019 The SHOT Show Episode

[Gail]

The ProArms team visited the SHOT Show in Orlando, Florida.
In this episode we discuss some of the new products that we saw there.
There is some major cell phone interference in this episode. so much that we had to cut out a substantial portion of this episode.
See all the posts in this topic for more of what we saw at the show.

[Gail]

Hi Folks,


The ProArms Team is enjoying the SHOT Show. We have a big bunch down here: John, Terri, Steve, Chris Mas and Me. Our mystery member Bill is here, you’ll hear more from him once he retires from his LE job. We were joined by the freshly retired Chief of Police of Grantham NH Russ and his lovely wife Chris. Also joining us are four friends that are Active Military, Air Force, USMC (oorah) and Army. We even met up with RichardInFla that you all know from this forum.

We’ll be taking turns writing up the show each day. We will start off with Mas. This is what he wrote for his blog for Backwoods Home magazine at www.backwoodshome.com and it is used here with his permission:

 SHOT SHOW: DAY ONE

Today was the first day of the Shooting, Hunting, and Outdoor Trade Show. The main Show itself won’t actually open until tomorrow (at the Orlando, Florida Convention Center). This was Media Day, when writers for the gun magazines, the hunting and fishing publications, and the military and police journals show up at the range to test-fire the newest wares of the gunmakers.  Kinda like a wine-tasting.


Beretta has something new under the sun: the UGB25 Xcel, the first “break-open semiautomatic shotgun.” You thumb down the lever on the left side of the receiver, to “break” it like a conventional single-barrel or double-barrel shotgun. Then you close the action…and slip one more 12-gauge shell onto a loading tray on the right. Two pulls of the trigger will fire each shell from the same chamber and barrel. The rationale: the handling of a fine single-barrel trap gun with the soft recoil of a gas-operated semiautomatic shotgun. A definite “one of a kind.”


Some high points: Colt was a welcome if unexpected presence. This brand has so long refrained from advertising in gun magazines that shooters frequently ask on Internet gun forums, “Does Colt still even manufacture handguns?” Yes, they do, and their long-awaited re-issue of the Delta Elite 10mm pistol, in stainless, is finally here. The one I testfired on the Orange County Sheriff’s Academy range grouped satisfyingly at 50 yards.  They also have a “rail gun” model of their classic .45 auto pistol.


Ruger introductions include a gold-trimmed 60th anniversary version of their classic outdoorsman’s handgun, the Super Blackhawk .44 Magnum. However, the Pro-Arms Podcast (http://proarms.podbean.com) crew I was running with voted unanimously that the big Ruger hit was probably the most innovative gun we’ve seen at the show so far: the LCR (Light Compact Revolver). Designed in-house by Joe Zaik, this is the first “plastic revolver.” It’s a snub-nose .38 Special 5-shot with specially designed Hogue grips (or Crimson Trace LaserGrips, your choice) and totally new lockwork with a very smooth trigger pull, double action only with no exposed hammer. Weight is in the 13 ounce range and it is very comfortable to shoot. Suggested retail will be $525 with those sweet Hogue grips, and $792 with the Crimson Trace laser unit.


Marlin has their latest bolt-action sporting rifle engineered to where it’s only a little over $300 retail at dealers. It has earned high points from testers for its accuracy, and the price is certainly right. There’s a version of their .45/70 Guide Gun with enlarged lever loop and extended magazine, just the thing for when you’re in the thickets after grizzly bears. I saw as more useful their lever action stainless in .338 Marlin, which spits a fat 200 grain bullet at .30/06 energy, but handles almost like a .30/30 deer rifle.


Remington now owns famed AR15 manufacturers Bushmaster and DPMS, and all their wares were demonstrated side-by-side. Bushmaster’s .50 BMG (Browning Machine Gun) caliber bolt action rifle was as impressive as it sounds. DPMS has an AR15 style semiautomatic in .308 Winchester that resembles their low-priced .223 Sportical, and which in .308 will retail for under $1000.  The big news from Remington, though, was the .30 Remington AR cartridge, which is designed expressly for the AR15 platform and spits a 123 or 125 grain bullet at a velocity that far exceeds that of the 7.62X39 Russian cartridge.  It had more of a push into the shoulder than a .223 when I fired it, of course, but little more muzzle rise. (Would’ve liked to have tried it on full automatic, but no such setup was available.) Curiously, the magazines were the size of .223 20-rounders, but modified to hold only four cartridges, though we are told it will be available with high capacity magazines. It was no trick to keep four shots in an inch at a hundred yards my first two tries on the Central Florida Rifle & Pistol Club range. Lots of promise here.


