Nate

Went to the dentist Wednesday to get a filling, that had broken, fixed. While he is removing the old filling "crack" the tooth splits in half. Good guy and good dentist but now the tooth has to come out. 25 minutes later of prying and pulling he brakes it in the other plane and gets half. The last part comes out easy(ier). Feel like I spent two weeks helping Mike Tyson "train". BUT today is my birthday and it was a great day. Got to shoot, spent the day with my wife and son and had a friend over for dinner, which I could not eat. With good comes bad and bad with good. Can't wait for my fisrt nats.

kellyn, THANKS for the pile of good info. I suppose I might have known all those things but those are significant considerations presented in a understandable way (important as I am simple). I also printed your response and gave it to my wife. I pray we never need to use that level of force. Nate

Kevin C, well said. I shoot with a LE fellow who beats me (and everyone else) to death at almost every match. He is the least cocky guy I know. He is confident, but earned it with trigger time. There are "wing nuts" every where not just in law enforcement. It is good practice to deal with those people. Teaches self control

Another good way to break them (this is probably not helpful) is to stick your muzzle part way into a port or under a fault bar, grip the gun lightly and blast away.

Erik, I havn't seen (read) anyone say this but have you tried running a silicone cloth through your mag and on your follower? I shot .45 for most of my first few years and always laughed at the people who spent a lot of time worring mags, but....... Now I tear each mag down before a match and wash the tube with a bottle brush, clean the follower and the base pad. I then silicone the inside of the tube and the follower. I never have trouble if I go through this 'dance'. Nate

Limited

I have a pair of .40 sv's set up with square SV hammers. I use a 12 lb spring in my guns. I noticed the blue version had a crack at the rear top corner of the hammer. Took another look and the stainless version has the same crack. Any ideas as to what is causing this? My load is 5.3 of n320 at about 169 pf. One gun has a frame saver in it but the other guide rod is naked. Do I replace them before nationals? Will sv stand behind them? Nate

Jim Wall has an old rusty .45 with out any sights and kicked the crap out of me at area 1 when it was here in Missoula (not a big deal then or now). You could become a cult hero shooting a sightless gun. For pete sake don't buy an open, gun think of the crap that could break.

I have a commander slide, officers frame .45 that rides everywhere but into work (where I might need it) in my fannypack or on the belt, and a G22 in my truck at all times. Better yet my beautiful and well paid wife (or we would have to live in a box) carriers her G23 with her at all times. God protect the person (and those in the general vicinity) who goes after her

My wifes new vacume will set off a .40 if you run over them just right. Or at least it use to. Scared the crap out of the dog.

thought I should fire 50 through my Tomcat as I was carrying it around a bit, and was not happy when it did not go bang. Where can I find a firing pin for the .32 Tomcat?

I am with Eric. Steel past 100. It makes scoring simple and have you ever tryed to sort out a brown target from a brown dirt background at 200 yards with iron sights. Maybe it's just me but I find where the sticks end and shoot there. Not a great plan. usPsa wise, I would not take a shot were I could not sort the target out from the back ground.

The big dogs I have seen don't seem to use them. I ask a GM I know and he said he gets a cleaner sight picture. Some one said TGO uses one for up close stuff and sight blacks it for distance, but that is second hand. I really like the fiber because I have better focus point when I return to the front sight form the target.

If you're not familiar with the work of Steven Wright, he's the guy who once said: "I woke up one morning and all of my stuff had been stolen... and replaced by exact duplicates." ) Here are some more of his gems: I'd kill for a Nobel Peace Prize. Borrow money from pessimists - they don't expect it back. Half the people you know are below average. 99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name. 42.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot. A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good. A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory. If you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain. All those who believe in psychokinesis, raise my hand. The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese. (Think about it some more.) I almost had a psychic girlfriend, but she left me before we met. OK, so what's the speed of dark? How do you tell when you're out of invisible ink? If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something. Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm. When everything is coming your way, you're in the wrong lane. Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be lazy. Hard work pays off in the future, laziness pays off now. I intend to live forever - so far, so good. If Barbie is so popular, why do you have to buy her friends? Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines. What happens if you get scared half to death twice? My mechanic told me, "I couldn't repair your brakes, so I made your horn louder." Why do psychics have to ask you for your name? If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried. A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking. Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it. The hardness of the butter is directly proportional to the softness of the bread. To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research. The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard. The sooner you fall behind, the more time you'll have to catch up. The colder the x-ray table, the more of your body is required to be on it. Everyone has a photographic memory, some just don't have film.

The best work I have seen has come from Jim at Advanced Performance Shooting. Give him a try. Nate http://aps.3av.com/

Shawn Carlock at Defensive Edge does a great repair to avoid the interceptor latch problem. As for the barrel, look at the gas port, does it have one hole or two? The two hole design is my choice for reliability. Gas rings once a year like TL says. I am not sure I would chop off the barrel unless you are going to shoot a match that requires the shorter barrel (there will be some crying over this) but the added length makes light loads fine at 15 yards on poppers and slugs more accurate at distance. Lots of enexpensive stuff to throw on your 1100 to make it ready to play. Have fun. Nate

It was the best of times it was the worst of times...... At Area 1 this year there was a stage that had a usp that you had to shoot through the barrel along with two heads. The drill was as usual, shoot left, shoot right, shoot through the barrel. Well you could see the usp from the start box and I figured what the heck, take a flyer at the usp. On the signal I started to move to the "sweet spot" and took the popper dead on.....I was on fire. Moved to the left, right and unloaded and showed clear, Wow what a run. The RO says" IF you are finished (you idiot) unload and show clear. I already have. Oh ya, the head shots. I pick the mag up out of the snow reload and fire 7, yes seven shots at the heads before I have two on each. I only added 18 seconds to my run. I look forward to the day when I quit learning so many lessons.

Strange, my "friends" tell me I have an a**hole personality type????????

I have been waiting for the dog gone Canadians to come streaming over the boarder into Montana for years. When they do, I will let them fire there 10 or 11 rounds then they are mine........

bang.......click..........crap..........

Back to things I'd fix on an 1100. The inerceptor latch is the one big item on my list. If it goes during a match you are done for the stage. You can not continue even loading one shell at a time. Shawn Carlock does an excellent fix at defensive edge. I try not to look at the internals of my 1100 when I strip it down, it looks like a cheap toy. Some one used to make a machined replacement trigger group. Any one know who it was? I will keep shooting my 1100 just for the 40% less recoil than the competition. That said, I am NOT the guy you come to for advice on shot gun. I like shooting it but am yet to be any good.

paraman1, did the 70 grain bullets work in your 1 in 10? I was told that the heaviest I could use would be the 62s. I would love to use the 70s. My Oly barrel is very accurate. Nate

I hate living in a state where our economy is so bad we get a sore neck from looking up at Mississippi........so I work a lousy job. I must let go and enjoy my family and ignore the foolishness at work.

Dminor (maybe ........D3), Congratulations. Come see Montana, we honor any states permit that honors ours.

I get a box now and then from big brown and my wife, who has the first nickel she ever erned (really a terrific trait in a spouse) , seems to be size sensitive. If it is a big box full of $1.50 ammo boxes I will have some explaining to do. If it is a small box with a new $250 barrel I am usually fine. The worst case was the Dillon 650 sitting at my door after we came back from vacation. Da** thing was in a box the size of a coffin it looked like I might need it for just that use for a while.