Gun-a-Day 49: More Marlin 1895M (“Let Him Roar Again …”)

The wisdom of C.S. Lewis provided guidance today as I decided to run a few more rounds through “The Beast” (my Marlin 1895M in .450Marlin). In The Problem of Pain, Lewis warns against a washed-out, weakened view of the power of Nature and the natural order as God has established Her in Creation and as She will be One Day when He redeems Her from the Fall in order to fulfill Her purposes in Eternity, and he uses the king of beasts as one example to paint his metaphoric picture of “the glory that will be revealed“:

But if there is a rudimentary Leonine self, to that also God can give a ‘body’ as it pleases Him … richly Leonine in the sense that it also expresses whatever energy and splendour and exulting power dwelled within the visible lion on this earth…. I think the lion, when he has ceased to be dangerous [as a part of New Heavenly/New Earthly ecosystem], will still be awful…. There will still be something like the shaking of a golden mane: and often the good Duke will say, ‘Let him roar again.‘

That made very good sense to me in regards to the Marlin 1895M, too. This gun can fill a person with awe, even when it is carefully managed. I decided to unleash the Beast and let him roar a few more rounds’ worth. At this stage in my shooting experience, 50 yards was too far for me to place a hit (it turns out … after missing with two shots from there), so I ended up at the 25-yard shooting station and moved in a bit for the last shot (on the Pepsi bottle– that video did not survive the editing process … live and learn).

I’d only planned on two shots but ended up sending six. Once I got started, it was hard to stop. I am very impressed with the quality of the trigger system on this rifle. It’s not feather-light, but I find no creep of any kind. It’s either cocked, or the hammer has fallen, and the thunder has rolled. There is as little “in-between” as in any other gun I’ve ever fired.

The cartridges were all Hornady. The last two rounds were ballistic-tipped Critical Defense rounds. I’d hoped to dig the slugs (the flat-tops weigh in at 350-grains each) out of the backstop, but they all buried deep after making a milk jug and a Pepsi bottle turn into short-lived mini-cyclones.

I hadn’t noticed that the cases for the CD’s are slightly shorter than the older, interlock slug-headed shells. Not that it seemed to make any difference; just a point of information I probably wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t been doing the Gun-a-Day thing.

The editing and uploading of the slow motion video recordings is still a work in progress. There’s a steeper learning curve than some of the other iPhone apps I’ve been using, but I’m gonna stick with my standard approach to such things: stubborn-ugly persistence. Hope to have them posted soon. Now posted below!

For now, Shot o’the Day is another “stand in” picture– an “after” of a Pepsi bottle which caught my eye at least as much for the appearance of heat-melted edges as for the banana-peeled effect of the explosive hit.

I think I’m seeing that right. It may just be stretching, but it looks for all the world like the plastic was melted as well as ripped and exploded.

It would have been nice to have some slow motion images of the plastic cap falling to the ground at least a full second or two after the bottle was hit. How high must it have gone to take that long to come down?!

In the interests of full disclosure, it should be noted that the addition of the recoil pad on this rifle (unlike the Savage 29B) is not just decorative nor merely used to increase the length of pull.

No, it’s on there to keep my right arm attached to my right shoulder when I fire it, and I’m not ashamed to admit it! I didn’t even bring it home in the first place without putting on that pad.

Yes, six shots was fun, for sure, but I am definitely feeling it in my collar bone tonight.

Here’s the video of the work done on a water-filled milk jug. It runs a bit long, but I got interested in the way the water spray floated across the frame from left to right, and then I heard the birds. Before and after, the same bird or birds are singing the same happy little song, seemingly undisturbed and unconcerned about whatever might have happened to make “that big, loud noise.”

Nature does not fear guns.

I say again: Nature does not fear guns.

So, the 1895M faithfully and effectively answered an impromptu call to action and receives recognition for a job well done. Now, all that’s left is a good cleaning before being laid to rest back in storage under lock and key.

The Beast is not dead, only sleeping. Here’s to the day when I’ll get to let him roar again.

Gun-a-Day 47: The MLR-1722 is Finally Ready for its Close-Up

The world looked extra crisp and bright with my amber Wiley X eye protection on. These Anzi’s are old but barely used. Usually, I just grab a cheap pair of hardware store safety glasses from the truck dashboard, and these stay in the gun cabinet, but they were handy, and I was not going to risk another cartridge-failure flash in the eyes again.

