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I am a fan of John Moses Browning.
I own several of his creations and a couple he gets undeserved credit for.
Fine guns, nothing wrong with them.
Well...
Except for that whole obsolescent thing.
Dude's been dead for 96 years.
His last designs weren't much of his by the time they hit market and Saive's been dead for 52 years and he'd been retired for 16 years before that.
But we're getting to the point where "I'm not driving no infernal combustion engine Robert Fulton's good enough for me!" proportions.
Don't get them started on double or triple expansion engines let along them new fangled turbines.
And when you say you don't like these new guns, and are sticking to Browning, these new guns ARE Brownings!
Except for materials they work just like Saive's improvement to the tilting barrel premiered on the Grand Puissance.
I love my Hi Power, but I'm packing a souless plastic pal who's fun to be with.
Improved materials, lighter weight, more capacity, smaller package, more resistant to corrosion and lint.
There's just no down side.
Then when you add in that Gunwriters® have to run thousand round torture tests to distinguish between models and that so many are passing the excessive torments...
Yeah.
Now that the rant is done. Don't comment without saying "rutabaga" to prove you got this far.
I've carried 1911's in two calibers (.45 and .38 Super).
I've pocketed a 1908 Pocket Hammerless in .380.
I've toted an FN Hi-Power a time or two.
They do the job. They did the job.
They did it as well as any gun I've ever carried because I've never, once, had to draw or fire in self defense.
Nothing about new guns being a vast improvement in many objective ways makes the old JMB guns no longer work!
Nothing about new 9mm hollow point technology makes a .45 ACP ball round make smaller holes.
These old guns still work. Note my carrying a S&W 59 for a while: I was testing that they still work.
The take-away isn't that the old, proven, designs no longer work; it's to not close your mind and to be open to changes which make your experience better. But not too open or you will end up being a jaded Gunwriter® who no longer derives any joy from shooting.
WTF is rutabaga?!?!?
ReplyDeleteEven here in West Oz, where many Americans wrongly believe that guns are totally banned, I own both 1911-style and Glock pistols.
I have shot both types in various competitive formats, and find that, for me, the Glock grip angle just doesn't work as well as that on the 1911s.
That may well be due to round count differences, as I have fired multiple times as many .45ACP, .40S&W, and .38Super rounds from Colt, AMT, Para-Ordnance, and STI pistols as I have fired 9mm and .40S&W rounds from Glocks. With the muscle memory associated with so many draw strokes, the 1911 sights are just "there" when I am ready to fire, while I spend a little time finding those of the Glocks.
TLDR: I find that new is not necessarily better or worse, just different.
Rutabega.
ReplyDeleteNothing about the technology to improve the 9mm round that can't be applied to the .45ACP to make ACP even better.
Same tech can be applied to .32ACP, all the transition (from BP to smokeless) calibers and even the diminuitive .25ACP (which has killed quite a few people even though it is underpowered and undersized according to all the gun writers.)
Same with, as you said, all the materials behind JMB's designs and improved designs.
They work. That is the true test of a gun. Does it work nigh unto 100% of the time for the conditions it was designed for? Those conditions include range, climate, what carry the gun was designed for, etc.
Now I have a thing for Americanized Croatian designs. I like the Springfield XD in Satan's caliber (the .40S&W) as the guns fit my hands intuitively, I have no problem holding on, getting a sight picture and all of that.
Would not turn away a free JMB design. Even in .25ACP. Though the BAR in .30-06, with the tax stamp, sounds like a helluva weapon, and too bad they never pursued modifying it into a side or top feeding gun with more ammo in the mag.
Rutabega
Actually, the improvements to 9x19mm can't be applied to .45 ACP because it's moving too slow. It's left us in a place where JHP .45 and JHP 9mm are making the same wound channels.
Delete.32 ACP, while going fast enough, is too small to get the expansion to the same ratio.
It's some interesting reading. Especially with all the trade secrets and dancing around the "how we did it" when they're DYING to explain how.
Rutabaga. Myself, I'm of the opinion that if it works well for you, that's fine with me. I have no desire to convert everybody to the One True Sidearm. Some people like revolvers. Others prefer semi-automatics. Some people like one caliber, others like others. As long as you can reliably hit what you shoot at and the machine works, it's cool with me.
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