Hank Ellis

As we all know, if it goes bang, it's flying out the door. I see this as a fertile field ready for harvest. There are thousands if not tens of thousands who are new to the shooting sports and it's up to us to bring them to the range and matches. No manner what the shooting sport is. I'm seeing fresh faces at the clays range. I'm seeing new ARs being sighted and shot. The pile of handgun brass is deeper than it used to be. The more of us in the gun culture there is the better off we will be. Specifically toward USPSA I see that we will have a influx of new shooters. Looking at the scoresheets of the three clubs I frequent I'm already seeing more PEN tags in the member number column. Mostly in Single Stack but also a number in Production and here and there in Limited. I also see the potiental for 3-gun/Multi Gun to get a boost. There's a bunch of new ARs out there. Put together an 870 with an extended mag. Grab that Glock that has been around a while. Poof. New 3-gun competitor. It wouldn't hurt for clubs to have a rifle or shotgun side match to introduce the handgun only guys to 3-gun. We're pursuing that on a local level. The issue of the materiel required to do the shooting sports is a front burner issue right now. Part of it is filling the pipline for all those new guns and shooters. Part of it is "hoarding" or "maintaining a prudent inventory of strategic supplies". Bottom line the demand is outstripping supply. Eventually the market will correct itself. Either the pipeline will be filled and demand will drop or new machinery will be put in place and supply will increase, or a bit of both. Last summer, lead prices hit record levels. Lead shot at some places (Cabelas) went for $50 a bag. $38 was the norm if you could find it. Today it's $25 a bag and I can get all I want. Draw your own conclusions. We will get through this and be better off tomorrow than we are today.

I know the exact range you're talking about Buddy. Used to be a member there myself. Keywords - used to be.When the owner told me to my face that he wasn't making any money on us members and that was why the annual fee went up from $200 to $275 that sealed the deal. That, his moving target attitude on ammo, and the attitude of his employees made me take my money and go somewhere else.

The quick out for this situation is the flight attendant. Keep your cool, be respectful, don't make a scene. Descretely ask for another seat as a hippo has taken all of theirs and half of yours. Really you don't even have to ask for another seat. The seat assignment is the same as getting a reseved seat at a concert. Southwest Airlines doesn't do assigned seating for example. Just get up and get another one if available. Still, pass it by the flight attendant as a courtesy. I detest flying Part 121 (scheduled airlines). Hate the cattle car mentality. Seats only anorexic midgets can fit into. The illusion of security Kabuki theater. Then throw Jabba the Hut next to you and the stress level goes up a bit.

I've loaded and made ready. Made the screening and eye exam appointment for March 30 with Dr. Dell in Austin. Fly in Sunday night and take a late flight home Monday. Wife will drive me around. If the screening goes as it should it will be one more trip to Austin for the surgery. Except for the 1 day followup the rest of the followups can be done locally. Just got to find someone here. Doc Dell may have someone in his Rolodex. Wish me luck.

2 - Never point a gun at anything you don't intend to destroy including yourself.

12ga - 1oz load Hodgdon Clays Clean burning. Light recoil. Very reasonable chamber pressures. Inexpensive and can be found anywhere. 12ga - 1 1/8oz - 2 3/4 or 3 dram load Hodgdon International Clays Clean burning. Light recoil compared to Titegroup. More reasonable chamber pressures compared to Clays. Inexpensive but not often carried in stock in local stores. Usually have to order.

Sounds a bit hot to me.My chrono data: Local Caster 180gr LRN which actually weighs 186gr Win Brass Win SP Primer 2.6 Clays 1.135" OAL 720fps for 134PF Montana Gold 180gr RNFP Win Brass Win SP Primer 3.15 Clays 1.130" OAL 735fps for 132PF Found one of my early loads that was way hot. Precision Moly 185gr RN which actually weighed 187gr Win Brass Win SP Primer 3.4 Clays 1.125" OAL 848fps for 159PF Only shot 5 as I was getting pressure signs.

