Chuck Buck

I got word today that Chuck Buck, the Chairman of Buck Knives and grandson of the founder, passed away in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho on February 6th.

I had the very good fortune to meet and briefly talk to Chuck twice at trade and outdoor shows, and he was an extremely personable fellow and a fine gentleman.

Perhaps Chuck's greatest contribution to the American knife culture was his introduction of the Buck Folding Hunter (Model 110) in the 1965. It was a design the company's board members didn't think would sell, and at the time even Chuck thought it would have a limited market, selling just to hunters and outdoorsmen. Both were wrong, but in a very good way. The folding hunter went on to be perhaps the best selling folding knife design ever brought to market and is one of the most copied knife designs in the history of cutlery manufacturing.

Vaya con Dios, Chuck.  You will be missed but you left us with a great legacy.

Stay sharp!

- Brian

The M-16, Part II

Last week in Part I of this series I outlined the whys and hows of the M-16's tortured acceptance by the US military. All of what I wrote is public knowledge, well documented and easy to find.

This second part, however, will outline my personal experience with the M-16 platform that constitutes more of a personal journey of realization and acceptance.

When I joined ROTC in 1974 I didn't like the M-16. I was a child of the 1950s and 60s. All of the adult males in my life - my father, my uncles, our neighbors, my Boy Scout leaders - all served in the US military during WWII or Korea and for them the M-1 Garand was the weapon of choice. Their experience deeply influenced me and I viewed the Garand (and the newer M-14) as the only acceptable choice for a Soldier. At the same time we were seeing the M-16 almost nightly on the evening news and in magazines like Time and Life. While the M-16 was cool looking I had the vague sense that it didn't offer enough 'punch' and that the Army and Marines were going to go back to the good old hard hitting M-14 once all this Vietnam silliness was over. I also remember hearing the reports about the unreliability of the M-16 and I'm sure that colored my perceptions.

Real men carried big heavy rifles... or so I was told

In ROTC all we used were M-14s. We learned to field strip them, clean them, maintain them and march with them. Our armory only had one or two M-16s for familiarization, and those got pulled out only for the cadets who were headed off to ROTC Summer Camp.

My first real introduction to the M-16 came in 1977 at ROTC Summer Camp at Fort Lewis. There wasn't an M-14 in sight. We were issued M-16's on day one and we lived with those rifles for the next six weeks. Our platoon sergeant, SFC Louis B. Pincock, hammered rifle cleaning and maintenance into us with a 5 lb sledge hammer. He was hell on any cadet with a dirty rifle. In part because that's just the way NCOs are, but also because, as a Vietnam vet with three combat tours, he understood firsthand the necessity of keeping your weapon clean.

Truth be told, we over-cleaned the damned things. It's what Soldiers do. Attention to detail, cleanliness, good order and discipline, all that stuff, A sparkling clean rifle goes right along with a sparkling clean latrine and a mirror polish on Corcoran jump boots. It makes a good NCO happy. But it's unnecessary (the sparkling clean rifle part - I'm all for sparkling clean latrines and a mirror polish on the toe caps of a pair of Corcoran jump boots is a thing to behold).

SFC Pincock also let us know that he thought the M-16 was a fine rifle for killing Viet Cong and North Vietnamese regulars. The Special Forces combat patch on his right shoulder clearly indicated that he'd spent a lot of time looking down the sights of an M-16 so his opinion carried a lot of weight with a bunch of no-nothing cadets.

In late 1979 I went on active duty. The very first M-16 I was issued, at Fort Bragg, was so old it was stamped 'Colt AR-15/XM-16E1'. It rattled like hell but shot just fine.  On my first trip to the range with the rifle I shot Sharpshooter, and that's more a testament to the rifle's shooting ability than mine.

No, not my rifle, but the one I was issued at Fort Bragg in
1980 was marked the same way. And it was a fine shooter

Twenty three years later when I put in my retirement papers my assigned weapon was an M-16A2 manufactured by FN out of South Carolina. It too shot just fine. In the intervening years I carried dozens of M-16s (A1 and A2 models) in combat zones or places where the natives were pissed enough at us to start popping off rounds. I've also shot dozens more under range conditions and as a platoon leader and small unit commander in Germany, Fort Bragg, Panama and Fort Hood I've been responsible for the maintenance of over 100 more rifles in places like the jungles of Panama and the deserts of Kuwait.

I can count the number of malfunctions that were the fault of the rifle on the fingers of one hand, and have digits left over.  In fact, I can only recall three issues that could be traced directly back to a mechanical problem with the rifle - one was a damaged gas tube, another was a bent barrel (yes, a bent barrel) and the last one was with a very early issue M-16 (by serial number) that, in the words of our armorer, was "just worn out and too tired to run".

All of the remaining reliability issues I experienced or observed were the fault of the magazines. Well into the mid-1980's the Army continued to issue 20 round magazines, many of which dated to the Vietnam era. Finding magazines with weak springs or damaged feed lips was common. If we had an issue on the range the standard practice was to just swap out magazines and the problem would go away. Later, when new production 30 round magazines were introduced the reliability issues all but disappeared.

New production mil-spec 30 round magazines tend to cure most M-16
reliability problems. But when they don't work any more don't try to fix them.
Toss them and get replacements!

I quickly developed a deep respect for the M-16 platform and that respect continues right up to this day.

Perhaps the real test is the question, "If you had to choose a rifle to carry into battle today would you unhesitatingly select the M-16?" My answer is an unflinching "Yes!"