Of course, it will come as no surprise to anyone that, true to the way normal life works most of the time, there were no blow-back issues of any kind today. In fact, there were no mis-feeds, jams, stove-pipes or chambering glitches of any kind today?

Coincidence? Surely not. Who knew?

I just found my new lucky charm!

That’d be helpful, maybe, if I actually believed in that kinda stuff.

🙂

Anyway, time was at a premium this morning, so I decided to limit the session to 25 shots. I also decided to stick with the 6-inch round Shoot-n-C as target and used only the center-dot targeting image on the reflex sight.

If I measured, the math might show that the shots are all within the dimensions of the 9-ring, and 21 or 22 of the hits are in 9s or better. With the non-magnifying sight.

Yes, this little Browning-branded, loss-leader, battery-powered, reflex optic is kinda like Sunset Boulevard‘s Norma Desmond. If it could talk, it might say today (finally!) in a melodramatic impression of Gloria Swanson’s voice: “All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up.“

Close-up is right. This is a group to be proud of. More importantly, it’s a group to be productive with. This is varmint-management accuracy here. The width of this group is comparable to a squirrel’s torso hunkered down on a tree trunk, so while I want to avoid any premature announcements of “Mission Accomplished,” I am definitely ready to say that this rifle and sight set-up is real-varmint ready.

As a matter of fact, there was a stray dog roaming the edge of the property while I was finishing up. If I’d known for sure that it didn’t belong to someone, there would have been a field test event right then and there. I’ll keep a close lookout. We’ve got coyote problem, and we’ve got a more serious, near-feral dog issue in our neck of the woods, and they are welcome on my land only if they’re ready to stop by long enough to be put down for a permanent stay.

Yes, the 25-round plan was the way to go today. If it turns out that this gun and these cartridges and the sighting system is repeatedly and dependably reliable after all, I may want to conserve as much of this ammo as possible.

Played out right, the 9000+ rounds I have left could potentially be a rest-of-my-lifetime supply.

As far as I know, it already is … Thank You, Lord, for my life this day, and, as Randy Stonehill sings, I “… celebrate this heartbeat / ’cause it just might be my last / every day is a gift from the Lord above / and they all go by so fast …” This one has almost slipped away already, so I’m extra grateful that I got to spend part of it out in the sun and the breeze and the pines and the empty cartridge cases.

Pretty much perfect.

Shot o’the Day is this pic of the MLR-1722’s breech from the magazine attachment opening. Good grief! it’s almost completely fouled, gunked and sludged with accrued smoke stain, gunpowder grit, cleaning solution residue and other unidentifiable ingredients comprising this sludgy mess.

Once again I’m a bit confused. There were no feed malfunctions today, and this pampered little rifle has never been anywhere close to being this dirty. Go figure, huh? I’m taking that under advisement and making a mental note.

Well, it won’t stay sloppy for long. I’ll give it a nice makeover session this week and put it back in its cozy cabinet for a while.

All better. Sleep tight. Good work. I’ll call for you again sometime soon, little buddy.

Gun-a-Day 46: MLR-1722 Redux

It’s a do-over of the best kind– trying to “go from strength to strength” and from good to better with this gear.

It sure has been fun so far.

As interesting and challenging as it is to shoot with a 1x image and electronic, heads-up display overlay, this red-dot can only provide an approximation of a sight picture at 50 yards and beyond.

But that doesn’t mean I’m not enjoying it and learning by practicing with it.

I started with five shots and walked to check the group. The shots were riding high and left even after one-click adjustments.

The next five were about the same. One more adjustment to the right, and I poured the other 40 rounds into, onto and through the target.

The end result left me wondering even more about the potential this gun has with long range optics.

Of course, good optics don’t make much difference without decent eyesight to use them.

And these Eley-primed rounds have me concerned in that regard.

The ignition and recoil weight is very inconsistent, and every once in a while a round fails explosively. That is, unfortunately, Shot o’the Day.

I know better than to go out without eye-cover, especially with these rounds, but I forgot to grab them this time (it’s been a problem with small caliber guns, but that’s not good enough, and it’s no excuse).

