Gun stuff

• Fun Supply's Airgun Forum
• Chinese Airgun Forum 
• www.straightshootrs.com/chat/,
  
• Makarov forum at gunboards.com
• XD Talk, discussions on the Springfield XD
• CZ Forum
• CZ Shooters
• Rugerforum.com
• The Firing Line "The leading online forum for firearms enthusiasts."
• The High Road
• Armed Polite Society
• Combat Carry
• The Firing Range
• Pistolsmith dot com.
• SKS forum at Kalushnikov.

• National Rifle Association Ancient and Venerable--founded in an era before anyone thought to demonize shooting.We respect Grandpa mostly, but he's a bit addled sometimes. They're either the country's biggest gun rights group, or the biggest gun control group, depending on who you talk to. Subject to quite a bit of bitter internal squabbling and political wrangling. Favorite phrase is "Enforce the gun laws you've got." (without asking whether we should have them or not.) Their current hobby horse is something called "Project Exile". They have a lock-em-up and throw away the key attitude. More NRA sites:NRA HQ,NRA Live,NRA ILA
• Gun Owners of America
• Second Amendment Foundation
• Champaign County Grassroots. aka Guns Save Life.com. In a previous incarnation of their site they called themselves "The attack dogs of pro-gun activism in Illinois" Excellent site.I wish I'd run into these people before I left Champaign-Urbana.
• Illinois State Rifle AssociationIllinois Affiliate of the NRA.
• The Texas State Rifle Association
• NRA Member Councils of California
• Rocky Mountain Gun OwnersColorado's No Compromise Gun Lobby
• National Firearms Association "The United Voice of Canada's Responsible Firearms Owners"
• The Hunting and Shooting Sports Heritage Fund
• Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership

Every gun I've ever seen with the exception of some nasty derringer (that no one except the clueless or the desperate would want to use) is well equipped with safety features--manual safeties, automatic safeties, grip safeties, magazine disconnects, transfer bars, etc., all aimed at keeping the gun from firing by accident. Gun safety means that no gun should fire without deliberate, conscious and responsible intent. The hardware is only half the equation. The "software" is the other half--the user knows his hardware and is responsible for it's use. Knowledge and responsibility.

Locking guns up has it's place, but requiring that all guns be always locked reduces their availability in a situation where a gun would be needed.

Smart guns? Give me a break! I don't want one scrap of electronics in my guns, outside of maybe the sights.

Teaching simple gun avoidance is appropriate for little kids, but inadequate for anyone else. Even if you don't ever want to own or handle a firearm, can you guarantee that one will never pass through your hands, however briefly?

The Rules, copy-pasted from the NRA's site. Read them, internalize them, obey them:

The three fundamental rules of gun safety must always be applied simultaneously when handling or using a gun:

Always keep the gun pointed in a safe direction.
Always keep your finger off the trigger until ready to shoot.
Always keep the gun unloaded until ready to use.

The following gun safety rules should also be observed when using or storing a gun:

Know your target and what is beyond.
Be sure the gun is safe to operate.
Know how to use the gun safely.
Use only the correct ammunition for your gun.
Wear hearing and eye protection as appropriate.
Never use alcohol or drugs before or while shooting.
Store guns so they are not accessible to unauthorized persons.

Be aware that certain types of guns and many shooting activities require additional safety precautions.

Blasting away with your loudenboomer is great fun, but sometime you should get some instruction and learn The Right Way, before The Wrong Way gets too ingrained.

Midwest Training Group This is the only school I have direct experience with. I took their Intro to Defensive Pistol class. In a day's worth of shooting we covered safety (an Ayoob video plus discussion), sighting, stance, grip, Weaver vs. Chapman vs. isocoles, strong hand, weak hand, the correct way to draw from the holster, reloading on the fly, clearing jams and I don't recall what-all else. We burned through 300+ rounds one beautiful day in April. Recommended.

Gunsite Academy

Mossad Ayoob

Thunder Ranch

Chuck Taylor, instructor.

"The Site", out in the boonies of Mt. Carroll, Illinois.

Fun stuff

• Joseph's Innocent Inanimate Objects page. Same thing, but with groceries. "Disgusting Red Christmas soda shot with .357 CorBon"YES!
• The Terminal Shoot -- what better fate for those nasty old Beehive things.Ka-Bloooie!
• You know you're a gun nut if. . .

