Hank Ellis

Need a bit more info. Red 8 doesn't ring a bell.Claybuster part numbers go along the line of CB-1118-12 which is the clone for the Win WAA12 wad. Go to www.claybusterwads.com and see what you have. The claybuster part number is in yellow and the manufacturers part number that is was cloned after is in white. Once you know what clone you have you can then interchange them one for one for the OEM wads in loading data.

Being 40+ and sans parents when the wife and I got married 5 years ago, we were well aware that any costs were coming directly out of our pockets. We did well for under $10,000. Close family friend that needed another wedding shoot for his resume to do the still photography. Cost of film and developing. Family friend in in the video business did the video in lieu of a wedding gift. Free. Networking through our friends we found a cake at a very reasonable price. $250 if I recall and the grooms cake was another $50. Another friend of ours. Lawyer, deep in our Mardi Gras Krewe. He just happens to be a JP. Free. And besides if it doesn't work out, we can blame it on him. He'll probably give us a discount on the divorce papers also. We wanted the wedding location, reception for 120, and the band be where the bulk of money is spent. Wedding was held in the grand ballroom of Nottoway Plantation just a few miles down the road. Reception was at the modern Randolph Hall on the grounds. Don't remember the cost of the bar and buffett but it was the bulk of our wedding costs. Music was local blues legend Tabby Thomas and his band. $1500. Sure, there were other expenses. She paid for the dress. I paid for the honeymoon. The rings. Oh, yeah the rings. Another friend of ours used to be in the family jewelery business but went on disability years ago. He came over one night and we designed our rings over the kitchen table. My cost for the rock and gold casting was $1600. The ring has been appraised for $6000. When I hear the average wedding is $25,000 we just choke. It's a racket and with a bit of work you can have a fairy tale wedding at a paupers price. One bit of advice to the groom. There will be a time in the wedding preparations that you gotta let go of the reins and let the horse take you where it wants to go. Lestwise you'll be bucked off.

Dear Robert A. Levy and Dick Anthony Heller; I owe you a sincere debt of gratitude for the work you've done for myself and other citizens of the United States. Although it's an individual choice whether to own a firearm or not, todays' ruling affirms that the right to firearm ownership and use is an individual right as I believe the framers intended. Mr. Levy. Your untiring efforts and personal sacrifice lay the foundation for future work to restore the rights as the Framers intended. Please continue with the work from the Cato Institute. Mr. Heller. It is a proud day when one man who believes a wrong by a government has been done, can stand in front of the highest court in the nation and plead his case. That the highest court found that indeed the government was wrong and that the wrong has been redressed is indeed a symbol of our democracy. Gentlemen, thank you. Till later Hank Ellis

The only time I've taken a Dremel to a firearm it accomplished what I wanted to do. Had a Taurus 94 and the case hardened trigger was causing blood blisters. Took the Dremel with a fine stone and made one pass to knock the sharp edges off. Couple strokes with a jewelers file to clean it up. Then used the felt polishing wheels to give the whole trigger a final finish. Two coats of clear fingernail polish to top it off. Work good, last long time. Knowing how much helicopter stuff we've torn up using Dremels, I know better than using it on my own guns. For precision work we use jewelers files and India stones, especially on dressing out turbine engine blades. We also use KY Jelly for installing tail rotor driveshaft bearings. Use the right tool for the job.

Start at www.cafepress.com. Search for shooting then narrow it down by clothing and infants. Spend the next hour or two browsing. Here's one to get you started. USPSA infant shirt.

When I piled up what I needed for the Chute n Shoot it looked like I was moving out, not going to the range. Two handguns, two rifles, two shotguns, one parachute. Ammuniton, mags, shooting mat, jumpsuit, helmet. Wife looked at the pile and asked, "Is there anything left in the gunsafe?" Before I could come up with a good BS answer she interuppted with, "No! Don't answer that. I don't want to know what you have in there." Whew. Close one. When someone asks how many guns I have, I give a stock non-answer, "More than I need, less than what I want."

We were on the Merritt Island causeway. Being a mile away I thoght that it was too far to see or hear anything. At ignition I realized I was very wrong. I was about as close as I wanted to get. Getting a pass used to be no problem. Now you have to know someone connected with NASA to even apply for a pass. If you can't get a pass, a Google search will come up lots of options. Met an older gentleman while waiting for the countdown. He lives local and makes every manned launch. One quote of his stuck, "You should have been here for the Saturn 5 launches. That thing makes the Shuttle look like a Bic lighter."