Now let's consider another question: "Can the M-16 platform be improved?" Anyone who says "No" is a fool. The M-16 is a tool, a mechanical device, and like any mechanical device can be improved upon. As experience with any tool increases the user finds ways to make it more reliable. effective and easy to use. So it is with the M-16. Since the 1960s the M-16 has undergone a number of product improvements to increase reliability, shootability and service life; chrome lined barrel, better sights, different rifling twists, improved flash hider, improved stock and hand guards, reinforced lower receiver, and more. Perhaps the biggest improvement has been the successful shortening of the M-16 by Colt to produce the M-4 Carbine. Shortened versions of the M-16 had been tried since the rifle was first fielded in Vietnam, but reliability was always an issue. In the late 1980's Colt did extensive development and testing to produce the reliable and accurate M-4 Carbine. It was so successful that it became the rifle that has taken the US military through the Global War on Terror on battlefields across the globe.

The M-4 Carbine kitted out with an Advanced Combat Optical Gunsight - a deadly combination

While my personal experience is all with the full-sized M-16 I've had the chance to talk with perhaps a dozen Soldiers about their opinions of the M-4. One was an senior Engineer NCO with multiple deployments to Iraq, one was an SF Medic with multiple deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan the the Horn of Africa and the rest were Soldiers in Kuwait, fresh out of the fight in Iraq. To a man they either praised the M-4 or expressed grudging respect for it. The Engineer NCO in particular felt the M-4 was the best battle rifle he ever carried. He praised it as being, "very handy, easy to maneuver inside of vehicles, reliable and deadly accurate inside of 100 meters."

I tend to believe my own experience and that of people who have actually used the rifle in combat vs. those that glean all their expertise from the internet or other second hand sources. The M-16 and M-4 are two of the best battle rifles available today.

But is the M-16 the best? Are there better designs and better calibers that would make for a better battle rifle? Aaaah, that's a topic for another time!

- Brian

The M-16, Part I

This is a blog post series I've been meaning to write for a long, long time.

For the past 14 years or so the AR-15, the civilian version of the M-16 rifle, has been all the rage among shooters. There are more manufacturers turning out their own versions of the AR-15 and variants than Carter's got little liver pills.

What drove the popularity of a once maligned rifle platform? Simple - the news images of America's sons and daughters carrying the M-16 and it's carbine variant the M-4 into battle across the Middle East. The M-4 in particular captured America's eye. While based on a 55 year old design, the M-4 got a cosmetic make-over that turned it downright sexy.  Colt sawed off the carrying handle to mount a wide range of optical sights, installed a collapsible stock, slapped on a fore grip that could take all manner of lights and lasers and suddenly the M-4 was the star of the show - literally. Thousands and thousands of photos and videos hit the internet showing America's Soldiers with the Colt M-4 hanging across their chest. America's fighting men and women never went anywhere without their M-4s. On battlefields in Iraq, Afghanistan and the other piss-holes we found ourselves killing terrorists in, the M-4 was the ubiquitous symbol of American military might. In perhaps its greatest starring role it was a Colt M-4, in the hands of a US Navy SEAL, that fired the double-tap that put out Osama bin Laden's lights.

A Colt M4 cabine in the hands of an American Soldier somewhere in Afghanistan.

What also spurred the popularity of the AR-15 platform was the 2008 presidential election and the ushering in of a blatantly anti-gun chief executive, who brought on-board an equally anti-gun administration and emboldened anti-gun forces in Congress and those working out of K Street in Washington DC. The American public realized long before the November 2008 election that Barack Obama would likely win the next election and that triggered a nation-wide firearm and ammo buying frenzy the likes of which had never been seen. 

The AR-15 had long been at the top of the 'hit list' maintained by numerous anti-gun groups simply because it looks scary. In fact, the AR-15 had been singled out by the Clinton administration back in 1995 when he got a law (with a 10 year sunset provision) through Congress that banned the sale of AR-15s that sported such deadly accouterments such as flash hiders and bayonet lugs. Clinton's ban was the triumph of political showmanship over substance. Even today the Clintonistas claim that the ban of cosmetic features made the world a safer place, while the FBI provides crime statistics for the 1995 - 2005 period that proves the banning of AR - style rifles had zero impact on crime anywhere in the US.

Yet the AR-15 is still a 55 year old design that has received relatively few updates since Eugene Stoner and ArmaLite introduced it to the world back in the mid-1950s. That alone is a testament to the soundness of the design. In the hands of the US military the rifle has gone through a few product improvement cycles starting with a critical upgrade right after it was first widely fielded in Vietnam in 1965. From that time most of the upgrades have focused on usability issues - better sights, improved stocks, different flash hider designs, heavier barrels designed to fire varying ammunition loads. However, the basic operating design - the direct gas impingement design developed by Eugene Stoner - remains essentially unchanged. It is this direct gas impingement system that generates the most discussion when talk starts up about the M-16's reliability.

Eugene Stoner, firearms engineer extraordinaire, standing next to a display of some of his designs

Stoner specifically selected the gas impingement system with the goal of keeping the rifle as light as possible while still maintaining a high level of reliability. In more traditional full auto and semi-auto rifle designs a small amount of gas pressure is bled off behind the bullet as it travels down the barrel. This gas is routed through a small hole in the barrel into a chamber where the rapidly expanding gas pushes against a piston. This piston pushes against an operating rod that is attached to the rifle's bolt. The gas pressure against the piston/operating rod assembly is enough to force the rifle's bolt to move rearward, unlocking it from the receiver and extracting and ejecting the spent casing.  A large recoil spring captures and reverses the bolt's rearward movement, forcing it forward to strip a fresh round of ammunition from a magazine or clip, pushing the round into the rifle's chamber and locking the bolt closed. The rifle is ready to fire again. If you close your eyes and try to visualize the mechanics of what I just described you understand two things - the piston/operating rod combination adds weight to the rifle, and when the operating rod is moving under recoil there's a lot of moving mass right beside or below the barrel, negatively impacting accuracy.

