I Thought I Heard Hank Williams Coming From his Garage

I am fed up with Midway USA. I had reminders set for large pistol primers; when they came in, Midway would email me and let me know so I could order them. Twice, the silly things have come in, and they sold out before I could place an order. Today I put them in my cart and then looked for a soft case for my AR10, and by the time I was ready to check out, the primers were gone! Right out of my cart!

Here’s a tip. Powder Valley has lots of Wolf primers. Some people don’t like Wolf products, but I find their ammunition reliable, very accurate, readily available, and CHEAP. You can get large pistol primers for about $25 a box, which is cheaper than the American brands. They are said to be fairly soft, which I like. Powder Valley also has a good selection of powder right now, so you can load up and save on hazmat fees.

They sell Zero bullets. I have not tried these, but the price is very good, and I have read very good things about them. I usually use Laser-Cast bullets, but Zeroes are much cheaper, so I’m going to give them a try.

I use Unique for .45 loads, and I was considering getting something else, because my cases and my gun are so dirty after a day at the range. Two things I read changed my mind. First, I read that Alliant has changed Unique to make it cleaner. Second, I read that the greasy lube Laser-Cast uses is dirty, so it may be the reason I had problems with filth.

I am trying to face the following fact: if you reload, you should always shop big. Buy 10,000 primers at a time, minimum. Buy the big jugs of powder. Buy lots of bullets. You’re going to end up using it, so why lose bulk discounts and pay UPS for extra shipments? It’s moronic. But it sure hurts to see those jumbo charges on a credit card bill.

I tried putting my .40 S&W shell plate in the chuck on my rotab today, and it turned out it was not possible. The shell pockets interfere with the chuck jaws. Bummer. I guess I should try to make some soft jaws, or maybe I could mount the plate on a shaft held in the jaws. I broke down and ordered some carbide cutters, so I should be able to fix the shell plates eventually.

I used my drill press today to put countersunk screw holes in an aluminum door guide I made for some sliding doors in a closet. It goes on the floor, and the doors pass through it. I noticed a few things.

1. Spray Dykem may seem like a good idea, and I know it has its uses, but it’s very hard to use it without turning your fingers blue.

2. Spray Dykem remover appears to be a waste of money, since rubbing alcohol works fine. I bought this stuff a while back by accident. I have not needed to use it yet.

3. Everyone who told me drill presses were not for precision work was exactly right. My drill press is an industrial 17″ Rockwell, so it should be sturdy, but I can see it flexing when the pressure is applied. Small drill presses are apparently totally inferior to mills. If I ever get enough space, I could see buying an old Millrite or a beat-up Bridgeport for drilling. I would expect a Bridgeport in bad shape to be more accurate and rigid than a new drill press.

4. Drill holes have to be a lot larger than the screws that go in them. I measured some screws at 0.132″ diameter, and I had to use a 0.173″ (I think) bit to make them work. I started at 0.15-something, but the screws wouldn’t go in.

I’m getting a tiny Phase II rotab because I have decided I don’t want to rupture myself moving the 10″ job all the time. I looked at Little Machine Shop, Lathemaster, and Vertex, but it seemed like Phase II was the best combination of value and quality. Little Machine Shop sells them, but their price is not the best.

Soft jaws. Is there any hope I can make those? Guess I’ll find out.

I Know This Will Save me Money Once I Buy Enough Tools

I got my reloading press put back together yesterday. Now I need new shell plates. The new ejection system works off a projection on the lower hub, which projects up into a groove going around the bottom of the shell plate. When the plate advances, a shell’s bottom hits the projection, and it knocks the shell out of the plate. My old plates don’t have the groove into which the projection fits.

I can send the plates to Hornady and pay ten bucks each to get them machined. But where is the danger immaturity terror in that? I have a lathe and a mill. I should be able to do this.

I need to make a quarter-inch slot 0.052″ deep, around the bottom of the plate. I know of two ways to do it. First, I can use the lathe. Second, I can put the plate in my rotary table and do the job on the mill with a center-cutting end mill.

Here is the rub: the plate tests out at about 33 on the Rockwell scale, and I don’t have any small cutters in carbide. I have 8% cobalt, but I don’t know if that’s hard enough. It’s definitely harder than the plate, but I would assume the difference between the plate’s hardness and the cutter’s hardness has to exceed a certain figure in order for the cutter to work well.

I don’t think they cover this in Machinery’s Handbook. They list metal types and cutter types. I don’t think they list cutter choices paired with ranges of metal hardness. I guess I can dig it out and check.

Enco is having a nice sale on carbide cutters, so I may get a few. I can spend less than the cost of a Hornady refit and end up with some nice tooling to keep. The danger is that I’ll utterly destroy my shell plates.

I sold my .40 S&W pistol, so I have a shell plate I will never need. I may try to machine that one first.

I guess I could make my own shell plates, if I had any idea how to make a ball-bearing detent.

The lathe would be good, but how do you make a rectangular slot in the face of a disk, with an interrupted cut? I can’t even guess what kind of tool I’d use. I suppose I could make a rectangular tool from cobalt steel and push it directly into the disk, but I have never seen that done in a video.

I may go ahead and fire up the mill with a cobalt cutter and see what happens. A total disaster will cost me about two bucks.

Mounting the rotary table on the mill reminded me that I need a second rotary table. Mine weighs something like 120 pounds with the chuck installed, so in order to get it on and off the mill without risk of dropping it or chipping the mill, I take the chuck off every time. This means a tedious procedure of dialing in the chuck, whenever I want to use the rotab. I have been planning to get a 4″ rotab and mount it in my vise when I need it. This should kill about 95% of the 10″-table moves.

Finding the right rotab is not easy. Little Machine Shop sells a nice one with dividing plates and a chuck and a tailstock for $300. I can get a Vertex with nothing on it for $139. Then there is Lathemaster. But I don’t know what the specs on the Lathemaster product are.

It looks like Phase II has the best specs in the Chaiwanese market.