Gun Grabbers got too big so I moved it here.

Gun Vendors got too big so I moved it here.

"Sport Utility Rifles" and other pollitically incorrect guns.

• 24 rules for a gunfight
• AK47 dot net
• You can't get much more Un-PC than with a Barrett .50 "reach out and touch" from a mile away. (May, 1999. The usual suspects are starting to make noises about .50 cal "terrorist tank killer sniper guns".)

  More Big Guns

  Sarco Inc. [M-2 Browning Machine Gun .50 Caliber parts]

  Knight's SR-50 .50 Caliber BMG Semi Auto

• The Sten. A crude looking, cheap and easy to manufacture SMG the Brits came up with during WWII. Did you take metal shop in high school? If you want to buy one (mind the ATF and their $200 tax)),Long Mountain Outfitters advertises them.
• Cannon mania "offers over 100 different cannons (including all the famous Winchester brands), plus ammo. You will find kits and many interesting articles."
• Why do we shoot? An article from the Blue Press.

"Similarly, the few references to power seemed to belie the old claim that firearms represent a surrogate for sex. Presumably the subject had been put to bed (so to speak) over seven decades earlier when Sigmund Freud wrote in General Introduction to Psychoanalysis, "A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity." Apparently Dr. Freud, who probably was not a shooter, intuitively understood what marksmen know empirically: shooting is a mental exercise. The payoff occurs above the neck, not below the belt."

• Take your kids shooting educate them. See also. . .
• Children and Guns by David Kopel. "Having driven responsible gun-owners into the suburbs or into hiding, New York, Chicago, and Washington are raising a generation of children whose only visible role models of gun ownership are criminals and violent television characters."
• Varmint Hunters Association"The club was founded in 1991 for the benefit of those shooters who seek the highly refined accuracy necessary for the taking of smaller game at longer distances."
• South Dakota on Prairie Dog shooting
• Magnum Research classy expensive BFGs
• Tom Bowers' Politically Incorrect Machine Gun Page. It is just soinconvenientto have to pull the trigger every time.
• Knob Creek machine gun shoot.
• Sniper Country

• Trebeuchet twangggg!!---splut (pronounced tre-boo-shay) A trebeuchet is a medieval siege engine, used for lofting pianos, Toyotas or dead cows over your enemies castle walls. It's a guy thing, I guess.
• A Trebeuchet emulator for Windows.
• Pumpkin Chunckin'

Particular Guns

appropriate technology. Bang for the buck. Any one of these will do the job without maxing out your VISA.

• BSA Supersport
• Makarov
• Crosman 140
• Lee-Enfield
• New England Firearms Handi-Rifle
• the SKS
• Tuco's Mosin-Nagantpage -- another best buy .30 cal bolt gun, which I have no experience with.

If you have a little more money to spend, look into Ruger and CZ.

Somewhat more pricey

The M1 Garand and Mini-14.

The Glock. The original "plastic gun". Some people love them. I have no direct experience with them.

J. M. Browning's Colt .45 and clones. The classic (the design is almost a century old, still popular) large caliber, single action auto.

What it actually takes to buy a gun

• Ian Pellants airgun reviews and software. The software is forWindows 95, unfortunately.
• RWS adult airguns --target pistols and magnum spring guns mostly.
• Barnes Pneumatic Arms handmade custom pre-charged pneumatic guns.
• Dennis Quackenbush ditto. He also makes replicas of antique high powered pneumatic guns. Both these guys are way out of my league price-wise, but I can dream.
• Dianawerk Rastatt - Mayer & Grammelspacher Dianawerk GmbH & Co.. They make Diana airguns, sold here by RWS.
• Mac-1 fixed my Crosman 140 He also does modifications ("steroid treatment") on Sheridan and Benjamin-Sheridan air rifles.
• Bryan and Associates, repair on vintage airguns.
• Airgun Express --where the heck is Montezuma, Iowa? For the "price conscious", they also sell used guns, RWS demos and Beeman blemished guns. Buy anything from them and they'll put you on the list for a nice newsletter.
• Airgunspares.com "The major part of our business is supplying obsolete and hard to obtain spares for a very large range of air rifles, air pistols, target and sporting rifles and shotguns. We can supply most parts for any BSA air weapon, sporting or target rifle or shotgun, including weapons imported and distributed by BSA such as SKB, Valmet, KTC etc., produced from 1905 up to the present day."
• Is this Lewis and Clark's airgun?
• American Airguns has a classified page (and a lot more).
• Crosman American made air guns. Crosman is now the parent company of both Benjamin and Sheridan. (2001-feb-17 Requires Shockwave to see the menu. Looks like Crosman (and Daisy) are trying for the high end again. Both now show pneumatic target rifles.)
• Daisy ditto. Low end kid sized cheesy plastic stocked Crosman and Daisy guns are most of what you'll see now in the Kmarts and Walmarts of the world. Both companies make better guns, but you have to look for them.
• Robert Beeman's web site

