.44 Special ...

06 AUG 2019 UPDATE - After its seizure (noted in I'm sorry. We're closing now) - GOT it BACK!!!

In October of 2000, fearing a possible Al Gore victory over George W. Bush (Gore being a gun-control fanatic), and preferring something without a paper trail associated with it, I acquired THIS ...

That is an old model Charter Arms Bulldog 5-shot revolver, with a 3" barrel, in .44 S&W Special caliber.  

That target shows the first five rounds I put through it, at ten yards, firing double-action (a misnomer actually, but it's commonly used to describe firing a revolver without cocking it first; just using a long pull of the trigger*).

That flyer (the one furthest from the rest of the group) was the fifth one. With a .44 Special in such a light gun, the recoil is a very sharp slap that will sting the palm of your hand; not a fun gun to shoot. But it satisfied me that it should certainly get the job done.

As for my ammunition of choice, I favor ...

from smith-wessonforum.com

... because it's reliable, accurate, and falls into the "will get the job done" category. 

And before anyone warns me that "lots of indoor ranges ban the use of Blazer ammunition as unsafe, blows up guns (often showing spectacular pictures of blown-up revolvers)", well know this ...

A lot of police departments throughout the country use this ammunition, for budgetary reasons.  While the quality of their rangemasters may vary quite a bit, I suspect that most of those departments are very knowledgeable on lawsuits. That they keep using it is to me a pretty good sign.

I think that what indoor shooting ranges really hate about Blazer is that they sweep up the fired cartridge cases and reload them. The Blazer rounds use aluminum cases, which don't re-size as well as the brass used by most other manufacturers. They also use Berdan primers (needing a special two-pronged decapping tool) instead of the more commonly used (over here) Boxer primer that can use a single pin though a center hole for removing the old primer.

All that trouble probably keeps them from making a profit on reloading the Blazer cartridges.

I've never encountered an outdoor shooting range that had any problem with shooters using the Blazer ammunition. They probably don't collect and reload the cases because it may be more trouble than it's worth to separate and clean them from the dirt, rocks and other debris on the ground there.)

(* - Ok, then. What does "double-action" really mean? It means there are two ways to fire the weapon.

One: Cock the hammer first, allowing you to fire it with a light pull of the trigger, usually more accurate.

Two: Use a long (usually heavy and rough, although it varies greatly among different weapons) pull of the trigger, to raise the hammer and then release it in one motion. This is fastest, but not always very accurate. Mileage varies greatly among different weapons. Some Smith & Wesson models have very good and smooth trigger pulls when used this way, as does that Charter Arms Bulldog of mine.

So, one of the greatest misnomers is a weapon described as DAO (Double Action Only) when it in fact has just a single mode of being fired: by pulling the trigger to cock and release the hammer.

Ain't semantics wonderful? :-)
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COME AND TAKE IT

Apparently, the City Council of New Rochelle, NY was offended when the United Veterans Memorial & Patriotic Association replaced a worn-out American flag at the New Rochelle Armory and flew this flag below it ...

From the Gateway Pundit post linked below

This is what is known as the Gadsden Flag.  It has been a part of our history since before the Stars and Stripes, and has flown from the mainmasts of some of our first Naval vessels.

Because it was adopted by some groups within the Tea Party (as a protest over our rights being trampled on) some City Council member complained about it being "hateful" and wanted it taken down.  The City Manager had more sense and chose to leave it alone, but was overridden by the City Council and the flag was taken down. The Council voted 5-2 to refuse to let the veterans restore it.

See Outrageous! Gadsden Flag Removed By New York Town For Being An “Offensive” Tea Party Symbol


If they got their panties in a twist over that, just imagine their reaction to ...

From conservativeblogscentral.blogspot.com

That is the Gonzales Flag.

The earliest shots in the Texas Rebellion were fired at Gonzales, Texas.  Prior to the Battle of the Alamo (in March 1836) tensions had been building up for several years between the Mexican authorities and the Texian settlers.

In 1831, they had given the settlers of Gonzales a small cannon to help against frequent Comanche raids.  Not wanting to leave such a weapon in the hands of potential opponents, they decided to take it back.  The settlers balked, and sent out word to neighboring settlements for help.