Some of these things are hard to mount, because you can’t just use your usual studs and nuts. That’s a consideration. I am planning to put the table on a piece of aluminum and put it in my vise, but sometimes (probably), I’ll want it on the mill table surface.

I guess I’ll figure it out.

Someone asked for a link to a Youtube about upgrading the Hornady Lock-N-Load press to the EZ-Ject system. Here you go.

What are YOU Doing Today?

Sometimes I have a fleeting realization of how weird I am. I am having one today.

I got up and wrote a long blog entry about how the Holy Spirit tells me stuff when I’m visiting museums. Then I realized I had to install an EZ-Ject kit on my Hornady Lock-N-Load ammunition press and see if I could machine the shell plates to make them work with it. I got started in the garage, and then I remembered I also had to freeze a gallon of pizza sauce and try a dough experiment. The dough was especially important. I have an idea for easy croissant-like rolls, and I have to test the recipe.

I got on Youtube, found a video of someone explaining the press upgrade (the way Hornady should have in its instructions). Then I made a big pile of dough, turned it into rolls, and put them on a pan to rise. Now I have to go to the garage and do my repairs and machining while the dough rises.

Who else has a life like this? I had to check four WordPress categories for this one post.

I’m considering writing a cookbook for my church. Not for publication. Just to help people who work in the kitchen. If these rolls work, they’ll be in the book.

I forgot to put chocolate inside them. I better fix that before they get too warm to handle.

DC Looms Before Me

Tomorrow I fly to DC. On Thursday and Friday, I’ll attend the National Day of Prayer and a dinner with Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, founder of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. On Friday, I’ll be at a breakfast at the Israeli Embassy, and then I’ll tour the Holocaust Museum.

It’s an honor to be invited. Still, I wish they could hold these events somewhere else. Washington, DC is a hotbed of violent crime, and the Second Amendment does not exist there, and I won’t be able to carry a gun. The hotel where I’ll be staying sounds borderline dangerous. The events should be wonderful, but the city takes a lot of the shine off the trip.

Maybe they should meet in the IFCJ’s hometown instead. But wait. That’s CHICAGO. Arghh. Suddenly DC doesn’t look all that bad.

Here’s the main reason I decided to go: I want to walk by faith. This is one of those improbable opportunities God drops on people, and I want to stay in the flow of God’s will, so I accepted the invitation. I know there is a reason for it, and good things will result from my obedience. I hope that doesn’t sound ungracious. I’m extremely enthusiastic about the events. But how can anyone get excited about DC? It’s like visiting Fallujah. They should call it East Detroit.

Boy, that gun control works wonders, doesn’t it? Look how safe DC and Chicago are. I almost wish I were a gun-grabbing Congressman, so I would have heavily armed police, federal agents, and military personnel to take care of me.

I hope people will pray for my safety, and that I’ll accomplish whatever it is that God wants done.

I will not be afraid, though ten thousands of people set themselves against me, round about. Though an host should encamp about me, my heart shall not fear. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. No evil shall befall me, neither shall any plague come nigh my dwelling, for God shall give his angels charge over me, to keep me in all my ways. They shall bear me up in their hands, lest I dash my foot against a stone.

All the same, I wish I could take my Glock.

I am not a great fan of Miami, but the prospect of visiting DC helps me see the positive aspects of this place. I can carry a gun everywhere I go, including church. I am not very likely to need it. And I don’t have to spend much time in the decrepit heart of the city. This is not Tennessee or Texas, but it’s a huge step up from DC, New York, Chicago, LA, or any of the big eastern seaboard cities. Those places are like twenty years away from Soylent Green conditions. Detroit is already there. I think it’s where they filmed the outdoor shots for Battlefield Earth.

Safety is the only thing about the hotel that concerns me. I am not picky about accommodations. I’ll take ear plugs and decongestant spray, and those things should cover the most likely problems. I just want clean sheets and a temperature between 70 and 75 degrees, and I’ll be fine.

The food up there should be good. Miami is not a great restaurant town, and I cook better than any restaurant I know of, so I have no motivation to go out. DC has Indian and Ethiopian food, so I’m hoping to try a couple of places. I would love to have a big plate of beef or lamb bhuna and some terrifying appetizers. No one in Miami will use enough peppers; they’re abject cowards. Maybe the Indians in DC will take me seriously.

I’ll Have the Bollinger

I just cleaned the LR-308.

I am not sure what to make of the experience.

On the one hand, the fit and finish, in and of themselves, made the experience a joy. My Smith & Wesson pistols are about as cute as the LR-308, but my other guns seem pretty clunky in comparison. The LR-308 fits together perfectly and has no flaws I can spot with the naked eye. Cleaning it is like giving a massage to a supermodel. Except that I will never know what it’s like to give a massage to a supermodel.

The design is impressive, too. This is my first AR-type rifle, so I’ve never taken one apart before. I love the way it comes apart without fuss. You never have to reach for a hammer, the way you might have to when stripping an Eastern-bloc rifle. The pins are tight, but the tightest one will come out if you shove it with a hex wrench. The main pins come out without tools of any kind.

Still, while the gun seems finely made, I am a little distressed by the knowledge required to lubricate it and put it back together. Lubricate this lightly. Lubricate that heavily. Make sure this part is turned this way when you put the gun together, because if it’s not, the gun will explode.

I am positive I remember the cam pin thing in the bolt going in at an angle 90° different from the angle at which I left it after reassembly, but I must be wrong. Hope nothing blows up.

With an AK, you can push and beat on things and make it go together in a hurry, while wearing mittens. To put the AR together, you really should have a quiet study, a big table, a nice lamp, a martini, and a good classical piano CD. I have to wonder how many soldiers have been shot while trying to put an M16 together quickly.

The AR seems like the kind of semi-auto James Bond would use. The AK is more for shrieking imbeciles eager to kill random infidels with as little training as possible.

I also cleaned the Vz 58, which took like 25% as long.

I need a trigger for the LR-308. Jim from Smoke on the Water suggests a McCormick trigger, about which I know nothing. He says it comes in double-stage and single-stange, curved or flat.