• National Reloading Manufacturer's Assoc. has a course in basic reloading.
• Old Western Scrounger -- new production obscure or antique ammo and components for same. .32 Rimfire, anyone? .22 Velo Dog? Loaded ammo, bullets, brass, molds and dies, etc.
• Accurate Reloadingan information page
• M. D. Smith's Reloading Pages
• Alliant's Interactive Reloader's Guide (also in downloadable PDF version.) Data sheets for their powders.
• Reloading Equipmentand Consumables vendors

• Expedient Homemade Firearms -- a how to book. It looks doable, but nothing I want to try for a variety of reasons. Get your copy while you can.
• Lyman Reloading HandbookStep-by-step how to reload. Also history, ballistics, components and consumables. Most of the book is reloading data for reference. The 47th edition is current. Get it from a gun store or order it from some place like Natchez that would have it in stock. Amazon.com says 4-6 weeks to get a copy.
• Mossad Ayoob's In the Gravest Extreme. Legal and practical aspects of lethal force. He stronglydiscourages the "machismo" school of gun handling. It's a toolto save your life. The handgun advice dates from 1980, so it knows nothing of Glocks or Commie exotica like the CZ-52 or Makarov. Amazon.com lists it as "3 or 4 weeks" delivery. -
• In the 70's the late Mel Tappan published Survival Guns, a single volume of gun wisdom for "survivalists". Amazon says it's out of print (they'll keep an eye out for a copy for you). A good one volume introduction to the subject of firearms. Somewhat out of date as to particulars, not principles.
• Mel died, time passed, things changed. "Boston T. Party's" Boston on Guns and Courage ("Proven Tools for Chronic Problems") is, sort of, an update of Survival Guns for the 1990s. In the 70's we were worried about the Commies overrunning Europe and A-bombing New York and DC. In the 90's the Russkis are broke, the Chinese (still Red but no one seems to care) are trading partners, campaign contributors and honored guests at the Clinton White House. Boston doesn't visualize roving bands of looters, he visualizes resistance. He is opinionated -- loves Glocks, loathes some popular guns. He disagrees with Mel Tappan occationally (Mel raved about the then fairly new Mini-14, the most Boston will say is you can do better for the money). His recommendations start a lot cheaper than Mel's -- he usually has some "if you're really on a budget" (I am) recommendations and a Joe Trailer-park battery.
• Boston's Gun Bible.  An update, much larger, of Boston on Guns and Courage.  He's changed his mind on some stuff.
• Practical Pistol Manual by Bill Clede.  Short, covers the basics.
  
• The Concealed Handgun Manual, by Chris Bird. Twice the price, much more than twice the book.
• Firearms and Liberty online documents
• Single Shot Exchange
• The Gun Zone,
• Precision Shooting Magazine zillion yard shots
• Firearms Tactical Institute "We're publisher of FirearmsTactical[tm], an electronic magazine specializing in the tactical employment of firearms against deadly threats."
• Duncan Long, author.
• American Handgunner Magazine
• Guns & Ammo Magazine
• GunWeek Online
• Frontline on The Ring of Fire (Lorcin/Jennings/Bryco). I've actually got far, far better things to do than watch TV in general and PBS in particular.

Victorinox Swiss Army Knives. If you interact with the physical world at all you will find a SAK useful. Lifetime warranty, and they mean it. They rebuilt a 20 year old SAK I had that had nicks or problems with every single tool and blade on it.

