Took my DMR-style AR to the range today. Fired about 10 rounds through it and started having problems. Failure to extract/eject. In fact, in many cases the bolt didnt even unlock. Hmmm.

Ok, unload and let’s see whats going on. Pulled the bolt carrier and thought that, since it was new, I hadn’t really lubed it up. So, a quick couple of sprays of CLP and put it back in the gun. No joy.

Disassemble bolt. Aha! Gas rings!

Stagger them properly, re-assemble, no joy.

Alright, now I’m really curious. My buddy is shooting an AR that is also virtually new (less than 50 rounds) so we went ahead and swapped bolt carriers and bolts (yeah, yeah, I know….) Same result. My carrier/bolt worked fine in his gun. Ok, try the ammo. His ammo failed in my gun, my ammo worked fine in his.

Ok, clearly the issue is not in the receiver (upper or lower). It’s gotta be something in the gas system. Couldn’t really do much at the range without proper tools. Came back to the house and took off the forend. Please note this:

Those two screws keep the gas block in place. See how that one is backed out? The other one is also loose. How loose?

.That loose.

“Well there’s yer problem!”

:::sigh::: You know, I have been shooting AR rifles for over thirty years and this is the first time I have ever had anything like this happen. Solution? A dose of Loctite and some torque.

And, really, if I had the proper hex wrenches with me at the range I could have taken care of this right there…so, lesson learned. I’ll head to the range tomorrow to confirm that, indeed, was the problem.

Ruger announced today that they will be adding a new chambering to their Ruger American Ranch line up – 7.62×39! The new Ruger American Rifle Ranch 7.62×39 will feature the same 16.12″ medium contour, threaded, hammer forged barrel found other American Rifle Ranch offerings. It feeds from Mini-30 magazines and weighs in at under 6 pounds.

This interests me on several levels. Even though the days of $100 cases of 7.62×39 are long gone, there’s still plenty of 7.62 AK ammo to be had. Ruger used to offer the 77 in this caliber and I really would like one, but a bolt fun that takes a (somewhat) readily available magazine? Yes please.

Purpose? Well, you can hunt with an AK or SKS, of course…I’ve seen it done. But a nice bolt action with a decent scope would probably serve better, and if you’re already stocking the AK round why not streamline logistics?

I’ll be getting one (or three) of these as soon as my vendors have them.

So this happened…..

A used but not terribly abused .45 ACP GC NM Series 80. 1911’s are fun guns to play with, but the notion that they are somehow the pinnacle of combat handgun design would seem to ignore the last hundred years of gun development.

I picked it up as a range toy, and because the price was right, but I’ll happily swap it for a pair of Glock 9mms or a HiPower.

Nice El Paso Saddlery scabbard, though. But…..left handed.

Still a buncha 10/22 Steel Lip magazines, and $10 Magpuls availalable. Retail is for suckers.
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The Deer Lodge gun show was today. Drove out there with a buddy and looked around. Surprisingly, I ran into someone I recognized who was, I think, more surprised to see me than I was to see them. Either a ruptured appendix isn’t as debilitating as everyone thinks or..well…

Saw a few interesting things at the show. Most notably a Valmet in 7.62×39, a couple PTR’s, and a bunch of 870’s in various condition hovering in the $200-225 range.

There were a buncha AR’s floating around but, short of another Obama/Hillary panic, I think AR’s have gotten to be taken for granted…there are so many out there now that we’re only surprised if we don’t see a dozen of them on a dealers table. But…us old timers…we can remember some days when you could not get your hands on an AR for love nor money. Happened before, will happen again. I truly do think this window we are in will be the Golden Age of buying an AR…. a time when you could have one for less than the cost of a new Glock…but that window will, I think, start closing as supply starts to dwindle and demand slowly inches up.

Good trip, nice time, mediocre show, but always nice to go and always nice to run into folks you meow.

Pmags….still got some.
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A mixed bag.

Headed to the range to sight in the rifle I put together. (I won’t say ‘built’ because all I did was match up an already-assembled upper with an I-put-it-together-lower… that ain’t ‘building’.)

The IOR brand of scopes are fine scopes, and I like them alot. BUT…they can be pretty involved when it comes to zeroing. Since the M2 has a a BDC I needed to zero it at 100 yards and then reset the turrets.

See the top of the turrets and how it has three screws? You loosen the two outer screws (Never the middle screw. Thats trouble.) Notice the two rows of knurling around the turret? Hold the bottom row stationary and turn the top row to adjust point of impact. When thats done, tighten the two screws.

