Wesquire Posted April 17, 2015 Share Posted April 17, 2015 (edited) So the better I get at shooting (still not that good), the more I find gun review articles and videos to be worthless. Here's my idea of a review that would be useful to competition shooters and the average plinker (they care more than many think): -Get a group of 3 shooters of about the same skill level -One shoots primarily polymer striker fired guns, one shoots mainly DA/SA & SAO guns, and one mainly shoots revolvers. -All the reviews shoot each gun in the reviews -They all shoot classic classifiers and drills like el pres or a steel challenge stage -They shoot each classifier 5 times each and take the average for each reviewer -The results can be compared to other guns in the same niche. I know this would still be far from perfect, and less useful than actually shooting the guns....it just seems like the only gun reviews I can bare to read or watch are geared more towards subjectivity, brevity, and humor. Is there any hope for a good empirical gun review system? Edited April 17, 2015 by Wesquire Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wesquire Posted April 17, 2015 Author Share Posted April 17, 2015 El pres might not be a good drill for this sort of review since it has a good focus on draw and reload. Bill drills and Blake drills would probably be better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
motosapiens Posted April 17, 2015 Share Posted April 17, 2015 Just buy whatever everyone else uses. It *must* be the best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dddoo7 Posted April 17, 2015 Share Posted April 17, 2015 Just buy what the military uses. It also *must* be the best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbentley40 Posted April 17, 2015 Share Posted April 17, 2015 The problem with using a logical method for reviewing a firearm is it is not generic enough for manufacturers. They love a review that basically reads the specs of the gun that you can find on their website put into 1000 words. I mean honestly.. how many really BAD reviews published in a magazine or on a website have you found? Sure, you can read reviews people put on a message board, but then you get 100 haters agreeing and 100 fan boys arguing and you still feel like you have no clue what to think. Gun manufacturers love those generic and useless reviews.. only way to know if you will like a gun is to shoot it yourself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hi-Power Jack Posted April 17, 2015 Share Posted April 17, 2015 The BEST reviews I've ever seen are right here, reading the posts, on BE. Real discussions by people who are using these guns for 10-20,000 rounds per year. Priceless. :bow: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mgardner Posted April 18, 2015 Share Posted April 18, 2015 The BEST reviews I've ever seen are right here, reading the posts, on BE. Real discussions by people who are using these guns for 10-20,000 rounds per year. Priceless. :bow: What he said. ^^^^^^^ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wesquire Posted April 19, 2015 Author Share Posted April 19, 2015 The BEST reviews I've ever seen are right here, reading the posts, on BE. Real discussions by people who are using these guns for 10-20,000 rounds per year. Priceless. :bow: Oh I agree. But that isn't practical for a magazine, Internet site or YouTube channel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mgardner Posted April 19, 2015 Share Posted April 19, 2015 The BEST reviews I've ever seen are right here, reading the posts, on BE. Real discussions by people who are using these guns for 10-20,000 rounds per year. Priceless. :bow: Oh I agree. But that isn't practical for a magazine, Internet site or YouTube channel. Then you will get the same unreliable reviews that have become an industry standard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimmyZip Posted April 19, 2015 Share Posted April 19, 2015 Not necessarily. I think it sounds like a great idea. They could even ship the gun to each other, and i think there are numerous classifiers that can be used to run the guns. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wesquire Posted April 19, 2015 Author Share Posted April 19, 2015 (edited) And I guess it would probably be best if they each had a standard amount of about 300 rounds of practice with each gun before running the classifiers. Edited April 19, 2015 by Wesquire Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waktasz Posted April 19, 2015 Share Posted April 19, 2015 (edited) Unless a gun sucks really bad (I'm looking at you, HK), your testing procedure is not really going to prove anything. You can win with near any gun. Edited April 19, 2015 by waktasz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TonytheTiger Posted April 19, 2015 Share Posted April 19, 2015 Unless a gun sucks really bad (I'm looking at you, HK), your testing procedure is not really going to prove anymore. You can win with near any gun. That's true. There's this one guy, goes by Rob Vogel, and he shoots a Glock. And he's good at it. I hate Glocks.