The genius of Eugene Stoner's design is that he eliminated the gas piston/operating rod assembly and brought the gas pressure directly back to the bolt assembly. The M-16 design has a small gas tube that runs along the top of the barrel from the bleed hole near the muzzle and directly to the bolt carrier assembly. The gas comes straight back through the gas tube and pushes against the gas key which is part of the bolt carrier. This rearward movement unlocks the bolt and extracts and ejects the spent casing. Another example of Stoner's genius is that he put all critical recoil components - the barrel and chamber, bolt and bolt carrier and recoil spring and buffer - in a straight line. This means all recoil forces are aligned, greatly reducing the impact any moving parts may have on overall accuracy. The M-16 design has a lot of inherent accuracy.

The AR-15/M-16 direct gas impingement system

So if the design is so good why all the criticism? For a couple of reasons.

First, there's no wood or heavy steel in the rifle's design. You have to keep in mind that when this rifle was introduced to the US Army back in the early 1960's the venerable M-1 Garand and its replacement the M-14 were the Infantryman's weapon of choice. The M-1 had, quite literally, won the war. During WWII the M-1 put an unprecedented amount of firepower into the hands of American servicemen on battlefields around the globe. It was a much loved and respected rifle, A lot of American GIs made it home from the war because the firepower the M-1 provided gave them a decided advantage over their German or Japanese adversaries using 19th Century designed bolt action rifles. In the minds of  America's military leaders and millions of veterans a real battle rifle was made of American wood and ordnance steel.

Next, the M-1 fired a 'manly' cartridge, the .30-06 round. Now, the .30-06 is a very good rifle round. It has a flat trajectory and a lot of knock-down and killing power well out beyond 500 yards. But studies during WWII showed that the average Infantryman didn't try to engage targets much beyond 300 yards - that job was left to the heavy machine guns and artillery. The .30-06 is also a large and heavy round and has one heck of a kick. In the late 1950's and early 1960's there was a lot of discussion about the lethality of large rifle bullets like the .30-06 as compared to smaller fast moving bullets if used within the 300 yard engagement limit. Research showed that out to 300 yards smaller diameter, fast moving and slightly unstable bullets were just as effective at killing lightly clothed enemy soldiers as the larger and heavier .30-06 bullet. But the US Army Ordnance Corps and the Springfield Armory were not swayed by these test results. In a nod to modern ballistics developments and NATO pressure they downsized the .30-06 to develop the 7.62 mm round (.308 caliber) for use in the new M-14 rifle. Still it was a minor give as the new round essentially duplicated the ballistics of the venerable .30-06. In their collective minds only a powerful 30 caliber bullet could meet the individual Infantryman's needs.

By comparison the AR-15 fired a 5.56 mm (22 caliber) round that started life as the 222 Remington - a fast moving, flat shooting commercial cartridge designed for hunting small game.  Eugene Stoner redesigned the round and gave it a 55 grain bullet. He gave the AR-15's barrel a 1:12 rifling twist, just barely enough stabilize the bullet out to 300 yards. Because the bullet was flying on the very edge of stability this meant that when it hit a soft target like a human body the bullet tumbled around inside the body. This is what made the 5.65 round so lethal - more lethal in fact than the heavier hitting 30 caliber rounds that tended to just pass right through the body while doing minimal tissue damage.

The 5.56 mm round (right) compared to the 7.62 mm round.
The 5.56 round actually produces more tissue damage within
normal engagement ranges

So along comes this futuristic rifle made of aluminum and plastic, with just a bit of steel. Even worse, it fires a puny little cartridge that started life as something designed for shooting varmints. The small arms policy makers in the Army Ordnance Corps were having none of it. However, the Ordnance boys didn't count on four factors: General Curtis LeMay, Vietnam, The US Army Special Forces and Robert McNamara.

General LeMay was Chief of Staff of the Air Force in the early 1960's. He was also a gun nut, One of the problems he faced was a lack of small arms for his base defense forces. His Airmen didn't need big, heavy M-1s or M-14s, they needed lighter, smaller rifles. The stock of M-1 Carbines the Air Force was currently using was rapidly wearing out and LeMay needed something new. He was introduced to the AR-15 by Colt Firearms (which had purchased the manufacturing rights to the AR-15 from Armalite) and immediately fell in love with the rifle. LeMay was not the least bit put off by the materials used in the AR-15. Hell, he had fleets supersonic nuclear bombers made of the same stuff, and they performed just fine. In his mind there was no reason a perfectly good rifle couldn't be made of aluminum and plastic. LeMay put in an order for several thousand AR-15's. Congress quickly squashed the order, but LeMay and the Air Force remained convinced that this newfangled rifle was just what they needed and kept up pressure to have it adopted.

At the same time Vietnam was heating up. President Eisenhower got us involved and JFK expanded that involvement. Reports coming back from advisers clearly indicated that the big, heavy M-1 Garand was too much rifle for the small, wiry South Vietnamese soldiers. The M-1 Carbine was extremely popular but it was increasingly hard to get reliable stocks of the rifles and the cartridge it fired, the .30 Carbine, was underpowered. Small lots of the M-16 made their way to Vietnam for testing and the rifle got rave reviews from both the advisers and the South Vietnamese army. It was the right rifle firing the right cartridge for the type of war that was being fought.

The US Army Special Forces got involved in early testing and evaluation of the AR-15, including the advisory role discussed above. From the beginning they loved the rifle. It provided just the right combination of light weight and firepower they badly needed in places like Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Before long the green beret and the M-16 rifle became the universal symbols of the US Army Special Forces Soldier. As JFK's administration expanded the Special Forces role in Vietnam the AR-15 became more ubiquitous in press photos and news footage. The AR-15 became the rifle the 'cool guys' in tiger stripe camouflage and boonie hats were using to kill the godless commies all over Southeast Asia.

