Chuck Anderson

Throating refers to a gentle relief of the lower edge of the chamber. It is a slight bevel of the lower edge that allows the cartridge to transition from the magazine to the barrel more easily. Just be careful that some knowledgeable does it. I saw one yesterday where some moron relieved the barrel all the way down and blended it with the frame (which they also relieved and polished)

Don't do it. Glocks are too cheap to try and change calibers on. Just buy a new gun. Avoid the KKM barrel caliber conversions at all costs. The rounds fit in just fine but there is too much slop on the breech face and the extractor only gets a very small piece of the rim. I finally got tired of the one I was trying in a Caspian slide and bought a 34.

I have shot a fair amount with just about every Glock out there. I'm not surprised that you found the Glock 17 better than the 34. This is the same way I feel. I found that the 34 had more muzzle flip than the 17. The 17 just doesn't move in the hand. I also ran into the same issue with the 17L's. The 35 doesn't seem to have the same issue though. It seems to have less flip, although they both have much more than the 9mm, than the 22. I think the 22 and 35 are a couple of the most versatile guns in USPSA. They are competetive in Production (with light loads), L10 and Limited. Another thing to consider would be other sports you are considering. If you shoot GSSF the 17 is a natural for Amateur Civilian. The 35 would work very well in competition class.

How is the trigger weighed in IPSC? I tried weighing the triggers on both my Glocks with the 5 pound connectors. If measured from the center of the trigger the weight is around 6-7 pounds, easily legal. However on one of them if I weigh from the bottom of the trigger is comes in at 4.5 pounds. Just don't want to run into any problems. Looks like the first IPSC rules match I will be able to shoot will be Ecuador and I don't want to get kicked to a different division because my trigger weighs in low.

I have both of them. I picked them up at Nationals to play with. I haven't messed with my setup though so the holster is still on the sidlines. I have been using the mag pouch for my glock though and it does work well. The holster and pouch both seem well made and a nice step up from the early models.

Be careful with trying to take more than 11 lbs per passenger. I have been told by ticket agents that FFA rules have said no more than 22 lbs per plane. This was their rationale for the weight restriction. They just decided to limit it to 11 lbs per passenger and hope that there are not 3 shooters on a plane. I have no idea whether this is actually the rule, especially since Alaska Airlines doesn't enforce it. But, I would rather be safe then end up at a major match with 300 rounds of 38 Super Comp and need 310.

Smitty, if it matters, this match was very nearly sold out to the 600 shooter limit. The week before the match there were over 560 registered shooters. The reason we only ended up with 500 or so didn't have anything to do with the match. 60 shooters backed out at the last minute due to hurricane related weather. It's very difficult to estimate match attendance at one of these things. For the 2003 there were over 600 people on the waiting list for slots. Obviously, not everyone took their slots.

The RO's at major matches like Nationals aren't "paid" to be there. They get a small travel allowance to defer some of the cost of getting there. For the majority of the RO's which come from out of the area this doesn't come close to covering the cost of the flight and rental car. The get their meals paid for and they get the hotel paid for as long as they stay with another RO. If they want to bring a wife they get to pay part of their room. At the end of some of the matches there is an RO prize table. I can't speak to the 2004 Pistol Nationals though. I know we did this at the 2003 Open and Limited and the 3-Gun this year. Many vendors specify this as a requirment to them even donating. The RO prize table in not anywhere near as generous as the shooter table. So for all these wonderful benefits RO's get to take even more time off work. They arrive before the shooters, help set up or decorate their stages, listen to shooters bitch about their calls ("it's a double, that's on the line"), work the full day, every day and after the match they get to look on the internet and have more people complain about them being greedy and only in it for the money for the next 3 months. As far as them shooting the match, their scores aren't included in the overalls, normally because they don't get to shoot all the stages. Did you want to shoot this years Nationals, all the stages in 2 days? I have no interest in being an RO at a major match. I did it for the 2003 Area 1 and that is the last time for a long while. But, I'm not going to begrudge RO's the paltry amount that they get "paid" to come and work for the better part of 2 weeks at a National match. Chuck Anderson

I use UPS but you'll probably have to go to one of the actual UPS facilities. Around here you can't drop it off at the "UPS Store", because it is evil and may explode just sitting there in the box. Just contact one of the match officials. If it is a match where there are people flying in they normally have an address and person you can ship the ammo to. Otherwise I ship it to the hotel, C/O myself. Just make sure the hotel knows it is coming and will hold it.

I can understand the reasoning for production being scored major. Right now production is a game of Alphas. It requires shooters to get the good hits that Limited/Open guns can slide by with Charlies on. Production makes doubles the penalties for shots outside the A zone. Production is scored as a different division at every match that I have attended. I have yet to see a prize table combined with Production and Limited shooters. Right now this would do a huge disservice to Production. This is really a Production matter that wouldn't affect the other divisions. Making Produciton Major across the board would definitely change the feel of the division.

Well that was quick. How about the Heine Straight Eight night sights? They are a two dot pattern that Glock doesn't offer. No problem for USPSA I'm sure, but I can't tell for IPSC.

