal in the pink Glock shirt that handed out fresh baked chocolate chip cookies to the RO's after her squad shot on Sunday. Hope to see you all again at the next major match in the Pittsburgh area whenever that may be! Best regards, Mike

I shot the match today with the staff. You folks are in for a real treat with great stages and from what the local weatherman says an absolutely gorgeous weekend - sunny and temps in the mid 70's - so bring your sunblock. I'll be working stage 7 - drop by and say hello!

I have a Wilson in 40 and my son has an EGW in 40 - the Wilson is tighter. Rounds that didn't gague in the Wilson passed in the EGW. If you don't keep a thin film of oil on the exterior of the Wilson it will rust. I suspect that the Wilson is made from a machined mild steel round bar.