Has anyone had any experience with Stauer? http://www.stauer.com/ For playing dress up and going out I prefer the more classic style of a watch. Stauer has it and I'm curious if they are worth the money. Used to carry an antique pocket railroad watch but had to give it up as the J frame now occupies that space.

A bit off topic but... In my heavy skydiving days my primary DZ was Spaceland, TX. Spaceland was located just a few miles from the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Being in close proximity of NASA quite a number of the regulars were involved in the shuttle project. It was just another day at the DZ to have astronauts and rocket scientists sit around with iron workers and mechanics discussing not space but the sport of skydiving. Although it was a bit different having a conversation about black holes and singularities on a Sunday morning while hungover from Saturday night eating leftover Chinese for breakfast. Most larger jump planes have a control panel near the door for spotting. The controls activate lights in the cockpit so the pilot can control the plane as the jumper wishes. Beats the hell out of yelling at the top of your lungs to get the pilots attention. The switches in our Otter looked VERY similiar to the cockpit switches in the shuttle. After the Challenger accident a plan was put in place to equip the crew with bailout parachutes. What was designed was a 18' reefed canopy that weighed next to nothing and packed up super small. One of the parachute riggers for the SRB happened to borrow one and gave it a few test jumps one weekend just for grins. Report: Nice opening. Decent control and landing. But 18' looks very small when you're under it. One of our skydivers was Mary Ellen Weber. http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/weber.html One of the highlights of my life was when I went to Florida and watched Mary Ellen launch into space on STS-101. Put this on your bucket list. Go see a manned space launch. OK. I'll go get a life now ...

Hi. My name is Hank and I'm a NASA junkie. {All together now.} Hi Hank. If you like the series, may I suggest 2 books. "Moon Shot" by Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton and "Failure Is Not An Option" by Gene Kranz. Both books go deep into the inner workings of NASA during the heyday of manned spaceflight. After reading these books and digging a bit further. You'll find that "The Right Stuff" took several liberties and shouldn't be considered a documentary. In addition the test pilots of the X-15 and other research projects didn't get the press they deserved. Probably due to the Cold War and the tight controls on what information the research plane generated. Anyhow, the general definition of spaceflight is flight above the Kaman line. 100km or 62.1 miles above earth. The X-15 went a fraction above 67 miles in 1963. At that time we had just finished the Mercury missions and hadn't launched the first Gemini mission. The X-15 was truly the first reuseable spacecraft. Staggering to think that 41 years later a privately funded project in the name of the SpaceShipOne would go where only truckloads of government money went before. Gus Grissom was cleared of screwing the pooch when Liberty Bell 7 was raised in 1999. One of the first things checked was the plunger that detonated the ordinance that blew the hatch. It was found in the armed position. Besides the pilots detonator there was an external detonator located under a panel. Its' purpose was for divers to blow the hatch from the outside if necessary by pulling a handle. The current theory is that the detonator panel departed the craft sometime around parachute deployment. A hole about the size of the panel in the parachue canopy was observed by Gus. While in the water the external detonator handle may have been pulled by a lanyard from a sea dye marker or other object. It can't be proved but it's the most plausible explanation.

But if you don't plant the seed, the plant won't grow. Prime example. One of our former junior shooters showed up for a 3-gun match this last weekend. Since his dad had to work, on his own accord he loaded up the car and came to play. We've watched him grow up at the range and now at 18 he's his own man. What did you do on a Sunday morning when you were 18?In another shooting sport, the powers at be were in a tizzy about how old the average age the shooters were. Taking action they started SCTA. The Scholastic Clay Target Program. Very successful. You want to see a bunch of old goats. Go to a trap shoot. I'm 50 and considered a young punk in that circle. Most are well into their 60s and retired. SCTA hasn't taken off around here. Back on topic. Started USPSA at age 45. Now age 50. Wish I had started 10 years sooner. 3 seasons in L-10 with a single stack and the last 2 in Production. C class in both. Open invite for a party at my house when / if I ever make B. Looking at the USPSA demographic profile the large percentage of shooters are in the 36 - 59 age range. I'm curious how that breaks down further. Say 36 - 47 and 48 - 59.