"Bronze Bruce" (or as we used to call him, the 'gay beret').
This statue stood for decades outside the US Army Special Forces Museum on Ardennes Road on Fort Bragg.
Originally dedicated in 1968 as a memorial to all US Special Forces Soldiers,
the statue reinforces the image of the M-16 as the indispensable tool of the freedom fighter

But until Robert McNamara got involved the AR-15 program was moving forward in fits and starts. McNamara was Secretary of Defense in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. He was one of the 'wiz kids' Kennedy brought on board to help modernize government operations. McNamara had served in the Army Air Corps during WWII as a program analyst, helping develop the statistical models that gauged the effectiveness of various bombing and air logistics operations. After the war he was hired to turn the Ford Motor Company around and soon found himself in charge of the whole enterprise. Kennedy hired him away from Ford and made him Secretary of Defense with orders to modernize the DoD's development and procurement processes. The AR-15 program quickly caught his eye as an example of all that was wrong with weapons development in the Army. Field commanders in Vietnam were begging for the new AR-15 rifle, but Army Ordnance was pushing back claiming the AR-15 wasn't ready and wasn't what they really needed. McNamara stepped in and directly ordered the Chief of Staff of the Army to get the standardized version of the AR-15, designated the M-16, out to the field without further delay.

The Army Ordnance managers still got their digs in by altering the ballistic requirements for the rifle's 5.56 round so that it shot 'dirtier' (left more fouling powder residue in the rifle) and then failing to issue cleaning kits with the rifles. Eugene Stoner had once claimed that the rifle was 'almost self-cleaning', but that claim was based on a very specific rifle powder type and charge combination developed by Stoner himself. In an example of institutional petulance with a strong hint of criminal intent, Army Ordnance leadership decided to take Stoner at his word and shipped thousands of M-16's and the wrong type of ammunition to Vietnam. What happened were incidents that mar the rifle's reputation to this day - in combat the M-16's fouled and stopped working. Without cleaning kits the Soldiers had no options and many died surrounded by jammed rifles.

News of the rifle's failure was splashed across America's newpapers and TV news reports. Congress ordered an immediate investigation and the ammunition and lack of cleaning equipment were quickly identified as the main culprits. The report also recommended applying a chrome plating to the chamber and bore of the rifle barrels to reduce the likelihood of casings getting stuck in the chamber and to reduce rusting. Once these changes were put in place the rifle went from being a jam-prone piece of junk to a highly reliable, accurate and extremely effective battle rifle.

McNamara would later get his revenge by shutting down the Springfield Armory, home of many of the top Ordnance personnel that had stonewalled the M-16's development and fielding.

The M-16 became the Army's standard service rifle in 1967. Fourty seven years later it is still America's standard service rifle, and has seen reliable and effective service in at least eight wars or armed conflicts (Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm, Mogadishu, the Balkans, Iraq, Afghanistan and perhaps half a dozen other piss holes we found ourselves killing bad guys in). The rifle is well respected by most of those who have actually carried it and used it in sustained ground combat.

But it still can't get an even break!

The internet is rife with stories of failures of the M-16 and M-4. You'd swear from reading these 'reports' that we lost about a battalion's worth of Soldiers every day in Iraq and Afghanistan because of the alleged failures of the M-16 or M-4 design.

Bullshit.

Even General Robert Scales wrote an article for The Atlantic back in January 2014 that seemed to crucify the rifle (even though Scales admits that his initial exposure to the M-16's 'failures' was more related to his own leadership failure to make sure his Soldiers cleaned their weapons). Kyle Mizokami at the War Is Boring blog did a pretty good take down of Scales' criticisms.

Other 'experts' keep comparing the M-16 to the Russian AK-47 and other AK-series rifles.  Because (they claim) you can fill an AK-47 with thick mud and it'll still operate that makes it sooooo much better than the M-16. While I'll admit that the AK can be more reliable, it's also inherently inaccurate and ergonomics are lousy.  Here's a hint - the Russians (and before them the Soviets) don't teach rifle marksmanship. Why bother when you can't hit a damned thing with an AK out beyond 100 yards. The Russians teach 'suppressive fire' - using the AK as a bullet hose to force the enemy to keep his head down and, if fortune smiles, perhaps get a hit or two. Yes there are countries that have adopted the AK design and modified it for their own purposes. The Finnish Valmet and Israeli Galil rifles copied the AK gas piston system and both are very good rifles, but the re-design and improved production processes didn't really yield a rifle that was more reliable AND more accurate than the M-16. Plus they weigh a lot more than an equivalent sized M-16 or M-4.

The other reason the AK-47 is so reliable is because it was designed with sloppy tolerances. Why? Because the Russians (and those they sell the rifle to) never clean them. Ever seen a Russian issue cleaning kit for an AK? Naaa, me either. Maintenance on an AK normally consists of dipping it in a tank of diesel fuel to loosen the crud, then pouring half a quart of motor oil into the receiver to lube it. The point here is that the AK is designed for a peasant society that will receive a minimal amount of firearms training and who's vocabulary has no equivalent for the terms 'accuracy' and 'precision'.

For the American Soldier steeped in the lore of the skilled rifleman and highly trained in the concepts of marksmanship, fire discipline and weapons maintenance an accurate and deadly rifle like the M-16 is a much more effective tool.

Before closing this segment of the discussion of the M-16 let me recommend a great video on the history of the M-16, part of the History Channel's 'Tales Of The Gun' series.

- Brian

(PS - stay tuned for Part II)

Gun Control

I've been thinking about writing gun reviews for a while now. In the past I avoided them because of the politically and emotionally charged nature of the gun discussions in this country, the fact that there's thousands of folks already doing gun reviews and my voice would be just one in a wilderness of gun review crap, and I had lots to write about regarding knives and felt that's where my niche was.

Well now it's five years on and guess what - I still feel the same way. But I'm still going to write about guns, occasionally at least. I dipped my toe in the waters with my recent write-up about Ruger 10/22 modifications and that got some good responses, so I'll keep it going with reviews of some of the firearms I've encountered down through the years and have caught my attention.

