Scott Carnahan’s Tac-Optics ELS rig. “Um, excuse me, could anyone direct me to Helmand Province?”

Scott’s same belt, only rigged up for the Occupy Central Missouri rally.

My thoughts? Best thing to hit holsters since kydex. Especially for those of us who serve as Gear Monkeys for two or more people (“Hey Brian, I think I’d like to shoot Production at tomorrow’s match, then Single Stack down in Vegas on Sunday. And don’t forget Ironman is coming up”. You know who you are. /rant.) Also, pretty much all Kydex/injection molded (and there is a difference between the two) gear either will fit or can be made to fit on an ELS fork.

The only thing I don’t like about ELS is that ordering it can be a little confusing. For example, you want to have one belt and a bunch of receiver plated to use for everything. No big deal. But safariland standard holsters won’t fit an ELS fork, so you need a QLS fork and receiver on the rig. But you want to use a race holster like an 013 or CRspeed for Open Division. Those holsters fit an ELS fork. Solution? Blade-Tech holsters will fit an ELS fork. But when you’re ordering and you’ve got several Blade-Tech holsters (one for production, limited, single-stack, whatever) and a bunch of other Safariland holsters, you’ve got to keep track of them and make sure you get enough forks.

Also, as I mentioned in an earlier post, nobody ever has any ELS compatible .308 mag pouches in stock!

I ordered a few sheets of Kydex as well as some other supplies from KnifeKits.com. Their prices are decent and from what I’ve heard, they’re quick to ship too. We’ll see!

Checking YouTube I found Kydex holster maker PhillyEDC and watched his 2-part DIY holster vid. He put a little more effort into his holster than I would for my mag pouches (I won’t fuss with belt loops, just bolt on an ELS fork). I might hydroprint on a carbon fiber pattern when it’s done, or leave it black to match my other ELS gear.

An F-22 Raptor opens it’s weapons bay. At the Thunder Over Utah airshow, St. George Municipal Airport, 3/18/12

Stages

Adam Mann and Charlie Wotkyns designed the stages for this match, and they did a great job. They were some of the most fun stages we’ve had at the club. We had an all-steel stage (“Scholtzen Steel”), a stage where we put up basically all of our moving targets (“Frankenstein”), a run-n-gun hoser stage (“The Walking Dead”), an El Presidente drill, a scenario based shoot (“Maverick Madness”, where you supposedly have to fight off a gang that invades a c-store), and  a stage where you had to work your way around a crapload of walls and through ports (Man the Barricades).

Impromptu Match-Directing

Normally my Dad acts as the match director and stats guy. However as he was terribly sick the day before, and didn’t expect to shoot, he gave me the rundown on the scoring system (Ios devices loaded with PractiScore) and sent me off.

I had to build the stages on the device when I got there (Adam and Charlie hadn’t written up any stage diagrams), then transfer them to all the other devices (there were three squads). All this went fairly smoothly although I missed a few things in the stages (disappearing targets, wrong target count, etc.) that caused confusion among the other squads, so I had to run back and forth the correct them. Not that big a deal but it did delay my squad from starting it’s first stage.

Stage issues

I took the squad where we start all of the new competitors (I had given them a class the previous night). I accidentally had us start on “Frankenstein”, where their unfamiliarity with some of our gimmicky targets caused a few reshoots (combined with un-calibrated steel). We took a good hour to finish that stage, but after that everything ran smooth.

My Performance

Even though I won the match, I could have done much better. I was fortunate that due to taping targets before they were scored I had a reshoot on “Frankenstein”, because I was rushed into shooting it after dealing with scoring issues on the other squads. I did well on the reshoot, 16.96 with no penalties. The next fastest was Adam Mann at 20.43.

“Frankenstein”. Look at all that crazy crap!

After about an hour on that stage we moved to “National Command Authority”. Basically an El Prez drill with two strings, one started facing uprange and one facing downrange. I screwed up my reload on string one, which knocked me down to third on that stage.

Next up, The Walking Dead. The new competitor squad got a real kick out of this stage, because they got to shoot fast. On the run. Around/over obstacles. I did pretty well but had a miss on the first array. Had trigger freeze while I was running by and I didn’t want to take an extra second to run back. Still, I finished the stage with a smile on my face! Even with the miss, I managed to pull out second place. I guess I was fast!

