The Firearm Blog

I live down in the Arizona low desert, not really the sort of place where we are eager to add extra layers to clothing during the summer. Whenever possible, I prefer to open carry – it gets the gunout away from my body and makes my big ol’ steel heater much more comfortable. Of course, open carry is not always legally or socially permissible, so I have a backup IWB holster to use instead – a Galco Summer Comfort. It always worked well enough, so I never spent much time looking to replace it.

Well, it’s been replaced now, that’s for sure. I got one of the new Onyx IWB holsters from StealthGear, and it’s pretty awesome. I was going to try to keep this review cool and professional, but I am just really pleased with pretty much every aspect of this thing. But, ahem! Let me make an effort at neutral objectivity…

Materials

The Onyx is a “hybrid” holster, made form a combination of materials. Typically the choices for a holster are leather (if you’re old fashioned), nylon (if you’re cheap), o

Safariland introduced a new, inexpensive option for mounting a white light on your handgun.  The Rogers’ Rail Light mounts to most accessory rails on modern handguns, and is supposed to be easy and fast to put on or take off.

The Rogers’ Rail Light is designed to work with a Microstream flashlight made by Streamlight.  The Microstream is included in the Rogers’ Rail Light package.

The Mircrostream is not a very bright flashlight compared to many of the 200+ lumen tactical lights that are on the market.  However, it is very compact and inexpensive, yet still uses quality construction to make it water resistant and impact resistant.  It puts out only 28 lumens with a single AAA battery.

MSRP for the Rogers’ Rail Light is $48, which is substantially cheaper than many gun-mounted light options on the market.

Now we all love TFB for its motto “Firearms Not Politics,” and so I will stick to the factual details of these one-of-a-kind 1911s made by the folks at Cabot Guns. These are just too unique and have to be shown outside the confines of SHOT Show.

On the left, we have a left-handed Jones Deluxe with a scrimshaw engraving of Piers Morgan on one grip, and of President Barack Obama on the other.

On the right, we have a Jones Deluxe with a scrimshaw engraving of Ted Nugent on one grip, a

Remember that AR57 upper from Safir Arms from last week? Well when I was wandering around the 2014 SHOT Show I ran into Blackheart International (BHI) who was showing off their second gen AR57 rifles, which are a full pound lighter then their first gen AR57 rifles. The actual AR57 upper chambered in the FN 5.7x28mm round is produced by AR Five Seven at 57Center.com and BHI pairs them with their own lowers. BHI has them available in a few various configurations. The Mil-Spec2, their entry level rifle with a 16″ fluted barrel and mil-spec Gen 2 lower with a total weight of 6.15lbs. The S2, a lighter version with 16″ fluted and free floated barrel, Magpul CTR collapsible stock, Geissele Super Dynamic Combat trigger, Stark SE-1 pistol grip, and Wolff springs with a total weight of 5.91lbs. Both the Mil-Spec2 and S2 are available in SBR configurations as well with 12″ barrels and all their rifles also

Check out this interesting bump sled that the Slide Fire folks made as a concept. They were getting feedback from SHOT Show attendees, and like good gunnies, they provided plenty of feedback.

What kind of improvements would you make? Post your ideas in the comments, there’s a good chance the SlideFire folks will see them

SHOT Show was crazy. So many people to see, so many guns to handle and not nearly enough time to do it all. This year SHOT `14 was the best organized SHOT I have attended. Despite having a record 67,000 people in attendance, the show floor felt less crowded and chaotic than in past years. Good job NSSF.

The SHOT Show Hordes. Photo © Bryan Jones

We published 122 posts during the show, with many posts published since the show ended and many more to come. As biased as I am, I think we had hands down the best and most comprehensive SHOT Show coverage onlin

To celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Ruger 1/22 (1964-2014), Ruger ran a competition to see who could design the best 50th Anniversary Ruger 10/22 model. The winner was Gary from Michigan (whom I know is a reader of TFB, as was one of the Runners Up, Chris from TN). Gary’s design incorporated Ruger’s American-style stock, with its adjustable length of pull, a picatinny rail, flash hider, a winged post front sight and a low-profile rear aperture sight. Ruger is putting this gun into production soon and had a prototype on display at SHOT Show.