Great. Four options to think about. I don’t know why anyone would want a straight trigger. Seems like it would not hold onto the finger very well.

The Vz 58’s trigger is unbelievable, and as far as I can tell, it’s single-stage. I love it. I am inclined, on that basis, to go with something similar for the LR-308. But ten minutes after I install it, I know someone will email me and explain that I should have gotten double-stage.

I wonder what the Vz 58 would do, scoped. It’s not supposed to be all that accurate, but with a trigger like that, you can’t help but wonder. Scope mounts for this gun are pretty weird because of the way it ejects.

I’m pretty disappointed in my Boresnake. I ran it through the LR-308 before using patches, and I still got lots of blue when I started cleaning the gun conventionally. Lots of black, too. When I use the Boresnake on pistols, it leaves a mirror-polished surface in three swipes. But maybe that’s an illusion. Maybe I’m just polishing the copper residue.

I have realized I know nothing about cleaning guns. I thought the way to do it (pre-Boresnake) was to start with Hoppe’s and a wire brush, but the product directions I read today suggest a brush is only needed for a filthy, neglected gun. Does this mean a brush is too rough to use every time? I have also been informed that solvent eats brushes with copper in them.

It’s hard for me to believe that running a patch through a barrel one time does anything, but that’s what the literature seems to suggest. Use patch after patch, on a jag, and don’t change directions. I must have put 15 patches through the LR-308. Oddly, the Vz 58, after a hundred rounds of Wolf, was extremely clean except for the gas tube.

I don’t see why jags would work any better than a loopy thing (pardon the technical jargon). The loopy things I have are equipped with thick portions that would seem to do exactly what a jag does.

After I cleaned the Vz 58, I stuck it in the 35″ Bulldog bag I got from Classic Arms. I’m impressed. Very compact and easy to carry. I doubt the curved magazines will fit in the little outside pockets, but I haven’t checked. I can wrap them and put them in with the gun.

I still need a bag for the LR-308. It’s weird that DPMS sells sightless rifles in cases that won’t accommodate a scope, but that’s how it is. I guess I’m expected to buy some kind of mount that detaches when I go home.

The Radway ammunition I bought is attracting criticism RE accuracy. I’m wondering: should I go ahead and start reloading? I have a bunch of cases now, but it looks like this stuff is not reloadable without a lot of misery. Should I expect to be able to create sub-MOA ammunition with my limited skill set and microscopic attention span? I dunno.

Of course, the up side of the ammo criticism is that it implies that I’m not a terrible rifle shot. If the ammunition is quirky, maybe I’m not so bad. I do okay with the .17 HMR.

I’m going to get an elbow pad and something to go between me and the butt of the gun, so I can shoot more without getting sore. I still love the truck stop floor mats, though. What a bargain. And they keep your guns off the scratchy range benches.

I’m glad I got the LR-308. Now all I need is an AR15 in one of the Grendel-y calibers, and I’ll be ready for long days of zombie-shootin’ and Sicilian pizza, out on the front porch.

Plus Gun Stuff

Yesterday was pretty weird. It was a blast, but the usual speed bumps popped up.

I made pizza and rolls at church, and we also served apple pie and brownies I had brought to an event the night before. So it was pretty much like going to a restaurant in which I was the chef.

We didn’t sell much pizza. Why? No can opener, and not enough helpers. We keep buying cheap can openers, and they don’t like #10 cans much. One broke last week, and someone was supposed to replace it with a commercial can opener, but that did not happen, and I didn’t know until it was time to make sauce. That cost me the whole first service.

I had to attend the third service, so I couldn’t make pizza, and there was no one else available except for my eleven-year-old assistant. I can’t turn him loose without supervision, so I closed up shop. We sold six pies and six dozen rolls.

I have a problem with the people out front selling the rolls too cheap. I had to go out and remind them that the flour costs money. You can’t sell four rolls for a dollar and survive. The price is fifty cents each or $2.50 for half a dozen. I don’t mind making rolls if it will generate a hundred bucks for the church, but I’m not going to fool with them if the net is five dollars.

The apple pies were wonderful. The cream cheese crust I came up with is a dream come true. It’s flaky, it tastes and smells great, and it’s fairly tough, so it won’t fall apart when you’re making or serving the pie. It’s not tough in the sense that it’s not tender. It just doesn’t break up at the wrong times.

It gave me a fantastic idea for rolls. I make chocolate and strawberry/cheesecake croissants, but they’re a pain to prepare. The pie crust is somewhat similar to a croissant, and it has an even better flavor. I decided to add yeast and turn it into rolls. They were incredible. Better than croissants. They aren’t quite as flaky, but the flavor is magnificent. And they’re easy to make. Make dough in a food processor, roll it out, make rolls, let them rise, bake.

As dinner rolls, these things have no equal of which I am aware. Add a little sugar, and you have the perfect substrate for something similar to a strawberry or chocolate croissant.

I believe God drops these ideas on me out of nowhere. The Sicilian pizza still freaks me out, and so do the garlic rolls. I am not going to take credit for this stuff. That is a sure way to cause problems.

It’s wonderful having trained chefs to talk to. I’m not used to that. We exchange ideas about food, and we’re all pretty excited about cooking.

One of the chefs–Ruthie–told me men made the best cooks. That was surprising, but I think she’s right. The best cooks I’ve known have been men. I think it’s because we’re more aggressive with the food. We’ll try absolutely anything. After all, I’m the guy who made a casserole filled with doughnuts. And how many women will design a smoke box for a smoker, cut out the parts with a grinder, and weld them together?

These days, a lot of women disdain any type of work associated with housekeeping, so I suppose many women would feel silly bragging about their cookies and brownies. Hillary Clinton sneered at women who make cookies; we all remember that. This self-destructive and perverse snobbery is probably one of the reasons most modern women don’t cook well.

It’s very sad that we have so little respect for good housekeepers and child-rearers, because their work is more important than breadwinning. Think about it: in fifty years, will anyone care about your raise or the great Powerpoint presentation you did? Of course not. Those things chiefly affect strangers who don’t care whether you live or die. But the things a wife and mother does have direct and lasting impact within the family. Her job is to prepare the next generation and to create an environment in which the other members of the family can thrive. And besides, the preparation of good food is an altruistic expression of love.

