barrysuperhawk

It's ironic that if you put a 1x on a rifle, everyone will tell you it's no competitive advantage...then ask them about putting that same sight on a shotgun or pistol, and "poof" your butt is in open, because suddenly it *IS* a competitive advantage. I have already had my butt handed to me on this subject in the CMMG thread, so I will try not to re-hash too much, but I do get kinda wound up about Heavy metal class. My point is that HM is to 3 gun what Single Stack is to USPSA. It's a separate, restricted class that tries to insure that all of the competitors are running close to the same equipment. No Optics, no comps, 12ga pump, single stack 45, 20 rounds in the rifle, .308 winchester caliber rifles, and buddy, you better love recoil. Modifying the rules to allow more, different equipment to compete detracts from what I believe the original point of the class was, back when it was called He-man. To me, I would like to see it as a bit of a purist class, if you will forgive the repeated reference to uspsa, like Single Stack.

Ok Trapr, I like you and really respect your opinions, even though you consistently whoop me, but are you really saying that a red dot is no competitive advantage over irons? If that's the case why does adding one to your pistol or your shotgun dump the user into open? Increasing the numbers in the "Iron Sight" Division is a laudable cause and I respect the intent, but doing it by adding optics does seem a bit like an oxymoron? I do have to agree about the target presentation being slightly more difficult if you are shooting Heavy Metal, but to my eyes that's sort of the point of the class. For the record, *I* never complained about not being able to beat anyone, what I was whining about is changing the rules of a class that has been pretty static across the board for several years, just DAYS before the match. You also can't seriously be arguing that the only difference between the $2500 optic guys and the $200 optic guys is trigger time. Granted, the competitors that invest that much mostly also shoot alot more, but they don't spend that $$ just to look cool, they spend it because it gives them a competitive advantage. The whole reason this entire sport has any rules at all [other than safety rules] is to try to get as close to a level playing field as possible. Open guys shoot vs open guys, TO vs TO, HM vs HM. I sincerely hope you are correct, that the optics are NOT going to affect the results, but, on Sunday when the scores are done, I will be very interested to see the distribution of the optic vs irons on the scores. You and Fordyce and Kelly, and Villamor will all still whoop me, optics or not. And I hope you don't take my opinions personally. Shoot Straight.

I guess what hurts the most is that Heavy Metal is supposed to be a Restricted division, much like single stack in USPSA. This decision is like saying because so many people run Glocks and STI hi-cap guns, let's just allow them into the Single Stack classic. As much as I hate USPSA's take on Multigun, at least with USPSA the rules don't change from match to match. Last year there wer what 20 of us out of 250+ shooters? It's not like Leupold is going to go broke if they can't market optics to such a small slice of the competitors... Now, don't get me wrong, this will be the third year I have shot CMMG, and I LOVE the match. I love the crazy RO's, I love the ridiculusly long shotgun stages, I love those stupid little steel plates that laugh at you instead of falling, I love the cool ass range, I love shakespeares pizza at the end of the day, I even love the mud, but Dammint, leave heavy metal alone. Just one class, that's all I ask, Full on USPSA Single Stack rules for pistol, 8+1 12 Ga Pump Shotgun with full power loads, and a 20 round .308 Rifle. No Comps, no optics, no siamese mags, nothing on the belt forward of the seams, no Race holsters... Just one class where I don't have to invest more in the bleeding optics than the guns... Is that so much to ask? Really? On an unrelated note, I am trying a new Motel this time, the Quality Inn, in Columbia. Anyone have an opinion about this motel?

[Edited about a solid paragraph of swearing that you did notwant to read] I just caught the part about "1X optics allowed in Heavy Metal and Tac Irons" I am so mad, my GF just freaked out and came rushing in here wondering what all the cussing was about. [she thought I found a way to injure myself on my PC...]So, here it is a WEEK before the match, and I find out I am going to be competing against rifles with optics... Dammint, that is the whole reason I have shot HM all these years, because my FAL with open sights was competitive against most every other HM rifle. Granted AR10's have taken over recently, but the requirement for open sights always kept the field mostly level. Just what is so ever-loving hard about understanding the point of a NO OPTICS CLASS? If a red dot is the same as irons on a rifle, then why not on a pistol, or a shotgun? Why even bother having classes at all? Just lump everyone togeather and score us all in one big class. It's very simple, Heavy Metal is a spec-class where you can't buy your way into a higher finish, because open sights level the playing field and make sure the software is still more important. Competitors that wanted to run optics had EVERY OTHER CLASS TO CHOOSE FROM, Why screw with HM? What's wrong with Tac-Optics Or Heavy Tac Optics, or even, just Limited? HM USED to be a safe haven away from the Gamers. I am dissapoint. My theory is it's greed. HM gets it's own prize table, and since its a small class, the prizes tend to be pretty OK even if you are middle of the pack. With these rules, it won't be long before the middle of the pack gets a Sierra bullet keychain and a bag of catalogs for a prize. Sorry for the rant, you migh notice I have strong feelings on the subject. I think I edited out most off the cuss words for the sake of the more tender readers..