When a contingent of Mexican troops arrived to take the gun, they were greeted by a large party of armed Texians carrying that banner with its invitation.  A brief skirmish resulted in two Mexican soldiers killed, and one Texian injured (to be fair to the Mexicans, they were not under any orders to start a war and withdrew to prevent a bad situation from becoming even worse than it already was).

But, this was the first known instance of armed Texians taking on the Mexican army, and that genie was not about to go back into the bottle.  While not readily apparent on that day (02 Oct 1835) events were set into motion that I honestly don't know if could ever have been stopped.
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A-10 WARTHOG ... baaaaaaaaaaaad to the bone

One of my best friends and an Air Force buddy forwarded to me ...

  I thought you might be interested in this.

-------------------------------------------------------
WOW!!!

A-10 WARTHOG ... baaaaaaaaaaaad to the bone

"One shot will knock a turret off a tank. You cannot fly the airplane without the gun because of center of gravity being off too far".

----- First, there was this gun ...

It was developed by General Electric, the "We bring good things to life" people.

It's one of the modern-day Gatling guns.

It shoots very big bullets...

It shoots them very quickly...

Someone said, "Let's put it in an airplane."

Someone else said, "Better still, let's build an airplane around it."

So they did. And "they" were the Fairchild Republic airplane people.

And they had done such a good job with an airplane they developed back in WWII .....called the P-47 Thunderbolt!

They decided to call it the A10 Thunderbolt II ... AKA the Warthog

They made it so it was very good at flying low and slow and shooting things with that fabulous gun.

But since it did fly low and slow, they made it bulletproof, or almost so.

A lot of bad guys have found you can shoot an A10 with anything from a pistol to a 23mm Soviet cannon and it just keeps on flying and shooting.

When they got through, it looked like this.

It's not sleek and sexy like an F18 or the stealthy Raptors and such, but I think it's such a great airplane because it does what it does better than any other plane in the world.

It kills tanks.

Not only tanks, as Sadam Hussein's boys found out to their horror, but armored personnel carriers, radar stations, locomotives, bunkers, fuel depots... just about anything the bad guys thought was bulletproof turned out to be easy pickings for this beast.

See those engines. One of them alone will fly this plane.

The pilot sits in a very thick titanium alloy "bathtub."

That's typical of the design.

They were smart enough to make every part the same whether mounted on the left side or right side of the plane, like landing gear, for instance.

Because the engines are mounted so high (away from ground debris) and the landing gear uses such low pressure tires, it can operate from a damaged airport, interstate highway, plowed field, or dirt road.

Everything is redundant.

They have two of almost everything.

Sometimes they have three of something.

Like flight controls, there's triple redundancy of those,

and even if there is a total failure of the double hydraulic system, there is a set of manual flying controls.

Capt. Kim Campbell sustained this damage over Baghdad and flew for another hour before returning to base.

But, back to that gun.

It's so hard to grasp just how powerful it is.

This is the closest I could find to showing you just what this cartridge is all about.

What the guy is holding is NOT the 30mm round, but a "little" 50 Browning machine gun round and the 20mm cannon round which has been around for a long time.

The 30mm is MUCH bigger.

Down at the bottom are the .50 BMG and 20x102 Vulcan the fellow was holding.

At the bottom right is the bad boy we're discussing.

Let's get some perspective here: The .223 Rem (M16 rifle round) is fast.

It shoots a 55 or so grain bullet at about 3300 feet/sec, give or take.

It's the fastest of all those rounds shown (except one).

When you move up to the .30 caliber rounds, the bullets jump up in weight to 160-200 grains. Speeds run from about 2600 to 3000 fps or so.

The .338 Lapua is the king of the sniper rifles these days and shoots a 350 grain bullet at 2800 fps or so.

They kill bad guys at over a mile with that one.

The 50 BMG is really big.

Everyone who picks it up thinks it's some sort of fake, unless they know big ammo.

It's really huge with a bullet that weighs 750 grains and goes as fast the Lapua.

I don't have data on the Vulcan, but hang on to your hat.

The bullet for the 30x173 Avenger has an aluminum jacket around a spent uranium core and weighs 6560 grains (yes, over 100 times as heavy as the M16 bullet, and flies through the air at 3500 fps (which is faster than the M16 as well).