Among accessories, Crimson Trace now has sights that attach directly under the barrel for Glock and Kahr pistols, resembling larger versions of the ones they make for the Ruger LCP and Kel-Tec P3AT. I shot a Kahr 9mm with one, and the shots hit directly above the red dot. EOTAC has a new line of tactical clothing designed by and for women. Sorry, couldn’t test it without cross-dressing.


More to come. Back at ya tomorrow, I hope.
 

[Gail]

SHOT Show day 2.

I am sick as a dog with an upper respiratory "something," so I'm going to post Mas' blog entry for today again, with his permission and that of the Backwoods Home magazine and website:

The Show officially opened today. I for one prefer the Orlando venue to SHOT Show’s traditional haunt, Las Vegas, where they’ll be for the next several years after this one. More room in the aisles, for one thing, less sense of being packed in like sardines.

The “miles of aisles” take their toll early on us geezers, and I still have a podcast interview to do tonight. Producer is down with a bad cold, host/moderator is stuck on the other side of the city, and I got elected to run the microphone, God help us all. Like giving a monkey an AK47…anyway, I don’t even have time to put things in alphabetical order by manufacturer tonight. So, please forgive the “potpourri” approach.

There is, overall, a definite sense of foreboding about the incoming anti-gun administration that pervades this gathering of firearms professionals. Lots of the heavy hitter gun rights players are here.  Over at Second Amendment Foundation, Dave Workman notes that while he personally feels the new administration will come in early with all guns blazing (so to speak), director Alan Gottlieb has cautious optimism that President Obama will have his plate too full to come after us from the get-go.  Time will tell.  My friends at Sabre Defence, manufacturers of one of the finest lines of AR15 rifles, are taking orders hand over fist from the attending retailers, as are their competitors.  Sabre’s Charlie Shearon told me today, “We took orders for more guns in November than we’ve sold in the last three years.”

At Taurus, CEO Bob Morrison showed off several new handguns, all geared for concealed carry and personal defense. They had on display a new little polymer frame .380 pocket pistol to compete with the hugely-in-demand Ruger LCP and the pistol it appears to have been almost cloned from, the Kel-Tec P3AT. Weight will be 10 ounces with a steel slide assembly atop its polymer frame, and a mere 8.5 ounces with Titanium slide. It will be produced in Miami and Taurus USA will be hiring some 70 new people to carry out their plans. Taurus’ biggest seller right now is their unique Judge, a revolver that can hold a .410 shotgun shell OR a .45 Colt cartridge in each of its five chambers.  The recently introduced version that takes a 3” Magnum .410 shell is now joined by a small frame revolver (the size of an S&W J-frame or Taurus’ similar Model 85 .38 snubnose) that will take .410 shells. The Judge series is particularly popular among outdoor folks who live in poisonous snake country, for obvious reasons. Second in popularity is their PT1911, a well-executed, low-price clone of the classic Colt 1911 .45 pistol.
Blog reader Erich (welcome to this place, bro!) asked about the new little SIG .380. Played with it today. It’s a scaled-down 1911 that does indeed resemble the late, lamented Colt Mustang and Pocketlite .380s. Flat metal grip panels enhance its slimness and concealability.

Smith & Wesson has sort of re-introduced the classic old K-38s to its “retro” line – I say “sort of” because the front sights and stocks aren’t quite authentic – and the .41 Magnum revolver in both the target version and the iconic 4” barrel, fixed sight Model 58 variation. A truly beloved “cult gun” among knowledgeable gun enthusiasts, the S&W .41 Magnum will earn a hearty “welcome back” from those of us who habitually carry a handgun in the outdoors.

More tomorrow…

[Gail]

I am down with an upper respiratory infection, too sick to go to the Show today and too sick to even Twitter.

Fortunately, as the Princess I have the power to command my subjects to do my work for me. So, once again, Mas' entry on the topic from his blog, with his permission and that of Backwoods Home (www.backwoodshome.com):


SHOT SHOW, DAY THREE
Just when you thought you’d seen everything…

Two days ago, I shot a plastic revolver (Ruger LCP) and a break-open semiautomatic shotgun (Beretta).  Today I came face to face with a muzzle-loader…with an electronic trigger.  When I told my significant other about it, she asked, “Isn’t that a little like a Glock at a cowboy match?” Actually, it makes a certain kind of sense. If you get a few more days to put venison in the freezer with a muzzle-loader hunting season, and tradition is NOT your motivation, anything conducive to a clean, surprise break of the trigger that sends the projectile true is in your best interest. This strange melding of Davy Crockett and Buck Rogers comes to us from CVA.

Old and new is always a theme at such “gun gatherings.” Replica 19th Century Sharps rifles, Winchesters, Peacemakers etc. are always good to see, especially with today’s prices through the roof on original antique guns.  Ithaca’s sweet, trim slide-action shotgun, which goes back to before WWII, is back in yet another incarnation. You can get the original format or one with a space-age pistol grip/thumbhole stock.