Uh Oh, I hope the change to 1 day wasn't an april fools prank..

BACK TO 1 DAY!! Then I am in...

The 2 day format really puts a twist in it for me also... I am going to try to make it also, though.

Taste indeed. 350 JHP at 2k This is 18 rounds of "nobody will ever question if it's major" ammo... Over 425" of drop at 600... maybe I'll just take the misses...LOL Range Velocity Impact Drop ToF Energy Drift 0 1950 -1.5 0 0 2955 0 50 1732 6.38 1.4 0.08 2331 1.26 100 1539 11.34 5.72 0.18 1841 3.81 150 1368 12.61 13.73 0.28 1454 8.33 200 1225 9.2 26.42 0.4 1166 14.98 250 1115 0 44.91 0.52 966 23.78 300 1035 -16.19 70.38 0.66 833 34.48 350 975 -40.47 103.94 0.81 739 46.81 400 929 -73.85 146.6 0.97 671 60.56 450 888 -117.23 199.26 1.14 613 75.58 500 853 -171.52 262.83 1.31 565 91.82 550 821 -237.6 338.19 1.49 524 109.24 600 791 -316.39 426.26 1.67 486 127.83

OK, WMM seems to work [with sound] for the files I still have , but it choked when I tried to feed it .flv's from Youtube..

I have a different vest for Saiga mags. My Kifaru EMR hold 120 pounds worth of stuff easily. This vest will sit in the pack until my Saiga explodes. I have space to add one more shell carrier to that vest if necessary. 10 in the gun + 9 in side saddle + 24 on vest = 43 shells. The round count at Ironman is not what it once was, and there's also a lot of places to stage ammo on the course on tables more than there used to be. A couple years ago, at the FN\CMMG 3 gun there was a 40+ round Shotgun stage. Last year they "toned it down" to 38 or so rounds...

Oh don't think we didn't think about it... We decided against it though as we wanted to increase the slug count Ok... how far out are you thinking of putting your slug targets at? We're on the fence about that... Half of the gang wants some out a ways, the other half wants them up close for hosing. What should we do??? We added over double the number of slugs we originally intended and thought a house clearing stage might be fun...? Or maybe some paper and/or poppers at 80+ yards? I just don't know what we'll come with yet... Well, my feeling on this is closer is faster [as long as it's safe] and more fun. Last year I was RO on a stage with a couple of slug targets at 80-90 yards [depending on where within the shooting area you were] and those targets caused much gnashing of teeth and utterance of foul epithets, especially from the shooters that didn't plan on using more than the minimum # of slugs. As long as your targets are such that hits are clear and obvious [the ones referred to above rung like a bell when hit] I suppose a challenge could be good too.

I saw a thing some where on the net about sticking your stainless bottle in a wet sock to keep it cool, so I tried it, and it actually works. My method is to use old OD GI socks, 2 to a bottle, folded back down over themselves. Carrying them can be messy, until I figured out a 32 OZ plastic cup nestled in my shooting bag makes a perfect "holster" for the otherwise wet soggy mess, and can be used to "recharge" the wool, too. I am guessing that a cotton sock or two might actually work better, but I haven't tried it yet. The theory being, I assume, that the water evaporates from the sock, pulling heat out of the bottle. In practice the bottle is noticibly cooler, even when left out in the sun in a black range bag. If someone else saw this too and can remind me where I saw it, I will give credit..

Same pain for me too, hit really bad last year for some reason. My solution [besides OTC pain meds] was Biofreeze as often as I could get away with it and this velcro strap dealie with a gel-pack in it. I also started paying very close attention to what I was doing when it hurt, and what I could do differently that would accomplish the same task but with less pain. Stupid little things like which direction I flicked my wrist during a reload made the difference between pain and no pain, in some cases. Also I ended up shooting most of last year with mouse guns [9mm & .223] instead of my standbys [.45 & 308]. I'm gonna have to look up badchad myself if the pain comes back, though, because doing it on my own took FOREVER to heal.

