Hiro's Storage Unit

Watchmen

2008-07-20T12:39:00.000-07:00

Growing up I was not a traditional comic nerd. I enjoyed more the short form stories that came in the form of graphic Novels. One that stands above many others if The Watchmen.
I found in it's pages the themes and questions that would be of huge influence to me in my life.
I could see the world of The Comedian, Rorscach, and Dr. Manhattan in my own world. Granted minus the masked heros.

I say it is one of the works that changed my life.
I have it on my bookshelf next to 1984.

I have hope for Zak snyder.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/herocomplex/2008/07/new-watchmen-tr.html

Heller Stands!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-06-26T08:12:00.001-07:00

The Second Amendment is an individual right.
Let it be carved in stone and shouted from the rooftops.

Well let the real fight begin.
Read the opinions here:
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/07-290.pdf
Like I stated earlier we will get some guns but welcome ammo bans.

GET ACTIVE PEOPLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Local activism will matter more as I see this getting kicked into
the state and local arenas. Let your local government know how you
vote and what you feel about individual rights.

Let's not as gun owners get too complacent.

But tonight raise a glass and enjoy the victory.

I think I am going shooting this weekend in celebration.

DC V Heller My predictions

2008-03-19T10:58:00.000-07:00

Here is the transcript:
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/07-290.pdf
find the audio yourself.

Ok after spending 5 hours reading and listening to the arguments I have come to the following predictions.

It will be a 5 to 4 split for Heller. DC will lose it's gun ban, yet they will cook up other restrictions to make it really hard to get a firearm and there will continue to be storage restrictions.

In the big picture the decision will state that "reasonable restrictions" are constitutional. With the central theme that the right to keep and bear arms is one of an individual.

Effects that blanket bans on types of guns will go away in their current form. They will pop up again in new creative gun banning ways.

LIKE AMMO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is the next one. Ok so you want that FN MAG you can have it but due to various restrictions it is going to cost you $10 a round.

I used the FN MAG as an example but I highly doubt that machine guns and destructive devices are going to be touched. I know the high dollar machine gun dealers (I am looking south to vegas) are shitting themselves at the idea of $800 m-16s. The NFA of 34 and 68 will stand along with the 1986 ban on registration of new machine guns. So basically the title 2 firearms will remain in their current legal designation.

I hope I am wrong here but I see very little coming from this ruling IF they rule in favor of Heller.

One can wish.

Fresh tritium in an UPO-2-1, 1P29 optic.

2008-01-30T07:45:00.000-08:00

Why I bought this optic I am not sure. The UPO-2-1 is the made for the civilian copy of the russian 1P29.
I'm not really sure how it is different but I suspect that it has to do with export laws and the such. All of that aside it is a copy of the British SUIT that road atop many an L1A1. It is not the standard tube optic as it has a periscope of sorts and a maze of mirrors inside of it. Very typical of a british design. One can feel the Island Victorian influence on the sight.
Then there is the russian copy of it. well, it is russian. Simplified and basic in execution and the finish on it is the typical "hammered grey". I have taken it out and shot it quite a bit on a new AK 74 build and it does it's job well. I dispensed with the rubber eye cup since I find them silly and it makes it hard to get a good sight picture with glasses on and we are all supposed to be wearing eye and ear protection right?

So here it is on the rifle before I finished it. As you can see i am using a cheekpiece on the stock so I dont have to "turkey neck" to get a good sight picture.

Like I stated the optic has the potential to have an illuminated reticle. So I remove the vial holder and find that while it did not have any tritium in it there was nothing that kept me from installing a light source.

So, time to find tritium. Man you can get everything on ebay. So I wait a week and 2 6 mm tritium vials.

I realized that the vials would be a bit long for the holder, so Dremel to the recsue.

I really did not want to shoe horn 2 glass vial full of a radioactive isotope so a little grinding is fine.
Then I packed the vial holder with an amount of white hobby putty.

Before the putty setup I crammed 2 green vials of tritium into it. I know one would do but being a believer in overkill.
Why not??????

I let cure for a day and then I reinstalled into the optic.
Here is what the reticle looks like in the day.

Now the really bad pic, if you look close you can see the hint of green.

As I locked myself in the laundry room the tritium was fair to medium. So I busted out the ELCAN I have and wow it is bright compared to it.
So this thing needs to have 300 or so rounds through it to make sure the vials will not move but they seem like they are pretty secure.

kinda cool huh?