The next stage, the scenario shoot, was a load of fun, especially for an 18-round stage.

“Maverick Madness” has the shooter start off holding a pair of milk jugs in either hand. At the signal, put the jugs on the table behind you (must stay upright or 10 point penalty) and engage all targets from within the shooting area. Nine targets, all obscured behind a sea of no-shoot targets.

Being the gamer that I am, I started holding both the jug handles in my left hand, with my right hand loosely holding the body of one jug. On the start signal I drew with my strong hand, put the jugs down with my weak hand while shooting the first two targets one-handed. It worked, I had the fastest time in the whole match on that stage. Unfortunately one of the jugs tipped over when I put it down, so I got the 10 point penalty, putting me back in third.

Next stage, “Man the Barricades” was fairly straightforward, start behind a barricade, shoot three targets, head up and shoot some long-ish shots through a port, four hoser targets after that, then a big lean around a wall to pop the last four paper. I won this stage because I didn’t actually screw anything up. No misses, procedurals, dropped mags, etc. And I was fast.

Our last stage, “Scholtzen Steel” (the name of a steel supplier here in St. George), was a great stage to end on. All steel, 20 rounds. 15 Pepper poppers and a Texas Star. I won this stage, no penalties in 11.45 seconds. That was a very fast run for Limited division. I had a bit of an equipment advantage in that I have a Rescomp 21 round magazine, while most Limited division magazines only hold 20. With one in the chamber, there’s only room for one makeup shot or else you have to reload on the clock. I didn’t need it though, I only took one extra shot at a popper, and went one-for-one on the star.

The Guns

While my guns may look like something out of the Tombstone, on the inside, they’re quite different. It’s almost impossible to find a gun at a SASS match that hasn’t had some sort of action work done on it. That’s because, like USPSA, Cowboy Action Shooting is about speed. At the top levels, long lever-stroke or a heavy mainspring could mean the difference between first and third place. Not to mention it’s just more fun to shoot a slicker gun since the stock ones (lever-guns especially) are kind of a pain to use.

Part I: Revolvers

When it comes to choosing revolvers, I had basically two choices: Colt-style or Ruger:

Colt-style “Smoke Wagon” from Taylor’s & Company

Ruger New Vaquero

Looking at the two, It’s awful hard to tell the difference. But inside, they’re two completely different animals. Pretty much everyone can guess that the Colt came first (in 1873). Their only fault was that the firing pin (part of the hammer) had to rest on a chamber. If that chamber happened to be loaded, and the hammer happened to be jostled (from working on a horse, mostly), you might just find yourself with a bad case of the “Cowboy limp”. So the “Six-Shooter” became a “Five-Shooter”.

The Ruger “Blackhawk” came about because of the popularity of TV westerns in the 1950′s, when Colt hadn’t been making any 1873s (They had discontinued them prior to WWII). The Vaquero model was introduced in the ’70s, as a more traditional-looking iteration of the Blackhawk.

The main difference between the Ruger and the Colt is that Ruger incorporated a “Transfer-Bar” system into their sixguns. The hammer on the Ruger is notched out, the firing pin is in the frame, and a transfer bar hinges on the trigger. When the hammer is down it doesn’t touch the firing pin. When the hammer is back and the trigger is pulled, the hammer strikes the transfer bar, which strikes the firing pin, and you know the rest. Another difference is that the mainspring (or hammer spring) on the Colt is a flat spring, while the Ruger uses a longer-lived coil spring.

Yeah, Yeah, enough design history, which one ‘d ya pick!?

Well, I picked the Colt. Specifically a Taylor’s & Co. “Smoke Wagon” that’s been slicked up by Codymatic. Why? Well, I actually feel like I understand a little about the Colt. I can take one apart and put it together in a few minutes. I might have to replace the firing pin or mainspring every few thousand rounds, but that’s about it (and that’s easy work, too!)

The Ruger, quite frankly, baffles me. It’s because it’s got so many extra parts! I took my Single-Six .22 apart and it took me a few days to get it back together. And since SASS requires that all revolvers be loaded with five rounds when holstered, the ability to carry safely with six is irrelevant (not that we could accidentally set off a round during a stage anyway).

