Housekeeping note: Quarterly ammunition price reports are next week.
I just finished helping an acquaintance assemble an AR-15 from a kit. The build went quickly and easily. I had been under the impression that it would be a good deal more complicated than it was.
While assembling the fire control group I noticed that it was functionally identical to the AK fire control group. I can see why someone would mistakenly say that the AR is a fine watch compared to the AK, given all the detents and springs in it, but that just makes the build complicated, not complex. The rifle is much easier to maintain than the AK, which really requires a gunsmith to change barrels, as an example.
You would need a gunsmith to change barrels in an AR given potential problems with headspacing, but it is much easier with an AR.
Months ago I found a link on the internet to an AR builder who built his lower from scratch without machining a full aluminum billet. He simply broke the drawing down into specific parts, and assembled them using button head cap screws.
He swears up and down the rifle is functional, and I believe him, but it looked terrible. He admitted problems exist with the build, namely with the takedown pins and the magazine catch, and the safety did not work properly due to the lack of any detent to control its location.
Looking over the drawings he provided, I realized that the lower parts kit for every AR fits every other AR, including the AR-10 rifle. The main difference between the two lowers is the length of the magazine well and the distance between the fire control groups and the forward pin holes.
To me, it was a pretty amazing piece of engineering to take and machine individual parts, then assemble them into an actual AR lower, and then build the rifle.
You can find a complete set of drawings here (PDF).
And don't worry. I maintain copies of this file in several computers.
In other news, eggheads at Harvard recently argued that white people should die. When the school got caught hosting such a debate, videos of the debate disappeared. Never happened.
Just weird. Whenever Russia holds one of its racial meets and invites white supremacists such as Jarad Taylor, you never hear about them arguing people of color should die.
You can view the video of Harvard's latest contribution to the coming civil war here.
Loads.
Rantburg's summary for arms and ammunition:
Prices for pistol ammunition were mostly unchanged, while prices for rifle ammunition were mixed.
Prices for used pistols and for used rifles were mixed.
New Lows:
None
Pistol Ammunition
.45 Caliber, 230 Grain, From Last Week: -.04 Each After Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Ammo2U, CCI Lawman, TMJ, Brass Casing, .20 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Today's Ammo, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Cased, .24 per round (From Last week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (5 Weeks))
.40 Caliber Smith & Wesson, 180 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .22 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Freedom Ammunition, Mixed Bullets, Store brand, Brass, .22 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (1Q, 2016))
9mm Parabellum, 115 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .17 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: SG Ammo, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .16 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks))
.357 Magnum, 158 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2 weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .25 per round
Cheapest Bulk: 1,000 rounds: SG Ammo, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel cased, .25 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4Q, 2015))
Rifle Ammunition
.223 Caliber/5.56mm 55 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: LAX ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .22 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Ammunition Supply Company, Tulammo, FMJ, steel casing, .22 per round (From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (2 Weeks))
.308 NATO 150 Grain, From Last Week: +.01 Each
Cheapest, 20 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, steel casing, .37 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, steel casing, FMJ, .34 per round (From Last Week: -.02 Each)
7.62x39 AK 123 Grain, From Last Week: -.02 each After Unchanged (9 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Munire USA, Wolf Polyformance, steel case, FMJ, .23 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: SG Ammo, Wolf WPA, steel case, FMJ, .23 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4 weeks))
.22 LR 40 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Ammomen, Federal, RNL .07 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 325 rounds: Natchez Shooters Supply, Federal, RNL, .07 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks))
Guns for Private Sale
Rifles
.223/5.56mm (AR Pattern Semiautomatic) Average Price: $500 Last Week Avg: $585 (-) ($616 (49 Weeks), $476 (25 Weeks))
California (186, 183): Smith & Wesson M&P Sport: $600 ($650 (1Q,2015), $400 (28 Weeks))
Texas (248, 237): Mixed Build: $500 ($700 (1Q, 2015), $350 (49 Weeks))
Pennsylvania (110, 109): Smith & Wesson M&P15 Sport II : $450 ($700 (48 Weeks), $300 (36 Weeks))
Virginia (138, 144): Smith & Wesson M&P Sport: $550 ($750 (1Q, 2015), $480 (14 Weeks))
Florida (299, 304): Colt AR-15: $400 ($650 (38 Weeks), $380 (50 Weeks))
#2
BLM activist advocates white genocide at Harvard.