Schrade. American made knives, some high quality, some not. If you want a classic American redneck lockback, take a look at their Uncle Henry Bear Paw. The Bear Paw, BTW, comes with a one year warranty against youloosing the knife.

The Bear Paw was creeping some of the end users out (it's kinda big), so I picked up a CRKT Urban Shark. It's a modern design liner lock. It works, but there's not much to love about it. The pocket clip is held in place with three small torx screws that don't match anything I have (t5 is too small, t8 is too big, and just try to find anything in bettween), and loosen constantly unless you tack them in place with Loctite.

Gerber is part of Fiskars (the scissor company) now. They make knives, outdoor equipment and multi-tools. I have a Multi-lock tool, bought in 1997. They appear to have improved them since I got mine, which is good, because I'm not overly thrilled with mine. It is useful, but the selction of tools could be better, the pliers don't handle torque well, and for a long time the plier jaws would bind, no matter what I did.

(2001-dec-23 I've been given a current model which is improved in many ways. The pliers on mine are smaller and closer to what I could consider "needle nosed" (ie., they're for precision work, not mashing things). This one has one knife blade (mixed regular and drop point) not seperate drop point and serrated blades. It also has scissors (yeahhhh!!!!), as well as the bottle opener, can opener, phillips head screwdriver and 3 different flat head screwdrivers that my original tool has. It lacks the metal file and lanyard ring. If you look closely at the two tools, you can see where some of the tools are slightly redesigned. A cool geek toy.)

Spiderknives

Ragweed Forge

Kellam Knives

• American Firearms Industry wants to "Sue the Mayors"
• American Gunsmithing Association gunsmithing videos
• Antique Ammunition Webring homepage
• Neal Knox can tell you more about the NRA
• African Hunter dot com
• the rec.guns FAQ page
• Rick's Firearm's Page and Internet Shooting Directory
• Second Amendment Committee home page
• International Defensive Pistol Association
• Plus P Technology We are dedicated to providing a comprehensive source to help answer any and all questions you may have regarding handguns and self defense"
• Dexadine.com -- they make some kind of ballistics program.
• Gunfax, "a free gun newsletter"
• Calibers "The Handgun Ammunition Information Resource"
• Sportshooter.com
• The John Caradimas' 1911 Pistols Home Page
• John Moses Browning, Man of the Century
• Dr. Martin Fackler on Terminal Ballistics
• The Reflex Suppressors homepage. A supressor is what is commonly called a "silencer". (Air gunners call theirs "moderators.) Mark this down under "stuff you can't get in Ill-i-noise."
• The Armed Mensan
• realguns.com
• PDCUETM Counter Sniper System(Projectile Detection & Cueing) gunshot detection equipment. Microphones in every lamppost?
• 1911 Forum.com
• Makarov.com postal match
• Curios and Relics
• Parallax's Curio and Relic Firearms Forums
• The Shooting Show
• Records Bureau "Discreet Research, Inc. -- When you need to know"
• Forensic Firearms Identification
• ar15.com
• Handgun Wounding Factors & Effectiveness
• U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit
• Small Arms Ammunition Manufacturers Institute
• Civilian Marksmanship Program
• The M1 Garand Information Place
• The Garand Page and garandm1rifle.com
• A lawyer in training visits the gun nuts. Fun read.
• New Jersey Institute of Technology report on personalized weapons, aka "smart guns", which is to say, guns that have deliberatly been made overcomplicated and thus, less reliable. With the arguable exception of laser sights, I want no electronics in my guns.
• 
  
• Gun Making as a Cottage Industry
  
• Pictures of  Military Surplus Rifles
  
• Ammoguide.com
• Targetshooting.ca competition shooting of all sorts.

"Take a look at Megasports in Plainfield. Take I-55 south (its a ways outside of Chicago proper), exit Hwy 30 north, its on the right after a mile or so. Big store, modern range. Excellent service 9/10 of the time." --somebody in rec.guns.

"G.A.T. (Guns, Ammunition, Tackle) Guns in Elgin area. Take I-90 West and Hwy 25 north about two miles on right-had side." --somebody in rec.guns

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