Even a salmon understands the importance of putting the next generation first. Come to think of it, my pastor talked about that yesterday. Shoveling money at your kids is fine, but it’s no substitute for hands-on, traditional parenting.

One of the women at church started telling me I should open a restaurant. I waved my hands at the food, and I said, “I HAVE a restaurant.” But I appreciated the compliment. I have considered opening a pizza joint, but it has occurred to me that a gun shop might be more practical, not to mention much less expensive.

There are very few gun shops around here, and most of them are no good. The prices are generally bad, and most shops have poor service. When a good shop opens up, people go. And it’s a much easier business to run than a restaurant. You don’t have to come in at 6 a.m. and put yeast in the guns so they can rise. You don’t have to wash the guns or carry out bags of smelly gun scraps at 11 p.m. There are no gun inspectors counting your cockroaches or forcing you to remodel in order to conform to unrealistic codes. You show up, sell stuff, do the paperwork, and go home. It’s a nine-to-five job. You buy for x dollars and sell for x plus a profit. It is not rocket science. And you don’t need two hundred thousand dollars’ worth of commercial cooking equipment that breaks down when you need it most. Nor do you need a big staff of skilled people. Any honest person with a fair knowledge of guns can work for you.

On top of that, we have Barack Obama. The greatest gun salesman in history. This man has literally made gun sellers rich. While he’s in office, you can’t lose!

Sign a lease, get a license, put thirty grand into inventory and renovations, and you’re a gun shop owner. That’s how it seems, anyway. If things go sour, sell the inventory and go home. You won’t be like the failed restaurateurs on Craigslist, begging people to buy their dreams for twenty cents on the dollar.

South Florida needs someone who sells reloading stuff. If you buy powders and primer over the Internet, you get royally dinged on the hazmat fees. A local place that made a respectable effort should do well. I use Accurate No.7 for my .38 Super, and trying to buy this well-known product in Miami is like trying to score plutonium.

This week, I’m going to DC to participate in the National Day of Prayer and some events sponsored by the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. I’ll be visiting Mike. I am distressed that I’ll be in a crime-plagued city without a sidearm. I’ve gotten so used to the security of concealed carry that it bothers me to think I’ll be unarmed up there. I decided to stay at a hotel, and while I was looking for good ones, I kept reading reviews referring to bulletproof glass and scary parking lots. What a failure that city must be, as a place to live. The Detroit of the East Coast. I want to get in and out, fast. I would appreciate prayers for my safety.

I don’t like Miami much, but I thank God I live in a place where I am permitted to take care of myself. When I get out of here and move to more rural setting, I think it will feel like paradise. Nicer people, less traffic, same gun rights, more room…that would be nice.

I look forward to getting some good food in DC. Indian and maybe Ethiopian. Mike is scanning the horizon for opportunities.

I didn’t want to go (still don’t), but it seemed like God’s hand was in it, and it’s wonderful to be invited to these events.

This might be a good day for some experimental cooking. I would really like to finalize that roll recipe.

Gallery of stuff I cooked:

It’s Almost Like a Blonde Joke

Here’s a funny story. There was this guy who bought an AR10 rifle over the Internet. It was his first AR-type rifle. When it arrived, he looked for charging handle and couldn’t find it. He was very disturbed, and he called the manufacturer to find out if it was normal to ship AR-type rifles without charging handles. Maybe it was a customizing thing, so people could buy their own handles.

The employee who answered the phone was distressed and said this was like selling a Chevy truck with no windshield. They did not sell guns without charging handles. He asked for the dealer’s name and asked the buyer to call back if he couldn’t clear it up.

The buyer left a voicemail for the seller, asking if he knew what had happened to the charging handle. Then he went to look at the gun again, and he pulled on a thing at the back of the gun, and the chamber opened. Suddenly he realized the charging handle on this kind of rifle was in the back. And he felt pretty stupid, and he left another voicemail for the dealer, explaining that the first voicemail was some moron who sounded just like him and liked to play really bad practical jokes.

I’m sure glad I’m not that guy.

Yes, sir.

Glad.

Die, Gas Pumper!

I guess I’m stupid, because I somehow had the idea that April 29th was tomorrow. In fact, it is TODAY, as many of you may already be aware.

What does this mean? It means MY NEW AR10 IS AT THE GUN SHOP. I checked the tracking site to make sure the gun would be in the shop tomorrow, and it’s already there!

Do you KNOW what this MEANS?

SECOND RANGE DAY IN ONE WEEK!

Small problem: I have no scope for it. But I can steal the scope from my Savage. I think 14x will suffice for 100 yards [sarcasm alert]. Or I could take the scope off my K31. It needs to be redone anyway. I think it’s a 9x, but I forget.

This is spectacular. I’m more excited about this gun than I have been about any gun I’ve bought in a long time. I wasn’t all that eager to get it. I felt like something was pushing me, and that’s the reason I bought it. Nonetheless, now I can’t wait to shoot it.

In my collection, this will be the closest thing to a serious high-end rifle. I guess the K31 would count if it were new, since it was made to extraordinarily high standards. But it’s old, and I paid something like $200 for it. The Savage is super-accurate, but it was really cheap, and it’s not fancy. Besides, how worked up can you get about a sub-MOA rifle in the same caliber as a BB?

Today I read that some people kill coyotes with .17 HMR. That surprised me. It’s such a tiny cartridge.

I’m going to change my sheets so I can sleep next to the new gun. Hopefully I’ll dream of Navin Johnson, trying to elude me in a car with no tires.

Oops. Was that racist?

Get me Some Camo Jammies

Depending on the breaks, I may be able to take my new .308 rifle to the range tomorrow. Then I begin the unbelievable process of breaking in the barrel. The manufacturer recommends cleaning the barrel after every round for the first 25 shots. Then you have to clean it after every 10 rounds until you get to a hundred. That wouldn’t be so bad if they recommended a Boresnake, but they don’t. They recommend a cleaning rod, a jag, and patches.