My duty gun for years has been a Glock 17 that I fitted with a Glock 21 magazine release. This is the same part that Glock puts into the 34/35 as an extended mag release. Is this setup legal for USPSA and IPSC Production class? I assume that that 34 with the same release would be in USPSA since it is manufactured that way. I also trim the slide release down to almost nothing so that it doesn't interfere with my grip. Do I need to switch parts out to be legal? Thanks, Chuck Anderson

Carry your stuff around. There's normally not a huge amount of walking at SMM. The small bays to the left are close enough you can make a couple trips and the bigs ones? Well just tough it out. It's not worth it to ship a cart.

If you haven't tried one, get your hands on a Beretta 92 Elite II. I played with a couple at Nationals and it has the nicest out of the box DA trigger I've ever seen. If IPSC compliance isn't that big of an issue the Springfield XD with a trigger job is really a good choice. Rich Dettelhouser does an incredible trigger job on them. The two that he had at Nationals were very light with a very short reset. I'm sticking to my Glock 17 though.

And here is the answer from the IPSC FAQ section. 15. Can I replace the original 3-dot sights on my Glock 17 with aftermarket 3-dot fiber optic sights? No, not unless Glock offers fiber-optic sights for the Glock 17. Production Division rules allow competitors to use aftermarket sights but only if they are of the same "type and kind offered by the OFM for the approved handgun". In your example, both sets of sights are "3-dot" however fiber optic sights are not the same "type and kind" as the original sights, and are therefore disallowed.

I asked John Amidon this question at Nationals and he told me that Fiber Optic is allowed in IPSC Production division. I looked up the below paragraph on the IPSC site. Sounds like some clarification might be in order. Aftermarket sights of the same type and kind offered by the OFM for the approved handgun are permitted, provided their installation and/or adjustment requires no alteration to the handgun.

My guess would be that declining attendance and increasing costs probably caused the downfall of the banquet. When the match is running in the red for as many years as it has, it's kind of hard to justify the banquet. If this format brings the Nationals back into the black, as I think it will, then maybe, we can start having some better food. Until then I imagine it's snacks and $2.25 Bud Light

I think the format worked very well. The stages were a bit light each day and we got out early. However, I think some of that would have changed had the additional 60 shooters that were registered but skipped because of the hurricanes came. Or if the match had sold out, another 40 shooters. There was only one day when we got out in 2 1/2 hours. The other days were 3-4. I would imagine that had this not been the nicest weather that I've ever seen there would be less people complaining about only shooting for a couple hours a day. If memory serves there was another National event held recently in Barry where the temperature was a bit on the warm side. My complaints for this match have nothing to do with the shooting schedule though. The awards ceremony should have been held on Friday night. I was rather suprised to see the shootoffs take place before the awards. The shootoffs went fine and should have been on Saturday as they were. However, why the heck was there a built in delay of four hours till awards? The original letter that I had said prize distribution to immediately follow the shootoff. When we were at the range on Saturday I asked several RO's and not a one had any idea whether the prizes were after the awards or the shootoff's. The location where the prize tables were placed was horrible. This is the responsibility of whoever selected the hotel. There is no excuse for choosing this type of location. USPSA sponsors are very generous and Colleen Voigt does an incredible job of wranging them, however, who saw how much or what they donated? One of the nice things about having a table open to view is everyone can see just how much loot really is piled up. Mike V. said that there was $90,000.00 in prizes but who can visualize that. Oh, and one last thing, post the overalls somewhere. It will make the prizes go a lot quicker if people have some idea of where they are at. I would have had not idea were it not for my shooting buddies laptop and the USPSA results page.

Final results are up on the USPSA website now.

It's still a work in progress, slow, slow progress. I'm not too worried about it. She's gonna be a safe queen at least through World Shoot. After that I'll think about open again.

I'll be giving you some company in L-10. Figure it will give me lots of reloading practice before Nationals. Chuck

Erik, that is definitely specific to you. Half the competitors will be starting at Tri-County and half at Dundee.

Shooter registration is on Friday at Tri-County Gun Club on Friday evening. I think the hours are from 5:00PM - 8:00 PM. I was told by match staff this is the only way to know which range to show up on. Half the shooters will start on each range on Saturday and switch the next day. What limited information there is has been posted on the internet. http://www.columbia-cascade.org/section_championship.htm Tom Chambers is not the MD for the match. I spoke with him the other night and he is not involved in it's production.

JP also has a new lightened steel bolt carrier that he was showing at the 3GN Nats. Should work with any trigger system and no issues of wear like with the Aluminum carrier. Should have a similar feel to the aluminum though. The both seem to weigh about the same. I'm not sure if it's on the market yet but it should be close.

In Tactical Dave Neth was using an AR with the 3.5 x 35 Trijicon mounted on it, Winchester SX2 and Glock 40 cal pistol at MGM, I assume he was using the same here. I ended up using my JP AR 20" with the Leupold CQ/T, Reminton 1100 that looks like it was dragged behind a truck, and shot like it too, and an SV 40, built by EGW, lightened slide, bushing Bar-Sto Bbl. I love this gun. The CQ/T seemed to be a really good scope for this match with one exception. The black reticle tended to disappear unless it was right on the white poppers. This was really apparent on Bay 6, the truck bed stage. With the black background targets they were using the reticle was really tough to spot. Chuck Anderson