ModernServiceWeapons

I’ve been following Mike Pannone through his writings and videos on the Internet for quite some time now. I enjoy his no-nonsense, performance based approach to training. His drills are challenging and rooted in reality. I particularly like his 15 in 10 Drill, which pushes the limits of speed while keeping a tight accuracy standard. This past SHOT Show, I ran into Mike in one of the hallways and had a nice chat with him. While this was the first time we had met in person, I felt like we were chatting like two old shooting buddies. His real world experience is significant (look it up), but Mike also has a solid grasp of the industry, and therefore understands the pros and cons of each weapon system. Hilton recently attended Mike’s Covert Carry Class and keeps telling me how I have missed out by not yet taking the opportunity to get on the range with Mike.

A few years back, I purchased Mike’s M16/M4 Handbook, a field sized, spiral bound, reference guide printed on smudge resistant p

In my travels, I see that many LE agencies and individual LEO’s are moving toward Short Barreled Rifles (SBR’s) for patrol and SWAT.  Most typically, the rationale offered is for easier movement in and around cars, as well as CQB movement inside buildings.  While there is no arguing that a shorter barrel is easier to move around, I would offer that it is not a mandatory requirement for success.

If agencies or individual LEOs already have non-NFA patrol or special team rifles which have either 16″ barrels or 14.5″ with pinned and welded muzzle devices, I would offer that it is not necessary to blow a huge chunk of money and create NFA issues just to lop off a few inches of barrel.  I have run non-NFA length carbines for my entire career, and prefer them over SBR’s for a number of reasons.

What is most often cited is that the shorter barrels are required to be effective indoors or around cars.  I would offer that while it is easier to use a s

The Glock 17 is commonly considered the first striker fired polymer service pistol, but the reality is that HK beat Glock to it by about a dozen years.  The HK VP70 represents an interesting milestone in service pistol history, and a bout of ’80′s nostalgia all but demanded that I hunt one down for the reference collection.

Rather than bore you with a history lesson from Wikipedia, I prefer to distill down some of the more interesting design features of the gun.  The VP70, produced from 1970 to 1989, is widely known as having a trigger similar to a staple gun.  I find it reminiscent of the toy guns which shoot the plastic disks, and the VP70 actually works on the same principle.  The striker is at rest when the gun is in battery, and the roughly 18lb trigger pull (yes, 18lb trigger pull) draws the striker to the rear and releases it.  By comparison, the Glock’s striker is partially cocked when the gun is in battery,

With ammunition costs climbing and availability being erratic, it is more important than ever to be smart with your ammo during training.  One way to do this is to have a plan when you go to the range.  This plan can be simple, or part of a more comprehensive strategy.

Earlier this year I wanted to isolate some accuracy development, and came up with a short regimen that only required about 30 minutes and 50 rounds.

5-5-5 Aggregate, 25 yards:

No time limit, fired on bullseye target, 25 yards.

-5 rounds, 2 hands, standing unsupported

-5 rounds, strong hand only

-5 rounds, support hand only

5-5-5 Aggregate, 50 yards:

No time limit, fired on USPSA or IDPA target, 50 yards.

-5 rounds, 2 hands, standing unsupported

-5 rounds, strong hand only

-5 rounds, support hand only

Competition vs. the Tactical World:  Stage Planning and Wrap Up

So as we head into the final stretch of our exploration on why competition is good (no great) for the tactical world, we have one more area to cover.  I’d like to talk about stage planning and visualization.

There are several ways of stage planning so for most of this article I want to focus on USPSA style of stage planning.  “Well, what is stage planning?”  Good question.  In USPSA, at a match, the rules allow competitors up to five minutes to look over a stage, walk through it and air gun (not air guitar) as they walk through.  Let’s break down those parts.

