Author Archives: Commander Zero

Video – The best HK 91 Clones on the market

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Thats a bit of a misleading title. To the best of my knowledge, you can count the makers of HK roller-lock clones on one hand… it’s not exactly a broad field.

However, I’ve played with Century, HK, PTR, SWF, Fed Ord, Springfield Armory, and a few others over the last thirty years and the PTR has been my hands down favorite, mainly because of the recent addition of the original G3 mag release, adding a rail, and changing the thread pitch on the muzzle.

Personally, I rather like the FAL. But the FAL has a couple drawbacks for me…not the least of which was price. All guns are a give-n-take in terms of good/bad features. For me, the only real options for a .308 were G3, FAL, M1A, and AR10. When I started throwing numbers into the calculator, the PTR wound up giving me, literally, the most bang for the buck when spare factory mags were $1 each.

If you decide you want to get a G3-pattern, I highly recommend the PTR and would strongly advise staying away from the drunken monkeys that do Century’s gun plumbing.

Entertainment – The Walking Dead

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I’ve gotten out of watching TWD regularly. I let the DVR record it and then watch the whole season at once. (And, lemme tell ya, several hours of non-stop post-apocalypse viewing will cure any motivational issues you may have.) Anyway… I decided to go back to watching because TWD did a ‘time jump’ which they do every few seasons. In this case, they leapt ahead six years to give us this:

An utterly adorable 8-year-old with a Colt Python (which she holds better than Rick ever did) and a sword. (And, apparently, it’s still impossible to find a holster that fits a six-inch Python properly.)

There is something a little odd about seeing a tiny kid with a Python, but rationally it makes perfect sense. There’s a scene later in the episode where Michonne has an encounter that had the potential to turn violent. When its resolved peacefully, she turns around to see the kid providing overwatch with her Python. And the kids says: “..Dad would have wanted me to have it. To protect myself and the people I love.” Lovely sentiment and pretty much the reason many of us own guns.

What I’m going to find fascinating to watch is that this character will have absolutely zero normalcy bias. This kid will have been living in zombieland her entire life.. so itwill be interesting to see if they show that in her behavior, relational skills, pragmatism,emotional maturity, etc.

Certainly, what I’ve seen so far is a lot less annoying than Coral* ever was.

From a temporal standpoint, it is my understanding we are now six-years past Ricks last appearance, and Judith was about two when when that happened, so I’m saying it’s about eight years on at this point. And, from the looks of things, ammo is getting scarcer since virtually no one, except the eight-year-old, seems to be throwing bullets around.

*=For the humor-challenged who don’t get the joke, Rick always seems to pronounce Carl as ‘Coral’.

TechSights install

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The TechSights I ordered arrived today and, naturally, that means I spent some time getting them mounted on one of the recently acquired Mini-14s.

From a functionality standpoint they seem superior to the Ruger factory sights…the adjustments aren’t as coarse. Only drawback seem to be that the aperature is a tad smaller than what was on the factory sight. This would contribute to accuracy (or what passes for accuracy in a Mini-14) but it would slow down your fast target acquisition. Fortunately, other aperatures are available and I’ll be getting a slightly larger one.

Having used the Tech Sights on the 10/22 rifle, I’m pretty confident these will work out just as well. Obviously I still need to head out to the range and re-sight things, but so far I like what I see.

If you get a set of these, a couple caveats:

  • There are some really small parts. Work over a flat, smooth surface or some other environment that will make finding dropped parts easier
  • It looks intimidating, but following the instructions shows that it isn’t nearly as complex as it looks. Probably took me fifteen minutes and about half of that was looking for a punch and a few other niceties.
  • Trickiest part was putting on a tiny e-clip onto the end of a screw. That’s the part that, if it goes flying, you’re never going to find…so keep a handle on it.

Article – Democrats Plan to Pursue Most Aggressive Gun-Control Legislation in Decades

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The Democrats apparently are going to try and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory:

WASHINGTON—Democrats say they will pass the most aggressive gun-control legislation in decades when they become the House majority in January, plans they renewed this week in the aftermath of a mass killing in a California bar.

Their efforts will be spurred by an incoming class of pro-gun-control lawmakers who scored big in Tuesday’s midterm elections, although any measure would likely meet stiff resistance in the GOP-controlled Senate.

Democrats ousted at least 15 House Republicans with “A” National Rifle Association ratings, while the candidates elected to replace them all scored an “F” NRA rating.

“This new majority is not going to be afraid of our shadow,” said Mike Thompson, a California Democrat who is chairman of the House Gun Violence Prevention Task Force. “We know that we’ve been elected to do a job, and we’re going to do it.”

Mr. Thompson, who represents a district in the Napa Valley north of San Francisco, said he plans to introduce legislation mandating universal background checks in the opening weeks of the new Congress.

Wait two weeks. Black Friday Friday Of Color sales will be occurring and that will be your best time to stock up. Palmetto State Armory will probably have complete lowers with Magpul stocks in the $120~ range, or some other ludicrously good deal.

