nanopistol

My son shot his first match, an IDPA match, when he was 9 or so. He shot a Walther P22, and we worked on draw with finger off the trigger, pointing the pistol at the target before taking the safety off, and reloading with finger off the trigger. He knew not to go for speed, safety was key. The P22 has a slide-mounted safety that is pushed up, so he trained to push it up with his left thumb after the draw. I thought it was important that he get used to instruction and control by someone that wasn't dad. He learned a lot from the old codgers that wanted to help. The best thing was how cool everyone at the match was. They all wanted to see the little kid run-and-gun. He never had a DQ, missed a lot of targets, falling steal was scored if it pinged, and he started beating the old codgers fairly fast. I bet if you train up with a .22 the folks at your local matches will allow it. He shot his first match with a 1911 .45 at 11. I have video of that, one of my proudest moments. If done right, this early is ok. I am not saying every kid can do it, some kids don't have the temperament. But if you train separately for safety first then this age is not too young. Good luck!

Rub some dirt on it, you'll be fine :-) Get well quick!

You can use the simplified equations to approximate, as described in the Wiki article, but doing it in closed form? Not only is it a second order diffeq, the coefficients are not constant if you take the real effect of drag as proportional to v^2. Is this for personal edification? Because I do this crap for a living, and I would just make a spreadsheet to find what I was looking for iteratively, as AustinT suggested.

Kurtosis? I hope your sample size is large enough to warrent noting the Kurtosis, otherwise you are just living a fantacy. (OMG, I am even nerder than I thought and I don't even have a DC poster!). Of course, limit as n->infinity...but I always divide by zero and blink out of existence for a few minutes, gotta start all over when that happens

Oh, so many things to add to this! Nanotechnologist trying to be a redneck is probably a good description, the mostest fakest thing you will see at the range I suspect, but at least I don't drive my wife's Prius to the matches. "You know you're a Red Necky Geek if you have calculated the standard deviation AND kurtosis of your .40 S&W competition reload velocity...and have the graphs posted above your reloading bench, right next to the Duck Commander poster!"

Recoil depends on a lot of factors, including pistol weight, barrel length, type of bullet (jacketed, plated, moly, etc.), distance to lands, temperature, grip, and crimp (it can be difference slightly with the different bullets, even without adjusting the crimp die), just to name a few. We also have position on the Mayan Calendar, what dress Faith Hill wears on Monday night football, and reloader stance to consider Noise difference is not gonna be detectable with this small delta, IMO. My guess is that you will only see the difference with a chrono, You need much bigger variance than that to "feel" the load differences.

Have you figured out yet why she was feeling guilty? Might want to check your CC statement OK, I checked the CC and we're safe...whew! but she did sweet talk me out of a new scope purchase while we were reloading recently...I think she has this subversive control thing down better than me...

I had a whole case of federal pistol primers where the primer insert was raised, not seated well. I had to double pump the primer seating to get them in place, and I shot them only for practice, never in a match. By the way you describe, looks like you did everything right. The only other thing I can think of is old primers. They do lose their mojo, but that takes several years. I would pull the bullets apart and inspect. As it is they would be unsafe to try to fire again, and you can probably do as much diagnostic as Federal would care to do and share. And you can recover the bullets and powder for reuse as practice rounds. Good luck.

An old fart I know gave me 8 lbs of Unique a few years ago. I was using Titegroup in the 9mm 147gr, same as my .40. When I ran out of TG I started in on the Unique, got to 4.0 gr with 1.158". I haven't looked back. I still use TG for .40, but in 9mm the Unique is light, the powered almost perfectly fills the case, brass stacks up in one neat little pile, and nary a ftf.

OK, I have an evil idea brewing in the noggin, but before I put down some bucks (and thereby distort marital bliss), I'd like opinions. I'm thinking of an RRA 9mm carbine for the matches where the bays are not overly long. Save dough on the ammo, have another toy in the collection, and move faster than Sheldon Cooper in his flash outfit, right? But instead, what if I get the 10" bbl ar pistol with a red dot, should be plenty accurate and fast for 50 yds or less. What I have in mind is drilling a hole at the back of the mainspring tube and drill/tap/install a swivel with a clip for a sling. This I know is legal, lots of reading and past posts on BE and other forums, as well as close scrutiny of the law convince me of that. But what I want to do is connect the swivel to a shoulder holster or battle harness like the one pictured here. It will connect at the right shoulder on the utility d-ring so that when I relax it drops and hangs in a safe position, the pistol comes up to a natural shooting position, and the spring tube rests on the battle vest. [patent pending ] So I think I am legal in doing this, no stock changes made to the firearm other than what would be done for a sling. I could make whatever changes to the battle vest I wanted and it won't affect the gun from a legal stand point. A judiciously placed piece of kydex in the shoulder strap of the battle harness behind that d-ring would be for "comfort" purposes... OK, flame resistant tighty whiteys on, thoughts?

Mmmm, VTAC walls...in fact, I like any 3gun obstacle that screw-balls with the computers, as long as it is an equal opportunity screwer-baller

I have been to matches where the home team always seemed to win, were in a distinct group from the others and understood the rules a little better than everyone else. It is not common, but unfortunately it happens. Two things to do about it: shoot somewhere else or get involved. Shooting somewhere else is not always a possibility, I understand. Sometimes the next closes matches is 2-4 hours away or always during the Saturday you have to be at the in-laws, etc. So, get involved in the group, express your concerns in club meetings, offer to post solid, extensive stage descriptions ahead of time. And emphasize rules, they're all out there and can't really be bent if you articulate them clearly. Good luck!