So.

When a case rim blew out, a big cloud of smoke and a spray of grimy debris blew out of the breech (jammed open because the extractor pulled the crimp and left the case chambered) and back into my face.

Dumb. Really dumb. Really, really dumb. I still feel like I’m wiping crusty gunk out of my right eye, but there was no damage done.

I ended up with a target looking like this …

Once again, I’m blessed more than I deserve to be.

=== ( • ) ===

Wow, the Top Shot Elimination Challenge was cool tonight, wasn’t it? Thompsons on full-auto with multiple round mags. What a ride!

Gun-a-Day 45: My Valentine Rifle, the MLR-1722 (.17HM2)

I used more than one of the projected sight pictures to target the 6-inch Shoot-n-C circle came to the conclusion that I’m going to end up changing to another sighting rig on this rifle.

The Browning red-dot is great for what it is, but after finding out how accurate this gun/ammo combination can actually be, I want to see more and see better when aiming and firing it.

I’d mistakenly thought that the red-dot’s smaller circle image would frame the target shape for better center-point consistency, but the scale isn’t quite right.

A magnified optic is going to be necessary. The aesthetics are going to be a big hurdle to jump. This sleek, light rifle deserves complementary accessories.

Until then, I can keep practicing two-eyed sighting. And, boy, do I need the practice …

Starting on center-red, I checked the results after the first 10 shots and found that they were grouping on the high-left edge of the target circle. The rest of the shots were aimed at the 4 o’clock and 5 o’clock positions on the lower right edge. The grouping is nothing special, but it does confirm again that the rifle works (and the sight is good enough for what it is but not quite suited to the .17HM2’s potential).

That’s good to know after all this frustration with accuracy and aiming.

What a beautiful morning (the whole day)! The crisp air and raking breeze blusters made the light dance along the firing line, and the temperature brought out the best of the post-downpour, pre-spring smells of earth and moss and pines and dead oak leaves.

My shot o’the day is a tangible sign that I receive much more grace and mercy and plain-ol’lovingkindness than I deserve.

While waiting for a time-lapse upload to finish today, I decided to warm up with a few shots at a high-caliber spinner target of thick steel. It did not at all occur to me that its location and angle in relation to the angle and location of my time-lapse rig put my phone in harm’s way from fragmentation and ricochet.

But it did.

And I found that out when I came back to the target line and found that my screen protector had taken two hits. Of course, on first glance it looked like the glass itself had been smashed.

What a relief to see that even the scuffs wiped off!

Like I say: I’m a regular target of God’s grace, and I get hit with it very often– always a bull’s eye.

Happy Valentine’s to me, for sure.

Gun-a-Day 44: MLR-1722 (from Sad to Glad in One Easy Session)

The word of the day is “waning.”

Waning light. Waning energy. Waning focus. Waning confidence, and, truth be told, waning enthusiasm due to yesterday’s less-than-thrilling performance.

But we press on the best we can here at the House of Gun-a-Day, so after a bit of a Sunday afternoon siesta (more like a “snore-esta” in my case), I grabbed gear and headed for the 50-yard station after setting up the time lapse rig in an effort to keep the “waning” from turning into whining.

Please allow me to direct your attention to the upper-right squared circle. In square number seven (lower left of that target grid), I gained first-hand experience with that elusive and seductive quality that so many others admire about the .17HM2 cartridge.

Yes, that’s right. As of today, “inherent accuracy” is no longer a theory, a rumor, or a friendly bit of advertising hyperbole. No, I have now seen it for myself, and all my doubts are blown away.

The time lapse images show that the eight hits in this square are from nine consecutive shots. Number 8 struck in the square above, but these are all well-inside one square inch.

Most satisfying (and shooting-addiction-enabling) are the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th shots from this 10-shot set. The bullets from those shots (upper middle of that square) overlapped their edges to the point that they make one ragged, long-ish hole (and there are other key-holed pairs in the set, too).

There is a measure of good fortune in this because I can’t see the target in any detail with this non-magnifying scope, but the shots are real, and, in this case, they are also real close together.