Remember the Ginsu knife from TV infomercials? There’s now an outdoorsman’s line of Ginsus.

High tech flashlights (oops, I mean “tactical illumination devices”) are burgeoning. Leatherman has a line of them now. So do a bunch of other folks. I photographed the appropriately-named Beast light from SureFire on a .50 caliber M-2 Browning machinegun.  Just the thing when night-hunting raccoons in Jurassic Park…but also, I expect, useful after dark to our young service men and women fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Telescopic sights are mature technology, but incremental advances do occur. The most significant I’ve seen at the show thus far is from Leupold, one of our Cadillac-level makers of firearms optics. Their new VX-7 scope will give extraordinary visibility in twilight. 

The best thing about these gatherings is the people. It recharges your batteries to be among folks who share your values.

In a time of recession closing in on full-blown depression, most here are saying business is great. It’s unclear how much of this is the continuing concern that the new administration will soon ban some firearms. Randy Luth, head of AR15 manufacturer DPMS, told the SHOT Show folks that his company has taken as many orders in the last month and a half as it did in all of calendar 2007.

Will put up some pictures after I get home.

[Gail]

Well, I'm croaking like a frog and can barely breathe but managed to get to the show today and get two great podcasts "in the can." In-depth interview with Justin Moon, the founder of Kahr, and an interview with the guy who markets Charter Arms revolvers and Hi-Point pistols. (Fortunately, Eric, your name did not come up. ) We have an appointment to interview Rob Leatham for the ProArms podcast tomorrow, our first world champion for a podcast, woo-hoo!

To give you an idea how hectic it is here, we could only get 5 of the 8 of us who came together this afternoon to do a "SHOT Show Podcast" for ProArms in a conference room at the Convention Center. Mas had to leave early to do a book signing.

To save time, here once again is Mas' blog entry, from the staff writer blogs at www.backwoodshome.com:



SHOT SHOW DAY 4

Burnout is setting in. Yesterday I mis-typed LCP (Lightweight Compact Pistol) when I meant to write LCR (Lightweight Compact Revolver) in reference to Ruger’s new polymer .38 snubnose. And today, the most memorable product I saw was the fixed bayonet on a Glock pistol, courtesy of Laser-Lyte.  A buddy of mine, a police academy firearms/officer survival instructor, bought one. He’s going to bring it to class as an only slightly humorous reminder of why you fight, fight, fight and never give up. Hell, I’m thinking of buying one of these pistol bayonets to cure students from shoving a pistol down the front of their waistbands…

I’m told that Navy Arms is now offering a replica Springfield 1903A4 rifle, complete with World War vintage telescopic sight, the scope being a Chinese copy.  With the new administration, it’s possible that soon, pre-WWI-vintage bolt actions like this will be the only kind of military rifles allowed. If so, this Navy Arms flashback would be a choice example. I will try to get my hands on one tomorrow.

The SHOT Show is always alive with highly skilled demonstrators. I watched world champ Todd Jarrett give a gun handling demonstration at the ParaOrdnance booth: awesome, as always. At the Smith & Wesson complex, revolver wizard Jerry Miculek joined the precise Doug Koenig and the graceful Julie Goloski-Golub for a speed demo.  Dave Sevigny, Jessica Abbate, and young Randi Rogers were signing autographs at the Glock booth – great shooters all, freely dispensing good advice to any shooter who cared to ask.  Among them all is one common thread: a lack of the arrogance we often see in superstars in other sports. It makes us all the prouder to have them as the champions of our chosen sport.

Another of the great champs is Rob Leatham, and if all goes well I’ll record a podcast with him tomorrow. Rob won many of his world championships with target pistols with triggers as light as one pound, but when I asked him this afternoon what he actually carries nowadays, he told me it was a Springfield Armory EMP 9mm with a four- to five-pound trigger pull.  He knows that target guns with target triggers belong on the range, and that on the street you need a street gun with a street trigger.

We recorded a ProArms Podcast with Charles Brown, the guy who markets low-priced guns such as the old Charter Arms revolver and the often-maligned Hi-Point semiautomatic pistols that start at $119 suggested retail. The Hi-Point product was the focus of an active and very two-sided discussion on this blog a while back, and when this particular podcast is up, I’ll post a link here.

Federal has reintroduced their excellent 125 grain Nyclad hollow point .38 Special load. If you own Grampa’s antique Smith & Wesson .38 Special made in the year 1902, or the new little six-shot Taurus Magnesium six-shot .38 Special that barely weighs enough to keep it from floating out of your pocket, you know that modern +P ammunition is too hot for either one.  Within that range of needs, your best standard pressure .38 Special round for defensive purposes is, I’m convinced, that long-since discontinued Nyclad load. We’ve seen it expand reliably in flesh and bone, even when fired at low velocity from short barrels, many times.  Its return is most welcome.

