Wednesday, June 24, 2015

Ground Up, As In Ground Beef, Day...

…I am somewhat desperately trying to shake a nasty case of ebola I seem to have picked up at the dentist's office. Short story, I had a root canal a week and a half ago in anticipation of an impending trip out of the country. Easiest root canal a ever had…bing…bang…boom and out. And it steadily hurt worse and worse as the week progressed. Soooooooooooooo I go back and they say, surprise, you have a budding infection! Gee, I've gone through this before. So, the doc says, here's some penicillin and a pain killer that works so poorly it doesn't actually, you know, block pain but you can't sell it to junkies on the street in Denver!  Rats…there goes my plans for the evening…and penicillin…I'm surprised they didn't ask me to lick a moldy piece of bread.

Predictably, the infection really starts rocking and rolling. I get back into town after a few days of sitting up in bed all night eating Advil and hating Bill O'Reilly, get another appointment and, wow again, I'm a wreck, jaw swollen, big pain, etc. So they refer me to a specialist, give me nuclear antibiotics and few enough Percocet that I can't become some discount version of Walter White peddling pills on the streets of Ft. Collins to university students trying to recover from the microaggression of seeing a picture Confederate flag on the roof of "The Dukes of Hazzard's" General Lee while surfing the Internet looking for recipes General Lee's Crispy Chicken.


Cover your eyes, Special Snowflakes!

Anyway, the nuclear antibiotics make me sick but seem to have squelched the roaring infection…sort of trading a headache for an upset stomach, so to speak. I rallied enough this afternoon to spend some time refining the zero on my Scout rifle. I'm not totally happy happy happy with the 150-gr Superformance GMXs…the groups are okay, but not the absolute laser beams the 168-gr Superformance A-Maxes are out of that rifle. Maybe it's me.

I am, however, absolutely blown away by the new Ruger Redhawk .45 ACP/.45 Colt. 4.2-inch blaster. I picked mine up today and can't wait to wring it out. Here's the first part of Ed Head's report on DRTV, along with one of Ed's pixs:


This gun segues perfectly into my rebirth of interest in big bore revolvers. As you guys know I've been routinely carrying and shooting the Talo 2.75 inch .44 Magnum Redhawk as my EDC here at the Bunker…I left it with Hamilton Bowen for a tune-up, BTW. I really like the idea of shooting an ICORE match with the big Ruger. Ken Jorgensen and I did a GUNSITE revolver class with the 4-inch .44 Redhawks shooting .44 Specials…it was big fun, like shooting a really heavy, very accurate stapler. Since I've shot a .44 Special with moon clips in an IRC, I've got the experience. In fact, there should be a special class, "S-Class," for stupid.

I've got to fish out my Blade-Tech Dropped Offset for the 4-inch Redghawk and see if the new 4.2 inch-er will fit (something about Canadian laws dictated the barrel length).

Still, it's kinda neat to have a revolver capable of running .45 ACP or the incredible variation of .45 Colt loads. Ashley Emerson had some 365-gr .45 Colt loads @ 1250 fps…that ought do it.

Plus, I finally got everything I need to finish my .300 Blackout pistol, adding a DoubleStar lower to the AAC upper.

BTW BTW, congrats to the hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers who have giving the big ole "You're Numbah One" middle finger salute to Andrew Cuomo's Safe Act…some 23,000 New Yorkers have registers around 45,000 of the estimated 1 million "assault weapons" in that state. Color me surprised…not.

14 comments:

Alien said...

Michael, what's the trigger like on your new Ruger? Is it acceptable out of the box, or should one plan on obtaining gunsmith magic for it?

DonD said...

Michael: When I saw the announcement of the new Redhawks (as a S&W 625 shooter), my brain said "MUST HAVE!"

Rob Drummond said...

You know my brother who still lives in NY brought up his AR's, FN-FAL and assorted other nasty's to my place here in NH to get them out of Commie NY and not register them
Rob Drummond

nj larry said...

Can I digress for a moment? .... SCOTUS just ruled in favor of Obamacare. Roberts wrote the majority decision. They once again twisted common and plain english to defend Obamacare.

Now how is this relevant to us gun owners? Simply I would be scared crapless of handing them any more 2A cases with Roberts as chief justice. We can not rely on Alan Gura to make brilliant arguments. The left wing segment of the court now includes Roberts. We are clearly in the minority today. God help us.

Michael Bane said...

Larry, I agree with you totally. And I'm scared.

Alien, not so great…specifically, not as good as my 2.75 snub or the 4-incher. It has the feel of a new gun to it, a little of an unfinished feel. I want to shoot the gun a bunch before I decide what to do with the trigger and see if it smooths out. I'm loath to back off very much on the mainspring weight until a slightly longer firing pin is available from the aftermarket.

I will say this may be the most perfect backpacker gun ever made. Powertful, super easy to reload with the moan clips

mn

Matthew said...

"moan clips"?

It's possible to like shooting a big bore a little too much, if you know what I mean...

;)

Anonymous said...

.45 "Long" Colt? You know that you're gonna shoot "hot" loads in it that approach .44-mag' performance, so why not a .454 Casull version. You can still shoot the wimpy-for-this-gun .45 ACPs and "stock" .45 Colts, but when it absolutely needs to be destroyed right now, you'd have the .454s to do just that!

Life Member

P. S.: "nj", You're correct. Just look at what was published in the latest NRA mag's: //www.nraila.org/articles/20150501/gun-ban-upheld-federal-appellate-court-uses-feelings-to-justify-it

Judges ruling based on "feelings" and not the law. SCARY!!!!!!

Michael Bane said...

Like the Long Colts!

mb

Michael Bane said...

Not adverse to the .454 Alaskan... That's the EDC here at the Bunker while Redhawk is overhauled. As you know, I'm considering habit it cut for .45 ACP MOAN CLIPS as well!

mb

Michael Bane said...

"having it"

I try...

Mb

Gary said...

Must be the drugs Michael!!!!

Alien said...

I've pretty much assumed that every revolver needs some gunsmith love out of the box, especially Rugers. I don't know who designs their revolver triggers or makes the parts for them, but my money is on severely demented elves living underground in the purple forest outside Cleveland.

Please keep us updated on your progress with the new Ruger; I'm a revolver junky from way back (ICORE is a way of life....), and a rock solid (and accurate) DA 45 Colt holds a strong attraction.

Anonymous said...

"MOAN CLIPS"??

It's that "high" mountain air! (a.k.a.: The "smoke" drifting up from Denver!)

Life Member

Will said...

Last year, I had an upper molar removed, and discovered that the roots protruded into the sinus cavity. Long history of sinus infections in that area. Nothing since it all healed up. Can't confirm the roots were the cause, but it's looking very probable.

IIRC, when they looked at the xrays again, they could see the roots protruding into the cavity, but it isn't something they normally look for. I confirmed it when I sneezed and blew the pocket plug out of the tooth socket two days after extraction.