Free Brass

2007-12-11T12:01:00.000-08:00

I recently attended a PSD class. I was able to beg the head firearms instructor to give me some of the leftover brass.
Man free brass is better than free beer.

I got it all cleaned and sorted.
Turns out I got:

5 gallon bags of LC 556
3 gallon bags of HSM 223
150ish rounds of 45s
75 match 308s
6 gallon bags of 9mm nato
30 live rounds of APIT 50
22 empty 50s

here is the before pic

Range report for NFA FNC

2007-12-11T09:56:00.000-08:00

Well the FNC has been here for a few months but aside from the blasting trip to test function I have not had a chance to shoot it properly. Until now.

Well the Belgian guys who put this thing together did a great job. Er Kinda....

Function,

This thing runs great. I did my typical run with 2 mags loaded with various ammo. It was a mix of commercial, mil surp, and a few reloads. On auto and semi it worked without a hitch. It ran everything just fine. It was fun to listen to the rate of fire change on the auto mag dump. I even tried a full mag of WOLF lacquer coated ammo. It ran fine but the gas regulator needed to be bumped to the "adverse" setting. So in all it runs great.

Accuracy,

Well as I sat in the blowing cold winds the sights were typical FN. Seems to be a direct copy of those found on an FN FAL. They work well enough giving me a solid 2 inch group at 100 yards. Now that would be shit in my book usually but there is a kicker here. The trigger is HORRID!!!!!!!!!!!! It is a 2 stage that has a great action and is smooth, however it is damn heavy. I called up a buddy of mine who has quite a bit of time working on these and he told me that it is a quick easy fix that can be cured with a little work. However I am kinda hesitant to go bending springs on my rifle with out extras on hand. Looks like vulcan imports will be getting some of my money considering they are the only people who have parts for the FNC.

Ergonomics,

Pretty good overall except for the manipulation of the safety selector. The Angle of the FN pistol grip which is right off of an FAL makes reaching the selector with the thumb of the right hand hard. This can be cured with a purchase of a TAPCO SAW grip. Plus I think it looks cooler. In addition I feel the fixed stock is a bit long for my needs. I guess i can find a junked out FAL stock and cut it down and make it work.

The Future for this thing,

Aside for the afore mentioned improvements that I listed I am going to ad an optic. It seems that the FNC has only one super reliable mount available in the US. A B&T made by the swiss and marketed in the US by DS Arms. I would like to throw an extra ELCAN I have sitting around on it but who knows if it will clear the rear sight or perhaps it will be too high for a good cheek weld.

Overall I like this thing quite a bit.

Rivets are so 19th Century, Home built AKs

2007-08-31T23:48:00.000-07:00

Damn finally! I have done quite a few Saiga mods and debanned a few AKs.
However, I never finished a build. Well I guess building from a completed NOdak spud frame is almost a whole build.
It was a tantal kit.

Costs:
tantal kit shipped from gunthings $234
hotbarrel piston $15
Nodak frame $96
FFL transfer $25
g2 $25
baseplate for mag. Already had it
tools ,well way too many hours welding grinding and sweating.
So $400 ish into a rifle.

See I got into the kit collecting and building thing way too late. Well actually I had a few kits before I just was way too busy to build anything. I find that if I know I have to invest a lot of energy into building tools and such I put off the project.

The demil and build went pretty smooth, I kinda crunched the rivets a bit and then one hole on the frame had to be reamed a bit. I do also need to open up the magwell ever so slightly because only half of my mags go in really smoothly. To do the rivets I am using a set of modified bolt cutters which work ok. I would love to get a fancy ak builder rivet tool, however I am giving Curtis too much of my money anyway. The headspace was good and cycles and all. Of course the real test is how it groups on paper.

I think I am going to start into bending my own flats so this will probably be the only build like this. So there goes another $200 plus bones to Curtis at www.akbuilder.com.
headspace was good and cycles and all.
My next build is a Full stock Bulgarian ak-74 build and I will do a detailed step by step for that one and post it here.

Lastly a pic of it with last week's project, the Saiga 12. I did a very basic pistol grip conversion to this. I got to practice my welding on this. Man my welding foo is weak.
Next project will be heavy in detail. For all 3 of you that read this blog.

