Articles by Herschel Smith

F&S.

Before getting into how to buy a suppressor, you need to understand the difference in types of ownership. You can own a suppressor either as an individual or as a trust. As an individual owner, you can use the suppressor and you can let others use the suppressor, but you must be with anyone else anytime they have the suppressor or are using it. If you don’t have any friends—and some of you don’t, I’ve seen your Facebook profiles—individual ownership is fine. Well, except when you die, because then your estate is left in possession of an unregistered NFA item. That’s a problem for whoever executes your will.

If you purchase a suppressor as a trust, any co-trustee can be in procession of and use the suppressor just as you would. Also, if you’re smart enough to designate a “beneficiary” then that person simply assumes the trust when you go to the great shooting range in the sky.

The article goes on to explain the relative ease of filling out paperwork these days.  Around here I know there are FFLs with kiosks which assist the buyer, and there are ways to get assistance with setting up trusts.  Every gun show has cards for lawyers in the area who want to charge money for setting up firearms trusts.

Do any readers own suppressors, and if so, what have you fund to be the best way to purchase and own them?

I find it difficult to dump that much money into something when that something could be a relatively nice firearm instead, and with use of electronic hearing protection, the noise problem goes away (for the most part, except for interference with your cheek weld).

Watch the video for yourself, but here’s what I think.  The officer turned around so quickly and charged back to the man (who said nothing but ‘God’), that I can conclude only one thing.  The cop got pissed off that someone didn’t bow down and lick his bootsand obey even unlawful orders.

He’s nothing but a bully.

One in .44 Magnum please.  As soon as possible please.  I’ll buy one. Ruger, are you listening?

Just several days ago we were discussing how to get the most distance out of your tactical shotgun, and the corollary issue of how to get the best pattern.

Little did I know this was going to come out on that very issue.  These results are very impressive.

Here’s the catch.  The choke is currently not available.  I’ve written Kick’s Industries to ascertain when it will become available.  I’ll let you know what they respond.

I carried a .44 Magnum when hiking in the Tetons several weeks ago.  Color me still a bit skeptical on use of the 10mm for bear defense.  I guess the advantage is capacity, but only that.

I don’t have a .454 Casull or I would carry that.

Here is a news report of the attack.

This image won an award by The New Yorker.

Folks have recently been having a bit of fun with it.  “How you react to this photo says ALL you need to know about American politics.”

The reactions are interesting, ranging from noticing the family man, to the bumper stickers on the truck, to the rusted body of the truck, to the fact that the truck driver is leaving his shotgun unattended, to these.

“Paddle guy gives me immediate disgust. Typical yuppie type who probably couldn’t even lift a finger to defend his family if the need arose.”

“Maybe he’s former special ops and decided to settle down and have a family. He met his wife and kids there after work. The truck is his, the car is hers (it’s safer for her and the kids). He’s looking over his shoulder because he’s still on edge from his previous life.”

“Pick-up owners kids are safer than those pictured.”

The clothing doesn’t interest me, and the fact that it interests some folks is weird to me.  I’ve seen squared away Marines with “high-and-tight” haircuts wearing shorts, tucked in tee shirts, and white socks with shoes.  That could be a former Marine for all I know.  If I could be around him for 30 seconds I’d know.  I have no idea what he’s supposed to be thinking.

But the artist apparently wants you to think that ownership of shotguns is somehow connected with the cross, Gadsden flag, and MAGA.  I’m not a Trump or MAGA person, but if they want me to connect ownership of weapons with the cross and Gadsden flag, I’m okay with that.

One woman calls the shotgun a rifle, and a another guy says the shotgun is okay if it’s a Mossberg.  I’m not a Mossberg guy – I’m a Beretta guy.  But the gun is clearly not a Beretta, or it would look prettier.  But the gun is also clearly a turkey or upland gun.  See, this is the sort of thing I think about, not politics.

Honestly, among my first thoughts were that the image is stupid.  I see no point in it and I simply don’t see how it won any awards.  My immediate reaction was everything is fine.  Pistols and Rifles are designed drop-safe these days as every gun owner knows.  Shotguns are not designed drop safe and never have been, even while on safe.  That’s why we carry the way we do and have designated fields of fire when we bird hunt.

However, the gun is not being moved, so there is no danger of dropping it.  So, what’s the big deal?

I guess I can’t escape being an engineer.

But since others are having fun with it, you can too in the comments in you want.

Y’all know how much I love dogs.  This is an inspiring video of a dog learning to walk on four prosthetic limbs.

Waterbuck versus lion.  The moral of the story?  Never give up.  I’d suggest that lion was beaten up pretty badly by the end of the encounter.

Cowboys are still relevant.

In a previous post I mentioned that I witnessed first hand the heavy snow pack in the Northwest this year.  The Wyoming deer herd is in deep trouble because of the snow pack.

Finally, this is a feral animal in Times Square.  He’s lucky he didn’t do that around these parts.  He deserves to be put in chains on a road crew for a year.