As you look over the stage, you are finding all the targets, no shoots (innocents) and places where props activate more targets.  When you walk through it, you begin to lay down the subconscious routines so it’s important to visualize your sights hitting the target exactly as if you were shooting.  The air gun further enhances this experience to make it more “real” for the subconscious.  Ideally,

15 yard 1+1 Drill, USPSA head box, from concealment.

One of my favorite drills is the 1+1 Reload Drill, which hits several core skills at once – draw to first shot, slide lock reload, and recovery to a followup shot.  I had previously detailed the par times for the “standard” version which is shot at 7 yards on a USPSA or IDPA target. The drill is a staple of my training regimen, and my performance on it gives me a metric for comparison of a given day’s session or how a new holster or gun is working for me.

For way of review, below are some of the par times previously set forth for this drill.  It was interesting to note that at the recent Mike Pannone Covert Carry class, Mike affirmed these par times as we used the same

Known as the most evolved of John Moses Browning’s pistol designs, the Browning Hi Power is one of the most beloved semi-automatic pistols ever. And why shouldn’t it be? It was designed by the single most influential firearms designer in history, features a double-stack high-ish) capacity magazine, a grip suitable for small hands, and is chambered for the most popular service pistol cartridge in the world.

On paper, the Hi Power has a lot going for it. It deletes the grip safety of the 1911, which many folks consider superfluous. (Note that no other commonly issued modern service weapon has since incorporated a grip safety.) The overall feel of the gun speaks to many shooters. And, like the 1911, the Browning Hi Power is an attractive and ergonomic pistol in terms of how it feels in the hand. It is acceptably accurate for a service pistol, and can be further accurized by a gunsmith. And did I mention it is an attractive pistol? Other than the grips, the gun is all steel a

Last week, I ordered several of the Firepower Base Pads for the Glock and M-16 magazines from Taran Tactical Innovations. For those who aren’t familiar with the competition world, Taran Butler is one of the biggest names in USPSA, holding such titles as USPSA National Tactical Champion, and more IDPA, Steel Challenge, and IPSC titles than I can count. Just before SHOT Show, Taran Tactical’s new Magpul Firepower Base Pad caught my attention. It adds less than an inch of length to the magazine but adds five rounds of capacity to the 30-round box. Since I was ordering stuff anyway, I also added a couple of the Glock Base Pads to my cart. A few days later, I had a box waiting for me in the mail.

Remember to remove factory lock plate

I previously noted in an MSW post the return of The Police Marksman.  You can read/download the latest issue, eBook style here.  In addition to the long running “Officer Down” column (the John Schoen incident), the current issue has articles on the XDM 5.25, shooting competition, use of extended magazines, and learning the mechanical offset of lasers.  Every issue contains good stuff for LEOs; the subscription price cannot be beat, so there is no $$$ excuse for not reading.

During the recent Mike Pannone Covert Carry Handgun class, I noticed a variety of appendix inside the waistband (AIWB) holsters in use by my friends. Of most interest was the “Extra Tuck” offering from JM Custom Kydex. I promptly ordered one off their website, and about 4 weeks later received my very own.

Pictured above is my holster with the adjustable soft loops, similar to the traditional “Summer Special” style. The belt loops are also available in Kydex, in solid or split loops and 3 different heights. I ordered the “Extra Tuck” feature, which is a clever and simple modification which improves the concealability dramatically. The holster has a bulbous protrusion molded into the body side of the muzzle end of the holster which pushes the muzzle out from your body. In doing so, the holster then cants the grip into your body, tucking it in for impro

Not long ago, this article could easily have been titled “Glock .40.  No.”  For most of the gun buying public, I would still say that buying any handgun in .40 is a wasted effort.  With the advances in 9mm JHP cartridges, the 9 gives up an inconsequential amount over the .40 in terms of performance.  For just plain shooting, you will be hard pressed to find .40 FMJ for as low a price as 9mm FMJ.  Add the additional recoil and wear on the gun, and the .40 is left as a rather distant second to the 9mm.  So why is my latest training gun a .40?  Well why not…..