Without further ado, may I present the 44th Shot(s) o’the Day:

The target was all wrong for 50-yard shooting with non-magnified sights (at least for my middle-aged eyes), but the evidence is clear and settled:

1. This rifle can be fired to a consistent point of aim

2. The ammunition (though there are still stove-pipe jams) is also accurate-as-advertised.

3. The sight is effective for what it is, and it is now close to dead-centered.

4. I am able to aim and fire it well enough to satisfy my fairly modest goal of being squirrel-center-mass-accurate at 50 yards.

My conclusion is: whining is no longer necessary, and any remaining small shreds of waning enthusiasm have been completely blown away!

=== ( • ) ===

Wow! This ammo is grittiest, grimiest and cruddiest (yes, these are highly technical ballistic terms, but please don’t be intimidated by the jargon) I’ve ever used, as today’s main picture shows (I hope it’s clear in this picture).

Gun-a-Day 43: Minimums from the Magnum (.17HM2, MLR-1722)

“The inherently accurate .17HM2.”

Not just accurate … inherently accurate. That’s the way I’ve seen this cartridge described in article after article and advertisement after advertisement.

Alright already! I get it!

And yet.

Evidently, I don’t. Not really.

Not today anyway.

I’m in a serious state of “I believe, but help me in my unbelief”-ism as far as things have been going with these Hornady Vmax .17-caliber bullets with Eley primers.

Today’s mission was to put 20 rounds on each of three 2-inch Shoot-n-C targets from 50 yards away.  I really should have remembered to take the binoculars out with me …

By the time 80 (eighty!) shots had been fired (and at least 15 stovepipes had been cleared), I had one (yes, 1!) hit on one of the targets.  That’s, for lack of anything close to better, the shot o’the day, but I didn’t even have the energy to take a separate picture of it, so it’s just in the time-lapse …

Good grief!

And this is from the gun I thought I’d sighted in yesterday.

Today’s main lesson is to more carefully avoid over-estimating my prospects of success on the second day of practice with any gun, especially this Ruger 10/22 adaptation.

Now, all I can do is hope that tomorrow’s target practice will be the today I was hoping for yesterday. Or something like that …

And the moral of today’s story is, to paraphrase an old, hunter’s proverb: Sometimes you shoot the heart out of a target, and sometimes the target tears the heart right out of you.

I had a hard time even getting the pictures together, but there are gonna be days like this. I tried to do my best, and my best didn’t turn out too great.

And that’s the way it was: February 12th, 2011. Good night.

Gun-a-Day 42: Doing Some More Magnum Research (MLR-1722, .17HM2)

May God richly bless the people of Egypt. What a gift of hope and opportunity and potential they’ve been given today. I pray that they will use it to pursue peace– within and beyond their borders. And may America be a blessing to them as well. May it be so, gracious Lord.

=== ( • ) ===

Of much, much less importance is the personal pleasure of trying again– and … finally … succeeding!– at sighting in the browning red-dot sight on the Magnum Research .17HM2 rifle.

I don’t think illness was the issue today, but I didn’t get up and going too well. Sunset was in full spectrum by the time I finally put it all together and got to the range.

Turns out it was a good thing that so little daylight was left.

I might have ended up spending hours and hundreds of rounds (and loving every second of it).

After all the trouble I’ve had with this rifle, it turns out that the answer to sighting it came with a plain piece of foam-core board salvaged from office discards laid “landscape” style and my trusty pair of Barska shot-spotting binoculars (one of many value-conscious buys from The Sportsman’s Guide).

From the 50-yard station, I targeted a 2-inch Shoot-n-C and hoped that the foam’s width would provide enough space to walk the shots in with sight adjustments. The rifle was mounted on a Stoney Point “PoleCat” tripod (the medium size is great for seated and bench level shooting).

And it actually worked. Wow, was it ever satisfying. I am really looking forward to tomorrow’s session now that the sight is dialed in.

The pictures that follow track the strategy and the progress.

I started with a small center spot on the big board mounted on yard sign clips in front of a full-sized railroad tie and the rest of the backstop.

With the illumination on a 4-setting for brightness, I used the center-dot-in-cross-hairs as the reflex sight picture and set it over center-red on the target and went one-eyed during the sight-adjustment process (force of habit, mostly). I worked in groups of 10 shots and usually checked hit locations after every five shots and made adjustments after every group.