When I sighted in for slugs with my FNH SLP (same gun as the Win SX2) I used the factory Mod choke and four brands of reduced recoil ammo. The SLP liked everything except the Remington. Under 2" at 50yd. With any shotgun, you have to tinker with the right combination of ammo and choke to find what your gun likes. With a 'normal' shotgun with a front bead only, your eye is the rear sight. When you mount the gun and weld your cheek to the stock you now have your two fixed points. Eye to front bead. If your shots are going high then you need to lower your rear sight, your eye. That is why you see so many adjustable cheekpieces on competition clays guns. That in effect is the adjustable rear sight for elevation. For windage there is stock cast-in and cast-out, but we won't go there today. Slug shooting is a different animal than bird shot. In effect we are now converting a finely tuned shotgun to a dumb down over caliber short barrel musket that we have to reload a lot. Here a flip up rear sight is worth it. It now has the sights of a rifle that is sending a patched (the wad), 437gr projectile through a smoothbore barrel. With your eye, rear sight, and front bead you now have to tools to send a slug accurately to it target. Shooting a shotgun from a bench with only a front bead is no where near the same as shooting offhand. It's not possible to mount the gun and get the rear sight (your eye) to exact same place as you did on the bench. If you moved your eye further forward on the stock, which in most cases will raise your eye level, then the shot will go high. I think this is where the problem is. Try this. Go back to the bench with slugs and birdshot. Shoot a group with slugs. Then shoot a couple of shots with birdshot. If the slugs and birdshot both go high and left then its a gun fit problem on the bench. Another way to check is to set up a pattern board at 25yd. Place an easily seen target in the center. I'm cheap and just make a 6" circle with a felt tip marker. Load one birdshot and one slug. Shooting offhand, first the birdshot at the board then the slug. If they pretty much went to the same place the gun isn't the problem. If one or the other goes off where it shouldn't then there is a gun problem. I'd look at the choke first. If they both go off somewhere they shouldn't then it's a gun fit problem.

Correct. To do it by the book the package shall be offered for shipment at a main depot of either UPS or FedEx. Companies who have gone through the paperwork hoops can ship from their place of business. But for the rest of us who only ship ORM-D a few times a year it isn't worth the hassle.I've heard of instances where ORM-D has been picked up at home. However it's one of those things that fell through the cracks and I wouldn't bet on it as a normal thing. Keep these phone numbers in your pocket when you offer your package for shipment. 800-554-9964 - UPS Hazardous Materials Support Center 800-463-3339 - FedEx Customer Service Often you'll encounter an individual at the counter who doesn't know the HazMat regs and rather than put out the effort to educate themselves take the easy way out and say NO. One call and it get straightens out immediately. I've dealt mostly with UPS as the depot is just around the corner from me. I haven't used the FedEx number but our shipping guys at our home office probably has them on speed dial.

OK. One more time. Ammunition is NOT classed as HazMat and shipping is no big deal at all. First go to this link and read it. http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?...st&p=667326 Then bring your package that is properly classed and placarded to one of the main stations of FedEx or UPS and send it on its way.

Gave Trail Boss a try with 230gr lead in a 5" 1911 in .45acp. Gave up on it as I couldn't make Major at max published load. Been putzing around with it in 125gr and 158gr loads for my .38spl revolvers. The SD for the 125gr is way more than I willing to let go. Like in the 50s. So bad that I thought I screwed something up in the reloading process. Did it again. Same results. However it seems to be working OK with the 158gr loads with the SDs in the very low 20s. Go figure. Either way you're not going to get belchfire performance with TB. At max load with 158s you just might make Minor. I'm with LPatterson and about to add it to my nice try, no cigar shelf. For .45 and 230s you can't go wrong with Clays or N310.

My best buddy was an orange tabby named Fubar. Fubar was so named as when he was young he had several bouts with kidney stones blocking his bladder. The permanent fix was to basically give him a sex change operation. Remove the .. uh .. package and open the urethra. Happy and healthy after the procedure he was full of personality and was with me through thick and thin.After 15 years of life my girlfriend (now wife) called me while I was out of town. Fubar is in trouble and is in ICU. Got back in town as soon as I could and immediately went to the vet. Renal failure. Probably brought on early due to his bouts with the kidney stones. When I walked into the room the look in his eyes told all. "Please make this go away." With no hope of recovery the choice was clear, although tough. The next day I was with him for his last moments. And I cried. His ashes are still in my nightstand. Haven't found a suitable place that I'd like to call his final resting place. If I had to do it over again I wouldn't do it any other way. We lost our daughters cat early this year. At her last annual visit the vet said we're on borrowed time. Being 18 we knew it could be any time. Unfortunately Kay-Kay suffered what the vet termed a cerebal event in 4Q '07. Probably a stroke but not exactly sure. It left her blind but she still had some quality of life. As long as we didn't move any furniture or the litter box she got along OK. But in February she suffered a massive cerebal event that left her in convulsions that didn't go away. The choice again was clear. We buried her ashes at my daughters gravesite last April. Betrayed trust? No way. The other option was not do the right thing and allow them to live with no quality of life and suffer a painful death. Our furry family trusts you to do the right thing from litter to grave. And you did.

