Been doing some tactical shooting lately...my thoughts on guns gear and shooters

[Spock]

Lately I've been participating in a local tactical rifle competition. I've shot the match 3 times now over the last few months. Sundays match also involved pistols. I've had alot of things going through my brain of late and i wanted to share and discuss them.

1. AR-15s. WTH? I don't get it. These things are the dominate rifle in these competitions yet at every match, on every squad I'm on, these things malfunction. I don't get it. I never had the myriad of issues I've seen others experience with this rifle. I can't believe I was some how lucky when I ran these rifles. I've seen pretty much every malfunction to date so far usually on the same day. Double feeds, FTE, FTF and operator error. the only malf I've experienced was a short stroke while moving which was quickly taking care of by racking my bolt. Some of its obvious. If you have a $2k AR with a tone of mag pul stuff on it and are dressed to the nines in tac gear seriously do yourself a favor.....don't stick 25 year old worn out gi mags in the rifle. Your rifle will work alot better. If you have a cheap no name ar-15 build and your mag pouch is your back pocket....don't feed it steel cased ammo. pounding out THE VERY 1st CASE fired in the rifle over at the safety table is not a good indication of reliability.

2. gaming. WTH? yeah I know you want to win. but at what cost? the cost I see is making un sound equipment choices. Some of the guys are like me. They show up and run their duty/shtf/working gear. Some army guys did that a couple of matchs back. they came out decked out in their actual fighting gear. these guys in my opinion "get it". They've been shot at before and are out to have fun but also to keep their skills honed up with live ammo. But alot of these guys are in it for the "game". Alot of the guys show up with a couple of belt mounted mag pouchs and no plate carrier/flc/chest rig. This is how they shoot and train. 2 or 3 mags and no gear on their chest. What are they going to do when the SHTF fan and they seriously need to 1, carry more than 3 mags, 2 need to strap on a pack to carry the rest of the gear they now need? they are setup both physically and mentally for a close in short duration gun fight but not to go out and patrol for a few miles or work with or engage a group.
One of the guys shoots a 10 inch SBR. He's real good but....that things fireball in daylight is blinding. at night i can only imagine the night blindness to the shooter and never mind the enemy. everyone within 3 blocks range can see you when you touch that thing off. it would be like having a strobe light attached to your rifle.

3. pistols are pretty reliable...as long as they aren't 1911s. I'm sorry but every time i go to match be it this or uspsa I always see 1911s fail to function well. One of our shooters Sunday had ruger p89 he paid $200 for and it functioned 100%. Another guy had a Springfield 1911 loaded that i know goes for $800 because my friend has the same one. it jammed several times during the course. the 1911 on our squad was the only one that didn't function 100%. we has 2 sigs, 1 HK , my CZ-75, a glock and a ruger. all those guns worked 100%.

4. money does not equal skill and gun fighting training does not equal marksmanship. One of the stages had a texas shooting wheel that we had to engage with our pistol. if you've never shot at one of these its challenging. this was my 1st time shooting at one. However I have alot of experience shooting USPSA steel targets. I cleared the wheel quickly and the 2 other steel targets 7 targets total and i used 12 rounds. not too bad having never shot at one of these things. Watched a guy with an $800 USP run through all his mags before he got all the targets. Watched the guy with the $200 ruger clear the wheel even faster than I. The usp guy has been to training classes. the ruger guy hasn't. Me? USPSA.

5. short brained vs long brained and why both are dangerous mind sets. Over the last 2 years I've attended 3 appleseed shoots and now have been taking close range tactical training and have been as previously stated shooting short range tactical matches. I have encountered 2 opposing and in my opinion danger mindsets. Mindset number 1. long range brain. This is the fred's appleseed crowd. They train for distance shooting. their mantra is the rifleman and his quarter mile (500 yards). The problem is they think this is all they need. They think some future war/insurrection/shtf situation is going to involve them shooting solely at distance. they can't see the need to for shorter range tactical training. Mean while there is the short ranged brains. These are the guys at these tactical shoots. they can't see the need to engage a target past 25 yards. One of them one day says how he'd like a scar heavy with a 16 inch barrel. My response was "you loose alot of velocity with .308 shortening the barrel" his response "so its not like I'm going to shoot anyone past 30 yards". I was pretty much left flabbergasted. These two mindsets can't see the need for a skill set that involves being able to drop prone and hit a target 400 yards away and then pop up , do a tac reload, and then pie a corner, shoot left side or right side or transition to pistol. Neither mind set accepts the other as being valid or acceptable. I believe in both skill sets. both are in my opinion necessary skill sets to be worked on and honed. why limit yourself? you aren't going to dictate how a shtf situation occurs you probably won't be able to dictate how a gun fight occurs either.

what do you guys think? whats your experience? discuss.

