Ch...ch...ch...changes

I put my lower on The Lovely Harvey's upper and shortened the stock two clicks (A1 stock length) and she decided she liked it better than the A2 stock that she had on the gun.

Marv, who is having reliability issues we think stem from using a rifle gas system on a carbine stock, swapped us stocks.

Result:

Now it REALLY looks like one of the CARs from Platoon.

I Just Can't Seem To Leave Well Enough Alone

None of these rifles have the same upper receiver they were delivered with. The carbine in the center has the upper that was delivered on the carbine on the bottom. The carbine on the bottom has the upper that was delivered with the rifle, on top. The rifle has the upper that was delivered with the carbine in the center. At one time, the rifle has worn all three, delivered with a flat-top, swapped for the C7 and swapped again for the A2.

There's a reason for all of this. I wanted optics on my carbine, bottom, and the C7 upper is not conducive to that end. So I needed a flat-top. I've wanted a 20" for a while, so I ordered that kit with a flat-top and then swapped the uppers when the rifle kit arrived. Last night I was showing The Lovely Harvey that I had installed an A2 aperture into the C7 handle and she expressed a preference for the simpler rear sight. So off comes the A2 upper on her carbine, middle, and on goes the C7; leaving the 20" with an A2 rear and looking very much like an M16A2 now.

The Lovely Harvey's now has a strong resemblance to the CARs used by Tom Berenger and Willem Dafoe in Platoon, and she thinks that's really cool!

We Don't Have A Fireplace

So we've hung up The Lovely Harvey's Grampa's shotgun over the closet

Looks good up there, doesn't it?

Need A Pig Stuck

Guns with bayonets! From left to right, SMLE #1 Mk.3; Mosin-Nagant M1891/30; Remington M-1903A3; Mosin-Nagant Kb wz M48; Laconic VKb.07.

We're ready to be out of bullets!

KISS Rifle And Tactical Carbine

Ordered a 20" flat-top kit last Thursday. While waiting for it to ship I decided that I wanted the carbine to be a flat-top.
Today the parts arrived and I swapped the upper receivers between them.

The 20" is now a clone of a Canadian C7. The C7 is basically an M16A2 with the M16A1 rear sight and fire control, full auto instead of three round burst.

There was a little drama when I sent the front take-down detent sailing across the room. I had to run down to Kastle Keep Firearms in Clearwater to get a whole new lower parts kit just for one little detent.

As always I used Del-Ton for the kits and Anvil Arms for the lowers.

The XM177E3 carbine is now a flat-top and sports a Knight's 600m back-up iron sight and an EoTech 552.A65/1 reflex sight.

Here's the view through the EoTech

A Man's Gun

For the paltry sum of $500 I have finally acquired a surplus AMERICAN rifle!

This is my first US military rifle and my first .30-06.

She's a gorgeous Remington M1903A3 made in February 1942. About 80% condition, has the original metal oiler in the stock too. There was some minor surface rust on the butt plate and in several places under the wood. It cleaned up very well.

The pic doesn't do her justice.

Update: I have been talking to the family of the previous owner. This was the gun he was issued in the Marines. He was what we call a designated marksman today, his brother says, "sharpshooter." What that means is when the rest of his unit got M1 Garands, he kept this gun. He carried it on across the whole of the island hopping campaign. What makes this gun interesting is a sharpshooter would have been aiming for specific targets and not just firing with the rounds addressed "to whom it may concern". In all likelihood this gun killed. His brother thinks so. This is the first gun I have bought where I have a strong confidence that it was used.

My SMLE #1 Mk3 was made in 1917 with an Indian pattern stock, it might have seen trench time. The Mosin-Nagant 1891/30 was made in 1942, I don't think the Soviets held guns back. In the case of those two guns, I have not spoken to the people who knew the man who held them in combat.

An Absolutely Essential Read For Any Political Season

Read it, learn it, live it!

Sixty Years Ago

Perhaps things weren't so bad back when...

An Excellent Suggestion

Read, enjoy.

$425,000 per capita!  I think I could have relocated and gotten established in style for that kind of scratch.

Just So You Can Start Saving Now

I'm going to need one each of everything pictured here.  If everyone compares notes, I'll bet we can have all the parts gathered for the Biscayne by Christmas!

Image From Modred

I held my breath as I took up the slack in the old German AT rifle. BOOM! Quickly I half rolled to the telescope I had set up near the gun. It always struck me as odd how long it took for the bullet to fly at ranges like this. I could see my target more clearly now, magnified through the scope. The image was one of heartbreaking beauty. When you saw them, you wanted to obey their whim, to give your self to Him.