Here is what one of their people says on their forum:

For “break in” cleaning – you will need to use several patches of copper solvent, not just oil, to properly remove the copper fouling. Then use your regular gun oil, fire, and repeat. I do single rounds for a while, then go to 3 round group, clean, 3 round group, clean…until I am happy.

I’m not even sure I own a rifle-length cleaning rod. I think I have one in the garage. And I didn’t know what a jag was until five minutes ago. Time to visit Bass Pro, I guess.

He doesn’t say anything about a brush. How can you remove copper without a brush? Is that even possible?

I didn’t do this with my Savage. I wonder if I was supposed to. I don’t know if a normal rod will fit in a .17-caliber barrel.

Patches don’t impress me much. I know they worked great for George Washington’s army, but this is 2010. They don’t provide much friction, they hold very little stuff, and they leave junk in the barrel unless you use a pile of them. I would think a well-aimed can of Breakfree or Bore Scrubber would be much better, since it would carry the crap out of the gun instead of just smearing it around. I would be inclined to use a Boresnake, follow it with spray, and then use patches just to see if the barrel was clean. But I am no expert.

For the guns I own now, I use the following stuff: Hornady One Shot, Powder Blast, a Sonicare toothbrush, Q-tips, paper towels, and a Boresnake. Sometimes I use brake part cleaner, taking care to keep it off plastic, wood, and paint. I think I’m getting good results. I never see anything in the barrels when I sight down them.

I really like the bipod I used yesterday. It’s a Rock Mount something or other, I think. I should look at the package. The legs are nice and long, so you don’t have to be a yoga instructor to get behind the scope. I can’t understand why anyone makes rests or bipods that don’t hold the gun up where you can sight through the scope. I’m sure there is a reason, but I am not familiar with it.

I’ll want a bipod for the .308, but I don’t know what kind to get. FAB makes one that collapses into a foregrip, but a foregrip on a 10-pound rifle unsuited for close-quarters work seems silly. The bipod I have is great, but it will not attach to a rail.

Hold it. I won’t have a rail on the bottom of my new gun. I just checked. It’s a swivel. That will work.

I have a Caldwell rest, but I don’t like it. It’s very low, and it weighs a ton, and it takes up half of my shooting box. It has occurred to me that I have the technology to make a new screw for it. The big screw that supports the bag. If it were longer, the rest would be useful. But I prefer bipods. I can’t get used to the idea of shooting from a ridiculous sled type of thing; it seems like it’s one step away from clamping the rifle in a vise and walking away and firing the gun with a remote.

A bipod requires some amount of skill, and unlike a rest, it’s something you would actually find useful in the field. I know people like heavy rests for zeroing rifles, but it appears that I should be able to get sub-MOA performance with a decent bipod, and that’s good enough for me. That’s all I ever wanted. Besides, wouldn’t a giant Frankenrest move the zero anyway? I’d have to re-zero it with the bipod later.

Yesterday I noticed that the guy next to me was also shooting .17 HMR, and he was using what appeared to be a Savage in a target stock, and he had a giant sled thing that must have weighed fifty pounds. I am surprised it didn’t have a built-in seat and an end table for his beer. He was shooting about 9 MOA. Again, I am no gun expert, but here is what common sense tells me: if you shoot that badly with a rest doing all the work, you need to dump the rest, learn to shoot without it, and then try again. He is clearly doing something wrong, and the rest is probably discouraging him from trying to learn what the problem is.

Maybe he has a medical problem that makes a sled necessary to reduce recoil. I wonder.

I hope I am not going to make sled fans angry by writing this. I know there are people who shoot from those things every time they go to the range. I know a guy who shoots a .45 ACP carbine from one, so the reason is not always related to sighting in the gun. I’m sure these guys like the results, and they are not anxious to admit the machinery is doing most of the work, or that they can’t shoot without them. But these things were never intended to be crutches. Were they? Surely not. Far as I know, you’re only supposed to use them to get your rifle and scope acquainted.

From the results I got yesterday, I think I should be able to do something like .75-MOA, shooting the Savage from a bipod. I believe I should be able to put most of a 50-shot box into a group that big at 100 yards. I have to get my scope moved forward, and I have to work on my grip and my trigger pull and my breath control, but I think this is where I’m going to end up. God willing, of course. If that’s true, a complicated rest seems pointless.

It’s very satisfying, seeing it come together. I don’t get much of a thrill out of shooting all over the target, unless I’m playing around with iron sights. I love having a gun that will do exactly what I tell it to do, when I do everything right. This takes the gun out of the equation and allows me to see my own problems more clearly, and that means I learn more and shoot better. This is why I wanted the .308. If a gun will put 50 rounds into a hole the size of a quarter, it will tell me every time I make a mistake. An inaccurate gun will always make me guess. In a situation like that, I may guess wrong and make “corrections” that actually make me shoot worse.

I have one other complaint about the Savage. The cheek weld is pretty much nonexistent. Hard to believe, from a $10 plastic stock. Maybe moving the scope will fix this. If not, I think I should look for a solution. Given the cheapness of the gun and the fantastic as-is accuracy, I am not highly motivated to get a new stock. Maybe there is a product I can screw onto it.

Eye Relief Fix Should do It

Took my dad to the gun range today. Things went very well, for the most part.

Started off with my Vz 58. I intended to test the laser at 50 feet, but they have a new setup out there, and the closest distance is 25 yards. At that distance, the laser wasn’t on the paper, and I could not fix it. I decided to shoot with iron sights and no rest, just to recall how the gun shot and felt. I shot from a seated position with my elbows on the bench. This starts to hurt after not too many rounds, because the recoil pushes the skin of your elbows along the wood.

I love this gun. It must be as fine a home defense weapon as there is. The trigger is magnificent. You always know exactly when the gun will fire, and there is no staging, and it never hangs or drags. It’s like a squirt gun for bullets. I couldn’t see that well, and I wasn’t trying all that hard, but the gun still shot beautifully.