But first I think it's important for me to lay out for my readers just where I stand on the issue of guns and gun control. To begin, I am a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution, which states (and the US Supreme Court recently affirmed) that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right, not a collective or state right. Our Founding Fathers - smart, savvy men hardened by long experience - clearly understood that an armed citizenry is often the last thing standing between despotism and freedom. The right to keep and bear arms is the ultimate veto against a government that no longer serves the will of the people and refuses to stand aside. To men like Adams, Monroe, Jefferson, Mason, Franklin and Washington the need for the citizenry to retain arms wasn't some academic exercise in good government. They had experienced first hand a tyrannical government that took as its first step the seizing of weapons when its citizens began asking tough questions and demanding the right of self governance. The Battle of Concorde, the first battle of the American Revolution, was all about the seizing of arms to quell a rebellion.

But my stance on guns (and knives) derives from an even deeper perspective. I believe every person has a fundamental human right to defend themselves, their family and their property to ensure their survival. This right extends not just to American citizens, but also to the goat herder in the Sudan, to the farmer in the Ukraine, to the slum dweller in Venezuela, to the shop keeper in Israel and to the factory worker in China. All human beings have a natural right to life and freedom, and if this means they feel they need to carry a weapon to defend themselves and their loved ones then so be it. No state, no law, no political system should be allowed to override this most basic human right - the right to live. In my interpretation this means that any political system that seeks to deny or tightly restrict the right of self defense is an immoral system. I'm not just talking about places like North Korea. This includes political entities like Washinghton D.C., New York City, Chicago, and the United Nations.

Simply stated, I believe in and support the right of every single human being on the face of this Earth to defend themselves and those they love by whatever means necessary to ensure their survival in the face of violence and aggression. 

But this is a right of defense. The moment you take unprovoked offensive action you are giving another human the authority to act in his or her own defense and you deserve anything and everything that comes your way.

As is often said, with rights come responsibilities. We must adopt our defensive practices to meet the likely threat. We must also adopt to the society and the times we live in. If you are going to carry a firearm for self defense do it in a responsible manner that meshes well with societal norms and respects the citizens around you. In the US this means no M4 carbines slung over the shoulder while riding the bus to work or schlepping an AK-47 into a Starbucks just because you can. In the US during times of peace and normalcy the responsible approach to defensive carry of a firearm is concealed carry or non-threatening open carry of a pistol.

I am also a firm believer in training. I live in a state where the major pro-citizen carry organization espouses a firm belief that a Constitutional right must not be restricted by education or training requirements. I believe they are 100% correct. I also believe that every citizen who chooses to carry a weapon or own one for home defense has a duty and responsibility to know how to safely and effectively use that firearm. This includes regular shooting practice to ensure proficiency. Achieving just a moderate level of proficiency helps ensure the firearm owner can safely carry the weapon and effectively employ it should the need arise. In my case I practice regularly, often weekly, with the firearms I regularly carry for self defense.

I also respect the wishes of private property owners and the mandates of my employer. If a business or location states they do not want guns on their premises I will honor that and leave my pistol locked in my car. However, I will likely never do business with them again. If they don't respect my right of self defense then I will spend my money elsewhere. Work is a bit more complicated. My employer has a strict no firearms rule, and I respect that.  Why? Simple - because I chose to accept their offer of employment and their no-guns policy was well established when I signed on. I don't like the rule and hope that some day they will change it, but as long as I work for them I will respect and abide by their rules as long as they comply with existing law.

So in summation:

• The Second Amendment to the US Constitution addresses the citizen's right to keep and bear arms as an ultimate recourse to an unjust government that no longer reflects the will of the people
• Beyond that, all human beings have the fundamental right of self defense. This is a basic human right no government can grant or take away. This individual right is universal and always supersedes governmental authority and rights. Any government that refuses to acknowledge this right of self defense and/or works to subvert it is an immoral government.
• The individual right of self defense is a defensive right - it can not be used to justify unprovoked aggressive acts against individuals or governmental representatives (to include police)
• Rights come with responsibilities, and the responsibilities that go along with carrying firearms are heavy. You and you alone are responsible for ensuring the proper and safe carry and employment of that firearm. If you are unwilling to meet these responsibilities then do society a favor and leave the gun at home

- Brian

No Weapons Allowed In The Atlanta History Center!

Yesterday Roberta and I took a trip up into Atlanta to visit the Atlanta History Center. I've only been there once before, a year or two after we moved to Atlanta. I took our daughters up for a special exhibition and to just get out of the house and give Mom a day off. By that time, having spent two years in the Atlanta area listening to all the self-indulgent whining generated by the grievance industry that rules Atlanta today, I wasn't expecting much out of the History Center. All I really expected were exhibits designed to bludgeon me into an elevated state of remorse over how my ancestors oppressed the ancestors of others (even though my grandparents on both sides didn't step off the boats from Europe until the early 1900's and settled well north of the Mason-Dixon Line).

However, I was delightfully surprised by the History Center. It had one of the best exhibits on Civil War history I've ever experienced (with lots of excellent equipment displays), a wonderful section on Reconstruction Era Atlanta, an interesting section devoted to folk art and crafts, and an outstanding section on the legacy of the famous Atlanta golfer, Bobby Jones.

The Atlanta History Center is where you go to see the other Atlanta history; the proud history of the city that predates the civil rights struggles that started in the late 1950s. I'm not implying that the history of the civil rights movement isn't important - it certainly is. However, visitors to Atlanta today only hear a narrative of the city's history that starts around 1960 and focuses tightly on only one aspect of what was happening during that period. Atlanta's history is much more than that, and the Atlanta History Center is where you can go to learn about it.

This second visit reinforced my impression formed a decade ago - the History Center is a great museum and well worth the time and cost.

When we arrived and went to the ticket counter to pay I notice a sign that stated 'No Weapons Allowed' and had images of both a knife and a gun with slash marks through them. I wasn't really surprised. Atlanta on the whole is pretty anti-gun. Remember, Atlanta is no longer a 'southern city'. Atlanta is just a city located in the south that's filled with people that either migrated in from other places that are known for their anti-gun attitudes (i.e., the Northeast) or people who's families have been here for generations but who's neighborhoods and culture have been ripped apart by gun violence. These folks are incapable of distinguishing between random, senseless gun violence sparked by illegal activity and lawful, safe carry and use of firearms by responsible citizens.