Welcome to the forum. Friendly and helpful bunch here. The Search function is your friend. 94.3% of the questions has already been asked. No need to replow old dirt. Clays does have a place in pistol reloading. Go to www.hodgdon.com and use the online loading data. There is data for .40S&W. Clays in .40 is fine for low velocity loads around 750-ish FPS. Step it up to 900 FPS and Clays gets a bit spikey in pressures. Some people do it. I don't. A tad slower such as N320 or Titegroup works for these hotter loads. You didn't say what game and division you're playing in. Lets us know so we can give you better info. As a general rule in non-compensated guns like the XDm a heavy bullet with fast powder gives the least amount of perceved recoil. Lead is fine in the entire XD line. Major and Minor are power factors used in USPSA and IDPA competitions. The formula is (bullet weight X velocity)/1000=Power Factor. For USPSA Minor the floor is 125 and Major is 165 in the US. International rules (IPSC) differ a bit.

A solution looking for a problem. A quick check of Midway has Etronx ammo in .220 Swift at $41 a box. Conventional ammo in the same caliber from the same manufacturer was $30 a box. It begs the question. Why does this gun even exist?

Got a Taurus 94. Haven't handled a Smith so I can't compare the two. However the T94 has a crap DA trigger. SA isn't too bad. The blued finish is pretty good. It's a revolver in rimfire. Two strikes against it in the accuracy department. Haven't found anything yet that shoots in it what I call good. Best I've found so far gets me 3/4" at 25 ft. Checkering on the hammer was very sharp and caused blisters on the thumb. Dressed it down with a file. Case hardening on the trigger caused blisters on the trigger finger. Buffed it down with a Dremel and coated with clear fingernail polish. I keep it around as a backyard pest gun when the air rifle isn't enough. If it wasn't for that I'd get rid of it and look for something better.

Not exactly "NOT Welcome" but here are a couple others along that line.....http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M46.jpg http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M242.jpg This one would have been perfect where I used to live. http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M79.jpg I want this one for the outside pet food bowls. http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M235.jpg Either one of these for the front door. http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M1.jpg http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M517.jpg And the one the wife picked up for the back door that started it all. http://www.highcotton.com/products/highcotton/large/M62.jpg Their coasters are downright sick and disgusting. Gotta get a few of them.

Got a new doormat. Not a big deal. Just a doormat. On the backside was the warning label. That alone was worth the price of the doormat. Door_Mat_Warning_Label.pdf

Or they don't have a clue that powder and primers need the full blown HazMat shipping ritual. I'm sure that the DOT will educate them when they get caught.

I've got a low level ringing in both ears. Not bad enough to really get in the way but it's there. Rode motorcycles extensively till about my mid-20s. Started wearing earplugs as the fatigue from the wind noise was a factor on daylong 700 mile runs. Always wore hearing protection while shooting. Always wore hearing protection while on the flight line. Wear hearing protection while running power tools or any internal combustion engine tool. Wore earplugs while skydiving. Did everything right and still have ringing ears. Chalking part of it up as my 50th birthday present.

Will do. The wife won't mind at all helping me get around. Might even stay an extra day to check out the music scene. Been kinda on our list of things to do.So how many followup visits are required and at what time intervals? Wanting to give work a heads up.

Looks like a couple of road trips to Austin may be in my future. Gave Frank Garcia a call. He gave me the short story of his eyesight, what the end result he wanted, and why he went to Dr. Dell after 5 other docs wouldn't touch him. Gave doc Dell a glowing recommendation. We also quickly discussed mono-vision vs. distance correction. Frank went with distance correction and he can see handgun sights as well as the targets. Reading glasses are a given. Frank, thank you for taking the time to talk to me in the middle of the Florida Open. {I'm such a dork.} The limit for astigmatism correction is +- 3.0. But what if you had say a -5.0 of astigmatism? If you're over 3.0 most of the docs won't touch you. But what if you do one surgery to correct it to -2.0 then come back later and correct the last -2.0. One doc can do that and he's in Austin. PatD. Give Frank Garcia a call. Better yet if someone could talk to Frank and post it here it'd save him a bunch of time repeating the same story and answers. Ever wonder what that scratching on your eye prescription means? Here's an answer.