Ain't going to happen. Time to go over the checklist again, let's see guns cleaned, oiled and in good working order (✔), plenty of ammo (✔), other essential stuff (✔) in case of urban chaos.
#3
I just finished helping an aquaintance assemble an AR-15 from a kit.
Just to pass on some advice that I found helpful. Take the time to research every single part prior to purchase. One benefit of "Complete" kits is that it takes the guess work out. The downside is the parts included typically offer basic functionality. That's fine but it may be more cost effective to purchase more desireable parts initially and avoid upgrade costs down the road.
BLUF: [Guardian] Guevara is reluctant to share personal reminiscences. "I have flashes of memory but I’m not sure how reliable they are because we fill emptiness with our own visions," he says. Instead he prefers to focus on the concrete legacy by distributing his father’s ideas online, in educational materials and exhibitions.
All of which are politically toxic to a US president during campaign season. Obama will be cautious about endorsing his hosts. Officials say he will not meet Fidel Castro. Instead, he will be more intent on workshops with entrepreneurs, talks with civil society groups, a baseball match, a speech to the nation’s youth, and bilateral talks.
There is no chance he will visit the Che Guevara Study Centre for a lesson in revolution. For Guevara that is a shame: "If Obama comes, he might learn something."
#3
They've found out that gear and training works or can be made to work.
Optempo is wearing them down, though. Not enough assets in depth.
They can also see that Assad is about to imitate a smoking hole in the ground, and don't want to be nearby in force when it finally hits the fan there (or they'd have to intervene).
Posted by: ed in texas ||
03/19/2016 10:31 Comments ||
Top||
#4
They kept a regime that provides them the only port in Mediterranean in power. Tested/advertised weapons/operational procedures. Signaled the rest of the World that Russia is back. And showed (former) USA how it's done. If several million Allah-beasts end up in Western Europe (home of Russia's implacable enemies), it's just just a bonus.
...Accusing Republicans of being Hitler for assorted petty reasons dates back to the time when Hitler was still around. FDR accused Republican candidate Wendell Willkie of using "Hitler tactics" by repeating his slogans frequently. But it was the frequent associations of Republicans and Hitler by Democrats that was the true Big Lie. Its only purpose was a senseless association through the repetition of ridiculous and baseless accusations that every single Republican was just Hitler in a better suit.
...To most people, Nazi analogies summon up images of the Holocaust and a ruthless dictatorship. To the left however, any populist reaction against their rule is Nazism. In their world, there is a battle between progressive and reactionary forces. Any movement that dares to run for office by challenging progressive policies is reactionary, fascist and the second coming of the Third Reich. Republican victories are lazily attributed by liberal hacks to mindless public anger being exploited by right-wing demagogues.
...Republicans aren’t progressive. Therefore they’re Hitler. It’s really that simple.
Optimists thought that the Democrats had reached "Peak Hitler" under Bush. But for the left there is no Peak Hitler. The same tired line of attack has been trotted out for fifty years. It will go on limping around the liberal corral for another fifty years or a hundred years. The Big Lie will continue being repeated to indoctrinate each new politically active progressive with the conviction that anyone to the right is Hitler and that every election is a brand new battle to stop Hitler 2.0 from taking over America.
Goldwater was Hitler. Nixon was Hitler. Reagan was Hitler. Bush was Hitler. None of the latter three men declared the Fourth Reich, made themselves dictators for life and ran concentration camps. But the Big Lie retroactively rewrites the past by claiming that last decade’s Hitler was a decent moderate while the latest Republican Hitler is a terrifying monster. Goldwater, Nixon and Reagan were all resurrected as moderate contrasts to each other and then to Bush. The process of recreating Bush as a moderate has already begun. And so each Republican makes the electoral journey from Hitler to a political moderate whom a latter generation of liberals mourns while complaining that this latest Republican really is Hitler.
Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of scumbags.
Hulk Hogan may have earned his biggest victory in or out of the ring on Friday when a St. Petersburg, Florida jury awarded him $115 million in his invasion of privacy lawsuit against Gawker Media, which published clips of a 2012 sex tape he made with the wife of one of his friends. The professional wrestling and reality TV superstar sued the company that same year, seeking damages for defamation, loss of privacy and emotional pain. But wait - there's more!
