Cliff R

Loctite will release if you apply heat lightly with a propane torch. Of course in some applications this may not be possible or practical.......

Good to know. This XD likes them. I forgot to shoot a pic of the group. The felt recoil is noticeable with the CFE Pistol powder at 7.5 grains, 8.1 is max and shows 1139fps from a 5" barrel on the table for reloading data. It's a pretty "hefty" load right where it is and grouping well so going to leave it as-is for now and start enjoying shooting the pistol some.....

Was stuck in the house yesterday so worked up some 45 ACP hand-loads for the XDS. I thought about trying them in the Shield but I like the XD so much better no sense of wasting any ammo in it before I send it down the road. Picked up some Hornady XTP 185 grain JHP's and backed them with 7.5 grains of CFE Pistol powder. The reloading manuals say that's good for about 1100fps with a 5" barrel and still under max pressure. The XD sure loves them tearing out another 3" or so jagged hole in the 55 gallon drum lid with two magazines fed thru it. Pic of the 185 JHP's on the right next to a Remington 230 grain factory JHP round.....going to do some expansion testing next to see how well they open up at that velocity......

Forgot to mention that it's drilled for a sling stud and I had a Magpul short rail section on it to mount accessories.....

It's been sitting in the safe since 2003 and no plans on using it. I'm sure it's top of the pile for what it was built for. I'm getting ready to retire again next Spring, so one more year then another life change......

I don't even remember what I paid for it, just wanted one. My career path took a sharp change after retiring the first time so no time for competitive shooting other than going to the 8 ball tournament in Canton this Spring.......Cliff

Good plan. Hornady/Bushmaster got it right with the 450 BM. To date it's by far and above the most accurate platform I've ever pulled out of a box and ran factory ammo thru. Groups at 100 yards ALWAYS touch and more often than not punch out one jagged hole (if the shooter does their part). Killing power is excellent with plenty of energy and minimal bullet drop within reasonable distances one would typically take most game at. It's probably a "mortal shell" past 250 yards or so, but for what I use it for here in Ohio I can't think of anything legal here that would work better. Just look at the expansion on the bullet above after traveling thru both shoulders of a huge whitetail buck and stopping under the hide on the far side, it speaks for itself.........Cliff

Damn, remind me to never get on your bad-side!....LOL People can use deadly force and have no weapons at all. Folks need to realize what this means and how it plays into defending yourself and others. Most need a little more than just the "toaster oven" analogy. I've heard that before but don't use it when I teach others for CCW and use of deadly force. IF a person is using "force" on another which could cause serious bodily injury or death, regardless of the method, or weapon, then deadly force may be on your list of things to use to stop that behavior. Doesn't mean that you have to use deadly force just because all the elements may be in place to do so. Case in point. IF I saw someone kicking another guy in the head while he was down that certainly meets the requirements (provided that you can articulate it could or would cause serious bodily injury or death based on your knowledge of anatomy and past life experiences), however if I simply touch my weapon and tell him to stop, and he does, then the problem is solved with nothing more that verbal task direction. So a little common sense applies when it comes to using deadly force. Basically, what I tell my students (small arms and LE instructor for decades) is to NEVER shoot someone who doesn't need to be shot, and ALWAYS use the minimum amount of force to compel compliance. That's the short version and simply rule to follow. Of course there will always be one or two students in the group who come up with nearly impossible "what if" scenarios. Despite the circumstances one needs to follow the basic rules above and more times than not you'll be fine when an investigation is done and others are scrutinizing your actions......FWIW...... Back on topic and gun-restriction stuff, it starts with every single one of us standing together and letting our views be known in public Forum, thru our Representatives, and hitting the ballots at every election. I've already made it well known that the only way anyone is taking my guns away is to pry them from my cold-dead fingertips......

Complete National Match upper purchased around 2003-2004. Bought this when I retired with plans to continue shooting competitively. Don't think I ever fired it other than maybe a few test rounds, so basically NIB. Complete upper only. It has a heavy NM air-gauged barrel with the Wylde chamber, NM sights, and all the other features offered by Rock River for their NM AR's. Complete specs are available on the Rock River Website. $600 shipped. I can do Pay Pal, Visa, MC or Discover. PM if interested......tks...