Thanks for the replies. It's helping me make an informed decision. Keep them coming. If I recall correctly my uncorrected vision is 20/200 right and 20/300 on the left. With progressive trifocals and a bit of work we can get it down to 20/20 or 20/25. Got the name of a doc in town that comes highly recommended. Xre could you PM me with contact info for Dr. Dell and the other doc in Austin. The cost thing isn't an issue. Figure in the cost of progressive trifocal glasses, shooting glasses, contacts for skydiving, and mask with lens bonded in for scuba diving and I'm looking at well over a grand just to change prescriptions. I'm prepared to spend whatever it costs.

And I thought my car was bad. He wins. Cut the guy some slack. It's his space. Let him do wiith it what he wants.

Up front. I have never owned or shot a Hi Point firearm. What I'm relaying is from a gun dealer. My mom n' pop gun store (Houma Auto Parts. Houma, LA) sells a lot of these to those who are after nutria pelts for the bounty. Apparently they run as not one has come back. The owner of the shop tried one out and although it won't win any accuracy competitions it worked and filled a niche in his lineup. Low cost and does the job asked of it. However he will not stock any Hi Point handguns. They don't run. My opinion. If anyone wants a gun for personal protection you have to ask yourself one question. What is my life worth? A $200 Hi Point that chokes in a gunfight is not a tool I would trust my life with. Yeah it may have a lifetime warranty but once the bad guy cuts your head off that warranty is worthless. Get a gun that runs 100%, 100% of the time. Another way to look at it. You're about to jump out of an airplane. It's on fire and the wing just fell off. You're in extreme fear for your life. Do you want a $200 parachute that has very high malfunction rate or would you rather spend a bit more to get something more reliable. Your life depends on your choice. As stated there are great deals on the trade in market. Take a look at the CDNN flyer and get him in something in the $350 range. Wasn't long ago they had S&W 642s at $375.

I've got it all. Myopia. Astigmatism. Cross dominance. And my 40th birthday gift, presbyopia. Thinking the path I should go is mono-vision with dominate eye set to handgun front sight and the other for distance. My shooting glasses are set up that way and it worked till my prescription changed. Only negative is I couldn't read text unless I took my glasses off. I can live with reading glasses. I'm right handed, left eye dominate and shoot all guns right handed. Although this will take care of the shooting side I have a concern for my employment. In aircraft maintenance I have a need to see fine detail up close. Will reading glasses in addition to mono vision correction still allow me to see fine detail? FWIW there's three guys at work who've had lens replacements due to cataracts. None of them wears glasses anymore and all of them can see stuff without readers that I can't. All of them would do it again in a heartbeat.

Made it another one. Still wonder how I've lived this long doing the things I do. At least none of us today have a age ending in zero. Those birthdays are the tough ones.

Wildcat. The others are a bit busy and can make finding desktop icons a bit tough.

The chart is spot on in 12ga for todays loads.Couldn't sleep one night so did some digging on the 'Net. Been toying with getting a muzzleloading shotgun to play at Trap and Skeet. Not one of those inline jobs but external hammer percussion job. Just something different to do every so often. So what is the loading data for a muzzle stuffer scattergun? Dram is an antiquated unit of measure of weight. 1 dram = 27.3 grains. 3 dram = 82.0 grains. In blackpowder shotguns if you had a 3 dram charge with a 1.125 oz payload you'd get about 1200 fps. It became part of the shooting vernacular. Say '3 dram load' and everybody knew what you were talking about. So here comes those fancy smokeless powders and how do you tell the buying public what they were getting? Stamp on the box "3 dram equivalent" and the public knew that it was a 1.125 oz load at 1200. Ignore what the actual charge was. You'd think that 100 years later we'd dump this ancient tidbit but it still works. Problem today is that most people don't know what a dram is. I didn't till just a few days ago. So Heavy Barrel, you need a 3 dram load to run your Benelli. That translates to 1.125 oz at 1200 fps or 1.0 oz at 1250 fps. Take a look at the online Hodgdon charts and pass an eye over the speeds at the right side. There's a bunch of them. I've decided on my loads for the next season. 1 oz at 1200 for Trap Singles and Skeet using Clays. 1.125 oz at 1145 for Handicap and Sporting Clays using International Clays.

Big oops. It was Major. Oh, and AARP still isn't getting any more of my money.

In the meantime till the rules are set and non-vaporizing targets are developed we can dry fire to get ready. Blue Ray Phaser