The gun shoots at a rate of 4200 rounds per minute. Yes, four thousand.

Pilots typically shoot either one- or two-second burst which set loose 70 to 150 rounds.

The system is optimized for shooting at 4,000 feet

OK, the best for last.

You've got a pretty good idea of how big that cartridge is, but I'll bet you're like me and you don't fully appreciate how big the GE GAU-8 Avenger really is.

Take a look.

Each of those seven barrels is 112" long.

That's almost ten feet.

The entire gun is 19-1/2 feet long.

Think how impressive it would look set up in your living room.

Oh, by the way, it doesn't eject the empty shells but runs them back into the storage drum. There's just so dang many flying out, they felt it might damage the aircraft.

Oh yeah, I forgot, they can hang those bomb and rocket things on 'em too, just in case.

After all, it is an "airplane"!

Like I said, this is a beautiful design.

-------------------------------------------------------

That's the email, which has been making the rounds with a number of people.

Feeling that it would make a wonderful post, I sent this to whom I thought to be the originator ...

Mr. ******:

****** thought (correctly) that I would be interested in this.

I'd like very much to have your permission to use this as a blog post, giving you full credit.

Beware, though. It is not great fame you will acquire. My blog (see link in my sig below) does not have a large following; probably only a few hundred people will ever see that post.


He replied ...

Mr. Gordon,

Thanks for the above message. I'm a retired Air Force fighter pilot. E-mails such as this one are frequently passed among us- and those friends that are felt to be interested in military aviation and new equipment - such as ******.

This one on the Wart Hog is not of a classified nature. As a matter of fact, nothing such as this that is classified is sent over the Internet. Don't know who originated this one so no credit or acknowledgement should be mentioned.

My airborne roles over the years were of air-to-air and air-to ground in nature. The guys driving these A-10 Wart Hogs were always doing a great job at being "down and dirty" in support of the ground troops.

This "Improved" version is just great for getting the job done with improved safety for the pilots as well. Your displaying this on your Blog Site will perhaps inform the unknowing of one of the things their Air Force has at their disposal for protecting this nation of ours.

If any questions, please feel free to ask.

Regards, **

Ok. I only hope I've done this justice.  I wish I had originated it. (Of course, when someone else has done your work for you, it's so much easier. :-)

BTW, there's another advantage to the engine location besides being "away from ground debris".  If you are an enemy combatant and trying to take a shot at an A-10 with a shoulder-fired heat-seeking missile, you're probably aiming from below and behind. From that position, you'll find the exhaust from the engines obscured by the horizontal tailplane and the twin rudders, making it difficult for the heat seeker in the missile to get a good lock on the target. That is not an accident.
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"You keep using that word.

- I do not think it means what you think it means."

Thus spake Mandy Patinkin as Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride (1987).
(That is the second most-quoted line from the movie. The first?  Many of you probably already know, but we'll get to that anyway.)

That movie was the midnight special at the River Oaks Theater last night.

The night was a bit of an adventure. Catching that showing was already on my to-do list, but got complicated by my car being in the shop Saturday, and not being finished (as they were sure it would be) so I'm on foot until Monday.

Fun part of that situation is that lower back pain makes walking difficult and painful.

Plus, you may have noted the "midnight" part.  The theater is a mile from my apartment and I walk though a mixed residential and commercial area (West Gray Street is a series of strip shopping centers in that area). Heading to the theater, a bit after 11 PM -- not so worrisome as plenty of people are out and about.

It was the return, at 2 AM that I wasn't all that thrilled about. So I took advantage of my CCL and was packing when I went to the theater.

In my post Speedloader, I mentioned a fanny-pack that I could use for concealment, but its problem is that it draws attention to itself. Instead, I just emptied the right-hand pocket of my slacks and put the .44 there.

It's a big pocket, but not an ideal solution as the weapon could snag if you don't grasp it properly (and adrenalin triggered by fear could certainly render "properly" as problematic), but I did feel much better knowing it was there. I figured on using situational-awareness as a substitute for fast draw anyway.

Also, it does make a bulge in that pocket, but it's not noticeable with black slacks at night. I would feel very uncomfortable in broad daylight with this. I'm really gonna have to come up with something better. But, time and money. Time and money. Mostly money.

