Yesterday, I took my friend and fellow guitar player to the range for his first time. He’s never handled a gun in his life. After about a half hour at the house here going over the basics of firearm safety, we drove to the range. We started off with pistols – a Sig Sauer P6 and a RIA 1911A1 – in a closely supervised environment. It became quickly apparent that my friend would be a safe and conscientious firearms user. He remembered the basic safety rules and obeyed them to a T. I was very impressed.
So, after we shot pistols for a while we moved on to long guns. We started with an old Winchester Model 195 .22LR that I inherited from my dad. He enjoyed that, then moved on to a Mossberg 500A 12ga that I also got from my dad. After the first shot, I believe his response to the recoil was “Holy shit!” We were using light target loads, but even they have a lot more oomph to them than .22lr (doesn’t everything?)
The high-power rifle category was fielded by an AR15 comprised of a CMMG lower and an Addax Tactical GPU (Gas Piston Upper). He really enjoyed the AR as it performed swimmingly. I can’t stress enough how nice the Addax GPU is. 100% function, 100% reliability. It’s an awesome setup and I have to thank the guys at Addax for hooking me up with a great upper.
As a final bonus, I brought along an H&K G36k for my friend to try. This is a legally-registered Post-86 dealer sample gun registered to my company. He tried it on semi-auto, then on full auto with only 3 rounds in the mag, followed by a 5 round mag. As it was his first time out, I wanted him to get the feel for the muzzle rise before giving him a full 30-round magazine. Before long, he was burst firing with the best of them.
By the end of the day, we both had sore shoulders – thanks to the Mossberg – and smiles on our faces. It was a really great time and was made all the more worthwhile when my friend said afterwards, “Man, now I’ve got the bug!” It’s always nice to introduce a new shooter to the sport. Hopefully we’ll see him again.
Just got the gallery working again. Also, updated the theme for the main site. Site navigation is now achieved thru the ribbon just below the main banner picture above. There are a series of dropdown menus that you can use to go from link to link. Thanks for looking!
Hi, everyone. Just wanted to make a note that the gallery is currently a little messed up, so it’s not displaying pictures correctly. I’ll be working on that shortly in order to get it fixed again.
Another year down. Another decade down. Hard to imagine, eh? Time’s not going by any slower, that’s for sure. Anyhoo, it’s been a great year here. Had a lot of fun running Southern Michigan Arms. Met a lot of cool folks this year and had a lot of neat guns through the shop. Looking forward to another happy, productive year of collecting and enjoying old guns.
Anyway, just wanted to post a quick note wishing you all a Merry Christmas (belatedly, of course) and a safe and happy New Year. Best wishes, all!
Well, guys, I found out recently that a moderator (the admin staff, and thereby a representative of the site itself) on a prominent gun forum has been stealing photos and posting them where ever he pleases without even so much as asking permission if he could do so. In fact, when he’s politely asked to remove the pictures, he blows up and starts berating the owner of the photos; making up all sorts of wild (and false) claims in the process.
I wish I was writing this from the third person, but in fact I’m not. I am one (of several) of those from whom this moderator has been stealing photos. When I politely asked him to either remove it or simply give credit where it was due, he took it personally and began making any number of false accusations against me. He then threatened me five separate times to delete any of my posts that he deemed in appropriate while in the same breath saying that he is 100% against censorship of any kind. The term oxymoron comes to mind… well, at least the moron part.
So, it is with great sadness that I had to remove the link to that website from my links list.
Additionally, that’s why you’ll notice a big, annoying watermark on most of my photos. This is temporary, I promise. The watermark will be replaced shortly with a smaller, less-annoying watermark. That way, when that moderator decides to steal my photographs again, at least I’ll get some credit for them.
Hi, everyone. Took the MG34 to the range yesterday. Went well. Had a few issues and I broke a firing pin, but otherwise it ran pretty well. Cleaning that thing is a cast-iron bitch though. A half hour of shooting and 4 hours of cleaning. Oi!
Anyway, it was a great time with that, a byf43 K98k, and an MP5/40. Hope you enjoy the video!
Hi, everyone. This is just a quick update to keep all three or four of you GotR faithful up to speed. I have decided to feature the G98/40 bolt-action rifle for part VI of the series German Small Arms of WWII. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a really neat, somewhat hard-to-find German bolt gun built in Hungary adapted from an earlier Hungarian design. Not sure how long this installment will be because there’s just not much info out there about that particular rifle. I hope to have it posted within a few weeks. People keep suggesting I just put this all together and publish it in book format. I’m exploring that option, but it’s up in the air right now.
Some other, semi-related stuff: I will be receiving my freshly-overhauled MG34 back from Ohio Ordnance Works in a couple weeks. The bill is a little more than I’d hoped, but I know when I get it it’ll be running 100%, so it’s worth it for the peace of mind alone. I’ve also got an MG42 inbound, but there’s no telling when the NFA will process that one. Hopefully it’ll be fairly quick, of course. In the meantime, I’m just stocking up on ammo and spare 8mm parts.
Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. Happy Holidays!
I just uploaded another essay on German small arms of WWII. This one examines the MP43/1 in detail. Click here, or follow the links on the right. Hope you enjoy.
Hi, everyone. It’s been a long time with no updates. Sorry about that. It’s been one hell of a busy summer and I haven’t had much chance to get around to writing gun essays. Now that the summer has wound down, I’m going to try to bang out a few in rapid succession.
In other news, I got the chance recently to shoot a full-auto PPSh-41 submachine gun. It is hands down the fastest-firing machine gun I’ve ever handled and it rips through a 71-round drum mag like nothing. We brought a video camera to the range, so here are a few videos. (They’re also up on the videos page as well.)
Hi everyone. I hope you’re enjoying the series of articles I’m posting about German small arms of WWII. I’ve just added Part IV of the series detailing the Gewehr 41 rifle. Check it out by clicking the link on the left. You can also see that rifle in action at the videos page. Thanks for stopping by!
As a final bonus, I brought along an H&K G36k for my friend to try. This is a legally-registered Post-86 dealer sample gun registered to my company. He tried it on semi-auto, then on full auto with only 3 rounds in the mag, followed by a 5 round mag. As it was his first time out, I wanted him to get the feel for the muzzle rise before giving him a full 30-round magazine. Before long, he was burst firing with the best of them.