[Matt In Oklahoma]

My experiences have been the same at competitions with the handguns. I am taking alot of heat from the 1911 magnetic holster crowd for my stock glock and blackhawk serpa holster but when I show them video that I shoot it gets real quiet.
On the rifles I see the same but I have no issues with my AR or even the steel cased ammo. If I did it would either get fixed or get gone. Older mags work well with good springs (mine are from wolf) but folks are 2 busy hanging name brands & looking cool to be fixing real issues.
I did a steel competition shoot with shotguns a while back and one guy who "was gonna help me and my son" told me to use an open choke and shoot between the targets on 3&5 and 7&10. I told him to ...... and we were using a full choke and would be making solid hits.
I have talked with the guys running it and to my son and explained that we may never be #1 but we are staying true to tactics. Most of these guys are not of a Warrior mindset as you and I are, so we will always have complaints. I almost quit over this but have put my ego aside to gain some experience. I run all my weapons as far as I can stretch them. My glock 9mm is shot all the time at 100yds and still has the same velocity as a .45 out of the barrel at that range. I have killed several coyotes at this distance with it. My rifle up close and out to 400 which is all I have acess to right now, I would love to stretch it on out. Train as You Fight!

[Hawkeye]

what do you guys think?

I think there is a lot of inaccurate generalizations that get repeated anymore, as well as a bunch of unfounded agenda based BS that gets spouted, by a lot of people.
I think there are a lot of people who are going to be in for a rude awakening one day.
I think there are a lot of people who avoid doing what they should, and getting the tools, equipment, and gear that they should, because they are trying to avoid being given a particular label, because they dont want to be "labeled", by intentionally trying to fit into a different label. Example.... they dont want to be labeled a "gear queer", so, they go as far as they can the other direction to try and show how cool they can be by being in the "cool guy" club and just running a far lesser part/piece of equipment/load out, etc...
I think I've grown pretty tired of even beginning to try and discuss things with most people, and have given up for the most part.

Sorry, rant on my part.

To somewhat answer your question better.... any firearm that is fed with suspect mags and low grade ammo, is subject to malfunction. A low grade firearm fed with suspect mags and low grade ammo, will be even more subject to malfunction. I've seen AR's, AK's, 1911's, Glock's, and a host of other style guns that would puke within the first mag. I've seen others AR's, AK's, 1911's, Glock's, etc., such as mine, that run endlessly and one has to intentionally induce a malfunction to get any clearance drill practice in. There are always stark differences between the ones that run, and the ones that dont. I've seen it in competitions, in training, and in the gun store I worked at doing repairs.

I've seen the same exact things with gear. Its always the same...I bought brand XXXX at half the price of brand AAAA because its "just as good as". 99.9% of the time, under real use, NO, its NOT. But hey, knock yourself out. The problem is, these same folks will then pontificate about how running this type of rig or that type of belt, or whatever, is uncomfortable, doesnt work, etc. When the truth is, the piece of crap low end gear they bought is the problem, and not neccessarily the style of that piece of gear.

People have a very strong tendency to train and prepare for things, that fit what they hope will happen. They purposely avoid training for situations, that may be far harder to handle. See, in order to do that, they would have to admit to themselves, and accept, that however rare the chance may be, the day may come when they really and truly have to face a bad situation, of which the parameters are far out of their control. This upsets their fun-time hobby mental utopia and causes them to have to face a possible reality, that scares the h*ll out of them. Oh, and also because they dont want to get tagged with some icky "label".

[thereisnospoon]

Well, I think there's a lot of supposition on your part with nothing but anecdotal eveidence to support your way of thinking, but that's just off the top of my head. I am not trying to be confrontational, but you asked, so I gave you my immediate thoughts. I mean no offense other than to answer your question, "what do you guys think?"

I'll start by saying I am neither LE or .mil, but have been playing the gun games since 1999, IDPA, IPSC, Tac RIfle, etc. I am a certified Range Officer and an SO for IDPA (Expired).

I have seen a metric ton of shooters both with handguns and long guns and some of what you experience rings true everywhere. The malfunctions are usually a product opf 1 of 2 things; 1) shooter inexperience with his new gizmo(s) or 2) over modification of a basic weapons platform. There are exceptions to each rule (your cheap ammo comment being one of them...never understood a guy feeding a 1500.00 AR cheapest ammo he could find???), but for the most part, that will be your 2 primary reasons for malfs.

Training how your gonna fight sounds good, but if I am out in the field hoeing a row of beans and the huns come over the mountain, I may not have time to don my Plates and Chest Rig and may have to just grab my rifle with it's coupled mags and the spare strapped to the handguards and join the fray. As ou said, you can't predict how/when a fight will start, so I approach each match with a different gear setup that I "might" or might not use at any given time, if available. A lot of folks come as they are or want to play rambo...not everyone at each match is a prepper training for the apocolypse. SOme of them just want to have a little fun and burn some powder. I wouldn't judge someone's marksmanship, skill or intestinal fortitude based on their choice of weapons and gear.

