MON | JULY 1, 2019

The Outdoor Wire Digital Network will be closed Thursday and Friday, July 4th and 5th for the Independence Day holiday.
No wires will publish on those dates. We will return to our regular schedule on Monday, July 8, 2019. We wish all subscribers, members and advertisers a safe and happy holiday.
CCI Ammunition announced availability of the new Quiet-22 Semi-Auto, which is incredibly quiet yet reliable in autoloading rimfires. Quiet-22 Semi-Auto drastically reduces the volume of standard 22 LR rounds while cycling through semi-automatic rifles and handguns.
Scholastic Action Shooting Program athletes had the opportunity to train and compete at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, CO. From May 24-26, 2019, 12 athletes learned to shoot the International disciplines of 10 Meter Air Pistol, Sport Pistol and Rapid-Fire Pistol. 

Legacy Sports International and HOWA Precision Rifles announce plans to introduce the .300 PRC and 6.5 PRC chamberings into its HS Precision and HOGUE offerings. All will come with threaded barrels, muzzle breaks and 24” or 26” standard barrel offerings.
Lipsey’s and combat veteran Larry Vickers, announce the official on-sale launch of the “Vickers GLOCK 43.” The Vickers GLOCK 43 has the TangoDown parts kit, Wilson Combat rear sight and AmeriGlo ProGlo tritium front sight. The new gun also has front cocking serrations.
Reno Cerakote announces Justin Cagle’s promotion to Production Manager. He will be in charge of planning and organizing production schedules, assessing project and resource requirements, and overseeing various projects.

The Salem, Illinois Police Department has deployed the FACT Duty Weapon-Mounted Camera from Viridian Weapon Technologies to all of its sworn officers. Viridian and the police department of Salem will hold a joint press conference on Tuesday.
Umarex USA is teaming up with outdoorsman and artist Tim “Spike” Davis to kick off its 2019 Summer Safety Campaign. Umarex will use Tim’s quirky and unique art to underscore the safe use of airguns.
Stealth Cam takes "set-and-forget" trail cam technology to the next level with the WX Series wireless remote cameras. Now you can have anytime-access to photos and videos, as well as full programming control of your wireless cams anywhere AT&T or Verizon cellular access is available.  

SIG SAUER, Inc. is pleased to introduce the P320 PRO-CUT Slide Assembly for various SIG SAUER P320 pistol models. The slide is now available directly from the manufacturer at the SIG SAUER Web Store at sigsauer.com.
DeSantis offers a pair of holster fits for GLOCK pistols with reflex sights. The gun models include the G17/G17 Gen5 and the G19/G19 Gen5, along with variants enabled to use red dot optics.
Breakthrough Clean Technologies announces their annual 4th of July BOGO sale, their biggest sale of the year. The sale runs from July 2-7, which includes the new All-In-One CLP. 

Taurus is offering their Sizzling Summer Rebate on select Taurus 856 and 856 Ultra-Lite revolvers. Concealed carry revolver fans can receive up to $30 back when they purchase a new model 856 or 856 Ultra-Lite in matte black or matte stainless.
Customers who purchase select XD and 1911 pistols, as part of Springfield Armory’s Instant Gear Up program, will receive 5 magazines, a holster, double mag pouch, range bag and a hard case packaged with the firearm.
Taurus has announced a promotional discount. The Sizzling Summer Rebate program will offer consumers a $50 rebate when they purchase the TaurusTX 22 semi-auto .22LR handgun.

Using the latest data available, Shooting Industry’s July issue breaks down the ATF’s comprehensive 2017 Annual Firearms Manufacturing & Export Report and provides extensive analysis of the 29% year-over-year drop in firearms production from 2016.
 

My friend Bryce Towsley has recently completed a new book: Gunsmithing Modern Firearms: A Gun Guy's Guide to Making Good Guns Even Better. I considered reviewing this book with some misgivings. I am to gunsmithing what Washington, DC is to sound public policy: a zero.

Oh, I can do a detail inspection of GLOCK pistols and install sights on them – and the federal government can do something worthwhile. I’m not quite sure what that would be at the moment.

But Bryce is mechanically sound – and another thing Bryce can do is write; entertaining, instructive and detailed, he takes duffers like me along the path he followed in doing some rather serious work in “making good guns better.” When he finds that’s not enough of a challenge, he takes a collection of parts and creates ‘builds,’ something I should never be tempted to do.

He brings gun crankery into the modern era by a complete, frank and candid discussion of the modern firearms finishes: coatings. Not stopping there, he takes the reader by the hand and teaches the best way to prep the surfaces for the new finish and to apply them – and to cure them. A very humorously told tale of his “oven,” a device he created to cure coatings brings to mind the books from Brownells entitled Gunsmith Kinks.

He doesn't just build and repair guns, Bryce is also an accomplished shot and an experienced hunter.

Bryce takes homely guns – the Mosin and a GLOCK 22 trade-in – and makes them his own with considerable work and detail. He builds a rifle without a lathe and later in the book describes a cost-effective gunsmith-appropriate lathe, currently available and one he’s acquired to do his work.

No gunsmithing book would be complete without building a 1911 and an AR-15 from parts – Bryce puts his mark on each, making them personal. In fact, all of his work is personal as is his conversational writing style.

I’ve heard it, long and loud, from people in my cohort who decry the loss of story-telling in gun-writing. We speak of the greats from our youth who wrote stories (more than reviews), tales that made us want to be gun-writers, accounts that touched our very souls – I’m as bad about that form of nostalgia as the next guy.

Here’s my message: stop complaining and read Gunsmithing Modern Firearms. Doing so took me back to the greats that graced the pages of 1960s and 1970s issues of Guns & Ammo, Shooting Times and GUNS Magazine. Bryce does this while telling a modern tale of trying to buy gear “off the economy” in his locality and facing the loss of a thing called “customer service;” he did that while discussing something as simple – or not so simple – as determining why “When a Good Gun Goes Bad.”

His method for cleaning a gun – a disliked chore by him and by me – is alone worth the price of the book. If you’ve taken any guns in on trade or bought used, you likely know what I mean.

The book is dedicated to Bob Brownell, a father of modern home gunsmithing and the provider of gear to the professional gunsmith trade through a company extant to this day. The foreword is written by Pete Brownell.

I simply can’t recommend Bryce’s book enough – and it’s not because we’ve worked together at media events. It’s because it’s a good read even if you never intend to rebarrel a rifle, refinish a pistol or actually go through the trauma of cleaning all the crap out of a shotgun barrel.

If you like guns and you like humor, this is the book for you – available signed by the author here.

- - Rich Grassi

SHOOTING WIRE
Event Calendar

SEPTEMBER 6-8
NRA Personal Protection Expo

Ft. Worth Convention Center, Ft. Worth, TX

www.NRAPersonalProtectionExpo.com

 
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