The Battle Rifle

2007-08-22T12:28:00.000-07:00

While I have shot and enjoyed many firearms my favorite is the battle rifle. When I say battle rifle I mean a rifle firing full power ammo in a semi automatic format.
Full size/power ammo in calibers such as:
308 win or 7.62X51mm Nato
7.62X54mmR
30/06
8mm Mauser
etc.
I guess many people will argue about what exactly qualifies as a BR but here are a few in my mind.
FN-49 in its many chamberings
M1 Garand
FN FAL
SVT
M14 or M1A
HK G3 or HK91

I own a few great ones, I have an FN FAL clone that is my knock around in the truck rifle. It will eat any ammo I put through it. I just recently just shot the last of my slightly tarnished mixed up, and stomped on Israeli surplus that I picked up from century in the 90s. I think I had 10k of that stuff but, at $50 shipped in a 50 cal ammo can one cannot be too picky.
These rifles can do everything that you want. You can hunt damn near any game on this continent with them. In the military arena you can task them as a Designated Marksman rifle (DMR). In my opinion they are great rifles to shoot NRA high power competitions. In fact when was younger there was a guy at my local club who would smoke many of us with an FN-49 in 7mm argentine. IIRC. Plus the simple fact they are just fun to shoot.

My current project is rehabbing a Polytech M14s. It is a great rifle and it never suffered from the soft bolt problems that I feel were mostly made up bull shit from gunwriters. More to the point Polytech never really set up a media PR organization here in the states. While Springfield Armory has one and well you draw your own conclusions. Don't get me wrong I am not bashing Springfield one of the only rifles I miss is an M1A bush rifle I sold in 1998 that was amazing in how accurate it was.
If you doubt the commie versions of this rifle just give Ron Smith or Tim Straight a call and ask them. If you have no clue who they are well google is your friend.
Back to this rifle, it is a Polytech that I fitted (well Tim Straight did) with a GI bolt, trigger group, and I have it sitting in an Ugly E2 stock. I left the original chrome lined barrel, op rod, and gas cylinder. My next step is to fill in the FA selector, bed the action to the stock, fit a standard recoil pad to it and then paint it somehow.

Of course this has been an ongoing project for me due to the fact I have over 11 guns in various stages of what I consider completion.

Now this next part is the one where I will piss many of you off.

The Battle rifle I dislike the most is the G3. The delayed roller lock system is horrible for a civilian shooter. It destroys the brass, due to the fluted chamber. Yes you can reload it but it reduces the life of them plus it makes it ugly. Very few ways to mount optics. (big one for me) The recoil is greater than others due to the method of operation. Plus my biggest complaint is it is a bitch to clean. I have a fetish for clean guns and the roller block system is not compatible with that. All that being said the G3 is almost AK reliable. Plus the system in use for a subgun ala the MP5 is amazing.

Why I love the AK.

2007-08-21T07:34:00.000-07:00

Maybe it was reading my fathers old issues Soldiers and Soldier of Fortune in the 80s. Or watching all of the shcloppy 80s flicks in cable.
I have made the effort to always have a few AKs. I love them all. IN the past I have had at least 12 of them, which in this age of the home builder is way too few. Yet I always find myself trading or selling them off.

this is my favorite one

I bought this one in 98ish and did an early pistol grip conversion with a kit from Wes at SoupBowl enterprises. It was silly looking but in the days before historically accurate compliance parts were around. The Romanian CUR 2 was one of the first of the AK-74 type rifles to hit the market. It was a wet dream for me to have a rifle that fired the "poison bullet" that I had read about for so long.

The cool thing was that this rifle was accurate with the Barnual ammo that came with it. While shooting it at the gun club I was able to get a solid 2 inch group at 100 yards.

I then traded it off to a buddy of mine and he added the folder to it and and was trying to get it authentic looking. After that he borrowed $500 from me and gave me the rifle to hold if he didn't pay it back. One night in April of 05 I get a call asking me to make it to his house and stay with his sister since he had just shot himself. So this makes this rifle as my most expensive AK. Not only did it cost me $500 in cash it also cost me the best shooting partner I ever had.

So kind of, in honor of him I returned it to its Rommy military glory.

As to my other AKs I have a Saiga 12 that I did a pistol grip conversion to. This is the only AK I am going uber tacticool on. I am going to add an ACE folder and a rail for a flashlight. With the AGP 10 round mags it sure makes one feel good and secure in a middle of the night call out.

THEN THERE WERE KITS....
Well I ran out of time during the early days of the AK kit building maddness. I bought and sold a few but nothing I really wanted. But here is what is on the block for builds.

