Magpul Shotgun

For Christmas this year, Santa Claus got me some new furniture for my Remington 870 Express a la Magpul.  I've had the shotgun for a few months now and this was the first time I've ever taken it down.  Usually I just run a bore snake through it, give the working parts a couple of shots of G96 and leave it at that.  I know some people who never clean their shotties out of principle.

I got the SGA stock and the fore end in Flat Dark Earth, and I also got the sling plate as well.

Talk about some quality parts.  I took my 870 apart with relative ease and the Magpul parts installed with such precision, you'd think they were hand-crafted.  There was no modding, no smithing, no grinding or cutting.  The old furniture came off, the Magpul stuff just slipped on.

I'm pretty happy with the feel of the new furniture, but let's see how it works out at the range.

New Toy - GSG 1911 Tactical .22LR

I finally took posession of my GSG 1911 .22LR that I purchased from www.blueline-activities.com about a month ago, haha!  It wasn't their fault as the hold up was with the CFO.  I heard that the CFO has been seeing a lot of lay-offs as with many other government departments so I can't fault them for the delay.  Either way, I was pretty happy to finally take home my new toy.  On the way home from Blue Line, I stopped in at DVC with my buddy Jay to break in the new addition to the family.

I took some really crappy pictures of the GSG here, sorry for the poor quality.  I just threw it on a rag along with my Remington 1911 R1E for comparison.

The GSG came with one mag, the fake can and an accesory rail already attached.

I thought the field strip was going to be a pain, but it turns out that the only major difference was a hex screw and an additional retaining pin.  There's a Colt Gold Cup 1911 in .22LR but that one is a bit different in that the barrel stays attached to the lower receiver after the slide is removed.  For that reason, I like the GSG better because the take-down procedure is more in line with a standard 1911 in .45ACP.

I swapped the smiley face Watchmen grips from my R1 to the GCG, but ended up reversing it back again because the notch cut out in the smiley grips isn't quite big enough to accomodate the ambi safety on the GCG.  Jay said he could dremel it out to fit so I may take him up on that offer.

So, we put about 500 rounds through it that afternoon and there was only one thing that concerned me. There was a bit of wear on the slide-lock notch that appeared to be a bit more than paint wear.  I've heard that the GSGs have a really crappy finish on the slides because they're simply painted, but it looks like the metal here is actually getting a bit mashed.  Well, I've only got 500 rounds through it and there's a year warrantee on it so let's see how this progresses.

Overall, I really, really like the GSG 1911 and the experience so far.  From the first day I saw it in person to the time I picked it up, Blue Line Activities gave some incredible service, so special thanks to Mona and Claire for taking care of me.  The customer service was friendly, informative and accomodating to my needs.  I'd definitely go back and buy more stuff from them.  It's a neat little shop and they've got lots of goodies I want.

The gun it self has so far done well also.  The slide was nice and tight, fitting almost as well as my R1.  The groups were a bit messy out of the box, but after a couple of mags later, the groups started getting a bit tighter.  I'm not sure if it was just because we were getting used to the gun, or it just needed a few rounds to break in, but by the end of the session, I was pretty happy with the results.  We tried Federal, CCI and Remington sub-sonic and it only got a bit finicky with the Remington ammo.  .22LR ammo is so cheap compared to .45ACP so we started experimenting with off-hand shooting.  I usually shoot right handed, but I practiced with my left and found my groups were almost as decent with my right.  I think if we had two GSG 1911s things would have gotten stupid and we probably would have tried duellies.

Anyway, no issues surfaced after my first day with the gun that owners typically experienced in the past.  When I stripped the gun, I found that it came with the plastic guide rod (I heard the metal one was prone to breaking) as well as the clear budder disc rather than the rubber one that was prone to cracking.  The only concern I have is the wear I noticed in the slide-lock notch.  It looks like it's more than just paint, and my guess is because the slide isn't steel, but we'll see over time.

Looking forward to a lot more happy (and cheaper) days at the range!

Yoroi of the 21st century

I study a Japanese sword art called iaido and I made this sword stand for one of my swords.  Anyway, I was cleaning my stand and remembered seeing a picture of an AR on a similar sword stand so I wanted to see if mine was strong enough to hold up my AR, and it is:

I have swords, but don't have any yoroi (armour), but I do have a bit of kit of a modern-day soldier so I tried to peice it together in the fashion that yoroi is usually displayed.  It's not perfect as the helmet is in the wrong place, but meh, it's close enough.

Haha, I should get in my kimono and hakama one of these days and take some pictures with my AR.

At PCDHFC

I installed a new scope onto my M14, and my buddy Mok just installed a rail system on his so we went up to PCDHFC to zero the new scopes, but neither of us had any luck.  I guess the mounts needed a bit of massaging so it was back to the drawing board.  I was so pissed I didn't even bother taking pics of my rifle.

I got my Remington 1911 R1 out and blew off some steam.  Sadly, my 1911 shot better than my M14.  This was at 50 meters.  Talk about dumb luck, managed to pull of a shot dead-centre.....I know, it will probably never happen again in my lifetime.

Didn't have any issues with my Norc CQ-A

Oh yeah, this blog was originally about my Jeep

My Jeep's been sorta acting up the last few months where the tranny would slip a bit if I was too hard on the gas.  Three of my pals helped me out in this department.  Jay and Justin were both under the truck for about 8 hours trying to yank the think in my driveway.

Let's just say there was a lot of cursing and hurling of wrenches and insults.

A few days after they got the tranny out, it was off to my pal Roy for a rebuild.  He had the thing apart, cleaned and half-way reassembled in under three hours.  It was like watching a surgeon at work, you had to have been there.  The thing was covered in an inch of mud and you could barely find the bolts, but it was barely a hindrance for him. 

Apparently, it's bad if these discs have metal exposed....it means their worn out.

He had the parts so cleaned, I thought it would be a shame to reinstall the tranny back onto my filthy truck.

Roy playing with the "widow maker"

These were just a few of the parts he removed from the transmission.  There were like a thousand pieces all over the workbench and he had the order all in his head.  I was getting a headache just thinking about what order they were supposed to be in.

At DVC with the shotties

My buddy Jay after he sent a bit of anger at the target sheet.

My buddy Justin giving birth to a brand new fireball.

Me trying something I saw in a Magpul video...I watch wayyyyy to many of those.

Shooting in Squamish