So it was with a bit of ironic humor that I noted the special exhibit going on at the History Center named 'Confederate Odyssey - The George W. Wray Jr. Civil War Collection'. The History Center cleverly describes the exhibit as a 'collection of Confederate artifacts'. Yeah, OK, but pretty much all of those artifacts are guns and knives - dozens and dozens of 'em! This is one impressive (and impressively displayed) arms collection.

But wait - guns and knives are banned at the Atlanta History Center. Oh silly me - just my guns and knives.

If you have an interest in Civil War era firearms and edged weapons this is an outstanding exhibit and I encourage you to take the time to see it. All I was able to collect were a few fuzzy iPhone pictures of some of the exhibits, but it give a sense of the scope of the collection. By the way, one of the most fascinating tidbits about this collection is that, as vast as it is, the owner George Wray kept most of this stuff squirreled away in his garage up in Sandy Springs before donating it to the History Center. He must have been a real popular guy ("Hey, let's go check out George's garage!")

And finally, since this is supposed to be a blog that focuses on knives, let's pause before leaving to view an impressive example of a Bowie-style Confederate bayonet:

And remember, if you do visit the Atlanta History Center leave your weapons at home. They have plenty for you to choose from should the Yankees return (oh wait...  there're here)!

- Brian

True Grit

I'm a John Wayne fan. A huge John Wayne fan.

I should clarify that I'm a huge John Wayne western fan. I've seen just about every western he's made, even the pre Stagecoach B-movies where he cut his teeth as an actor and roustabout. In my opinion he never made a bad western. He's made some absolute classics (Stagecoach, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon), a few fun but middling flicks (McLintock, War Wagon, The Alamo), and his last movie, The Shootist is perhaps the best cinematic farewell ever made. If you understand what was going on in Wayne's life at the time he made the movie you realize that he is merely reflecting his real world anguish through the main character, John Books, who is dying of cancer and can't bear the thought of a slow, painful and undignified end.

John Wayne had an extremely prolific career and was a consistent box office draw right up to the end, but he only won one Academy Award, and that was for his portrayal of Rooster Cogburn in the 1969 movie True Grit. While this is certainly one of Wayne's best performances, the other lead cast members - Glenn Campbell and Kim Darby - are second-rate at best and drag the entire movie down. Campbell in particular gives a very stilted, wooden performance and I wince every time he comes into the frame. (An interesting historical 'might have been' is the fact that Elvis Presley was under serious consideration for Campbell's role but his manager blew the opportunity by insisting on top billing. Elvis was actually a pretty good actor and was desperate to grab more serious, non-musical roles to expand his film career. Sadly it was not to be.)

The lead cast from the 1969 version of True Grit - John Wayne, Kim Darby and Glenn Campbell

I put True Grit at second-tier status; a great story and a great performance by a leading actor but an otherwise middling piece of film making.

Then along comes 2010, and the Coen brothers remake of True Grit. The Coen brother's films are often so nuanced and so well crafted that I have to watch them several times before I fully appreciate them. I've watched Oh Brother, Where Art Thou perhaps a dozen times and I'm still marveling at the quality of the work and I'm still pulling things out of it that I hadn't discovered before.

I made a huge mistake when I went to see the Coen's True Grit in the theater. I went with the intent of comparing it to the original. I spent far too much time just listening to the dialog and viewing the scene construction and saying to myself, "Harumph, this is just like they did it in the 1969 version. Nothing new here." I left the theater under the impression that I had seen a good, solid remake that was perhaps a bit better than the original, but nothing really special. But I was wrong. I should have gone into the theater from the perspective that the 1969 movie had never been made and judged the Coen's work on its own merit. 

Since 2010 I've watched True Grit a number of times and now understand that the movie is not a reinterpretation of the earlier work, but instead is a reimagining of Charles Portis' original novel. From that perspective the 2010 version of True Grit stands as a classic western. It doesn't need the 1969 version to prop it up or to offer comparison, In fact, to consider the 2010 movie in light of the 1969 version is to do the Coen brothers movie a grave injustice. 

Jeff Bridges as Rooster Cogburn and Hailee Steinfeld as Mattie Ross in the 2010 version.
A far better cast in a far better movie

I'm confident True Grit will go down as one of the best westerns of the early 21st century.

- Brian

A 10/22 Carbine Project

I've ignored this blog for far too long.  Two or three posts per year is just a sign of mental laziness. Time to put in more effort here.

I've hinted in the past that I like firearms. Actually, I'm fascinated by them and have been since I was old enough to hold a copy of 'The American Rifleman'.  Perhaps one of the reasons I joined the Army was the chance to play with an unlimited number of toys that go 'bang!', from pistols to rifles to machine guns to grenade launchers to anti-tank rockets.  I'm lucky to live in a state that takes a lessaiz-faire attitude towards firearms; as long as you don't act like a knucklehead with your guns the po-po pretty much leave you alone. I'm also lucky to be able to indulge my fascination with firearms (in a limited way) and be surrounded by friends and family who share the same fascination.

Of late I've been interested in the 22 calibers, from .223 and 5.56 to the venerable old 22 Long Rifle (22 LR) round. For almost the past five years 22 LR ammo has been all but impossible to find - a reaction to national politics that fueled an almost insatiable demand for anything that launches bullets. Firearm manufacturers literally could not crank out guns fast enough to meet the demand, and many of those guns were the relatively inexpensive models that shoot 22 LR ammunition. This in turn fueled an incredible demand for 22 LR ammunition. Ammunition manufacturers pushed their existing production capacity to the limit and added new capacity as quickly as they could, and still couldn't meet the demand. I had friends who had the ammunition delivery schedules for the local gun shops and big box stores synced with their smartphone calendars and would run off during lunch several times a week in the quest to pick up a box or two of 22 LR ammo. Sometimes they were successful, but often they showed up at the stores to find the ammo shelves empty and sales personnel singing the all-too-common refrain, "You shoulda' been here an hour ago!"