Wisdom from his son: “Let’s not sleep on a ridge any more.”

Yea, I could have told him that too.  However, I see the alure of the camp site. If he thought there would be no foul weather, it’s easier for him to see what he wants to see and get where he wants to go for hunting from the top of the ridge.

If I’m going to sleep high, I prefer to find a strong patch of evergreens to help block the wind.  Large boulders will do that too.  There were both just down from the ridgeline. But you have to be careful around trees because they can come down on you if there are any dead ones.

The storm starts around 15 minutes.  I’m surprised the tent survived.

American Hunter.

To appreciate the Creedmoor’s design details we must first look back to the mid-twentieth century. At a time when the Beatles were the hottest band in the land and the Bay of Pigs debacle was unfolding, American hunters and shooters were obsessed with belted magnum cartridges. The 7mm Remington Magnum, the .300 Winchester Magnum, and Roy Weatherby’s red-hot cartridges had become the standard for making long shots on big game. If you wanted to improve performance from your favorite belted magnum the answer was simple: shoot a lighter bullet.

Over the decades, serious shooters recognized two things. First, while lighter bullets did offer higher velocities and flatter trajectories at moderate ranges things changed when shots stretched much beyond a quarter-mile. Light bullets tended to drop very quickly when their velocities waned, and the wind shoved them all over the place. Second, hunters realized that powerful magnum rounds kicked hard, burned a lot of powder, and required long actions, magazines, and barrels which increased gun weight and overall length.

Fast magnums remained popular through the end of the twentieth century, and they are still popular choices for those who hunt big game at long distances. But by the turn of the century, shooters were taking a long, hard look at long-range bullet performance, and what they learned was that a bullet’s ballistic coefficient played an important role in downrange performance. Heavy-for-caliber bullets with aerodynamic profiles and high ballistic coefficients make sense for long-range shooting.

The sensible solution would be to load magnum ammunition with high-BC bullets, but there were two problems. First, many rifles had barrel twist rates that were too slow to properly stabilize extremely heavy-for-caliber bullets. Second, most cartridge cases were not designed with maximum-weight bullets in mind, so heavy bullets would rob case capacity or exceed acceptable cartridge overall lengths (COL).

Enter the 6.5 Creedmoor. It’s based on the .30 T/C, a cartridge that never garnered a major following. The Creedmoor was necked down and features a 30-degree shoulder and a long enough neck so that it can accommodate 140+ grain bullets without robbing case capacity, yet still fit in a short action. Muzzle velocities weren’t extremely high—around 2,700 fps with Hornady’s ELD match load—but that bullet boasts a G1 BC of .697, so at 500 yards it retains over 2,000 fps of velocity and almost 1,500 foot-pounds of energy. Compare that to Hornady’s .308 Win. 168 Boat Tail Hollow Point (BTHP) Match ammunition, and you’ll see why the Creedmoor makes sense. The .308 Win. load has a BC of .450 so it’s going to move more in a crosswind. The .308 Win., with its heavier bullet, is actually about 200 fps slower than the Creedmoor at 500 yards, and the .308 Win. produces more recoil.

That’s the best explanation of the 6.5 Creedmoor I’ve ever seen.  Not even the engineers at Hornady have done so well at explaining why they developed the round.

It’s a heavy-for-caliber bullet, but not heavy.  It’s long and has a high BC, but it fits in a short action rifle.  It’s a long bullet but it doesn’t rob the case of powder capacity.  It’s a compromise round.  It achieves moderate to high MV at short ranges, but exceptional velocity at longer ranges.

Its recoil is of course more than say a 5.56mm, but it’s not like shooting a 30-06 or 7mm magnum.  Guns designed for it send the round downrange with enough bullet twist to take advantage of the cartridge design.

There isn’t any such thing as perfect ammunition.  Every decision is a compromise on something.  But this round achieves the best of the compromises that have to be made, and is nearly as perfect as can be for white tail, hogs, varmint, and elk at close range.  “When Emary and Thielen designed this round, they wanted a superb low-recoiling cartridge that was accurate and could take advantage of high-BC bullets, and that’s exactly what they’ve created.”

If you want something else, then get something else (e.g., use a 7mm magnum or 7mm PRC for ridge-to-ridge hunting in Idaho or Wyoming).  Don’t criticize the 6.5 Creedmoor – its design has a purpose.  Know what your bullet and gun are designed for, and stay within the boundary conditions of the analysis.

Field & Stream.

• You’re Probably Putting Too Much Pressure On Your Rifle
• Shooting Bags Aren’t Just For the Range
• Blading Your Shoulders Leads to Bad Shooting
• Learn to Build Good Shooting Positions
• Light Rifles Can Be Accurate, Too
• You Don’t Need A Lot of Ammo to Practice
• Respect the Wind and Your Limitations

See the discussion at F&S.  I’ve tried to put some of these principles to practice recently in my own rifle shooting.  I’m a long ways from mastering them all.