Amazingly, Hogan could be getting even more from the jury, as punitive damages have yet to be decided. The jury will meet again next week to consider that argument. I hope Gawker's required to immediately put a sizeable amount of that in escrow while they appeal.
[Business Insider] Hotels.com has an amusing TV character called "Captain Obvious" who makes humorous commercials by saying clearly obvious things. The CIA has a director who is the exact opposite -- a "Captain Un-Reality" -- who constantly makes absurd claims contrary to facts and common sense.
During an National Public Radio interview last month, for example, CIA Director John Brennan made what may be the most bizarre statement ever by an U.S. intelligence official: "We don’t steal secrets," he said. "Everything we do is consistent with U.S. law. We uncover, we discover, we reveal, we obtain, we elicit, we solicit."
This was a ridiculous statement. Although the CIA is required to comply with U.S. law, one of its core missions is stealing secrets abroad through a variety of means that blatantly violate the laws of other nations. This is the nature of intelligence collection.
That this CIA director would say something so preposterous is symptomatic of the damage the Obama administration has done to our national security with his assistance. It also is not the only example of Mr. Brennan’s denying the obvious.
He has repeatedly echoed President Obama’s refusal to use the terms "jihadist" or "Islamist" to describe members of Islamic terrorist groups like al-Qaida and ISIS. He explained this in a 2010 CSIS speech by disputing ties between these groups and Islam.
Brennan also said in this speech that we should not label "our enemy as jihadists or Islamists because jihad is holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam meaning to purify oneself of one’s community."
Brennan had a controversial tenure as President Obama’s assistant for homeland security and counterterrorism in the National Security Council. He played a role in the administration’s decision to read Miranda rights to Umar Abdulmutallab, the so-called "underwear bomber" who tried to destroy a civilian airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009.
Brennan also was widely criticized for defending this decision by falsely claiming that the Obama administration had continued a Bush administration policy.
While at the NSC, Brennan also was involved in editing talking points drafted by the CIA on the 2011 attacks on the U.S. consulate Benghazi which said, contrary to available intelligence and State Department reporting, that the attacks were in response to an anti-Muslim video and were not a pre-planned terrorist attack.
Reports of Brennan’s ineptitude have grown since he became CIA director in 2013.
#1
Nice bit by Fleitz, but he only scratches the surface. The author confuses 'ineptitude' with a puppet master's clearly focused pro-Islamic strategy.
[The Motley Fool] Once upon a time, there was an F-22 Raptor. It was a good plane -- some even called it "the most capable air superiority combat jet in the world" -- but it cost a lot.
At a sticker price of $412 million per plane , the U.S. Air Force couldn't afford to buy a lot of F-22s. So, to ensure it had a good quantity of fighter jets, as well as a few of good quality, the Air Force proposed a "high-low" solution. On the high end, it would buy a handful of ultra-expensive F-22s to ensure air dominance. On the low end, to boost its numbers and ensure its ability to carry a lot of bombs into combat, it would buy a whole mess of F-35 Lightning II fighter jets -- projected to cost just $35 million each. (Lockheed Martin, which builds both planes, was happy to oblige on both ends).
That was the plan. Instead, the F-35 fighter jet is turning out to be the most expensive fighter jet ever built, and is expected to ultimately cost taxpayers as much as $1.5 trillion.
#1
Instead of a simple but mighty OPTIMUS PRIME = TRIPLE-CHANGER AUTOBOT TRANSFORMER, it devol into a SUPER-DUPER-OMEGA-SUPREME/AUTOBOT CITY way wayyy way-y-y beyond anyone's dreams.
#2
And the next breakthrough technology aircraft will be so expensive that the Air Force and Navy together will only be able to buy one. They will share it on alternating days. The Marines get it on Leap Day.
#4
Aw Snowy, you know rules, it's a small town we gotta support the team, and the team sez F-35 is a stinker. Open up the A-10 and F-22 lines (486 with coprocessor!). :)
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[The Motley Fool] Once upon a time, there was an F-22 Raptor. It was a good plane -- some even called it "the most capable air superiority combat jet in the world" -- but it cost a lot.