Box of misc spare parts for Govt model 1911 pistols. These parts are left over from the 1980's when I used to build these pistols and shoot Bullseye. Includes a jig to "work" your seer and hammer for improved function. There is also at least one adjustable Match trigger in there. Most of the parts will clean up fine, they have been sealed in this ammo can coming up on 35 years now and starting to show it. Too many parts to list, what you see is what you get. $50 shipped. I can do Pay Pal, Visa, MC or Discover. PM if interested....tks...

Removed from my DPMS 450 Bushmaster upper. Well used and drilled/tapped for sling studs. Good shape otherwise. $20 shipped. PM if interested. I can do Pay Pal, Visa, MC or Discover....tks...

Cleaning up some parts left over from building some 308-AR's. Found this one in a bag, says PA-10 on the buffer tube and Blackhawk on the stock. Don't know anything about it otherwise but it probably came from one of the lowers that I build using early PA-10 stuff. I convert all my 308-AR's to A2 stock so no need for any carbine stocks and selling them off. These parts have never been used so NIB. $50 shipped. I can do Pay Pal, Visa, MC or Discover. PM if interested....tks...

Removed from a NIB DPMS Oracle. $50 shipped. Pay Pal, Visa, MC or Discover. PM if interested...tks...

Never ran into any feral hogs even when I lived in Southern GA. Used to see areas all rooted up by them, but never encountered one up close and personal in the wild. I'll bet in the right scenario they could be pretty dangerous.......

Any of the later S & W 44's are more than up to the task of shooting custom heavy loads in them, NONE of the early guns are. I'm not sure exactly when they put all the upgrades in place, but as a general rule if your 29 or 629 has a "pinned" barrel it should NEVER get heavy loads of any variety put thru it. Heavy recoil can and will release the latch and the cylinder will fall open. The cylinder lock can also move down and allow it to rotate to a different chamber after a round is fired. Constant pounding will bend the crane back and it will start to become more difficult to close the cylinder and the air gap between the cylinder and barrel will increase. I ruined two early guns back when I was doing long range shooting with heavy custom loads. Tried a Redhawk briefly, actually two of them. They can take the pounding but can't even come remotely close to the accuracy of the S & W's with big heavy hard cast bullets, at least none I've ever had in my hand were up to the task. The barrels were so "rough" cut in both of my guns you'd be lucky to hit a 5 gallon bucket at 15 steps after putting a dozen or so rounds thru either one of them! I quit shooting and hunting with my 629 when Ohio allowed straight wall rifle cartridges for deer hunting. I miss hunting with it but not how bad it rings my ears w/o hearing protection. I never got used to wearing any sort of hearing protection when hunting, and my tinnitus is so bad these days even one round from the 629 w/o it is too much. I sold my 686 recently and going to send the 629 down the road as well.......

Just saw this so a little late in the game. My nephew asked me about it a couple of weeks ago, so I took a look. Since I have a 450 Bushmaster and considerable experience with glancing over the basic ballistics, energy, bullet drop etc, there really isn't much comparison. The 450 does everything about the same with a 100 grain heavier bullet. The increased energy is significant and the 450 is DEADLY to at least 250 yards. Also with a much larger hole in the barrel the 450 will be lighter in the same basic platform. Of course lighter doesn't help with getting "thumped" when sighting it in, but the 450's heavy recoil isn't even noticed in a hunting scenario. Of course if a guy lived in one of those sissy States like I do that require specific straight walled cartridges for the annual deer gun season you could put a 350 Legend together for the Mrs to lighten up the recoil considerably. I still consider Ohio's revised list of legal calibers for deer hunting a MONUMENTAL improvement over using a slug gun or muzzle loader, even if a guy had upgraded to a rifled shotgun barrel and using sabots. I moved from a 45/70 in a Marlin 1895 to my 450 Bushmaster as soon as they made the list of legal cartridges for deer and never looked back. The AR platform offers much quicker follow-up shots and a light weatherproof package to drag thru the woods. Our gun season is short, just one week a year with a couple of days thrown in here and there in certain areas, so it's a considerable expense right to start with to gear up to put a couple 3 deer in the freezer. The 450 is for sure a get-er-done-er. The last three deer I've shot never took another step and one was close to 200 yards, one about 90 and the other about 30 steps. I actually recovered the bullet from the buck at 200 yards, pic below.......