Custom Work

The work done to my guns is pretty extensive, but you’d never guess to look at it. The hammer and trigger have been slicked up. The rear sight notch has been milled out wider for a quicker sight picture, and the front sight has been serrated so your eye is drawn to it instantly.

There’s my opinions on sixguns for Cowboy Action Shooting. Next up: Rifles.

]]> http://briankevinnelson.com/cowboy-action-guns-part-1-776/feed 0 http://briankevinnelson.com/looks-cool-778 http://briankevinnelson.com/looks-cool-778#comments Tue, 13 Mar 2012 22:07:28 +0000 Brian http://briankevinnelson.com/?p=778 Continue reading →]]> …Hydrographics.

WeaponsRelated uses a hydro-dip kit to put a wood pattern on some AR parts. Found on the ENDO Tactical blog.

Kits go for $100.00, but the components can be found on Ebay for a lot less. They make them in all sorts of wood and camo patterns (both hunting and tacticool camo), as well as other different patterns such as skulls and carbon fiber. I might just give the carbon fiber kit a try on an XDM slide…

Reactions ranged from “NEIN! Das ist nicht SASS-Legal!” to just laughing out loud.

The damage to the rifle looks pretty bad, but I’m not sure how much of that is due to the stock becoming kindling. Obviously, something went wrong with the reloads, but nobody seems to know what. Popular theories are:

• Detonation Out of Battery (possibly setting off other rounds in the clip)(Yes, it is a “clip” because it is a Garand).
• “Squib”, or a bullet stuck in the barrel. Another round fired right behind it, causing massive pressure to build up in the chamber. However, there are no obvious bulges in the barrel, so that’s probably not it.
• Ammo too hot. The Garand was designed to run with M2 Ball ammo, which is fairly weak (i.e. low pressure) as far as .30-06 goes. Shooting standard loads will exceed the operating pressure in the gas port, slam the bolt back too hard and bend the operating rod. However, that doesn’t explain the stock being reduced to driftwood.
• Powder mixup. Using too much of a higher pressure powder can have catastrophic results, such as this epic AR-15 Kaboom.

Side note: Is it just me or do the ar15.com Garand experts seem a little bit preoccupied with the whole “M2 ball only” thing? I understand that if you shoot standard loads you can bend an expensive part beyond repair (which should be made very clear to gun store customers buying the Garand), but I think blaming an exploding gun on hotter-than normal loads? Seems like a bit of a reach to me.

I’m stoked to get out and shoot it. It’s Piston-Operated, has a Modular Free-Float rail, left-side non-reciprocating charging handle, a Magpul ACS stock, and…interchangeable chokes?

No, that’s not a rifle, that’s a shotgun. It’s a Turkish-made Akdal MKA 1919 12 Gauge, only this one has been worked over by Jim Lambert at Firebird Precision. This will be my (and my Dad’s) shotgun for Multi-Gun from now on. Allow me to go over some of the design:

Overview

Basically, it’s a Remington 1100 in AR drag. The action is the same soft shooting system, and from what I’ve heard, the (factory) charging handle is interchangeable with the Remington. Jim has done some tuning of the gas system to ensure reliability with low-brass birdshot (although not nearly as much as it takes on a Saiga).

That’s about where the similarities end though. From there, it’s got a polymer lower receiver that’s pretty much a scaled-up AR. That’s the big draw to the Akdal: it’s a mag-fed shotgun that’s not a Saiga. It’s got a bolt catch like an AR. It’s actually physically possible to seat a full magazine on a closed bolt (actually it’s quite easy). You don’t need a $100+ magwell to convert it from an AK Rock ‘n Lock reload. This is the future of the mag-fed shotgun.

The factory lower is very similar to the Cav Arms lower, one piece of polymer with an A1 length stock and grip.Jim cut all that nonsense off and put an adapter for a collapsible tube, as well as milled a slot so a standard AR grip will work. It should be noted that the length of pull is longer on this shotgun, so to replicate the length of an A2 stock, a telestock has to be set at position 3, rather than 6.

