Guest day at our gun club......

[tac]

What a day today, folks!!! Guest day at our club and an unprecedented number of taker-uppers of member's friends, co-workers and relations. Almost a hundred showed up today, including about 45 guests of all ages, from 9 to 80 y/o.

I drug along my Parker-Hale replica .58cal Musketoon carbine, a .45.70 Govt Winchester High Wall from 1885, and my faithish Ruger Old Army .44cal BP revolver.

All the .45-70 Govt loads were BP, too, so the smoke was thick and smelly, AND dirty, I'm happy to relate. Nobody who shot any of them went away without a great cheesy grin, even the 9 y/o shooting the Musketoon, although I DID reduce the load for him by about half.

Stats for my collection -

22 shots of 535gr Minié ball over 65gr of FFg.

1 shot of ditto over ca.30gr of FFg.

32 rounds of .45-70 Govt with 405g lead bullets

8 x cylinder loads [48] shots of 145gr ball over 30gr of 3Fg in the revolver, mostly by folks who had never handled ANY kind of handgun before, let alone a fire-breathing whomper like the ROA.

...and afterwards, the compulsory bar-b-q, of course.

A great day, for sure.

tac

PS - for those of you who know all about this kind of stuff, apologies. This is a copy of my post on boards.ie, a native Irish website that covers everything, including sports/shooting.

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[tac]

Anybody care to tell me what those two doo-dads are doing at the bottom of my post?

TVM

tac

 

[Andy54Hawken]

Great story tac...
I'm guessing pictures take longer to make it over here than text ... Since the images won't show.
All joking aside ... sounds like a fun day...Thanks for sharing your guns with other folks.
Andy

 

[Stomper]

Good news, tac!

Could it be that after all the recent (and unfortunate) terrorist attacks over there, more folks are waking up to the responsibility of their own self defense?


Perhaps this will be the beginning of building pressure on the polis to restore U.K. citizens' gun ownership.

 

[DirectDrive]

Nice writeup and sounds like a great time for all !

On those images, I would theorize that the Irish servers are probably in a leaky, thatched roof hut.

 

[tac]

Good news, tac!

Could it be that after all the recent (and unfortunate) terrorist attacks over there, more folks waking up to the responsibility of their own self defense?

Perhaps this will be the beginning of building pressure on the polis to restore U.K. citizens' gun ownership.

I don't think so, Sir. Here in yUK the law requires what is called 'good reason' within the remits of the Firearms Act 1967 [Rev.1997], for legal possession of a Section 1 [Rifled] firearm, or shotgun capable of holding more than three cartridges.

None of those 'good reason's include self-defence, and have not done so since shortly after the end of WW2.

The 1689 Bill of Rights actually DID permit ownership of a firearm for self-defence, but only by Protestant persons for use against Catholics. Being Jewish, that would have let me right out instanter.

Unless you live in Northern Ireland, still part of the yUK, and are a member of the judiciary, police, Army Reserve, Prison Service or other person whose life is likely to be threatened as a result of the fallout from the recently died-down 'Troubles' then the same applies, although citizens of Northern Ireland CAN still have ordinay handguns like you can, unlike the rest of the yUK. Those categories of people that I mentioned are currently issued with a total exceeding 3000 handguns for self-protection.

The rest of us....................?

'Run', 'hide'. etc.

tac

 

[tac]

Great story tac...
I'm guessing pictures take longer to make it over here than text ... Since the images won't show.
All joking aside ... sounds like a fun day...Thanks for sharing your guns with other folks.
Andy

Andy, I really didn't have time to take any pics, but a lot of other people did, for sure. I needed eyeballs on stalks to cope with the guest shooters at my end of the range. We ended up with six RCOs patrolling the line as guest shooters are not allowed to be alone on the line - their keepers must be with them at all times. I was just one of the show-and-tellers today.

tac

 

[Goosebrown]

And no one was shot... huh...

Sounds like a great day. Outreach is great for everyone

 

[tac]

And no one was shot... huh...

Sounds like a great day. Outreach is great for everyone

Our club here in yUK dates, in its present from, from 1928. There have been no shooting-related injuries to anybody during the interim.

In its previous incarnation it went back to around 1880-ish. Nobody seems to have walked into a bullet between that time and the re-organisation in 1928, either.

Getting hurt on ranges in this country seems to be virtually unheard of, probably due to the compulsory three months training and familiarisation period undertaken by every probie before they can actually apply for a FAC.

Add in that we don't get 9-y/o children shooting full-autos, either...

tac

 

[Goosebrown]

It's rare here too which was the point. Listen to the press and they imply that touching a gun is just a step away from Russian roulette.