That is awesome, fast question: did you point shoot or did you use some point of reference on the front slide to help aim? Or even some kind of floating holdover?

Funny you mention that, much closer to the truth than I care to admit. I told her that when I'm gone, there are 2 thing the "new guy" can't have, my guns stuff is one of them.

I'll let you know when we get there, but I'm sure it's between "stockpile" and "small republic"

The legal question is a catching point, I have to admit I hadn't thought of it. It will make me pause with my son. Same situation for me, I'd trust him over 76.35% of the people that were at the last match I shot (I can calculate that cuz it was a small match ) One thing I would do, if the opportunity arose, is allow him to RO those individuals that I know are good, safe and wouldn't be disrespectful even if I were ROing. A few fellas at our match that have taken an interest in mentoring him (I won't be smart enough to give hime advice for another 10 years or so according to him) wouldn't mind being ROed by him, and I know they are safe enough. I think the experience is important for a burgenoning young man to get time in-command, so to speak.

Step 1: Get practice time with a Texas Star! My only practice seems to be when I confront the wily beast at a match. It's cool you can practice with one. I have had luck with them in the past, not really ever given me fits, so even with my limited practice here are some observations that might help. Each club's Texas Start sits a little different at rest: some tilt left, some tilt right. That will determine the direction of rotation when you shoot the first one, so you have to be ready to go both way. (Had one earlier this year that was tied to a popper so that it started the thing spinning BEFORE the first shot!) So if you can, rig it to start both ways and practice going in CW and CCW directions. I don't like the ambush method, too much time wasted, and the best I have seen just shoot them before it starts rotating fast anyway. Last advice: a fast 2nd shot is key! If you can shoot the top one, then get the second one fast enough that it basically stops its angular momentum with three at the bottom, then those last three are easy to deal with and it won't turn over. Hope this helps.

If Apple had the same customer service that Dillon does, I'm quite sure they would dominate the mobile market...um....wait...why do I have an iPhone? I called them once, asked how to fix Glock-bulge .40 brass; the technical assistance fella I talked to said buy a Redding GR-x. That's customer service for ya! By the way, has anyone been able to use their GR-x on a Dillon 550?

eeek...I've mashed the digits on my GR-x while resizing glocked .40, so your post made my toes curl a little

Naive question: what's the benefit to making Master other than braggin' rights and the opportunity to get my but kicked by other (better) masters?

OK, a little bragging, and an enquiry. Ever been to Red Lobster for all-u-can-eat crab legs, but you spend the whole meal cracking and the rest of the family enjoys the fruit(meat) of the labor? Well, that's me reloading. Amazing how fast the teenager can burn through 200 .40s&w in his STI, but he has shown an interest in reloading recently, especially once I started precision loading .223. Then an awesome thing happened this weekend: my wife asked me if she could help with my most recent batch of .223! And it turns out she's better at it than I am! That's not to say she can punch em out faster, or knows how to safely fix a hiccup in the process better than me, but her attention to detail is better than mine (I was ADHD before ADHD was cool, I think...). We get finished with 200 rounds, and she says "I would feel a lot better if I just measure final weight and OAL of every one." What?!? OK, baby, you get right after that, I'll start on the next batch. So we spent Sunday with precision reloading activities in the garage. I gotta tell you, it was kinda romantic. Now I have enough data to justify making a Gaussian distribution plot with a few minutes in a spread sheet. SO my question: how many folks reload as a family, have brass sorting parties, etc? Maybe a poll is in order?

It's not so much seeing the lift of the pistol as it is seeing where it is aiming EXACLTY when the shot goes off. For slower cycling pistols like 1911 .45 you can actually see the lift, and if you can keep your eyes from blinking during the shot you can actually see that big fatty rolling down the range...kinda cool.

+1 on the backpack, makes stage-to-stage easier when the weight is on both shoulders. I would add that a sturdy laptop backpack works GREAT! Laptop pouch holds 2 pistols in a soft side case easily, room for ammo and muffs in the other big pockets, and the smaller zipper pockets hold mags, tools, etc. Targus is what I use, and it allows me to wear it on my motorcycle to I can drive to matches with better gas mileage.

I still think the biggest obstacle to shot calling is blinking during the shot. Watch Travis' eyes in the video. He is right, but I don't think this is emphasized enough. If you don't have enough lead down the barrel so that your subconscious ignores the noise and recoil, you blink. If you blink, you can't call the shot. Shoot at a target, but try to "watch" your pistol. When you have that down, then practice calling the shots (like the drill at the end of the video).

If you have some ammo to burn (and honestly, that's what it's gonna take...lot's of ammo), try this: Go to a berm isolated from everyone else. In a safe manner, fire into the berm but don't look at the berm, look at the pistol. I don't mean look at the sights, but really watch the pistol, its function, your hands during the recoil, where it returns to. What you are really practicing is keeping your eyes open during the shot. Once you have fired enough rounds that the operation/noise of the pistol is subconsciously dismissed, then you can concentrate where the sight is as the shot breaks, or even on what the round is doing in the case of .45 ACP. The first time you actually WATCH a 230gr bullet buzz down range from your shot, you'll be badder than The Hulk putting some slap down on Loki. Good luck