Carmoney

Flex, true IPSC wheelgunners don't whine like that. You must be thinking of IDPA.

Dan, That's the barrel cross-pin that was used on the older S&W revos, later eliminated for cost-savings in favor of simple crush-fitting. You've heard of "pinned and recessed" guns that the collectors like? That's it. (25-2s never had recessed chambers, of course, since they are made for the rimless .45 ACP cartridge.) Mike

Here's that Nowlin 25-2 I was talking about. The interchangeable underlugs attach to the Shilen barrel via hex screws, but I always used the lighter one. Great gun, I managed to win one of the shoot-offs with it my first year at Second Chance.

Yep, the 230-grainers that look almost like full wadcutters, 7.8 gr. Blue Dot, in .38 Spl. brass. I used to buy them from the Butte Bullets from Nebraska, when they went out of business I bought a mold from Barney Niner so I could cast my own. Best load I ever found for moving bowling pins in any caliber, bar none. Jerry used the same load for a year or two, but he eventually went back to the 200s.

On the issue of big slab barrels on revolvers....been there done that. It works for PPC and NRA action, where speed is secondary. In everything else, a heavy-hanging muzzle just slows you down. I have a fantastic Shilen-barreled 25-2 done by the late great John Nowlin himself (remind me to take some photos and post 'em), and used it somewhat successfully at Second Chance for a couple years. Then I discovered how much faster I could shoot pins with a light pencil barrel that I made the switch and never went back. In a game that allowed unlimited barrel shape, size, compensation, etc., my best pin-shooting years were shot with a factory Model 27 with its original unported skinny 8-3/8" factory barrel. While personal preference is obviously a big factor with this sort of thing, I do not believe that a heavy aftermarket slab barrel could be anything other than a disadvantage for shooting IPSC for most revolver shooters at the higher levels.

You'll notice in the picture above that my eyes are clenched shut as I wince in fear. Hopefully I will improve as I gain more experience.

Patrick, Great idea! The thing that would matter most to me is that this gun NOT be a ridiculously overpriced "Performance Center" product, complete with high-end gun rug, 25-pound "action job," and autographed Jerry grips. I might be willing to pay the same amount that a new standard 625 sells for, but I would not pay $1,000 when a nice 25-2 can still be obtained in the $400-500 range. Mike

Hey Dave, you'll also note the front sight in my avatar is quite out of focus, not unlike my sight picture on several stages at the Big Dawg match over the weekend. Still a really fun match, glad you could make it out to shoot with us. Mike

No profession trains its practitioners to consider both sides of an issue more than the law. People sometimes don't realize that because their only exposure to lawyers is when we're in advocacy mode. Many folks do have the luxury of seeing the world in black and white terms. Lawyers are forced to see infinite shades of gray. (Not sure if that's a blessing or a curse!)

Jay Tappe did well in both open and limited divisions:

Dean Gomez used the dot very effectively:

Chris Strabala shot strong both days:

A few of the other steel stages (there were 15 in all). Note the donut-shaped plates on that right rack:

Junior shooter Brian Green, in his first organized pistol match, shooting the "letters and numbers" on Bay 5. These plates proved to be extremely difficult to hit with any semblance of speed, particularly with iron sights:

Here's Doug Carden running one of the popper courses:

Limited revolver winner, lil 'ol me:

Open revolver winner, all the way from Colorado, wheelgun maestro Bud Bond:

Limited division winner Emanuel Bragg:

This was a great match! The falling steel set-ups covered the gamut from easy "mow-em-down" to extremely challenging, the atmosphere was pleasant and safe and well-organized, they had a good prize table and excellent sponsors, and talented shooters from many parts of the country traveled in to participate. Even if they expand the slot availability next year, this match will sell out quickly. Here are a some photos from the match, starting with overall match winner (shooting open), Iowa's own Dwight Stearns:

Steve, it was great talking to you at Nationals. And if you deserted your wheelgunning brethren, at least you wound up on a good squad! I'm signed up for Area 5, but for scheduling purposes, I need to shoot Sunday. Hopefully I'll bump into you somewhere along the way.

Bill, that's great!! If you need any digital photos of the OH Sectional "Sunday squad" (see photo below) for your article, you're welcome to grab any of the pics that I forwarded to the Area 5 website photo gallery. 2005 OH Sectional revo album

Even with only 6 shots in the guns, several shooters at the 2005 USPSA Nationals would have finished quite respectably shooting heads-up against the Production crowd, if you compare the hit factors straight across. Locally, I'm seeing many matches that tend to have lots of 8-shot arrays--I would think a guy with a 627 and a decent running reload could be pretty darn competitive.

Jerry commented that sometimes at a big match he likes to shoot a gun with a different kind of front sight than the one he uses for practice, "makes me look at it a little harder." It was definitely green fiber optic at the Nationals.

See guys??? When he's off the range, Jerry's just an ordinary average sort of guy, scraping gators just like the rest of us.

Headspace is simply the distance between the breechface and the cartridge when the gun is in battery. In different types of guns, headspace is controlled by different mechanisms. In a rifle, the cartridge can headspace on the shoulder of the cartridge, by the rim, or by a case belt. Shotguns generally headspace on the rim. Revolvers headspace on the rim, on a moonclip, or on the case mouth. Pistols headspace on a rim, cartridge shoulder, or case mouth. 1911 chambers have to be generous enough to accommodate brass of varying dimensions and quality, otherwise you'd have a malfunction every time a piece of longer brass cycled up and in. And a different type of malfunction from every round that was crimped too tightly. What happens most of the time with a 1911, even with regular ACP ammo, is that the cartridge is held against the breechface by the extractor hook. The fact that .45 Gap ammo functions just fine in a 1911 simply provides a good illustration of this fact. Obviously, there is a chamber step in the barrel that will stop the cartridge from moving forward if the extractor is broken or missing. Most of the time, though, the case mouth does not quite reach that step.