The Ruger American stock is solid and does not have that cheap polymer feeling. As a Ruger 10/22 aficionado, I

The Beretta ARX-100, the consumer semi-automatic version of the Beretta ARX-160, is going to be on sale in the USA in just a few months. Other than the lack of full-automatic fire it is almost identical to the military version and handles the same. The ambidextrous controls are easy to use. The bolt release is just in front of the trigger guard. The under barrel picatinny rail has a sleek looking handguard installed to cover it up if you are not using it.

Like many of Beretta’s contemporary firearm designs, it has an almost space-age look and I expect we will be seeing it in many movies and TV shows, like the Beretta Cx4 Storm before it. Below are photos I took of it at the Beretta SHOW Show booth …

Illicitly ‘homemade’ submachine guns feature very prominently in firearms seizures by police across South America, Brazil in particular. These weapons vary in their level of sophistication though a large number appear to be semi-professionally produced. In a recent study of over 14,488 firearms seized between 2011 and 2012 in Sao Paulo alone, 48% of submachine guns analyzed were reportedly homemade. Given the decent quality of many SMG clones, even that high statistic is probably significantly under reported.

The most frequently seized design for some time would appear to the be the model below. A workshop producing a variation among other machine pistols was the subject of a seizure by the authorities a few years back. There appear to be many variations in circulation, perhaps the design outsourced or copied by other illicit workshops. ‘Beretta – made in Italy’ is commonly seen stamped on these.

Rock River Arms is a company more well known for their AR-platform rifles, but at SHOT Show this year the company was showing off their polymer-framed 1911 pistol again.  First displayed 2 years ago as a concept pistol, and possibly to determine market interest, it appears that RRA is ready to bring the polymer framed 1911 to market.  Called the 1911 Poly this pistol aims to combine the proven 1911 design, with the lightweight benefits of modern polymer.  The company is marketing the 1911 Poly as a modern twist on a timeless design.

The 1911 Poly in its case on the SHOT Show floor.

Ashbury Precision Ordinance released their long awaited Savage 110 chassis system at SHOT this year.  The SABER FORSST system is a modular rifle chassis designed to accept Badger Ordinance, Remington 700, Defiance Machine, Surgeon, Sako, H-S Precision, McMillian and Weatherby Vanguard actions.  The new addition this year was the Savage 110/10. The chassis system is fully adjustable for length of pull, vertical recoil pad position and cheek weld height.

The chassis are made form 7075-T6 aerospace alloys, and claim to require no skim-bedding to maintain accuracy.  They also feature a modular forend system with three option available at release the Mod 1 Quattro which features a monolithic top rail, and the Mod 0 Quattro which has two 4″ picatinny rails that are user the user can place as needed.  Also available is a sporter traditional

Oakley Standard Issue, a division of Oakley, Inc has released a new lens system at the 2014 SHOT Show.  The new lens system is called Prizm, and comes in two shades, TR22 for brighter days and TR45 for lower light situations.  The lens systems are unique in that they pull out the color of targets, both steel and cardboard while they also diminish the colors of the background.

Developed in conjunction with the Army Marksmanship Unit using their direct input as to what colors they wanted to see better, Oakley was able to come up with the Prizm system.  ”The Prizm technology utilizes the adjustment or “tuning” of dyes in order to heighten specific colors as it relates to both the sport application and environment of the user.” from the Oakley SI press release.

Streamlight is introducing a new light for police use as well as campers hunters and others in need of handy small light.

The Clipmate has a strong clip on the back that can be attached to a pocket, belt, cap brim and many other places. The Clipmate uses two C4 white LEDs with 70 lumens on high and a 3.5 hour runtime. The low setting has an output of 10 lumens for 24 hours. In addition there is one red LED to preserve night vision. The output is 0.5 lumens for a runtime of 16 hours. The low setting of 0.2 lumens runs for 65 hours.

The battery is rechargeable with a built in limiter to prevent overcharging. Charging is done via a USB port in a car, laptop or other device such as an IPad. A charger is also included.

Size is 3.9 inches and weighs 1.9 ounces. The light is mounted to a pvc coated cable “neck” to target the beam where it’s needed. I was really impressed with the brightness of the light as well as the runtime especially on lower setting in white or red.

The Clipmate USB is water resistant to 1 meter. It’s also impact resistant.

