Bar-Sto is Moving Out of Commifornia

Bar-Sto Precision Machine, is a company in California that makes pistol barrels, and does gunsmithing work on 1911/2011 pistols, 870 shotguns, Glocks, Springfield XDs, and AR rifles.  It looks like they are also making a metal memory-groove type grip safety for Springfield XD pistols.

Irv Stone, current owner of Bar-Sto credits the tax situation in California as the motivation for the move.  There's no mention of the gun laws in Cali, but I imagine that's a part of it too.

According to the "Views and Reviews" column in the June 2010 issue of American Rifleman, the move is scheduled to take place sometime in the first half of 2010.

Concealed Carry Poll - Connecticut Courant

Link to Connecticut Courant poll on concealed carry.

Should Connecticut Allow Open Carrying Of Guns?
Should Connecticut continue to allow people to carry permitted handguns openly?

• Yes. We allow people to own guns after going through a screening process, so why not let them have their holstered guns in plain sight?

• No. When a private citizen walks into a public place with a handgun visible for all to see, it can create a sense of fear or intimidation -- or something worse.

• Not sure

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-poll-open-carry-handguns-0417,0,5186935,post.poll

April 19th, Day of "The Shot Heard 'Round The World"

I just turned April 19th, here on the east coast, about an hour ago.  April 19th is the anniversary of "The Shot Heard 'Round The World," the event usually credited with starting the American Revolution.

The British Army were ordered to collect and destroy firearms and other supplies stored by the militia in Concord, Mass.  Long story short, the Militia fought back, and defeated three companies of British Army regulars at Concord, and then some.

The "Shot Heard 'Round the World," was fired in Lexington, though the exact story is unknown, with both sides having coming up with different version of what happened.

Most would agree that when the British regulars came into Lexington, on the morning of April 19, 1775, Lexington militiamen, who had been warned of what the Brits were coming to do, came out of a local tavern into the common to watch the regulars, along with a few dozen other locals.

The leader of the militia was Captain John Parker.  Below is what he swore to after the fight:

I ... ordered our Militia to meet on the Common in said Lexington to consult what to do, and concluded not to be discovered, nor meddle or make with said Regular Troops (if they should approach) unless they should insult or molest us; and, upon their sudden Approach, I immediately ordered our Militia to disperse, and not to fire:—Immediately said Troops made their appearance and rushed furiously, fired upon, and killed eight of our Party without receiving any Provocation therefor from us.

The leader of the British regulars was Lieutenant William Sutherland.  Sutherland reportedly called out, "lay down your arms, you damned rebels!"

Well, they certainly didn't, and someone fired a shot, and all hell broke loose.

Wikipedia - "The Shot Heard 'Round The World"
Wikipedia - The Battles of Lexington and Concord

"Odd Angry Shot: Pause and Remember the 19th of April, 1775," Guns Magazine, April 2010, by John Connor.

Connor writes:

Historians tell us only about 3 percent of colonials actively fought as patriots in the Revolution, supported by about 1/3 of the population.  One-third sat it out, remaining neutral.  Another 1/3 were British loyalists, and in fact, toward the end of the war, more loyalists were fighting for King George and revolutionaries were fighting for their new nation.  Against all odds, the 3-percenters prevailed.
Sometimes great deeds are done by the few, the committed.  This 19th of April, let us remember those few, those brave, those 3-percenters.

More on Three Percenters

Not All AR Parts ARe Created Equal

They look pretty much the same don't they?  I didn't think there was a difference.  I haven't used my Model 1 upper in a few years, I guess.  Not fully trusting the charging handle, I put it in the Kuehl rimfire upper, and used the charging handle I got from the rimfire upper with a 5.56mm LMT upper.

The Kuehl uppers use a Jonathan Arthur Ceiner rimfire conversion kit with the chamber adapter milled off, and a custom made rimfire barrel.  Just by the way.

If you look a little closer, you can see that the channel on the underside, for the gas key, is shorter on the Model 1 charging handle.  The rimfire conversion kit ran through two 27-round mags with the Model 1 charging handle before the rimfire bolt raised enough of a burr to stop the bolt from cycling.

Upon closer inspection, the locking tab is also bent.  Not sure when that happened, or if it came that way.

Closer, side-view, of the burr that brought my shooting session with the rimfire upper to a screeching halt.

Bushmaster ACR Review on AR15.com

Link to thread, ACR Observations.

Some new information and detail photos.  Interesting.


Another thread, by Ghetto.  Link is to page 5, where he actually gets the rifle, the first 5 pages are pretty worthless.


This is Post #250!!

UPDATE, 9/18/2010: ShooterReview comparison tests of Bushmaser ACR Basic, Robinson Arms XCR, and an Rock River Arms M4

Virtual Arsenal on Mythbusters

This week's episode of Mythbusters features a pretty wide assortment of firearms as they test the myth of bulletproofing a car with phonebooks.  It's worth checking the TV listings for repeats of this episode, I'm sure it'll be on a few times this weekend, and maybe next Wednesday.  They pretty much go all out to finally stop the SUV, and deflate the blow-up dolls (yes, really) on the inside.

They also use more explosives to test the movie myth that diving underwater will save you from being injured by an explosion.

Oh, and Kari's back (and still cute after having her baby)!  I believe this is the episode that the photo of Kari with a .50BMG rifle came from, which you may remember if you follow The Firearm Blog.

Current Status of Gun Ownership In D.C.

Again from John R. Lott, from this FoxNews article, A Gun Ban By Any Other Name...

Lott tells the story of a D.C. man, a reporter, who spent $558.69 just in fees to get approved to buy a handgun.  Besides the fees, he spent nearly 16 hours on the process, made 4 trips to the police department, went through two background checks, was fingerprinted, took a five-hour class, and had to take a written test.


Part of the Heller decision was that the D.C. laws that required all firearms to be kept unloaded and locked was deemed to be unconstitutional.  Lott says, in his blog post about the article, "that D.C. law now requires that gun owners (primarily those owning long guns) only have to store their guns locked and unloaded if minors might have access to them."

I'm afraid to make any assumptions about what Lott said in the blog post, so I will just quote him as saying, "Despite the costs, about a thousand people may have gotten handgun permits. That is only about 0.2 percent of adults living in D.C."