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted April 19, 2015 Share Posted April 19, 2015 (edited) Unless a gun sucks really bad (I'm looking at you, HK), your testing procedure is not really going to prove anything. You can win with near any gun. True, but I think that a testing procedure kinda like that (having people that shoot different kinds of guns normally) would shed some light on what you might think of it (depending on which category of that you fit into) which would certainly be better than most of those gun reviews. Edited April 19, 2015 by Gooldylocks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wesquire Posted April 19, 2015 Author Share Posted April 19, 2015 Unless a gun sucks really bad (I'm looking at you, HK), your testing procedure is not really going to prove anything. You can win with near any gun. But that doesn't mean that all guns will perform the same. Vogel would beat me with a hi-point. I know that skill and practice is a much greater part of success than gear, but people love talking about gear...and I'm just trying to come up with an idea for how a useful and interesting review system would work. Another interesting aspect would be to see how each reviewer performs with different kinds of setups. Maybe it could give insight to who would benefit most from the advantages that polymer vs. steel gives. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawboy Posted April 20, 2015 Share Posted April 20, 2015 Objective gun review = UNICORN. Reviewing a gun is like test driving a car. The entire point of it is subjectivity. Embrace it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wesquire Posted April 20, 2015 Author Share Posted April 20, 2015 Objective gun review = UNICORN. Reviewing a gun is like test driving a car. The entire point of it is subjectivity. Embrace it. But car reviews also have standard performances tests. 0-60. Brake distance. Top speed. 1/4 mile. Nürburgring lap times. Etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
9x45 Posted April 21, 2015 Share Posted April 21, 2015 There's really only 2 kinds of guns in USPSA, Glocks and 1911's. And yes, Vogel could stomp everyone with a HiPoint or Keltec, but no one uses the worthless POS's, so it doesn't matter. Gun reviews are not for shooters anyway. It's like there is really nothing wrong with an H&K, or a Ruger, as long as you don't run them in the games. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leeb10 Posted April 21, 2015 Share Posted April 21, 2015 Trailing behind even car reviews, the vast majority of current gun reviews evaluate performance criteria, such as recoil and trigger feel, in subjective terms. Therefore we get descriptors like "flat shooting," 'minimal creep" etc. that offer very little real information and are unable to facilitate relative comparisons between firearms. What we need is a standardized set of objective metrics past the basics of accuracy ransom testing and "reliability round counts". If for example, recoil could be addressed in terms like: slide weight, slide velocity, spring weight etc... with information such as gun displacement in degrees when fired from a fixed rest, then you get more tangible and hard to contest data. Trigger feel can be measured with instruments like the Dvorak trigger scanner that plots the trigger feel in terms of trigger weight (ounces) and and trigger distance (mm).Standardizing these and other objective metrics to firearm performance will help make gun reviews more helpful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawboy Posted April 21, 2015 Share Posted April 21, 2015 Objective gun review = UNICORN. Reviewing a gun is like test driving a car. The entire point of it is subjectivity. Embrace it. But car reviews also have standard performances tests. 0-60. Brake distance. Top speed. 1/4 mile. Nürburgring lap times. Etc. True. But how do you get a similar set of objective performance tests with a gun? Also, those figures for cars really are not all that objective but I do get and concede your point. I still do not see how you can get a similar set of standard performance metrics with guns. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeRush Posted April 22, 2015 Share Posted April 22, 2015 Objective gun review = UNICORN. Reviewing a gun is like test driving a car. The entire point of it is subjectivity. Embrace it. But car reviews also have standard performances tests. 0-60. Brake distance. Top speed. 1/4 mile. Nürburgring lap times. Etc. True. But how do you get a similar set of objective performance tests with a gun? Also, those figures for cars really are not all that objective but I do get and concede your point. I still do not see how you can get a similar set of standard performance metrics with guns. Ransom rest grouping is one, trigger pull weight, reliability measures... But at the end of the day so much boils down to preference and your abilities as a shooter. Are you great at transitions and want a setup that tracks easier to help improve your splits? Do you currently rip off strings of .13s but overswing the gun and have poor hits on wide transitions? There are setups that can compliment your strengths or mitigate your weaknesses. Most people don't take the time to work things out on a timer so the easy way out is to pick what the pros use. Buying a replica of Nils' M2I will not make me a champion, but knowing that I have adequate equipment that will not hold me back can help lead to practicing more and improved confidence with a corresponding improvement in performance. You can't buy results, but you can eliminate excuses... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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