I seem to recall starting off talking about a movie.

Ok, then ...

I wanted to experience the movie in a theater full of people who absolutely love movies, and that is an accurate description of the typical River Oaks Theater attendee. The usual audience is much better behaved than you find at most theaters, not because the theater has a huge bouncer (it doesn't), but because that's just the way they are.

What I did not expect is that the movie has such a following of people familiar with screenwriter William Goldman's dialog, that it would get a The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) treatment from the audience saying most of the lines in unison with the movie. I had no idea it had become that much of a cult item.

Loved the experience and am so glad that I didn't let my fears keep me from going.

Absolutely wonderful and fun movie. If you can't experience it the way I did last night, at least get the DVD and give yourself a treat.

So, what's the most-quoted line from the movie? To the point where the movie even quotes itself? Once more, it's from Inigo (who gets some of the best lines in the movie) and is unappreciated by the one to whom it was directed.

Mandy Patinkin as Inigo Montoya
from billybrew.com

Inigo (to the man he has found after searching for him for twenty years):
 "Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die!"

The man (after Inigo has repeated it for about the fifth time while pressing his attack): "STOP SAYING THAT!!!"
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Speedloader

This is a speedloader ...

from bearonarock.com

It's a device to help quickly reload a revolver.  In the model pictured above, you insert a cylinder's-full of cartridges (5 for my weapon) and turn that knurled knob at the back to lock them in.  When reloading, you eject the spent cases from the cylinder, shove in a full load with that speedloader, and turn the knob to release the cartridges. It is supposed to be very fast.

Problem is, it has to be built to very exacting standards.  The model I bought, a long time ago, was apparently not made to those standards, allowing the cartridges to wobble a bit in the loader, and causing them to mis-align frustrating your attempts to insert them into the cylinder. In an emergency, that is not desirable. So, I threw that one away.

The events in my previous post, Accident Report - A Work in Progress (it is still in progress), mean that I will be dependent on buses and walking to get about for a very long time to come; perhaps for the rest of my life.  There will be places I will want to go to (if I'm ever able to walk again), at night, and unless I'm going to be a prisoner in my apartment, I'm damned well going to go.

That means, it's about time to take advantage of the Concealed Carry License I went to so much trouble to obtain years ago.

The speedloader (if I can find one I can depend on) would be a nice companion for this ...

(Yes, the picture looks faded. That was deliberate, in an attempt to better show something black and shiny against such a light background).

That is an old model Charter Arms Bulldog with a 3" barrel, in .44 S&W Special caliber.  I bought that years ago, and that target shows the first five shots I put through it, at ten yards, firing double-action (a misnomer actually, but it's commonly used to describe firing a revolver without cocking it first; just using a long pull of the trigger*).

That flyer (the one furthest from the rest of the group) was the fifth one. With a .44 Special in such a light gun, the recoil is a very sharp slap that will sting the palm of your hand; not a fun gun to fire. But it satisfied me that it should certainly get the job done.

A long time ago, I bought (and still have) a special fanny pack made for concealed carry, with a fast-open compartment.

I would truly like recommendations for speedloaders for that weapon, that are made to standards that should insure reliable loading.

It's possible that I may have to reconsider my ammunition of choice. I favor ...

from smith-wessonforum.com

... because it's reliable, accurate, and falls into the "will get the job done" category. To more easily feed into the cylinder, I may need to look at rounds that have a more tapered nose.

(And before anyone warns me that "lots of indoor ranges ban the use of Blazer ammunition as unsafe, blows up guns (often showing spectacular pictures of blown-up revolvers)", well know this ...

A lot of police departments throughout the country use this ammunition, for budgetary reasons.  While the quality of their rangemasters may vary quite a bit, I suspect that most of those departments are very knowledgeable on lawsuits. That they keep using it is to me a pretty good sign.

I think that what indoor shooting ranges really hate about Blazer is that they sweep up the fired cartridge cases and reload them. The Blazer rounds use aluminum cases, which don't re-size as well as the brass used by most other manufacturers. They also use Berdan primers (needing a special two-pronged decapping tool) instead of the more commonly used (over here) Boxer primer that can use a single pin though a center hole for removing the old primer.

All that trouble probably keeps them from making a profit on reloading the Blazer cartridges.

