Tag: Guns and such

Last week I got a missive from Mr. Free Market which was headed:

My Last .22 

“Just bought this Anshutz: it’s sorta the last 22 that I will probably buy or at least own.”

And a pretty thing it is too (yes, he’s a left-hooker):

Mr. FM being the deadly shot that he is, all I can hear is the sound of disintegrating rabbits in the fields of his estate.

However, that’s not the purpose of this post.  About three days later, I got this plaintive wail from him:

I know that none of my regular Readers have ever had such a thing happen to them, of course.  <eyecross>

However, as I pointed out to him in commiserating with his plight, I once went to pick up a Swedish Mauser at one gun store, then stopped at another store to get some 6.5x55mm ammo (back in the days when gun stores actually carried ammo)…

…and walked out of Store #2 with not only 200 rounds of 6.5mm Swede, but a minty Inland M1 Carbine as well.

Like me, Mr. FM is pruning back (“consolidating, dear heart”) his gun collection (the above impulse buy notwithstanding), and I think about half a dozen or so shotguns will be going onto the block in the next couple of months.

Which brings me, sorta, to the point of this post.

Regular Readers will know that I’m trying to settle on a couple-three “last rifles” myself, and a 20ga side-by-side to “round off” the total number of boomsticks.  As I despair of ever finding that clean 1970s Colt Python for $600, I think I’m pretty well set for handguns.

Doc and Combat Controller talked me out of getting replacements for my two Marlin varmint .22 rifles (880SQ and 882 HB) with the simple comment that if they’re already “one-hole” rifles with the adequate-but-actually-kinda-lousy triggers, dropping a new trigger group into each is all that’s needed.  And cheaper.

Makes sense, which means I’m not going to be in the market for those CZ 457 rifles anytime soon, or ever.  Although…

[sigh…]

As Doc and CC pointed out, that money saved would be better spent on paying off a credit card (don’t be stupid, these are my friends we’re talking about) buying that CZ Bobwhite:

…which makes all sorts of sense to me.

Last question:  are any of my north Texas Readers familiar with putting an aftermarket trigger group into a Marlin?

After posing the question yesterday, here’s the gun I would want if I had no restrictions on ammo, availability or money:

FG-42 (FallschirmGewehr Model  42)

The top is the first model — easily distinguishable by its sharply-raked pistol grip, stowable cruciform bayonet and milled receiver — and the lower is the second iteration which was sturdier and lighter, with a stamped receiver and no bayonet.

I would take either in a heartbeat.

Here’s Ian (a.k.a. Gun Jesus) first with the background story, and then on his day at the range.

Want.  Want.

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Update:  As do Readers Frognot and Preussenotto, from yesterday’s Comments, thus showing themselves to be connoisseurs of fine weaponry.

It all started, as so many of these things do, with a letter from Mr. Free Market which contained this pic:

Now I’ve owned the top two (CETME 7.62x51mm NATO and H&K P7 9mmP).  I didn’t like the P7 at all — that squeeze grip chamber loading thingie made my hand shake from the effort of actuating it — and as Dean Wormer famously said:

So I sold it after only a couple of months.

The CETME was a different story altogether.  I loved shooting it — preferred it to the G36 and FN-FAL, for that matter — but it was the lightweight C model which, although it could handle the 7.62mm NATO cartridge, really preferred the  .308 Win with lighter bullets.  (From memory, I only ever used the 120gr.)  So it was spendy to shoot, and in any event I’d just picked up my first AK, so I sold the CETME too a short while afterwards.

As for the bottom two guns… well, that’s a different story.  Amazingly, considering my handgun preferences, I’ve never owned a Walther P-38 (although I’ve owned a couple of Luger P-08s), but as it shoots the 9mm Europellet anyway, it’s not a serious object of desire other than as a WWII-era gun.  (That’s not to say I’d turn one down as a gift, of course;  but I’m pretty much out of collecting WWI and WWII-era guns nowadays.)

What about the rifle?

 

Let’s just say I’d get a StG-44 in a very rapid heartbeat, IF I could afford both it and the ammo it shoots (7.92x33mm or 8mm MP).   And that one in Mr. FM’s picture, with the Haenel 4x scope?  Oh be still, my twitchy trigger finger.

And for that matter, that scoped CETME also makes parts of my body tingle.

Which got me to thinking (always a dangerous thing when it comes to guns), and I came up with this question:

If money were no object, the gun was available, and ammo was both cheap and plentiful, O My Readers:  what rifle would you choose to get?

I asked the question of both Doc Russia and Combat Controller, and I’ll tell you their (and my) choices tomorrow.

Here are the rules:  you get to pick one gun, and one gun only;  no “top 3” or “1a” or any of that jive, and no crew-served weapons like the Browning Quad 4.  One rifle, of any era, and yes, full-auto is permitted.

See y’all tomorrow.

I’ve grumped about the cost of .22 WMR (Mag) before, because I just cannot fathom how the Mag can be that much more expensive to make than .22 LR — because it isn’t.  I’m likewise unconvinced by the “small market” argument (i.e. that it’s more expensive to make because there are no economies of scale), because that sounds to me like a self-fulfilling prophecy — the high cost of the ammo makes buyers leery of getting into the caliber, ergo  a small market.

Asking the question of my Readers:  ignoring the people who like me have guns chambered in .22 Mag already, how many of you who own .22 LR guns would like to get into .22 Mag, but are pushed away by the high prices?

It’s not just the ammo.  The guns themselves are badly priced. e.g.

I cannot accept that a .22 Mag rifle requires that much higher a production cost than its LR cousin;  we’re not talking about the difference between a .22 LR and a .308 Win.  Basically, what generally happens is that the manufacturer shuts down its production line for, say, a couple-three weeks, drops the necessary tooling and machinery to make the few parts that differentiate the one from the other, then produces several thousand of the Mag rifles, and then reverses the process and goes back to the .22 LR version.  (At least, that’s how a guy from CZ once explained it to me about their 612 and 612M semi-auto rifles, for which at the time there was a $20 difference in their respective MSRPs.  “The $20 pays for the inconvenience of rejigging the machinery.”)

Not $150, as above.

I think we’re being ripped off.  But I welcome comment from any gun manufacturers out there who can give a credible reason for the price difference.

Ditto for Remington, Winchester or anyone else who care to do the same for rimfire ammo.

Ammoman (over on the right-hand sidebar) has this deal:

That’s 67c per round if you buy two cases.  Get there quickly if you’re interested.