Ok, this isnt exactly within the purview of this forum, but it's close and I hope y'all will have some suggestions. First off, my youtube videos are here: Barrysuperhawk on youtube I have been posting videos for a few years now and I have 150 or so shooting videos up. Back when I was just using a digital camera I was pretty good at trimming the raw video down to useful clips. Then I got a GoPro camera and started using it as a headcam. The problem I now have is that the gopro is kind of pitky about turning on and recording, so I learned to fire it up and make sure it's recording well before I step up to the line. Then, after the stage, the last thing on my mind is turning it back off so I have ended up with 7-8 minute videos of me loading mags or hiking to the next stage. This is where my problems start. The video editor I use Avidemux doesent like the audio that the Gopro saves, and would crash when I would try to cut the video, often leaving me with a video with no sound. The newer version of Avidemux seems to work OK with one video, but still crashes on the audio track when I try to put two togeather. My workaround was to just not edit the videos, posting them up raw with the reasoning that I would rather have to fastforeward than lose the audio. So now I have these ridiculusly long videos out there that sometimes contain 30 seconds of shooting and 5 minutes of me being a smuck, and nobody wants to see that. After watching Jesse's Videos I realized I want to start editing up my vids the same way, one video per match, with just the shooting from each stage, more or less in order, maybe even with captions. So, I have 2 tasks, and a process to work on. Task #1 is to find a way to re-do the videos on youtube that I no longer have the original files for. Task #2 is re-edit the videos I DO have the originals of in a way that preserves the audio [such as it is]. The process I need to work on is being able to produce the match video in the new format [one vid, only shooting] with the least amount of fuss. So, I am taking suggestions on any of the above issues, from what's the best way to rip vids from youtube to what software to use to fix my video mess. Mods, If for watever reason this post doesnt belong here, feel free to move or remove it, as you see fit.

Check is cashed... I'm IN!!

Oh don't think we didn't think about it... We decided against it though as we wanted to increase the slug count Ok... how far out are you thinking of putting your slug targets at?

I'm up for RO'ing again this year.

What no Buckshot?

I'm in for RO duty. I LOVE having 3 gun matches so close... So, are there any resturants that I must go to while I am here?

It would be ironic if the Chi-copy made it to market before the Real thing...

We're trying to get the website ready and are shooting for a Feb. 1 launch of the registration. Enos members will be the first to know! Wow, another good match that I don't have to get on a plane for.. WOOHOO!

Go-PRO user here: http://www.youtube.com/barrysuperhawk I use the elastic headband [like a head mounted light] mostly so I can take it off between stages...

As another data point: I personally use home-made kydex pouches. A couple of tek-loc's, a [bladetech] hardware kit, Sheet kydex [available at any RC hobby shop] a heat gun and a towel is all I used. It's very possible that you could modify the Blade-tech .308 pouch to fit pmags if needed, with the same process... Email me if you are interested in instructions or pictures [OP or reader]

I thing the 17" of rain and mud might have slowed things down as much as the 230 shooters did, but then that's 3 gun. If the weather wasn't crummy, I would think I was at a USPSA match....

That was me, I was the CRO on stage 2, and I was the one that made those calls. I was consistant throughout the match on my stage, but found out later that other stages were calling those hits. I am sorry for the inconsistancy. My reasoning was that steel had to fall to score, and technically it was still on the stand. In every case that I saw, the shooter had actually hit the stand, not the target itself, and the target magically landed flat on the top of the stand. On other stages we were told shooting the stand was a no-go [think about center punching the shotgun spinners and knocking them all off] so I applied the same rationale to my stage. I did have 2 shooters manage to pick up the target by shooting it again, so while it was a more difficult shot, I wouldn't call it impossible. If any shooters are peeved at me for being a hard-scorer, you can take solace in the knowledge that Karma caught up to me and I ended up catching splatter from almost every shooter, and counted 15 separate places on my arms and torso where I bled for the cause. To make matters worse, I also managed to find some poison ivy along the way, and am STILL dealing with that. So, whatever bad juju I built up, instant karma got me back. On a positive note, here are my match videos for everyone to gain joy and humor from my ineptness: http://www.youtube.com/barrysuperhawk I also have some video of another RO that wanted it, but cannot seem to find his email address, so email me dude...