Author: Kim du Toit

ULD Update Part I

The Gun Thing

The Boomershoot Ultra-Long Distance Rifle project continues apace.  From what I can see of the entry numbers so far, I should be able to spend about a grand on the rifle, and about the same on the scope, which will have a maximum magnification of 20x, and 25x preferably.  (I’ll talk more about the scope when I’ve made a decision on the rifle, but I have a short list of about a half-dozen.)

Here’s what I’ve decided so far:

1) Caliber: I’ve looked at quite a few, both in terms of field performance, cost and so on.  Joe Huffman recommends a .3x cartridge, based on his observations over the years.  I’ve shot several of those, and a few lighter ones like the 6.5x55mm Swede and .243 Win, and the .3x is definitely a better choice.  So I’ve decided on either:

  • .308 Win — endless choices of types, weights, manufacturers and so on, also cheap to shoot
  • .300 Win Mag — more expensive to shoot, but handles wind a lot better than the .308 (and the wind always blows at Boomershoot).

I’m very comfortable with both cartridges, although with the .300 Win Mag I think a heavy rifle is mandatory — shooting a couple/three rounds at a deer on a hunt is one thing, shooting a few dozen a day at exploding targets is another thing altogether.  Which leads us to the choice of

2) Rifle: Today I’ll look at the .300 Win Mag offerings first, because that’s the direction I’m leaning.  Here are the guns I think will work best, under the budget constraints.  All fall into the $900 – $1,100 range.  The pics are not to the same scale.

For what it’s worth, I think I could pretty much play “spin the bottle” with these bad boys, and be very comfortable with whichever one the bottle pointed towards.  (As an aside, the reviews made by reputable distance shooters on all these guns recommend a heavier bullet — such as 180-200gr — which makes for more recoil punishment, but much greater placement consistency.  I’ll test that hypothesis for myself, assuming I choose the .300 Win Mag.)  Also, if the rifles don’t come with a muzzle brake (like the Savage and Ruger do), I’ll get one.  Muzzle brakes attenuate recoil almost as well as moderators, but I’m not going to do the latter because Gummint.

There is another aspect to the choice facing me, however.  All the above rifles are pretty much “bench” guns, obviously.  But the .300 Win Mag is a fantastic hunting  cartridge too, so just to make my life more difficult, I’ve shortlisted two “hunting’ rifles in the same price bracket as well.  (Note: they are also on the heavy side, but their stocks make them more convenient to carry.)

Just know that once you’ve added a Harris bipod to these guns, their weight will be very close to the bench guns.  (I am not  interested in shooting a lightweight gun like the Tikka T3 or Winchester Mod 70 in this chambering.  BTDT on several occasions before, and all you’re doing is wasting ammo and putting an owie on yer shoulder.)  The only thing that might pull me towards one of these two is if there’s an unbeatable price deal involved, and even then… probably not.

All comments are welcome, of course;  but please  don’t suggest some kind of custom-built thing, or even extensive modifications like Shilen barrels and Timney triggers.  I’ve looked at it, it’s too expensive, and I don’t have the time to do it anyway.  One of the deciding factors in my choice is how well the gun shoots out of the box, after a brief shooting-in session.  According to many shooters’ ratings, all four of the bench guns are exceptional choices, which was a major factor in them making the cut.

For what it’s worth, I’m leading towards the Savage 110FCP (because adjustable AccuTrigger), if  I decide on the .300 Win Mag.

Next up:  the .308 rifles.

Not A Chance In Hell

Elections, Politics

Quoth some Democrat “strategist”:

“This has got to be an election fundamentally about Democrats’ vision for bringing the country together and solving the big problems that confront us.”

Really?  This from a party which [deep breath]:

  • encourages urban unrest through its paramilitary Antifa movement
  • thinks voters for The Other Party are rubes, racists and “deplorable”
  • supports “open borders” (i.e. unlimited immigration) and calls those who don’t “racists” and “white supremacists”
  • resists ICE when they try to deport violent illegal immigrants
  • supports early release of violent felons from prison
  • supports Marxist electoral candidates and socialist/communist doctrine, in a nation which won the Cold War against that precise set of principles, and despite the obvious failures and appalling death tolls in all Communist nations since 1917
  • supports infanticide and unlimited abortion rights despite those being incredibly unpopular with the majority of Americans
  • wants to disarm the American population, despite Constitutional protection and (once again) massive popular support for private gun ownership
  • espouses insane social philosophies and policies such as gender-swapping surgery and gender-reassignment treatment for children
  • has Congressional representatives who ignore (and in some cases, even support) Muslim terrorism and the organizations which perform it
  • supports high taxation and increased government spending, when it is obvious that most Americans hate both
  • believes that climate catastrophe is imminent, excoriates all science (and scientists) that disproves their belief, and is willing to sacrifice both national- and personal prosperity to further their goals
  • thinks that America is still a fundamentally racist country
  • believes that international problems are mostly the fault of America, and supports diplomatic appeasement and accommodation of malevolent nations such as Communist China, Iran, Cuba and Venezuela (to name but a few)
  • demands First Amendment protection for themselves, while actively denying it to anyone who opposes their philosophy
  • continues to support failed education policies like Common Core
  • denies school choice to parents when those choices include non-state school education
  • refuses to allow failing and incompetent schoolteachers to be fired because of entrenched union opposition
  • allows radical college administrations to suppress any contrary positions to their own
  • supports radical feminism and its lunatic (and un-Constitutional) positions such as #BelieveAllWomen and similar policies which would deny the accused their right to a fair trial
  • has, through its adherents in the federal bureaucracy, attempted a coup against an elected President
  • has the support of a mainstream media which continues to excuse and obscure all wrongdoing perpetrated by Democrats;  and invents, magnifies and exaggerates the same for any organization or person who opposes them even marginally
  • sincerely believes in tropes such as “toxic masculinity”, Arab-inspired blood-libel of Israelis, and “climate catastrophe”
  • will attempt to enact “climate-friendly” legislation and regulations which will hobble America and indeed the entire Western world’s economies, while giving a pass to the major sources of global pollution:  China, India and the rest of the Third World
  • wants to resurrect ObamaCare and take it to nationalized “single-payer” medical care
  • will end America’s energy independence by outlawing fracking, construction of pipelines, destruction of the coal industry altogether and ending nuclear power generation.

There are more, but I think everyone gets the idea.  And if you think I’m inventing or exaggerating this behavior, feel free to study all California’s legislation and regulations enacted since 1990, or NYFC’s Mayor DeBlasio’s ditto.

Here are just a few pictures which encapsulate the incoherence in modern “progressive” thought:

And I’m not making this stuff up.  Look at the numbers in the chart below:

Considering that all the above are largely threats coming from Democrat politicians, supporters and Democrat-controlled organizations, explain this to me:

How will the Democrat / Socialist Democratic Party ever “bring the country together”?

The simple answer is:  they can’t, and they don’t want to.  Their entire philosophy is predicated on the Marxist principle of the class struggle;  and if they don’t have an economic class struggle (as in the U.S.A., where prosperity is the rule and not the exception), they will invent  another class struggle against a different enemy, e.g. “White Patriarchy”, “White Supremacists”, “Racists” or “The 1%” (to name but some), even if their own leaders  belong to said groups in one way or another.  This quite apart from their actual  opponents, e.g. conservatives and Trump supporters, whom they demonize with such exaggeration that reconciliation is quite impossible..

In other words, the Democrat Party thrives on disunity, and all their actions and policies are designed to exacerbate and not reduce it.  So their stated desire to bring the country together is just another political lie, and it’s nothing more than a transparent ploy to try to win the 2020 election.

Monday Funnies

Funny Stuff

Ugh.  That’s all I have to say.  Ugh.  Even worse, Monday Ugh.

So here’s Teh Funny:

(thanks to Knuckledragger for that pic)

And to help you forget that last panel:

And to sign off on a political note:

Finalists

Drive Time

Loyal Readers will recall that I reported a shattered dream (in that my #1 Dream Car, the Maserati Quattroporte was decisively debunked by a guy from Maserati), and that later, I confessed to being unable to decide on a post-1970 car in this fantasy exercise.

Slowly but surely, my foggy brain and confused thoughts are starting to crystallize towards a car made after 1970 that I would love to drive for the rest of my life, and about three are starting to break away from the pack.

To nobody’s surprise, none of them are modern (21st-century) models — most modern cars are as ugly and overweight as Lena Dunham — and I flip the bird at all the “safety” and “economy” features that Gummint has mandated, all of which make driving as much fun as steering a sofa down the driveway, or less.  So my “modern” (post-1970) dream car is going to come from an earlier era, and only just ahead of the 1970 rule.