I’ll fix the laser mount and go back. The dot is clearly visible at 25 yards in bright sunlight.

I got out my Savage bolt-action rifle in .17 HMR. I have a 14x scope on it. I moved to 100 yards. I had a problem getting my bipod mounted; I got it months ago and never bothered attaching it. I tried to shoot from my tiny Caldwell rest, and it worked when I raised it all the way and put the gun on the very top of the bag, instead of in the notch. Not stable, but good enough. No rear bag. Look at this target. That’s my first ten rounds. As you can see, this gun is unquestionably capable of consistent sub-MOA shooting at 100 yards.

I had real problems with my scope. The eye relief is way off. I need to move it a good inch or more forward. It drove me nuts; the target kept floating away right when I started squeezing the trigger. It must have ruined my concentration, because the next target was horrible.

Of course, “horrible” is a relative term. This is 4-MOA shooting, which is acceptable if you’re trying to kill something within 100 yards. But it was horrible compared to the first shots I fired.

I can’t wait to move the scope and try again. Incidentally, I don’t like the Savage Accu-trigger nearly as much as the Czech trigger on the Vz 58. I don’t think I could ever enjoy an AK-47’s dunnage-grade furniture and sheet metal parts as much as I enjoy the Vz 58.

I went and joined my dad on the pistol side, and I got rid of a box of dubious .357 reloads I made. A long time ago, I put a lighter spring in my S&W 27-2, and I went shooting, and I had problems with squibs. It occurred to me that hard primers and a weak spring might be causing the failures, so today I took my S&W 686+. It fired every round, although some were extremely wimpy. I guess the recipe I used was off, but the spring was also at fault, if my experience is any guide.

Anyway, it did not shoot badly. The bigger groups were shot with the pistol uncocked. The one at lower left is the result of cocking the pistol. The one at the lower right is my SW1911, firing my sweet reloads.

Trail Glades has a rule that you can’t put more than one bullseye on a pistol target. As you can see, I have come up with a borderline-snotty response to their policy. They don’t mind, however. I think their rule is aimed at people who shoot so badly they destroy frames.

I highly recommend the Vz 58 for home defense. I don’t know how much my recommendation is worth, but the recoil is low, the magazines are big, and it’s very easy to shoot. And the stopping power sure beats a pistol. I think the Saiga-12 is even better than a Vz 58, but you have to rebuild a Saiga from the ground up before you have a weapon you can use.

Dad enjoyed shooting his Glock, although the trigger seems very stiff. I am wondering if it gets looser with wear. If not, it needs work.

Another day of freedom, here in America. I am enjoying it while it lasts.

Dough Keeps Rising

I wish I could blog everything that happened on Saturday. I can’t reveal everything, but I will tell what I can.

For weeks I’ve been working to get my prayer group to go visit Ayts Chayim Messianic Synagogue, in Boca. We finally made it on Saturday. Only five of us showed up, but it was a good start.

We were under the impression that sabbath worship would be preceded by an adult class concerning information provided by Sam Solomon, a former Muslim and professor of sharia law. He appeared at Ayts Chayim the week before and told the congregation and the rabbi a lot of disturbing things about Islamist infiltration in our government and our military.

It turned out the class was actually a discussion of people’s reactions to Mr. Solomon. You might assume people raised their hands and talked about their fear of Islamists and the need to crack down on them, but most of the comments concerned the difficulty of communicating with Muslim acquaintances the congregants wanted to introduce to Yeshua. These people were concerned less about their own security than they were with the welfare of unbelievers they knew.

This shouldn’t surprise anyone. Polls taken in Muslim countries show that a high percentage of Muslims admit hating Jews, yet polls taken in Israel do not reflect much Jewish hate for Muslims.

When we headed into the sanctuary for worship, volunteers offered my friends yarmulkes and prayer shawls. I turned them down. I’ve seen how I look in a yarmulke. Some of my friends accepted the headgear, and one even went for the shawl.

The service was excellent. This synagogue encourages demonstrative worship, much like any charismatic church, and the people were very involved. A group of women danced at the front of the room, and people were raising their hands and praising God. The music was very good. Less noisy than what we get at my church.

This day featured a double portion of the Torah. When they brought the scroll out, people touched it and showed reverence for it, and a man carried it around the sanctuary while people danced behind it. A friend asked what was going on, and I said Jews revered the Torah scroll more than we do our Bibles. I pointed out that they had had to work to preserve the Torah; for thousands of years people had been banning and burning it. I said what we were seeing was a bit like The Book of Eli. God’s word was to be preserved and revered.

When the Torah portions were read, I could not see the person doing the reading. Then someone pointed him out. I couldn’t see him because he was sitting down. He was in the front row, using a Braille Torah. The man was blind. I hadn’t known that when I mentioned The Book of Eli to my friend.

If you’ve seen the movie, you’ll understand.

Rabbi Brawer taught about the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. He went through Old and New Testament passages demonstrating that the power of the Holy Spirit had been with us since the beginning. In fact, he is mentioned in Genesis, before the passages about the creation of man.

My friend were overwhelmed by the warmth of the congregation, and so was I. And it was very moving, seeing so many Jewish believers, assembled to honor Yeshua in spite of the hatred and rejection it brought them from their own people.

I met an older gentleman–about my dad’s age–and talked to him about life as a Messianic. I told him there were three kinds of people I loved meeting. Conservative Jews, armed Jews, and Jews who believed in Yeshua. He told me he was all three. He’s an NRA member, and he carries! I love it.

One of my friends is the leader of all the volunteers at my church. The lady who introduced us to Ayts Chayim is a field worker for the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. He hit it off with both of them, and hopefully, he will develop relationships with them and help Ayts Chayim and my church bond a little. He has my pastor’s ear every day.

My father tried to make it to the class, but he got lost. That’s okay. My friend from the IFCJ showed us a disk containing Mr. Solomon’s lecture. We are planning to meet with her so we can hear it. That will give my father another excuse to join us.