The first five shots helped me find out a big part of the reason I’ve been having so much trouble with the sight-in. The sight was way off. The bullets were hitting high and right by about a foot– far too wide to be strikes on the other target boards I’d been using.

Some adjustments brought the next five in much closer, although my aim was obviously spreading things around a bit. This is not great by any standards, but I had an almost silly sense of accomplishment out of this inadequate but very clear progress toward the goal of getting the gun and sight to work together and get on target.

The next five are in the six shots low and right. The adjustments were too far down and not quite enough left. The next five (including one of the shots off the target low/right) got me inside the target ring itself. That’s 20 shots to a touch on center-red, and I was thrilled.

The next 10 shots went to another 2-inch target mounted lower-left on the board, and I was still trying to dial it in. Always nice to get a 9-ring hit, but the rest were just “close” … but not close enough or consistent enough.

The following picture is from a 20-round test group after I thought the sights were set. They obviously were not. All 10 of the next shots were left and a bit high. I adjusted the sight again. I should say I over-adjusted, because the next five were low/right. I finally managed to get on target after more adjustments. What a great feeling after almost two years of trying to get all the variables worked out to some measure of success.

The rest of the session was fine-tuning and checking for repeatability. I began to picture squirrels under the glow of the red cross-hairs. These ballistic-tipped Hornady rounds (with match-grade Eley primers) should make for very decisive hits.

Speaking of the cartridges, though, the stove-piping issue persists, and it’s not getting any better as far as I can tell. I may have to break down and try out the Federal HM2 rounds in the storage bin to see if the ammo is the problem, but I almost don’t want to know yet. Maybe I’ll make sure I’ve got at least 1,000 rounds through it before getting overly concerned.

I also need to keep in mind that I have installed a cheap, after-market recoil buffer. For all I know, it’s preventing complete extraction, cycling and re-chambering of the rounds. No panic yet, but attentiveness, yes.

After 50 rounds, I felt like I had the sight very close and any variations were more an issue of my aiming than the sights settings. With 10 more rounds, I targeted another Shoot-n-C 2-inch circle placed in the lower-middle of the board. I also switched the sight picture of the red-dot to the dot-in-circle image, and it helped me better frame the whole target inside the projected circle. These last few shots were also taken “two-eyed.” I really want to learn that style of shooting at least as well as the “squint-eye” style I’ve defaulted to all these years.There are still signs of aim-float in these last 10 shots, but getting five of 10 on the 2-inch target from 50 yards was much more of a result than I’d allowed myself to hope for today. Even the two fliers on the left– nearly keyholed on each other– were encouraging as signs of aim consistency.

From what I understand, Teddy Roosevelt swore by the both-eyes style (at least until he lost the sight in one of them), and if it’s good enough for our Rough Rider President, it’s good enough for me.

This sight-picture is shot o’the day, because I plan to make it my sight o’the day tomorrow, and I’m expecting to have at least a couple more empty cartridge boxes by sundown on Saturday. Motivation and anticipation are both running high.

I’m very glad that I finally got to really, actually enjoy this rifle that I like so much. There’s nothing like a couple of center-ring hits to keep a guy coming back for more.

=== ( • ) ===

Today belongs to Egypt, and I sincerely pray for God’s best on the people and the government-to-be as they go forward. May they, and we, act in ways which leave room for God’s abundant, generous grace to be poured out.

Gun-a-Day 37: Glock 19C-n-Me

I’ve switched to one-handed sideways. I forgot to specify that in yesterday’s entry. If I were ever to actually be in a fight for my life, I’d be trying to skinny up, I’m sure (though some days, I’m about as wide standing sideways as I am facing straight on …), so this is my practice position for the time being.

I also hope that I’d get behind the nearest solid cover, too, but maybe I’ll get to that later this year …

For today, the 20-foot line was warmer and brighter than it’s been in several days, and the target was dry and easy to see in the mid-afternoon, winter light bisected by pine trunks.

Everything is summed up in one photo today because, once again, I’ve got a lone bullet hole outside the 7-ring. 24 of 25 in black is alright, and the multi-round straight vertical line in the center-red is a very welcome sight indeed. There are steady signs of progress and also clear evidence that there is still plenty of room for tangible improvement!