Oh to be young again. Loved that story. 30 years from now he'll still remember that trip. Reminds me of a run I did from Louisiana to California in the early 80s on a '78 Suzuki GS750 where I made it a point not to use the interstates on the way out there. One of the highlights of the trip was when I was on some lonesome two lane stretch in Wyoming (I took the long way to get to CA). Hadn't seen a soul in over an hour. The national speed limit at the time was 55mph. I'm in the middle of nowhere. 70 it is, and was for most of the trip. Cruising along taking in the sights of near virgin land I passed under a bridge and there was a cop. Looked in the rearview and got the flashing blue light special. Damn. After the formalities the cop gave me a ticket for 'excessive fuel consumption'. $5 fine + $10 court cost. Mail it in and doesn't go on your record. We then talked for the next 45 minutes. Got the history of the area. A few tips on good roads to explore. Exchanged the Cliff notes on our lives. Just darn good conversation. $15 well spent. In all that time only one other car passed us. And the cop knew who it was. Found out what America was really about on that trip.

Losing one of the furry family is always hard. However, it is in the cycle of existence. I'm a bit of the odd one out here. When it's time for one of mine to go, I want to be there for their last moments. We've shared a lot and, to me, being there giving what comfort I can, is the right thing to do.

Thats the one. Couldn't remember the name of it when I did the above post.Although I got decent results the first time out I loaded a bit short as per the Hornady manual. 2.230" Per the Sierra manual I can go to 2.250". Got another batch waiting for range time. Also have Hornady 55s I want to try out for 3-gun and leave the A-Max for really serious accuracy work. Like Steel1212 I've got a 3-gun match in about 10 days and my load isn't ready. Guess the MagTech will have to do. But the targets are only to 75yd so it shouldn't be an issue. For more information on the Audette method try http://www.washtenawsportsmansclub.org/gro.../incredload.pdf

I've been working up loads for my Clark Gator and have tried a technique I got from Glen Zediker in his book 'Handloading for Competition'. Say you've picked all your components and now just need to figure out what charge will work best in your rifle. Start with your minimum charge. 25.0gr for example. Load one cartridge. Load the next one at 25.2. The next at 25.4. Continue till your max load. Load the hottest load first in the mag continuing in order till the softest. Set a target to 200yd. Bag or rest the gun so your point of aim is repeatable. Shoot each round making notes as to the exactly where the bullet hit. You'll need a spotting scope or what I do is set up a camcorder a few feet uprange from the target to film the hits. What you're looking for are the sweet spots. Ignore the deviations from windage. Places where 3 or 4 bullets are impacting very near each other in elevation. When it falls off the sweet spot the bullets will start going high and low till it finds another sweet spot. Hard to describe but the illustrations in the book make it clear. Didn't believe it would work but I loaded up a few at one of the sweet spots. First try at it with Hornady 52 A-Max and AA2015 resulted in sub MOA. Easy A zone hits at 300yd unsupported prone. I've got more work to do but for a first shot at it the results were impressive.

The best airshow routine I've ever seen was at the EAA flyin at Oshkosh sometime in the late '70s. Art Scholl spent the day rigging pyrotechnics to his Super Chipmunk. Everybody was wondering what he was up to. That afternoon an annoucement was made that Art won't be doing his afternoon show today. But come back after dinner and see his routine ... at night. Night aerobatics?! After dinner and about an hour after sunset we went back to the showline. Off to the east several miles away was an approaching storm. Frequent lightning lit up the sky. Art took off and proceeded to give us a show I'll never forget. With the lightning in the background and the shower of sparks from the wingtips, the visuals were incredible. And don't ever forget that sometimes things can go very wrong. Art Scholls' last flight making the movie Top Gun. http://www.ntsb.gov/NTSB/GenPDF.asp?id=LAX85LA393&rpt=fi