On the topic and FWIW about working up "hot" loads. WAY back when S & W introduced the 586 .357 magnum revolver I obtained a very early production model. It was the same year I got married (1980) and had already started a family and new job with the Sheriffs Office. Loved that gun and started hand loading for it. I didn't have much money to work with back then so I used some powders I already had on hand to work up magnum loads with. Those included Bullseye and Red Dot. BAD idea. Within a 1000 rounds or so I'd eroded the forcing cone right out of it and it started to spit lead and excessive gas leakage between the chamber and barrel. I was devastated, but it's good learn lessons early in life with these things. I moved on to a 629 when they came out and used either H100 or 2400 for all my magnum loads, and have taken scores of deer with that pistol over the years. It's in perfect shape and has had many thousands of pretty hefty loads put thru it. I cast my own Keith SWC bullets for it out of wheel weights with some tin added. They weigh in a little under 300 grains grains (nearly as I can remember) and are smoking across the chrony around 1400fps. I've taken a few whitetails out close to 200 yards and that load still passes right thru both shoulders! These days the 44 mag is overshadowed by much more powerful offerings but back when I first got into long range hunting with handguns it was at the top of the pile and still very effective with the right loads. I would add here that one should NOT attempt to load early model 29's anywhere near full house with heavy bullets. I tried that once briefly in an earlier model 29 and they don't have the internal upgrades and other mods needed for those loads. I've had the cylinder fall open after a shot, and frequently unlock and rotate back so the next round falls on an empty chamber. Also bent the crane that holds the cylinder from the heavy recoil. S & W fixed all those issues with the newer versions........Cliff

Coincidentally I'm getting ready to load up some 45 ACP rounds. Haven't played around with that caliber for decades. Picked up some CFE Pistol powder and Hornady 185 grain XTP jacketed hollow points. Going to produce some higher velocity loads later today. Reloading data says 7.1 to 8.1 grains and about 1000-1100fps from a 5" barrel. Kind of cool but while I was digging around in my gun stuff I found some cool stuff I inherited from my dad after he passed. An old Redding powder scale, Lyman 30-06 hand loader, and a hand held shotgun loader. I also found a box of 45 Govt parts left over from back when I used to build them and shoot competitively. Going to send all of it down the road here when I get a moment to advertise it.......Cliff

"My rule for carry a pistol - or moreso, determining if a pistol is carry-worthy... It MUST blow through 500 rounds without a single ANYTHING. Perfect function." +2, 3, 4 and 5 Once something shows me it's unreliable I just don't trust it, period. Just went thru some drama with a S & W 45 Shield I purchased a couple of years ago. It will not "run" so down the road it goes. Mine even went back to S & W for a complete overhaul and they gave it a clean bill of health, get it back and still jams. I have tried just about every 22 auto pistol out there over the years and got to say that very few will "run" on most of this commercially available "low" end ammo. Bricks, boxes, buckets and tins of cheap 22 ammo is DIRTY and low quality. The last 22 pistol I had was a Ruger SR 22. It would run about 100-150 rounds of the cheap stuff then start acting up. I'd walk out to the shop, spray it down with brake-clean, blow it completely out with compressed air, a little Tri-Flow in the right places and good for another 100-150 rounds or so. That same saga happens with every 22 auto pistol I've owned. You can push that deal further by using cleaner ammo, or get less rounds before issues with really bottom shelf stuff, but 22 rim fire auto pistols are typically NOT reliable in long term service without keeping them clean. The worst ammo I tried to run was the cheap Remington hollow points, and the low-end Federal isn't much better. CCI is top of the pile as is the older Winchester Western Super X. As it's related I have a really old Marlin bolt action 22 sold under the Sears label. It's topped with a vintage Weaver 4X scope with the spider web thin crosshairs. ROCK solid platform and one of the most accurate 22's I've ever shot/owned. You can shoot a hole in a piece of paper then shoot a dozen more rounds right nearly thru the same hole at 25 yards. Even out at 50 yards it's under a dime.......but......ONLY if you use top shelf ammo in it. The same greasy-grimy crap that loads up the 22 auto pistols will not group nearly as well as the higher end stuff. As a general rule I NEVER shoot anyone else's reloads. I've been reloading coming up 45 years now.. Whatever I'm reloading for gets slower burning powders or at least those that yield over 50 percent case capacity with starting loads. This absolutely makes sure that you will not double-charge a load. I've been on the range when this happens and it's not pretty. Lots of folks just open up the reloading manual and pick a powder, like Bullseye for example. Good powder, doesn't need much of it and saves money. However, it's super quick burning and in most handgun cases you can EASILY double and even triple charge them accidentally.....YIKES! Folks may also try to load hotter loads with faster burning powder. Problem with that deal is that pressure rise is fast as is temperature and you can burn the forcing cone out of your favorite revolver using power on the faster end of the scale to load +P and Magnum rounds with it. Don't ask me how I know this. Anyhow, sorry for the rambling, hope it helps someone someplace with this sort of thing.......Cliff

