Range Day

The Mystery Impulse Buy: a Yugoslav SKS! What, you thought I bought something expensive? It's a good thing Kevin was there with me...I was worried that I'd bought a defective gun until Mr. Baker pointed out that there ought to be a gas switch for the grenade launcher. DUh! It's a semi-auto now, just like it's supposed to be! I'm sure I could have figured it out on my own...yeah, right!

Kevin brought a lovely variety of shootin' irons, ranging from his space-gun AR to a Colt 1911 .45 that could very well have served in the trenches of World War I. Kevin really ought to photo-blog them sometime.
I could have done it, but I was too busy loading 32-round magazines!!! (My thumbs are still numb.) The Pro-Mags from Natchez worked great! The 9AR shot like a champ. My one metal Colt mag worked too, except for the last shot, which always jammed. At least I can use it as a back-up. Next time, I'll load up the mags the night before.

I was a bad, bad gunnie, bringing BoG and the SOCOM-16, both filthy from last week's match...and the match before that. Lotsa reliability problems.

After dirtying up the rifles and beating up my hand with the Ruger .44 Magnum, I set out four bowling pins, three steel targets, and six paper plates for a little informal practical shooting. Kevin warmed up to the action shooting idea right away and wasted no time beating me on a couple of head-to-head drills. I think he might be hooked! There are plenty of practical shooting venues around here, including the Tucson Rifle Club's Action Shooting Club.

Bummer. I brought out the Rem 1100 for a function check and the darned trigger group is busted! Looks like the 870 is gonna get a lot of work this year.

More: I don't think I'll be scoring any more bags of commercially reloaded .44 Magnum. I'd bought the 240 gr. lead SWC loads to practice with the Win. 94; who knows what this ruptured case would have done to my carbine? As it was, I had to tap this one out of the Ruger's cylinder with a cleaning rod. I also have several bags of .44 Special, but those are loaded a lot lighter. I'm saving them for a Cowboy Action Shoot. This is the caliber that might finally drive me back to reloading.

I would have loaded more into the truck, but my "launch" time snuck up on me unawares. Military punctuality is still ingrained in my psyche, so imagine the frustration when a brain-fart-induced wrong turn made me miss my "time on target" by 20 minutes. Gate's Pass is lovely this time of year! Fortunately, the TRC is Kevin's home range, so he had no trouble hanging around the range office talking with friends. I hope the next time we do this, I have the sub-gun up and running again. Gotta find more bowling pins too!