The beauty was spoiled by the impact of the heavy 13mm slug in its forehead. Another thing that I had not gotten used to was how it took a hardened steel core bullet as big as your thumb to do as much damage to one of those things as a .22 would do to a person.

Some people called them angels. They were the essence of beauty, almost seven feet tall, gigantic swan-like wings sprouting from the alabaster skin of their backs. Most descriptions lay it on pretty thick, it's almost impossible to overstate how gorgeous they are. Two things make them dangerous; one, they are tough; two they exude an aura that makes you wish to be on their side, to follow their orders in the hopes that you will be allowed to remain in their presence. They aren't angels, they came through the same rift the Nazis made in Nuremburg as the other demons.

I dialed back the magnification on the telescope slighty to get a better view of the area surround the body. Uh, oh! I see another "angel" bending over the fallen form. I can see it is attempting to cast some sort of healing spell, but there's no effect, I had succeeded. But now I have to get out of here without getting caught, and there was another angel less than a mile from me, and alerted by the death of its comrade, would have bullet deflecting spells in place when it started to hunt, and it would not hunt alone like I do...

HELP! DEAR GODS PLEASE HELP WITH A SONG VIRUS!

It's an upbeat late eighties early nineties song.

The main thing I remember is in the middle it has a british guy discussing music, then it cuts suddenly back to the song.

HELPS!

Update: 11/21/14...

It's "Rush" by Big Audio Dynamite.

If You Cannot Laugh At Yourself What Can You Laugh At

Lyrics Corner Mad Max Edition

One of the Living

Tina Turner

In the desert sun every step that you take could be the final one
In the burning heat hanging on the edge of destruction
You can't stop the pain of your children crying out in your head
They always said that the living would envy the dead

So now you're gonna shoot bullets of fire
Don't wanna fight but sometimes you've got to
You're some soul survivor
There's just one thing you've got to know
You've got ten more thousand miles to go

Because you're one of the living
And if we can't stick together
One of the living
Who's gonna make it tonight

Walk tall, cool, collected and savage
Walk tall, bruised, sensual, ravaged
It's every man for himself, every woman, every child
A new breed, ferocious and wild

And all they want to do is shoot bullets of fire
They wanna fight and sometimes you've got to
You're some soul survivor
There's just one thing you've got to know
You've got ten more thousand years to go

Because you're one of the living
And if we can't stick together
One of the living
Who's gonna make it tonight

White Guilt

I finally connected why this bothers me.

Inherited slavery is WRONG! Because the debt that landed the father in slavery should not be transferred to the son. That assumes that the father was justly enslaved (not as far fetched as it first appears, think about it).

Blacks from Africa, for the most part, were enslaved for losing some local war. Enslavement was part of losing these things. Often the slave's children were raised as part of the conquering tribe, thus not slaves. When they got here though, their kids became slaves, and their kids, and their kids ad nauseum. That's how chattel slavery works.

If chattel slavery is wrong because the children who have done nothing to deserve being enslaved then blaming me for the oppression of blacks when I have never owned a slave is also wrong; regardless of whether gramps owned thousands. And while "freeing the slaves" was not why the Union government fought the war, it WAS the recruiting slogan that got many to join and fight. The debt to the slaves was paid in blood, by white men mostly. I guess if you don't consider that enough we can put you back into chains because I certainly don't wanna pay as much as the people who freed your ancestor paid.

It's even more galling to me that the descendants of slaves, who have never been slaves themselves, demand that I, who have never owned a slave, pay for the crimes of my forebears against their forebears. Never mind that my forebears didn't get here until 1873 on my Dad's side and 1924 on my Mom's. Wasn't there, didn't do it are positive defenses!

I have some of the same issues with the fixes being as bad as the original wrong with the wealth that was stolen from WW2 Jews. The people who own it now are very unlikely to be the person who stole it. The heirs of the original owner are demanding that the current possessor fork it over regardless of how it came into their possession. I am sorry the thieves got away with your stuff, but they paid in blood for the theft (remember that whole WW2 thing?). Want us to put Nazi Germany back so you can go through their courts? Any takers? Anyone?

The war crimes trials in Israel are another thing that bugs me. Isreal did not exist until 1947. That nation trying nazis for crimes committed in 1939-1945 seems ex post factum to me. Prior to 1947 it was impossible to break Israeli law because Israel did not exist. The war criminals also did not break Nazi German laws when they committed their "crimes". I do not think they should have gone unpunished for their deeds, just that the wrong government entity was doing the trial.