But it appears the five year drunk is over.  Gun sales have slowed (precipitously) and ammo of all types is becoming easier to find.  Military grade 5.56 ammo is available in near glut quantities and retailers are starting to offer some very good sales on bulk packages. I put this down to greatly reduced demand for 5.56 caliber ammo from the US military. We are pulling out of war zones, drawing down our military and struggling with budget restrictions, so Uncle Sam isn't buying as much 5.56 ammo as he used to. This means ammo manufacturers who ramped up to supply an almost insatiable demand for 5.56-caliber ammo during the Global War on Terror now find themselves with excess production capacity. Civilian shooters can finally get a break on 5.56 ammo supplies and prices.

22 LR ammo is also becoming more available. It's not in unlimited supplies yet, but it's becoming easier to find a box of CCI Mini-Mags here and there, and occasionally stores will get good supplies of bulk 22 LR ammo - the old 500 or 1000-round value packs that fueled many an afternoon of cheap fun popping off shots at soda cans, Neco wafers and spinner targets.

For years I've had 22 LR rifles and pistols in my gun safe, but during the ammo drought they came out only occasionally - I was afraid to burn through my limited stock of 22 LR ammo. But with the increased ammo availability I've become more and more interested in taking these fine old guns out to the range. A few weeks back some friends and I went to the range for an easy day of sighting in some rifles, trying each other's guns and trading old war stories. The 22 LR rifles and pistols were a universal hit, and with a couple of big 'ol 500 round boxes of Winchester ammo nobody worried about not having enough to shoot. It was pure fun, and reminded me again just why the 22 LR is so popular.

For some reason this range trip got me thinking about the potential capabilities of a low-end 22 LR rifle; just how cheaply can a reliable and 'accuratre enough' 22 LR shooting set-up be put together that would offer good shooting opportunities. I was interested because I've got an unused, bottom of the barrel Ruger 10/22 carbine sitting in my safe. This is the $200 Wal-Mart version - ugly wooden carbine stock, blued barrel, useless buckhorn sights. I stumbled into this rifle on a trade and wasn't really sure what I wanted to do with it (other than use if for future trading material). I figured what the heck, I'd use this as a test-bed rifle to lean some lessons about the 10/22 rifle.

The Ruger 10/22 Carbine in all of its low-end, big box store glory. Today they go for about $200 at Wal-Mart

Down through the years I've owned a number of Ruger 10/22s. In fact, my very first firearm was a 10/22 bought back in 1973. I was in high school, working as a stock clerk and wanted a good 22 LR for popping squirrels on some of the state hunting lands up in our area of Ohio. I wasn't 21 yet, so my Dad had to do the transaction.  I asked old man Cleland who owned Cleland's Gun Store out near the Toledo Express Airport order me a 10/22. What I got for my hard earned $98 was a very nice sporter model with a checkered factory walnut stock.  As a kid making $2.25/hour, and with college looming, about all I could afford was the rifle, an extra magazine and a box of inexpensive Winchester hollow points. The gray squirrels of northwest Ohio had nothing to fear from me - I never even tried to sight in the rifle, I just took it hunting as it came out of the box. I knew there were ways to gussy up this rifle, but things like Weaver mounts and scopes were way beyond my available resources. I had to make do with what I had. Down through the years that particular rifle was either sold or traded away, but 10/22s continued to flow through my hands as I traded things around. Today I've got two 10/22s in my safe, and one of those was about to become a test bed.

Let's take a quick look at the 10/22 before moving forward. The National Rifle Association's magazine 'American Rifleman' recently carried an excellent article about the history of the 10/22 so I'll just ask you to go out and read that article to get details on the rifle's history. The 10/22 has been in continuous production since 1964 (this is its 50th year of production), and the rifle has changed little since its introduction. It is the most popular 22 caliber firearm ever produced, with over 5 million sold. The reasons for it's success are many and varied. First, it's a Ruger, and the Ruger name means a lot to American shooters. Second, it's very well designed using a unique modular concept that makes it both easy to manufacture and easy to modify. Third, Ruger has been careful to not let the quality on these rifles slip. Now, these are not heirloom guns, but it's clear that, given the low price of the 10/22, Ruger still uses quality components and puts a decent amount of QC into the manufacturing process. Fourth, these rifles are reliable and reasonably accurate right out of the box.

The 10/22 has an almost mythical reputation among American shooters; for many it's the gun their fathers, grand fathers and even great-grand fathers used to hunt small game with. Many are passed father-to-son along with wonderful stories of fall hunting trips that are a deeply ingrained part of the American outdoor psyche. But to be honest, the 10/22 is a commodity item. It is the Chevy Nova of the 22 rifle world - inexpensive, rugged, reliable and a good (but not great) performer. And like the Chevy Nova it is very easy to customize the 10/22 and turn it into something its designers never envisioned. The 10/22 is a very good starting platform for fun and inexpensive projects, and that's what this post is all about.

Lately I've been reading about Project Appleseed and the Revolutionary War Veteran's Association efforts to foster a renewed understanding about the founding of our counrty. Part of this effort involves marksmanship training using standardized rifles which they refer to as the Liberty Training Rifle. The concept of the Liberty Training Rifle is an inexpensive 22 LR caliber rifle that can be used to teach marksmanship fundamentals. This sounded like a great starting point for my 10/22 carbine project. My goal is to end up with a light, handy, simple, reliable, inexpensive and accurate enough rifle that is fun and easy to shoot and is a good platform for teaching and reinforcing basic rifle marksmanship. Think of it as a 'mil-spec' carbine in 22 LR. I would look to modify or upgrade the stock rifle only where absolutely necessary.