Well..... I tried the build-it-yourself route with a Rem 1100. Found a thoroughly hammered duck gun with a trashed stock for around $250. Cut the barrel, new stock, putzed with it some more. Failed miserably. The gun don't run and got tired of sinking money and time into it. At this point I probably have $500 or maybe more in it and it don't run. I'm putting it up for sale soon. Maybe Merlin will buy it. After throwing in the towel I went with a FNH SLP MK 1. 3-gun ready out of the box. It runs on 2 3/4 dram trap loads (Win AA). Shoots decent enough slug groups to 50yd (anything except Remington). Does a 6" pattern at 50' with 00 buckshot (Remington reduced recoil). Screw in chokes. And I didn't have to do a thing to it. CDNN has them in the 2008-3 catalog on page 47. Mine ran around $750 in late 2007. Good money spent in my opinion. At it's first match (non-USPSA) I ended up lending it out to a couple of my team mates. It ate everything that was thrown in it without a hiccup. And the dude who beat me with my own gun will have to borrow something else next time. But for the uber-cheap way to go. Get a Rem 870 Turkey model. 21" barrel with Remington screw in chokes. Throw on a Choate mag extension and get after it. You now know what my home defense shotgun is. Total outlay. $400.

The events change up a bit from year to year. Partly to change the skill involved but mostly so that there is no way to practice it. That way no one competitor can have a strangle hold. Bottom line, you better know your gun, how to use it, and be prepared for any target you may come across if you want a chance to win it.For instance in the 2004 event the centerfire handgun had shots to 50yd and rimfire rifle to 100yd. Done any of that lately? This year had one station on the sporting clays course where the competitor was in the bucket of a bucket truck (or whatever that thing the power company guys use is called). Being 12' up gave a whole new perspective on bird busting. Clyde has said that he's going to run the bucket up next year. Clays from 30 or more feet up. That will be interesting. But as challenging the events are, they are do-able. As far as I know nobody collected max penalty points on any stage. Here and there my USPSA background worked to my disadvantage. Time. Nearly all of the events have a time limit but it's so liberal that it isn't a factor. Rushed a few shots and missed. Noted for next year. The focus is on accuracy, not speed. Just so you know, the Class III is supplied by a dealer out of Texas. Just bring ammo. As soon as I hear about the 2009 event I'll get the word out. 2004_chute_n_shoot_rules.pdf

Like ...The Downfall Of The Cowboys HD-DVD's "Downfall" Tabloid Paparazzi Vista Problems! Somebody Stole Hitlers Car (Hang in there for the last punchline.)

Just got back from one the most fun weekends I've ever had. The mostly annual Chute N' Shoot competition. A competition that includes parachute accuracy and firearm marksmanship, but not at the same time. See the attached file for the rules. I've been wanting to do this since I heard about it in 2004. In 2004 I was no where ready to try this. 2005 had Clyde who puts on this thing on, roll his tractor and nearly get himself killed. So the event was cancelled. In 2006 Clyde was still on the mend and it was postponed another year. 2007 marked the return but a family emergency came up and I postponed it. Finally in 2008 the moons aligned and I was able to make it. To win this thing you have to be semi-decent in every arm. Tank one stage and you may still be in the top 5. Tank two and you're in the middle of the pack. The way the rules are slanted you can be top dog at the end of the shooting events but if you're skydiving accuracy is off you've just got bumped out of the running. Myself I placed 5th out of 18 competitors in the individual standing. Best of the 'virgins' who've never shot the event before. Took the team title with solid performances by the rest of my group. Did very well in rimfire handgun, rimfire rifle, sporting shotgun and highpower rifle. Decent in centerfire handgun. Not so well in sub-machine gun due to not knowing that it had an 8lb trigger. Thought the safety was still on. Probably a third of my time was figuring that out. Tanked the combat shotgun jungle run. There the course outsmarted me. By the time I figured it out it was too late and dropped a bunch of points. Weather was a factor in the skydiving event. We only had a chance for one load so the top 4 went for a jumpoff. Bummer that I didn't get the jump in but in the end the top guy in the shooting events dropped to third overall due to overshooting the target. What was so cool was not just the shooting, but how everybody was there to help everybody else out. Ammo, guns, what do you need? One friend of mine showed up on whim and we supplied him with guns and ammo for the weekend. His shooting experience consisted of plinking at cans a few times with some generic revolver. The highpower stage showed me he has a natural talent. He had never shot an AR. Took him off to the side and showed him the controls of the gun and how to adjust the AO on the scope. Then I took a flap off an ammo box and showed him where to put the crosshairs for the short range (150 to 175yd), middle range (200 to 225yd), and long range (250 to 320yd) targets. Him ringing the gong at 250 from sitting it was something to see. Cleaned the 300 and 320yd targets from prone. Awesome showing. Beat many a hardcore competitor. But I won't loan him the FN SLP for the jungle run again. Beating the guy who loans you his gun is bad form. Good friends, good shooting, good times. Can't wait for next year. CnS_2008_Events.pdf