Anyway, here are the finalists, in no specific order of wanting:

 1) 1976 BMW 3.0 CSL (3-liter straight-6, 4-speed manual)

I love absolutely everything about this Beemer:  looks, performance, comfort, handling, the lot.  Unbelievably, this was a loaner (!!!) from a repair shop that was fixing my own BMW (see below), and I had it for three happy days…

 

 

2) 1986 Alfa Romeo GTV6 2.5 (2.5-liter V6)

I drove one of these once, on a long-ish trip, and the owner nearly didn’t get it back. What a beauty.

 

3) 1984 BMW 318i (with 5-speed manual) (This was the E20 generation which replaced the earlier 1800/2002 line.)

Alone among the cars featured today, I’ve actually owned  one of these — okay, it was a company car, shortly before I left South Africa — and I bitterly regretted having to exchange it for a 520 (POS) when I was promoted.  If I could have kept it, I’d still be driving it today.  It was no racer;  that little 1800cc four-banger wouldn’t stand a chance against the other cars listed, but I loved driving it.

 

4) 1985 Jaguar XJ6 Series 3 (4.2-liter straight-6)

If I wanted to eschew any kind of quickness and nimbleness in favor of pure, luxurious comfort, this model Jag would get my vote, every single day of the week.  And two  12-gallon fuel tanks.  But if I wanted something equally comfortable, but far more reliable:

 

5) 1976 Mercedes 350 SE (W116, 3.5-liter V8)

Zur

My Dad had one of these, we went on countless road trips in it, and I still think it’s one of the classiest-looking Merc sedans made since 1970.

Those are the finalists, so far.  I should also point out that as I posted each of these, I wanted it badly, until I posted the next one.  Looking back up the list, I would take any one of them, any day of the week, without looking back.

Friday Night Movie

Friday Feature, Movies, The Gun Thing

Loyal Readers may remember that a couple-three months ago I talked about fine shotguns, and my takeaway was that even if the Lottery Gods were to smile upon my choice of numbers, I’d be unlikely to buy a matched pair of Purdeys.

So what makes one of Purdey’s bespoke guns so exclusive, and yes, so expensive?

This evening, gather about ye a quart or so of your favorite beverage (Scotch, gin, coffee etc.) and spend the following hour and a half walking through the Purdey process — all of it — to see everything that goes into making one of these:

All that said:  even with all the money in the world (so to speak), I don’t know if I’d ever buy myself a Purdey (let alone a matched pair) — but I would seriously  consider buying one, or a pair, for the Son&Heir under those circumstances.  (He’s a better shot than I am, and  he’d have longer to enjoy shooting it than I would.  Plus, it’s a good investment.)

And one final warning:  do not go and browse around Steve Barnett’s website;  it is a Very Bad Place, and will cause you to think Unworthy Thoughts.

Don’t Do It

Men & Women

You know how you watch an unfurling catastrophe, shouting “Noooo!” in helpless frustration?  I speak here of events such as watching your best friend getting involved with a Train Smash Woman, or a lady friend taking up with a rancid Bad Boy, or another friend announcing with pride that he’s just put down a deposit on a Ferrari or cabin cruiser.

You know it’s all going to end horribly, with pain, tears and destruction in various forms, but you’re helpless to prevent it happening.

That’s how I feel about this development:

A crown green bowls club which has never allowed women to join as full members in its 100-year history is set to vote on whether to admit them.
Ilkley Bowling Club has about 1,700 full members, all of whom are eligible to vote in the ballot at the West Yorkshire spa town’s King’s Hall on March 3.
Women can only enter the bar of the club – which was founded in the early 1920s – as guests of members, and are banned completely during the week.
The main bar area – where a pint of beer costs less than £2 – is an entirely male preserve on weekdays and women are permitted to drink as ‘associates’ after 5pm from Friday to Sunday and on bank holidays.

Their mistake was in allowing female members in the first place, and allowing women onto the premises at all.

It’s not helped by the fact that lawn bowls is a game at which women are generally on a par with men in ability (see description here).  But a bowling club is not just about the game, is it?  Without the womyns, Ilkley B.C. would most probably be a happy place, where men can drink to excess, swear like troopers and in general act like the hooligan which lies not far beneath the surface of all of us.

If they open up membership to include the other sex, that will all change.  I know that if I were a member, I’d resign if they did — as I would in any men-only club of which I was a member.

Image by © Ron Koeberer/Aurora Photos/Corbis

And for those with short memories, it’s not the first time I’ve ranted about this topic.