As to the two mindsets you speak of, A lot of folks that love and cherish the Appleseed program get it, Fred just doesn't allow them to speak about it. It's one of the reasons I eventually left the program. The focus is singular and so be it if that's what Fred wants...but again, don't lump all the participants into the same batch. Fred also will not allow any type of addiitonal training, conversation or teaching about survival, preparedness or revolution, except in Historic terms. He has to keep his nose clean (in his mind) to keep the Feds at bay. As the program grows, the Feds are looking hard for any reason to terminate it.

As to the short game, I can't really answer that. Our Tactical Rifle matches consist of everything from contact distance to 300 meters, sitting standing, running, walking, and moving, twisting, bouncing and dissapearing and running targets. We also use multiple guns in some stages and this fall we're going full three gun (the range has been reluctant, but finally acquiesed).

Some of the other stuff is as true as it can be. I shoot Glocks for a reason: they go bang every time I pull the trigger...without fail. I shoot Ars and Aks and both have always functioned as long as I did my part in use and maintenance,

Keep playing, let the gamers game, let the funners have fun and you use each session to hone your skill with your equipment and mind.

[eeyore]

I believe that part of the malfunction problem people experience is because they over modify their weapons, whether it is a pistol or rifle. That would seem to be the case with what you were describing.

[Lowdown3]

I haven't had good luck at all with 2 different AR's. One of the catstrophic jams happened during a let's just say "inopportune" time. I didn't have a pistol with me.

I would urge everyone but most especially those that will use AR's to make absolutely sure you carry a pistol with you, and more than 2 mags.

I'll refrain from talking about my experiences with that specific rifle as I think a lot of folks see it as AR bashing ;)

[protus]

I'll bash em if ya want ;p

SGL- like any prep- shooting is one imho. Balance is key. Having both the skill and tools necessary to make solid hits at 5 yards and 200 is key. Once you specialize in only "one" spot you are now more prone to failure.
Since shooting. In the means we talk about will for sure be a split second life/death moment i dont think anyone should over look any thing, and should work on making sure there are no "gaps" in that prep.

Like hawks comments on gear and limiting your training to fit your "exertion" level. reality is gonna suck for everyone, its better to be ahead of the curve now than behind it.

ps: most guys that shoot those things go to look cool going fast for scores......they arent in the mindset that most of us that prepare are....it's a "hobby" for most of them.

[Hawkeye]

....it's a "hobby" for most of them.

One of the top two WORST words, ever to be associated with prepardness, and especially the 2nd Amendment. :mad:

[Templar]

I haven't had good luck at all with 2 different AR's. One of the catstrophic jams happened during a let's just say "inopportune" time. I didn't have a pistol with me.

I would urge everyone but most especially those that will use AR's to make absolutely sure you carry a pistol with you, and more than 2 mags.

I'll refrain from talking about my experiences with that specific rifle as I think a lot of folks see it as AR bashing ;)

Hater......

[protus]

One of the top two WORST words, ever to be associated with prepardness, and especially the 2nd Amendment. :mad:

i agree 100%

[Lowdown3]

Hater......

I remember some other guy that didn't believe me about them, till HIS went down also. ;) Actually I remember quite a few examples of that.... :)

[Klayton]

let me throw my two copper pieces into the kitty...

I own 3 1911s and have never had a failure using quality ammo
(exception, my S&W .45 is touchy with hollowpoints, so I had to have it tweaked, no problems now)

ARs, as I always told my Soldiers under me, 99% of malfunctions is caused by Operater Head Space & Timing (just military slang for saying operater error)
I do like the new piston ARs from H&K, I believe you can youtube their reliability testing, very impressive

Only fired 3 AKs ever, so can't say either way there...

As for short range vs long range... I am a firm believer in neutralizing any threat as far away as possible, but I also know that handguns have a VERY important purpose. You are out working the field, and next thing you know two baddies are charging from the forest line, now is not the time to be pulling out your .308 with scope. =)

May I add, when SHTF.......


everyone will have choices to make on what they will do....There are legal means to have certain things now pre event. What folks will do "post" event is anyones guess...till then lets not get to much into what should be done to certain tools of the trade ok....thanks- P

[protus]

I remember some other guy that didn't believe me about them, till HIS went down also. ;) Actually I remember quite a few examples of that.... :)

when i see an Ar that doesnt have issues i'll buy a kifaru pack..........maybe ;p

[Hawkeye]

Better get your money ready.

[Klayton]

OMG Protus censored my post.... you politician!!!

=)~