As a full time firearms instructor and trainer, I feel that it is important to have at least one pistol in each of the common LE calibers in order to be able to speak intelligently to their performance aspects.  Further, with the current volatile state of the ammunition industry, it is nice to have guns in various calibers so as not to become a victim to supply.  I recently burned up a lot of my

At the end of part one, I suggested a solo intervenor’s mission is driven by two goals: (1) Interrupting, containing, and deactivating the active killer, and; (2) communicating and identifying oneself as the “good guy” so victims, witnesses, and responding LEOs do not mistake an intervenor (you) for the active killer.  I didn’t suggest which of the two was more important.   That depends on the intervenor’s own analysis of the SHOULD and MUST.  I also purposely failed to mention something obvious: Time spent on the second goal delays implementation of the first, thereby diminishing the chance of an earlier, more lives saved intervention.

Let’s see what an active killer scenario might look like.  If you believe occurrence statistics are predictive of future events, consider the following ballpark for your lone active killer event (/ = out of) :  It will be 3 -10 minutes after t

In this day and age of the internet, we have the world of information at our fingertips, and it is possible to learn about anything without even getting out from behind our keyboard.  Unfortunately, many consider this to be a substitute for experience and actually doing something rather than reading about it or watching it on Youtube.

I have lost count of the times that I have heard folks say things like “well I’ve been shooting for 20 years!” or “I have had this gun for 5 years and it has never given me any trouble!”  Those are all bold statements, meant to be taken at face value to be quite impressive.  If we drill down even a little bit, these statements are not in and of themselves a record of experience.  If you shoot an average 1000 rounds per year, then it would take you 20 years to experience what a lot of dedicated shooters will consume in only a year.  To take this a bit farther, a professional trainer might see 20,000 rounds consumed in a week.  Same

This post started out in draft (many months ago) as a review of the Panteao Productions video by Paul Howe, “Civilian Response To Active Shooters.”  (Click on the image to read some of Paul Howe’s background).

        I was a bit uncomfortable some might think I had strayed from my lane as I have no military combat experience, and neither my training nor my life or death experiences resemble Paul Howe’s.  Thus, I changed this post to pose and (hopefully) answer the title question. I think a better term to describe the dynamic incidents addressed is “active killer,” so I use that term instead of the universally used term “active shooter.”

I know Paul Howe only by reputation, his videos, and the material he and others have posted on the internet about his classes and training facility, CSAT.  If I had a training “bucket list,”  a week or two at CSAT would be on it. 

You can never have too much ammunition. At least, that is the mentality of many users that wish to strap on as much ammunition to their rifle as possible. While I typically like to have my carbine as light as possible, there are legitimate reasons to attach a spare magazine to the gun. I have seen many different ways to accomplish this, and some are better than others. But before we go into the options, let’s look at whether or not you need to have a spare magazine attached to the rifle.

For most citizens living in the United States, the chance that you will need to use your carbine in a defensive scenario is probably somewhere around the same odds as being struck by lightning while being attacked by a shark. That is not to say “don’t practice”, but let’s be real with ourselves. And should we find ourselves in that rare instance, we probably won’t need more than 30 rounds. But then again, more is better, right? In the realm of domestic law enforcement, the carbi

My latest addition to the rifle pile is this S&W M&P 10.  I have taken great interest in the development of the 7.62/.308 gas guns, and am still trying to figure out what I want to do with one.  This M&P 10 got set up just enough to hit some range time with it.

The rifle is essentially in its stock configuration with the exception of a Vltor E-Mod stock from the parts bin and a Schmidt & Bender Short Dot in an extremely old LaRue mount.  This optic setup is quite interesting for many reasons.  It was likely one of the very first, if not the very first Short Dot in the US outside of the original DoD contract.  You can read about the background of the Short Dot on the Vickers Tactical site.  I was with Larry during the 2002 S