Cool!...... Finally got a few moments to look over some of these threads. Looks like gun rights will certainly be a player in the next election. We're probably going to let the Democrats have another go at it. Not sure if Trump can get himself re-elected with all the negative publicity. All I know is that my investments are at an all time high with him at the helm.........

Good plan. Not in a hurry and not really wanting to add another 9mm right now anyhow, but I really like the look and feel of that pistol, plus 19 + 1 capacity......

The shotgun course in place when I was an SAI involved combat loading. After the last round leave the action to the rear, keep the weapon pointed toward the target, tilt it slightly to the left and load a live round in with your free hand then action forward, then proceed to fill the mag tube. Something good to practice and if you watch the John Wick movies I believe he's doing some of that sort of thing in a few of the shooting sequences. That deal looks and sound good until you fail to get a round fully seated into the magazine tube and it slides back under the carrier!.......

It's been proven for the most part when the chit-hits-the-fan you will "play" like you practice. This is why I NEVER, EVER catch my empty magazines in my free hand with any weapon I'm reloading. It the heat of the battle more times than not you'll waste time and fill your free hand with an empty mag vs a loaded one to re-charge the weapon. Magazines are cheap and expendable, let them drop to the ground and fetch yourself a loaded one when you are practicing your tactical pistol skills at the range. It also takes many repetitions for something to become "automatic", so IF you plan on adding a step to your reloading plan that's considered beneficial, practice it many hundreds of times. It's been proven that most of us will go on "autopilot" in a situation where you are using or planning on using deadly force, no time to think things out, when you have seconds to end a threat any help is typically minutes away, so you just revert back to your training and experiences with those things. When I went to my first unit after completing SAI school in the early 1980's they still had a rack full of M-16's left over from the early years w/o forward assists (pre-A-1's ?). A couple of times during my tour there we got Servicewide messages to expend certain lots of 5.56 ammo (Yippie!). We would load literally dozens of magazines and hit the range for a day of fun and practice. We found out very quickly why later varieties of the M-16 were 3 round burst vs full auto. Anyhow, back then full-auto was allowed so we'd run those old M-16's till the ammo was gone. The would get so hot you could feel the heat from them 3 feet away! Never once did we experience the first malfunction of any kind (although I was expecting a "cook-off" here and there but never had any). Those old versions of the M-16 ran flawlessly w/o a forward assist or any other "modern" upgrades other than ours had chrome lined barrels put in them at some point. For the next 20 years I spent considerable time on the range training new recruits and keeping everyone at my units weapons quals up to date. I can't remember in all those tens of thousands of rounds sent down range with the M-16, A1's, A2's and A4/M4's a single instance where we needed the forward assist. Of course it goes without saying that my weapons got the full service, cleaning and maintenance they required, and we were in a "clean" environment, not burying them in the sand, swamp, rain forest or forging thru rivers with them........FWIW......Cliff

Yep, I'm eye-balling a 3.8" full size pistol right now in FDE. It might just follow me home here one of these days!.......

It's an appendage added to the AR design that probably isn't needed for what most of us do with these weapons in the civilian sector......IMHO.....