I really need a spotting scope because there was a lot of fire-a-round, walk-100-yards, check-target, walk-back-100-yards, repeat. Got it pretty much where I want it at 100 yards, now I need to fine tune it by making up some quality reloads and not the slapdash stuff I put together last night using assorted brass.

Oh, and this thing really needs a different trigger in a major way. I can sort live with the stock for now, but that trigger was horrible. If anyone wants to recommend a trigger that is better than your average rack AR but no so touchy you’d be scared carry it around in the zombie apocalypse….lemme know.

Headed to the 300 yard range, dialed the BDC to ‘3’ and started busting rocks. Elevation was pretty close to spot on but I need to work on the windage a tad. Again, when I’ve got some really good quality reloads made up, thats when I’ll start working on it again.

No failures of any kind. I need to seat the 62 gr. bullets a tad deeper in the case. Used the RCBS AR dies with the taper crimp. I really need to sit down with the case trimmer and uniform up some brass.

All in all, promising, but still just a .223.

Still a few bundles left.
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Well, in typical Montana fashion it dropped 2″ of snow the other day, and then today it was dang near 75 degrees. No point even trying to make sense of it…it’s Montana. Just roll with it.

Off to the range.

So I’ve been keeping track of what the supressed .22 likes and doesnt like. So far the best thing I’ve found has been Remington Subsonics. I’ve tried CCI Quiet, CB Longs, and American Eagle Suppresor…and they are positively anemic. In fact, the CCI Quiet didnt even make it to the backstop. I genuinely believe a steel ball bearing out of a slignshot would  have had a better trajectory.  When the thing finally does make it to the backstop, I measure for five-shot group.

Interestingly, just regular CCI ‘Standard’ velocity stuff does pretty well. But, so far, the nod goes to the Rem SS. I need to grab a few boxes of Eley and other premium .22 ammo and see how it performs. But, thus far, it looks like at some point I’m going to want to lay in a few cases of the Rem.

Some remarkably foresighted soul took a dozen bundles of 10/22 mags off my hands. Six bundles left. This one weird trick cures your 10/22 magazine deficit.

Nineteen bundles of 10/22 mags left. All the cool kids are doing it.
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Well, a fairly abbreviated range day anyway. There was a competition going on so all the ranges I normally like to use were full up. But, I dumped a couple magazines of ball through the new-to-me P95DC.

Good enough for the girls I go with. I’ll drift the sight a tad to center things a bit, but all in all I can live with that. I was packing for the range and discovered that while I have plenty of end-of-the-world 9mm ammo stashed away, my supply of go-to-the-range 9mm ammo is pretty thin. I need to crank up the RL 1050 and spit out a couple thousand rounds of ammo.

The P96DC shot well with one failure to extract as a result of a decidedly weak reload. Otherwise, it chugged along happily. Good little gun. These things were dirt cheap for Ruger to produce…it’s one of the very, very few polymer pistols that doesn’t use metal inserts for the rails to ride on. This is one of the reasons the manufacturing costs were low. The rest of the parts are Rugers usual castings, which also are cheap to make, and the whole gun only has about three dozen parts.

Has it always been a love story? No…I had a first generation P85 way back that was wildly inaccurate. Couldn’t hit the side of a barn if you were standing in it. But, as I understand it, the early guns had two-piece barrels of questionable quality. Ruger polished the P85 up in a hurry and re-ran it as the P89, which did better but was still a brick with a trigger. The guns were extremely overbuilt for a 9mm. Thats all well and good for end-of-the-world durability, but they felt like the handle on a gas pump.

Further refinement begat the P9x series of guns. And, to me, the P95DC with the textured grip and light rail were the pinacle of the the P series. The P95 was still a ’90’s design with it’s double/single-action, ring hammer, and styling. Glock ran the table and hammered autos went the way of tail fins and leisure suits. But…there’s a key for every lock, and for every gun there is a following. Some folks still like the DA/SA hammered autos. I certainly love me some HiPower, and a buddy of mine is practically a walking shrine to the CZ75. No doubt the Ruger P-series has it’s fan base as well, although it is certainly a quiet group.

One of the things I like about the Glock is that it is a gun that I can get wet, dirty, and drop without feeling the remorse I would feel if a similar event befell my 1911 or HiPower. The Ruger is an even hardier animal. I suspect that it’s ‘Isoplast’ frame is a little less forgiving of impact than Glock’s polymer blend, but I have no problem thinking that it would withstand the kind of trauma that would destroy the person holding it.

Anyway, its always nice to get out to the range and make some noise. This P95DC will get cleaned, lubed up, thrown back in it’s case with a couple loaded mags, and go off to the Deep Sleep.