Polish Tantal, have kit
Bulgarian full stock 74, have kit
Romanian Non G full stock, have kit
East german copy, using a g rommy kit have furniture
pistol build, Not sure if I will buy a rommy champion or cut up a kit.
krink, I have a handguard.

I was thinking that I really need a left folding 74 but man I doubt I will get one as a kit due to the rise in kit prices. I may as well just buy a complete rifle.

I will post details on some of my builds in the next few months.

ComicCon 2007

2007-07-30T09:56:00.000-07:00

I was down in Southern Cal last week on a detail and I was finished working early Friday. As luck would have it ComicCon was going on and I had a buddy down there who had been there for two days already.
Well it was amazing, as my friend Jordan put it it is "Burning Man" for the nerd crew. It start off with I only had one afternoon there so I did not get a chance to see any panels, advance screenings, or actually look at the comic tables.
What I did do:
1 Made a run through artists alley and spoke to many artists that were cool as hell.
2 Got a chance to talk guns with Lou Ferrigno. He was so proud of his new Barret 416 cheyanne. I think I got him a bit miffed when I told him that well at least it is close to a fifty.
3 watched many fans get dressed up as their favorite characters. I guess I must have missed all of the really trick costumes, granted it was late in the day and I guess the rubber and latex gets hot and sticky. One small aside while I am very eager to see the results of your heavy cosplay work, make sure that you remotely fit into your costume. Not just borrow one from your very thin friend.

All together it was a great afternoon. I really want to make it there next year for the whole thing. My wife is course registering her complete objection. She states that our child will be around then and she doesn't want the kid to be exposed to the nerd virus! I guess she has a point the young child's immune system will be weak but I guess exposure will have it's benefits.
I did not get many pics (due to having only a crappy phone on me) but the two I have are of a Zombie mob outside of the CC. One illustrates that Zombies do obey traffic laws and always wait for the walk icon to be lit.

I will have to lift some of my buddies pics and post them here.
After the Con the downtown San Diego nightlife was in full swing. There was even a sign on one nightclub that read "Geeks welcome".
Pretty girls were in abundance and so were the masses of the socially inept males.
If you have even a hint of geek in you, ComicCon would be a great place to spend a day.

Zombies aren't they fun.

And they said my Dillon was a waste of cash

2007-07-06T22:05:00.000-07:00

I guess it was my Dad who got me started reloading. As early as I can remember I was always having to pick up brass. It always bothered me as a kid since all you really want to do is shoot not spend the afternoon looking for the last 12 empty 9mms. I remember wondering if it will ever pay off.

Well in these days of almost $400 per case of 308 win. I think it just did. I made a choice early on around age 19 that I was going to be a reloader. Nothing fancy just mainly pistol ammo and maybe a single caliber of rifle ammo. Well here is what that has evolved into.

At the age of 31 I am a full reloading addict. I have made attempts to keep it under control a bit. I have refused to have anymore than 2 presses. I have almost picked up another 650, but alas I do not have the real estate for it.

I am going to get back into competition soon so I need masses of ammo for that. It sounds like the local club will be having a few 3 gun matches so I will fall into needing both rifle and pistol ammo.

So here is a test run of some 223.

Grand total of 30 minutes getting the charge to what I want and then just crank them out.
I hope I get a chance in the next month to test out quite a few "maybe" loads but I never stop experimenting.
For example:

This is my answer to the $1.10 per round Hornady TAP ammo. Granted I didn't break out the brass blackener like they did. I can handle my ammo not being "tacticool" plus this stuff hits damn close to my iron sight zero in my M14 clone. Two inches closer than TAP hits.
Mine are slower than the TAP but not buy much. This is going to be my coyote hunting ammo this summer.
Just another part of the shooting addiction.
hiro

Form 3 complete!!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-07-06T08:34:00.000-07:00

Well the form 3 is complete and it is on it's way to my dealer. This is a FN factory FNC with a Curtis Higgins registered sear in it.
This presents the fact that there will be many hours shooting this in the desert and many hours sitting in front of my Dillion XL 650 trying to feed it. I have been wanting another NFA item for a while. I think that this will cool my heels for a while. That is until I want to put suppresors on everything. But dropping $200 on each item for the NFA tax seems a bit much. So this leaves me with the task of loading or buying .223 or 5.56 for this. I have a few cases of Malay surplus from back when I was in my teens (man was it really that long ago) that was purchased at $105 shipped for a 50 cal can of 860 rounds. And I used to think that was high priced ammo. Man, how things have changed in the past 8 years.