As for the handguard, the stock Akdal comes with a 2-piece quasi-A2 style set. Jim replaced that with his own handguard and barrel nut assembly. It is kind of like a Wilson Combat “T.R.I.M.” rail for the AR, only Jim’s incorporates a nifty forward charging handle assembly on the left side:

Jim’s competition guns also come with a “Mid-Barrel” compensator, which basically means that the barrel is ported halfway down, and a block is clamped on to direct the gasses to stabilize the gun. Pretty clever!

Now, the magazines that come with the Akdal only hold 5 rounds due to import restrictions. However, Firebird makes an extension that will take that up to 11 rounds. They are on the heavy side though, seeing as how it’s 11 rounds of 12 gauge in a steel-and-aluminum magazine. It is a little heavier than a Saiga mag, but that’s the only advantage the Saiga has over the Akdal. Best to give the Russkies something over the Turks .

Future Modifications

This Akdal is already set up as best it can be, the only things I would add are an

• Optic. Since it has no iron sights, you have to aim the gun somehow! I put an EOtech on at Jim’s recommendation. I like it so far.
• Different pistol grip. This one doesn’t fit my hand too well, so I’ll probably put a Magpul MOE or MIAD on there. Just personal preference
• Magpul B.A.D. Lever. Since USPSA often requires shooting the shotgun to empty, something to speed up reloads is handy. Also lets you lock the gun open more easily.

I’ve got to say, having shot USPSA for the past few years and SASS for the last few months, I was blown away by the atmosphere at the match. These Cowboy shooters sure do put a lot more work into that than we do!

Typically, a good sized USPSA match (let’s say an Area Championship) will have one or two vendors (the most I’ve ever seen was seven, and that was at the Area 2 championship, the largest in the country) and one food vendor. The Nationals had seven vendors and an Ice Cream Truck.

The Arizona Territorial Company of Rough Riders, who put on Winter Range, basically set up a temporary shopping mall filled with Cowboy guns, gear, and other “lifestyle” stuff such as western art and clothing. And the food court… BBQ, Dutch Oven cooking, Fried Catfish, and some really great Philly Cheesesteaks at Handlebar Hanks (who will be a food vendor at our USPSA Area 1 match).

As for the stages…probably the most fun I’ve had shooting Cowboy. Lots of variety and some really cool facades including a fort and a saloon that probably satisfied most building codes.

My Performance

First off, I will say this…I had a Stage DQ. This is different from USPSA/IDPA where if there is a safety issue, you are disqualified from the match. With a Stage DQ, your total time is changed to 999.99 seconds. Here’s what went down…

The stage started off with a rifle sweep. I burned through that (I am pretty quick with the Winchester) and dropped the rifle on the table (action open). When it hit the table the lever closed, but by that time I had moved to the next position, drawn my first pistol and cocked it. I heard the RO (and half the Posse) shouting at me to move back and re-open the lever (to avoid a 10-second safety penalty). Knowing that I couldn’t move with a cocked, loaded firearm (SASS rules), I de-cocked my sixgun, reholstered, ran back and opened the lever.

After the fact, I learned that it is also a stage DQ to re-holster a pistol with the hammer over a loaded chamber. Oh well, at least it wasn’t a match DQ, but it dropped me out of the top 100 down to 148th.

The rest of the match

Not so bad. I had a couple misses and a boneheaded procedural, but I shot fairly quick. I really enjoyed a couple of the stages where we got to run downrange (not very common in SASS). I will talk to the rangemaster at our local club and see if we can incorporate some of that into our local matches.

Finish

Overall, I’m happy with my performance, even with the Stage DQ. I finished 148th in the overall, out of 800 shooters. I took 2nd in the Young Gun (14-18 years old) category, with Campo Kid winning. Campo also took 13th in the overall, and made it into the semi-finals of the Top Gun shoot-off. Congrats man!

Also worthy of note was the Rattlesnake Wrangler, a 13 year old “Buckaroo” who took 3rd Overall (yes, that’s in the whole match) and also won the Speed Pistol side match. He competed the Shoot-Off, but his first competitor was Lead Dispencer (world champion, world-record holder in speed shotgun). Wrangler actually did well in the rifle, but Spencer really got him on the shotgun.

Looking forward to next year!