We can’t get a copy. The material is not for public consumption. I’m thinking we should ask to be allowed to use my church’s cafe. That way, more of us could hear it, my dad would not have to drive so far, I would be able to cook, and my dad and my friend would get to visit my church.

That’s part of the story. I can’t get into the rest. Other things are breaking loose in my life, but this is not the time to disclose them.

On Saturday, I helped the cafe people make food for a weekly event called “Rhythms Lounge.” It’s mostly kids. People from church perform. They play music and recite poetry and so on. It’s very good. They asked if I could show up and teach people to make pizza. No problem!

When I got there, I found my three new assistants waiting. They’re all chefs! They’re graduates from Le Cordon Bleu, and they work in the big hotels on the Beach. Can you believe that? I learned how to cook, standing in front of a $300 stove in my housecoat, and I was showing these highly trained women what to do. Talk about favor.

It was pretty funny. The way I make dough is very unorthodox, and if you believe the pizza nerds on the Internet, it shouldn’t work. But the chefs wanted to see how I did it, and they were very impressed with the food. As I noted earlier, they said it was as good as Brooklyn’s best. That felt great.

I used to sweat and slave in the cafe, but more and more, I’m managing. I stand behind people and give tips as they work. It’s fantastic.

Of course, in the future, these women will be contributing their own material. That will be a huge blessing. And they know how to do institutional cooking. They volunteered to organize the kitchen. I can’t wait to see that.

They gave me a couple of useful tips. From now on, when I make cheesecake, I plan to line my springform pans with crust, from top to bottom, to hold the berry mess in. And they showed me I could keep pans from sliding around when I roll out dough, by putting damp paper towels under them. They also suggested I refrigerate unused dough. It works okay, but the rolls aren’t quite as good as fresh ones. Worth doing, anyway.

I’m planning to do a cobbler as soon as I can. Cobbler and vanilla ice cream. If we can figure out a way to handle ice cream. I suppose we could carve out portions and put them in the freezer and bring them out and add cobbler as people place orders. I also want to do hot cinnamon rolls with ice cream.

As volunteers, we are told to “reproduce ourselves.” That makes sense. Christianity is the same way. You accept Jesus, you make progress, and then you help others accept him. I haven’t been able to do much to reproduce myself as a cook, but God has handed me six helpers, so it worked out anyway.

In other news, I ordered a scope for my LR-308. On advice from reader Blindshooter and fellow blogger Jim from Smoke on the Water, I went with the Leupold VX-3 in 6.5-20x50mm. It may be ten years before I try 20x, but it will be there when I’m ready. One of my church buddies wants to shoot it with me.

Now you are all caught up on my life. I’ll be back if anything new happens.

Snow Shovel Required

One nice thing about making croissants is that it makes me realize how easy and simple it is to make other baked goods.

I just slapped a batch of dough together. It left a crust of dough bits all over the stove top (my rolling surface), and of course, I made some mistakes and got flour into places where it should not have gone. But I managed to get the dough made and folded and stored in the fridge in foil, and the cleanup wasn’t all that bad.

I’d say it takes about half an hour of work to get croissant dough to the point where it’s ready for it’s pre-baking rest. But that’s only if you have butter frozen and flour chilled. You have to use cold flour and frozen butter. I make it worse by burning some of the butter and refreezing it, for flavor.

It seems to pay off. I ate some of the dough (for the children, mind you, not just wanton gluttony), and if the croissants are anything like as good as the dough, I am in for some fine eating.

I’m going to work on cinnamon rolls after lunch. I had the most hideous idea, I’m almost afraid to share it. What if I make cinnamon rolls using CROISSANT DOUGH? It should be illegal to do that. It’s terrifying. Imagine how good that must be. Then you dump a hot croissant in a bowl with some vanilla ice cream and extra cinnamon sauce. Oh, man! You know that has to be good.

I may buy a dozen bagels for insurance. I haven’t made croissants in four years, so I don’t know what’s going to happen. I give myself credit: I know how to write a recipe so an idiot can follow it. I think I’ll be okay.

I’m using GFS Primo Gusto flour. I assume there is some kind of official Vichy-approved croissant flour out there somewhere, but I Googled around, and it seemed like bread flour was the norm. I have gotten wonderful results with Primo Gusto, so I figured I’d give it a shot. And I just happened to have several bags in the freezer, which gave me a head start.

It’s incredible how things have turned out today. Originally, it looked like four guys from my church would show up at the Messianic synagogue, more or less to pay our respects. Then I got a call from my contact. She said that last week, Islamic scholar Sam Solomon spoke there. Mind-blowing information about terrorism and Islamist infiltration. He used to be a Muslim, but he’s a Christian now, and he is helping Westerners wake up and prepare. There will be a class before the service tomorrow, and it will be based on information provided by Mr. Solomon. And we’re invited to the class.

Now it looks like we may have six or eight guys, including some armorbearers. The security angle makes it a natural fit. Should be fascinating. And we can help the folks at the synagogue with their questions on firearms and security. This is wild. Any time you help Jews provide for their self-defense, you have accomplished something worthwhile.

Thanks to political correctness, Muslim nutcases have infiltrated our military; they have already murdered a number of our troops. From what I gather from today’s conversation, the situation is much worse than we know. Unfortunately, I may not be able to pass all the new information on via this blog.

Are tea partiers and conservative Christians crazy to be stocking up on guns and ammunition? Maybe it’s an overreaction, but depending on what the Islamists have prepared for us and how badly our defenses have been compromised, maybe gun nuts are on the right track.

Hope not. I hope that in my case it turns out to be a harmless hobby I can enjoy until I drop dead at 95 from eating too many croissants.

Glass Shopping

Still thinking about optics. Reader Blindshooter recommended a Leupold VX-3 scope with a 50mm objective, in 6.5×20 power. It’s confusing because it comes in various versions, including tactical and varmint/target.

I can’t use the new gun unless I have a scope when it arrives. I suppose I could borrow a scope from one of my other guns.

With all the ammunition and crap I’ve ordered recently, I’m surprised Janet Napolitano hasn’t friended me on Facebook.