Let's take a look at the 10/22 carbine as it comes out of the box from the Ruger factory to figure out what can be left stock, what needs to be improved and what needs to be replaced or added.

• Wooden stock. The Ruger carbine comes with an inexpensive (read cheap) stained beech stock. Ruger is notorious for using soft wood for their stocks, and the 10/22 shock is no exception. The stock incorporates a plastic butt plate and a plastic barrel band. Yet the stock is well sized for most adults and, for me, it works just fine. We'll keep it as is.

• Trigger. The 10/22 trigger assembly is a self-contained one-piece unit housed in a polymer 'box' that holds the trigger, hammer, hammer spring, sear, safety, bolt release and magazine release. A lot of people on the 10/22 forums gripe about the 10/22 trigger, and I guess if they are building a high precision target gun their gripes are well founded. However, as a stock 'mil-spec' trigger it's not too bad, with just a bit of take-up and a small about of creep before letting off at around 6 lbs. I've got triggers on AR-15's and other mil-spec rifles that feel worse. For me the Ruger trigger works OK

The stock trigger breaks consistently at just a bit over 6 lbs

Ruger stock trigger group showing the bolt release lever that will be modified to improve bolt function. The heart shaped hole circled in yellow will be modified (see below)

• Bolt release. For some reason Ruger has insisted on a bolt release design that will not let the bolt go forward when the bolt handle is pulled to the rear and released. Letting the bolt go forward to load a round from a new magazine requires a two-handed fumble to simultaneously pull back on the bolt handle and manipulate the bolt release at the base of the trigger guard. It's actually easier for a left handed shooter to manage than a right-handed shooter, one of Ruger's very few concessions to southpaws. The fix for this is simple - remove the bolt release and do a bit of judicious filing to remove some metal in the hole where the bolt release rides on the bolt release pin. Yes there are inexpensive after market parts available to accomplish this, but in the spirit of this project (i.e., cheap) I decided to go the do-it-yourself route.

Modified bolt release mechanism showing the area that was modified to improve functionality. I used a Dremel with a 5/32" chain saw sharpening bit to quickly and easily grind away the material that needed to be removed

• Trigger group sloppy fit. The trigger housing or 'box' is mated to the underside of the 10/22 receiver using two steel pins. This fit is sloppy, resulting in a trigger group that the shooter can wiggle around. While this poor fit doesn't seem to affect functionality, it is very annoying. As you'd imagine there's an after market solution - over sized pins. There's also a much cheaper recommendation; strips of thin aluminum tape run around the top edge of the trigger housing to acts as shims to tighten up the trigger group - receiver fit. 

Lining the upper edge of the trigger housing with aluminum duct sealing tape will snug up the fit of the trigger group to the receiver. Easy, cheap and effective

• Safety. The 10/22 safety is a simple cross-bolt safety that works just fine for a right-handed shooter. Problem is, I'm a southpaw. This is one of the 'deluxe' upgrades I adopted - a Volquartsen 'big head' left handed safety.

• Sling swivels. A 'mil-spec' carbine needs a sling, but the 10/22 Carbine does not have sling swivels. This means installing them yourself. The good news is that a set of sling swivels and mounting hardware is cheap - Uncle Mike's 10/22 sling swivel set will run about $15. However, most folks will need to buy the specialized swivel stud drill bit set, and those actually cost more than the sling swivels themselves. Plus in involves drilling a carefully located hole on a rounded surface. OK, I'll say this - if I can do it, and do a halfway decent job, you can too. A few minutes of careful measuring and drilling and the rear swivel stud was installed and ready to go. The forward swivel mates with the barrel band, so no drilling is necessary. What about the sling? For me the answer was simple - I already had a nice M1 Carbine sling sitting in my spares box.

• Barrel. Ruger makes good barrels. They are one of the largest barrel makers in the business and they long ago figured out how to make quality barrels for 22 caliber rifles. The 10/22 Carbine comes with a good barrel and there's no need to upgrade.

• Sights. Sights are the single biggest (and most expensive) upgrade I undertook. The best thing that can be said of the factory 10/22 sights is that they are there. The good news is that there's a company called Tech-Sights that makes an excellent 'mil-spec' replacement sight set that follows the classic M-16A1 design. These sights are the single best upgrade any 10/22 owner can install if he/she wants to stick with iron sights.

The Tech-Sights mimic the M-16A1 sight design, both front and rear sights

The rear sight is adjustable for windage

The front sight is adjustable for elevation

So what do these upgrades cost?

• Sights - the Tech-Sights are the single biggest cost at $59, but they are absolutely necessary. 
• Aluminum tape to shim the trigger group - bum 6" of duct sealing tape off of your local HVAC guy and you'll have enough tape to shim half a dozen 10/22 trigger groups.
• Safety - this is something only 10% of the shooters would need, and clearly it's not 100% necessary, so I'll leave it off of the tally.
• Sling swivels - $15 for the Uncle Mike's 1" 10/22 set. Try to find a shooting buddy who has the specialized drill bit set.
• Sling - a good quality M1 Carbine sling copy will run about $15 from one of the major firearms parts suppliers like Brownells. You might be able to find one cheaper on eBay.

The cost of these upgrades adds an additional $89 to the base cost of the rifle ($200), but you end up with a very handy, reliable,and rugged little carbine.

Nice looking little carbine!

But how does it shoot?

I've had the rifle to the range just once so far, shooting standing off-hand at 10 yards. The light was poor, my eyes are old (and astigmatic) and the fool in the lane next to me was blasting away with a 44 Magnum. Not the ideal test conditions. Still, the little rifle managed to keep most of the rounds inside 3'. Not bad, and with practice I'm confident those groups will tighten up nicely.

This has been a fun little project, I can guarantee that this little rifle will be making a lot of trips to the range and it'll get a lot of quality trigger time!

- Brian