Personal touches

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Text message:

Him: GLock 21 w/ 4 magazines
Me: Price?
Him: [price]
Me: I’ll take it
Me: Curse you

And that’s when I realized I got so caught up in New Gun Fever I failed to ask some basic questions.. like what Gen Glock? Factory mags? Box-n-docs? Condition?

Now, since I already said I’d take it, I couldn’t then start asking those questions and expecting him to be okay with me changing my price. So..I hoped for the best.

Didn’t do too bad.

First disappointment was that it was a Gen 2… no lightrail. But…hmm..someone put aftermarket fiber optic night sights on there (yes, self luminous). Ok, thats kinda nice. Take it apart and…hmm..a Nowlin replacement recoil assembly. And the magazines all have +2 extensions on them. Hmmm. So what we have here are the signs of someone who took good care of their guns. Let’s see how good…:::peel back the foam from the inside of the gun case::: sure enough, under the foam is the original factory recoil assembly, the receipts from Brownells, and some other useful info. Not too shabby.

I’m not a .45 guy. I have a very nice, very tweaked 1911 and have never felt the need for more than that. And these big frame Glocks never fit my hand. But…this is a nice gun. I’m tempted to keep it, especially since it’ll go nicely with the little G30 I still have sitting here.

But..I’ve no interest in retooling my logistics table. First nice Gen 3 17,17L,19, or 34 that someone wants to trade will wind up taking this thing home.

 

Where to put the money

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What would you sink money into IF you were inclined to put away something for that future ban specifically for resale? I lean towards items that are cheap enough to let me buy lots of them, and that will turnover quickly…like AR mags. (You can check more than one item on this list)

[yop_poll id=”13″]

‘Tis winter

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Hmph…snowed the last two days. I guess it’s winter. Time to pull the Filson outta the closet, round up the boots, and find the knit caps.
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Elections came and went, an they went about as I expected. But…I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something is making me uneasy about 2020. I think that I’m going to have to keep my eyes open for some investment guns and accessories.  I have a comfortable supply on hand for myself, but there’s always going to be that contingent of people who never thought ahead and will rush to the stores at the last minute to try and buy an AR or a 30-rd magazine. Those short-sighted fools will be my customer base.  And their penance for shortsightedness will be…well..   as much cash as theyre going to be willing to spend for hideously marked up gun related stuff. In 2020 it’ll have been 16 years since the sunset of the Assault Weapons ban. If you couldn’t get your act together in those 16 years to get your gun needs taken care of, then you deserve to pay $500 for a stripped AR lower. Just sayin’.

 

Mini-14 sights

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Sp I picked up a couple Min-14’s here recently, and while they are so low on the ‘just in case’ totem pole that they don’t even come out as a quinary-level of backup, there are still one or two things I need to do in regards to their care and feeding before I put them away.

The Mini’s have never had decent sights. Ever. Thats why they made the ‘Ranch’ versions. So, when you Google ‘aftermarket mini-14 sights’ what do you think  Google spits out? Yup. These guys.

I put a set of Tech Sights on my 10/22 a few years back and they are a very worthy improvement. They are, unfortunately, made in Taiwan but the market for good aftermarket Mini sights isn’t exactly known for breadth and depth.

Since I originally only planned on having the one lonely Mini-14 sitting in Deep Sleep, I’m going to have to order up another of the excellent Tapco Mini-14 mags. And then I should be done. Unless another stupid Mini-14 makes itself known to me at a too-good-to-pass-up-price.

 

How it happens

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Backstory: I like rice, I like chicken, and I like chicken and rice. What I usually do is cut up a buncha chicken and cook it in some sort of teriyaki or other ‘Asian’ sauce. The stuff I really like comes in a glass bottle for about $4. I have a tough time finding it, so I figured I’d special order it at Walmart.

Me: How many of these to a case? :::Shows manager the bottle of sauce I want:::
Mgr: Six to a case. :::consults handheld digital device:::
Me: Okay, I’ll take ten cases.
Mgr: Ok. Got something going on?
Me: Really wanna know?
Mgr: Sure.
Me: Im one of those crazy survivalist types. I like to stock up. :::Said in a ‘maybe he’s joking, maybe he’s not way:::
Mgr: :::takes a step closer and looks around before speaking::: I’m LDS. We do alot of that, too. Smart.
Me: Ah, so you must know [name of couple that was operating Bishops Storehouse]
Mgr: Yeah, I went to school with their son.
Me: Oh, [name of son]…he runs a preparedness website now.

And the conversation continues as he taps his device to order the cases I want.

That’s how it happens, folks. That’s how you meet fellow LMI. No internet meet ups, no ads on Craigslist, no waving a Gadsen flag in the parking lot and seeing what kinda people it draws. Just a normal everyday transaction

To be fair, virtually every LDS/Mormon I have met has been on ‘the same page’ as me on the important things. That’s one of the reasons I like Mormons so much. (That, and Mormon chicks are almost always uniformly hot.) I would bet money that if you put a observant, tithing, lives-in-Utah Mormon in front of me I can tell you who he voted for, whether he likes to shoot, and whats in his basement. Sucker bet.