Ought to be a man and get a gun safe while they’re on sale.

Tears in his Eyes, I Guess

I keep waking up full of energy, ready to attack the day.

This is not normal.

I have always hated getting up in the morning. For that matter, I have never been a big fan of going to bed. When I was in college, my friends used to bang on my door with their fists at noon, trying to get me up so I could have lunch with them at Happy Burger, over on Broadway.

Great burgers, by the way.

To get back to mornings, for most of my life, I have regarded getting up as a great evil, to be avoided at all costs. I used to get up and literally stumble around, trying to get it together. I would do stupid things like putting the cereal in the refrigerator and the milk in the cupboard. It was pretty awful.

For a long time, I’ve used coffee to reset my morning clock. I would get up and have a quart of coffee to get the wheels turning. It worked pretty well, although it tended to make me a little crabby later on. Which I sort of enjoyed. Okay, not really.

A while back, I started getting the idea that God wanted me to give up coffee. It started keeping me awake at night, which was new. I would drink coffee to get up and take antihistamine to get to sleep. I began to feel as though it was time to let the caffeine go.

This was alarming. I have nearly given up artificial sweeteners, I can’t drink sugary soda all day, fruit juice is just as sugary as soda, and tea gives me kidneystones. Without coffee, I would be lost. What would I drink? A Christian can’t swill beer all day. Not unless he’s a monk. Then it’s okay. Ha ha. Religious humor.

I gave up real coffee, switching to decaf. If there is a difference in the taste, I can’t tell. I thought I would miss the caffeine rush, but that hasn’t happened. I get up every morning and have a quart of unleaded, I enjoy it, and I don’t get crabby. No crabbier than I was to start with.

I thought I would be unable to move until noon, but that hasn’t panned out. I wake up, I spend an hour or so in prayer, and I get out of bed anxious to get stuff done and experience the day. That is just plain weird. Like a mental illness. I don’t understand it. But it’s wonderful.

I had to have coffee to go with breakfast. My breakfast is pathetic. I eat a small amount of oatmeal with salt and sugar or maple syrup. I have to have something else with it, or I would go insane. Now I eat my oatmeal and enjoy my decaf, and I don’t miss country ham and hot biscuits and gravy. All that much.

I’ll tell you something funny. When you fast regularly, no matter what you eat for breakfast, your first meal of the day will seem like a banquet. You will wake up every morning and think, “Thank GOD I don’t have to drink water all day today.” I enjoy my crappy oatmeal and fake coffee a great deal.

We have spirits that hinder us and sap our energy and waste our time and discourage us. I think mine are getting pounded these days. I feel full of optimism, and I am receiving what Christians refer to as “favor,” which means things are going well even when I’m not paying attention.

I’ll give an example. I kept thinking about buying an AR10. But they cost a lot of money. Although I knew Gunbroker was hopeless, I looked at the ads. One day a gun I liked popped up for a hundred dollars below cost. If you order one from the factory, it takes months, because Obama is the savior of the gun industry and he has increased demand beyond manufacturers’ wildest hopes. Still, I got it for very little.

Let’s see. Here is another one. I designed a Cafepress T-shirt and ordered one for myself. When it came, it seemed to have some kind of goo on the front. I called and complained. They said they would send me a new one, but they said the old one might be okay after I washed it. So I washed it, and it came out fine, and I get to keep the first one. So I have two shirts.

I already wrote the story about my ticket to the National Day of Prayer.

Now my church’s cafe is going nuts. I have been frustrated because of the lack of a beverage fountain, and since I started making cheesecake, I have been thinking about the need for stuff that will allow us to sell cold food. I went to church yesterday, and there was a beautiful new Pepsi fountain at the cafe! It was there on Sunday, but I didn’t notice. And the pastor who runs the cafe started telling me about all the new stuff they were getting, so people would be able to buy cold things like desserts! I never told him we needed that. Never mentioned it, as far as I know.

Psalm 127 says, “It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows, for so he giveth his beloved sleep.” That last bit can also be translated, “He blesses his beloved even when they sleep.” It appears to be true.

Christians consistently overrate hard work. We want to feel like we’re showing our gratitude by working hard, but in reality, it’s a form of pride. We’re supposed to be given things we do not deserve, and we are supposed to glorify God for it. Sure, we work, but it’s not supposed to be utter drudgery. After all, Jesus said his yoke was easy and his burden was light. Your main obligations are to have faith and obey, not to do the heavy lifting. After all, Moses didn’t have to part the Red Sea with a bucket.

It can be very comforting to let yourself suffer and sweat, because it makes you feel like a martyr, and deep in your heart, you may start thinking you deserve the things you get from God. But it’s pride. There is nothing righteous about it. Adam didn’t deserve the trees in the garden. The Hebrews didn’t deserve manna or the Promised Land. We don’t deserve the Holy Spirit or the many blessings we get from God. We are welfare cases. Best to accept it. The suffering that is necessary is sufficient. We don’t have to add to it. That’s what I think.

And much of the work we do for God doesn’t feel like work, so it’s wrong to glorify yourself for doing it.

By the way, the rifle arrived faster than I thought I would. I posted a Youtube of me getting it ready to use. Check it out.

*Exhale*

Some gun on an auction site went so low on a new .308 rifle, I went insane and bought it. I had no choice. It was unfair, really. He wanted over a hundred dollars less than my dealer’s cost.

Now, what kind of optics do I need? I plan to use this thing at the range for now, at 100 yards, but I would like a scope that would work later with a .260 barrel and long distances. Just once in my life, I would like to shoot something a thousand yards away.

I have the nuttiest feeling that God has been pushing me to get an AR10. I’m not really that excited about it. I can take it or leave it (or at least I could, until the price collapsed). It’s not like the .38 Super or the SW1911, which made me drool for weeks. Very strange.

Now Janet Napolitano’s goons will be putting a notation on my file. “Thinks God tells him to buy sniper rifles.”

I have no desire to drive around in a van shooting people. Honest. But I might get an urge to make a few prairie dogs pop like water balloons.