This is just a very handy light with

Palmetto State Armory, the online retailer, had two prototype 1911 pistols on display which they are producing in-house. Instead of trying to compete in the low-end market, these prototypes were match grade pistols with a high level of hand finishing. I asked the company representative what the retail price would be. He replied that they had not determined pricing but because they were match grade we should expect them to be priced accordingly.

Two models were on display. One had a stainless finish, the other had a finish that looked parkerized. I am ashamed to admit I forgot to ask the rep that the

I have a little familiarity with the Lusa USA – Lusa 94 SA carbine and was interested in the next evolution of the firearm. The NiteScout comes with a polymer H&K Navy type semi-automatic trigger housing, with the markings SE for safe and semiautomatic (German Sicher and Einzelfeuer). The welds are very clean and the overall presentation exceeded my initial expectation, much better than I’ve seen on MP5 parts kit builds. The finish has a satin black powder coat with the aluminum parts hard coat anodized.

The included magazine is a standard 32 round Uzi magazine. This is an upgrade from the 28 round Lusa proprietary Uzi-like magazine. The magazine release is easy to manipulate and feels natural with a little practice. I didn’t try it left-handed on the range but tried it a few times at home afterwards and found it easy to do by feel. The charging handle is on the left side of the firearm, just forward of the magazine well. The handle is of metal construction and easy to grasp with thumb and forefinger of either hand. The selector is not ambidextrous but being H&K type, af

At their SHOT Show booth Knight’s Armament Company (KAC) had an early model Armalite AR-10 with a post-WWII night vision system on display. I do not know which night vision system this is or even if it was a production system. The scope looked similar to the M2 Infrared Sniper Scope Gen 0 and the lamp looked similar to the Active Infrared Gen 0 “20,000v” system (if it helps, the lamp is labeled MODEL X-26A). What is really interesting is that the IR lamp switch is integrated into the rifle pistol grip. To turn it on all the operator needed to do was squeeze his middle finger, not unlike the Crimson Trace laser grips today.

It’s a staple of cinema and video games, it looks cool, but as the image above from comedy action movie ‘Hot Fuzz’ reminds us, it’s mostly nonsense. We’re talking ‘dual wielding’, aka ‘guns akimbo’, or the simultaneous use of two firearms.

Mythbusters and others have experimented with its plausibility as a technique, and some have tried to trace its origins, but I don’t think anyone’s quite nailed just how old this trope is in fiction, nor established the extent to which it was actually done in history. Because it’s patently inaccurate and tends to be seen in fantastical settings, we tend to discount it as a real tactic. Let’s start there.

Pistols traditionally came in pairs, back to at least 1600, when the pistol was no more than a century old. Some

Many new 1-6x rifle scopes were introduced at the SHOT Show 2014 and one of the best among those is the new Meopta MeoStar R2 1-6×24 RD. The new Meopta 1-6×24 features a true 1x magnification, lightweight 30mm tube, daylight visible reticle illumination with great battery life and what I like the most: German Schott glass. Not a bad deal for $1595 MSRP. I always considered the top-end Meoptas are on the same level as the premium German and Austrian optics but with a lot less money.

Many TFB readers may not be familiar with the Meopta name. The company was founded in 1933 and it is one of the best optic producer

Arsenal Firearms (officially: Arsenal Firearms Group of Companies) is expecting approval from the ATF this year, of the AF-1 Strike One pistol. However, this doesn’t mean it will be available on the US market in 2014. The lucky honor will first go to Italy, where Arsenal has one of their companies, with a rough estimated price of $4,000. Sales in Italy are expected in Q4. From the link:

The Ergal Strike One will be available to the world markets from fall 2014 in limited quantities, for the very selective competition shooter and collector alike, at a street price in the 3.000 € class (4.000 USD).

The current version of the firear

Last May TFB reported the Magpul 1911 grips were coming, and thought they are on the market now, I’d yet to handle them. So I took the time to check them out at SHOT Show.

I like the look of them, though not in love with the tiny Magpul logos as texture, but function is more important. The deep cut for the thumb safety is of special importance to me with my shorter fingers. As the top photo illustrates, these accommodate well in that area.

The price of the Magpul MOE Grip Panels has dropped five dollars to $19.95 MSRP, since last I checked. At that price I consider these a great low cost option for an improved grip.