More tomorrow after the 2009 Shooting, Hunting and Outdoor Trade Show passes into history on its last day.

[Eric R Shelton]

I'm looking forward to the Charles Brown interview!  Thanks for leaving me out of it!   

[Matt G]

Hope you get well soon Gail and thanks for the updates.

Matt

[Gail]

I THINK all of the ProArms team got home safely by now. I am home and safe, still sick as a dog, but "doggedly" putting together the ProArms Podcast for tonight, the SHOT Show theme.

SHOT Show ended today, closing earlier than the other days. We got a GREAT interview with Rob Leatham this morning, stay tuned!!!

Here's the final post on the Show, taken again from Mas' blog at www.backwoodshome.com with his permission and that of Backwoods Home magazine.

-- Gail

THE ECHOES OF THE S.H.O.T. DIE AWAY

The SHOT show is over, and like most of the 48,907 people who attended, I’m pretty well shot. 

Playing catch-up: that Springfield 1903A4 clone from Navy Arms uses original receiver and bolt, new Pedersoli barrel and stock, and Chinese copy of the WWII-vintage Weaver 330 telescopic sight. A blast from the past.

One reader asked for more details on the re-issued Model 58 .41 Magnum revolver, so I went back to the Smith & Wesson booth for another look. It’s not pinned and recessed.  Nice gun, though. If you want pretty, get the adjustable sight Model 57 version in nickel.  Just gorgeous.

A US rep for one of the Italian makers got with me today regarding a prototype revolver with the barrel set up to fire from the bottom chamber, not the topmost.  This was last seen on another Italian revolver, the Mateba, and in years past the Russians have done something similar. Still a ways down the pike, but should be interesting. The lower barrel axis reduces muzzle jump. The Mateba was a good-size sporting handgun; I’m told the new concept will be smaller and more portable.

If you’re interested in the “tacti-cool” side of things, check out the thread on the SHOT Show at www.eotacforum.com.

The SHOT Show isn’t just about guns. You’ll see clothing, for all gun-related purposes. You’ll see accessories. You’ll see the latest in hunting blinds.

I spent the entire show wearing EOTAC garments. (I shoot with their company pistol team, and I wear this stuff on my own time, not just at matches.) Owned by Fernando Coelho, the guy who designed the Woolrich Elite line of tactical garb, this is the latest evolution of “shooterwear” designed with heavy input from beta testers from the sharp end of the war on terror to domestic shooting champions.  I was comfortable throughout, and thanks to all the pockets, never lacked for anything I wanted readily at hand.

Today, brother writer Charlie Cutshaw turned me on to SHADOWSHIELD (www.theSHADOWSHIELD.com). Available in hunting blind, sniper hide, or assault team shield formats, all but the hunting version are also available with bullet-resistant reinforcement. The key is a mirror-like outer surface that reflects the surroundings, turning the user into a human chameleon. Not exactly cheap, but pretty neat. Y’all decide if y’all need it. As a toy, it’s expensive, but if you fit a certain pattern of need, it’s downright cheap.

Like the National Rifle Association Annual Convention or the annual Gun Rights Policy Conference sponsored by Second Amendment Foundation and the Citizens’ Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, the SHOT Show brings together thousands of people who’ve looked at life the way we have and have seen the same rights and responsibilities.  It’s an affirmative thing. 

Most of us left tired…but most of us left feeling uplifted.

The old Chinese saying has come true, and we “live in interesting times.”  It is good to know that none of us are alone in this.

[Gail]

If you go back to the first message in this topic I have added episode 019 there.

Gail

[marsbike]

oh boy oh boy!  I can't wait!  Been keeping up with the blog on BWO, and can't wait! 

Gail- as a felow ex-Il'er, I sympathize with you for leaving, but in my heart, I will always be a chicago boy. 

[Gail]

Yeah, me too. You can take the girl out of the city but you can't take the city out of the girl, or so my FL friends tell me.

Gail

[marsbike]

So true.  I'm developing a Utah accent with a slight drawl (so I've been told) mixed with the adenoids of the chicago accent (being raised mostly on the south side).

BTW, I hope you're feeling better with your URI.

[austinguy23]

Just a friendly suggestion... having your cell phones near your microphones causes audio feedback (hissing & popping noises) during the recording.   Keep your phones far away from your mics!

Really enjoying your podcasts, by the way

EDIT:  Oops, I see now that this has already been discussed.  Disregard.

[meber1]

Thank you an I hope you get better soon Gail.

[Beldavius]

Great show and great blogs!  Thanks all for taking the time to record it all for posterity!

[Gail]

Thanks to all for your feedback, kind words and well wishes.

Gail

[A.C.O.CHICAGO]

Hi Gail,

Wishing you speedy recovery!

Miguel