Speaking of skinny, though, this is an improvement in terms of total hit width. Dimensionally, all the shots are inside the horizontal distance of the 9-ring, and that’s the positive I’m taking from today before I think too long about the one very low and one kind of high marks on the paper.

Shot o’the Day is the low ball round. It’s a good reminder as long as I don’t obsess on it. I’m seeing it as incentive for a visualized achievement of my “clean sheet” goal. Plain and simple, I’m going to do a little dance or something if I ever get a “7’s or better” set on paper.

I had one short-load receiver jam today. I think it was the 3rd round. For whatever reason, the slide didn’t close all the way over the receiver.  That was in the 10-round mag, and I’ll have to be conscious of which mag I’m using when the glitches happen. If there is no pattern, I’ll just accept that part of the price of this bargain-basement Brown Bear ammunition is the occasional failure to fully feed.

No such issue exists with the Hornady Critical Defense rounds I load in a magazine or two for home defense (when the pistol is put away, locked and unloaded but handy).

Gun-a-Day 32: Charles Daly Field Tactical Shotgun, 12GA

What is a fella to do when there are dead tree trunks to take down and a cold, dark, steady rain falling? It’s not like a guy can just stand around all day with an ax or even take the time to drag out the chain saw. My answer to the need for quick, efficient “tree girdling” in advance of stumping out a dead trunk is to load up the trusty 12GA shotgun and head out into the woods.

Well, that was the plan today anyway … even with extra processing on these photos, it’s obvious that the scene was almost dark as night.

I was home before 5:30, but the cloud cover was so thick and so dark, and the rain had been going on for so long that everything was dark and gloomy and chilling. It wasn’t a good time to set up an extended precision targeting session (as if I could claim any real “precision” at this point), and the dead trees I didn’t get chopped down on Saturday have been creaking and cracking in the back of my mind, so I decided to take a special tool out of the gun closet and venture out– bundled up in rain gear and mud boots– into the cold, drippy, gray-light evening to get some wood cutting done.

On the day I heard, late in 2009?, that Charles Daly was closing up shop (we miss you guys!), I jumped onto gunbroker.com and looked for the best deal I could find on the Field model with stand-off muzzle brake and full pistol grip. And, oy, did I find such a deal!

This was a major add to my collection, especially for home defense purposes. Even with a Taurus Judge and a Kimber .45 and a Bond Arms Ranger II in the house, the addition of a pump shotgun and its classic klink-clatch loading sound was welcome and, as far as these things can be, practical.

I’ve used it very little since the purchase and transfer were completed– just enough to know that it worked, and I bought only a box each of some basic buckshot, some Hornady heavy buck, and one box of Winchester PDX12. Oh my, what a punch that packs.

More than the slugging weight, though, I was really impressed all over again today at what seemed to me to be a very tight pattern made by the Hornady shell on my first shot from about 15 feet. Very tightly packed with no fliers that I could find.  This cheap plastic serving tray is about two feet across, and the load went dead center en masse.

That’s a shot o’the day to remember.

I expected a lot more spray, but maybe that’s just because most of my experience is with dual-use firearms which have rifling for .45LC shooting … whatever the case may be, I feel very confident with this weapon after “slugging it out” with that tree.

Anyway, I needed a fast shooting session, and I want to push this tree trunk over by hand or with just a bit of chopping in a few days, so this stripping and center-punching will have it ready for felling just fine.

Here are the shells I emptied. When I take the tree down, I’m going to try to find the 12GA PDX slugs and dig ’em out. I thought there might be a through and through effect, but there is enough life left in the ground level trunk that all of the shot was swallowed up in the tree.

One note about bad timing: I happened to notice– while I was firing into the tree trunk– that ducks/geese were honking overhead. For all I know, the neighbors figure I was poaching, but– I promise, Officer!– I was shooting withered pines not winged poultry. What a worry-wart I can be …

The front sight fiber optic line matched with the rear sight circle was the perfect combination for this low-light situation (and, so, also for home defense), and the shots went exactly where they were aimed. I worked around the tree, and the bark stripped away nicely.

This might have been a day to give up on the idea of target practice, but I got some good experience with my heaviest hitter and was back inside before either of us was soaked through. A warm leather couch for me and a silicon-infused cloth for the shotgun, and we were both doing fine after our workout.