I've never encountered an outdoor shooting range that had any problem with users using the Blazer ammunition. They probably don't collect and reload the cases because it may be more trouble than it's worth to separate and clean them from the dirt, rocks and other debris on the ground there.)

Anyways -- if any readers have suggestions for speedloaders for my gun (that I can depend on), I'd love to hear from you.

I'm quite aware that a compact automatic, with extra clips would be the smart way to go, but there's simply no money for that. "You go to war with the Army you have."

Well, I have to go to war with what's at hand.

(* - Ok, then. What does "double-action" really mean? It means there are two ways to fire the weapon.

One: Cock the hammer first, allowing you to fire it with a light pull of the trigger, usually more accurate.

Two: Use a long (usually heavy and rough, although it varies greatly among different weapons) pull of the trigger, to cock the hammer and then release it in one motion. This is fastest, but not always very accurate. Mileage varies greatly among different weapons. Some Smith & Wesson models have very good and smooth trigger pulls when used this way, as does that Charter Arms Bulldog of mine.

So, one of the greatest misnomers is a weapon described as DAO (Double Action Only) when it in fact has just a single mode of being fired: by pulling the trigger to cock and release the hammer.

Ain't semantics wonderful? :-)
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Trivia about True Grit - Updated 07 DEC 2019

This is a follow-up to True Grit vs True Grit (comparing the remake to the original).  In that post, I mentioned this item about the original (1969) version ...

The novel was adapted into a screenplay by Marguerite Roberts, who was blacklisted in 1952 for refusing to name names in her testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee and had been branded a communist for that.

When she learned that her script was being submitted to John Wayne, she was certain that, because of his right-wing politics, there was no way he would ever read it.

The Duke surprised her, twice, by saying, "Well, let me take a look at the script.  Let's give her a chance.", and then later coming out and saying, "This is the best western written in years.  Let's do it."

Most of the following will concern the 2010 remake and/or the novel.

Judge Isaac Parker - His court and his marshals...
The story takes place in 1878.  At that time, what we know as Oklahoma was then the Indian Territory, occupied by the five civilized tribes (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole). Being free of local law enforcement, it became a magnet for cattle thieves, horse thieves and various other desperadoes.

The only court having any jurisdiction over the territory was the U. S. Court for the Western District of Arkansas, located in Fort Smith, Arkansas right on the western border. In 1875, Judge Isaac Parker was appointed to preside over the court and quickly became known as the "Hanging Judge" (In 21 years, one hundred and sixty men were sentenced to hang, of which 79 actually were).

From Wikipedia (Yeah, I know, I KNOW - Supposedly you can't trust it) ...
One unusual element of the Western District's jurisprudence was the fact that, with respect to the Indian Territory, during this period it was a court of final jurisdiction. From 1875 until 1889, statutory law did not provide for appeals of Indian Territory cases from this court to any court of appeal.

To enforce the law, he used U. S. Deputy Marshals, of which author Charles Portis noted (in his character's words), "There is near about two hundred of them...". Mattie later observes, on someone calling the court "the Parker slaughterhouse", "I don't know who was right.  I know sixty-five of his marshals got killed.  They had some mighty tough folks to deal with."

Among those marshals was one Heck Thomas, who later rode with Bill Tilghman and was the one who killed outlaw Bill Doolin after an escape from the prison that Tilghman had helped to put him in. Thomas became known for that killing, and for his absolutely relentless pursuit of those he went after.  I've seen several mentions that Portis probably had him in mind when he conjured up the character of Rueben J. "Rooster" Cogburn.

Picketwire...
A character in the remake (not in the original nor in the novel) refers to someone currently "hunting north of the Picketwire".  Any who have seen John Wayne's  "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence" may recall mention of it there.

It is a river, in southeastern Colorado, that empties into the Arkansas River.  It was named the Purgatoire River by the French, and is so named on maps.  A Google search for Picketwire Canyon will disclose that parts of the river are famous for the amazing amount of dinosaur tracks preserved there.

Locals, having difficulty wrapping their mouths around the French pronunciation, simply called it the "Picketwire".

Guns, guns and more guns!  Oh, boy!! My favorite subject...
Mattie goes hunting her father's murderer with this ...

From firearmshistory.blogspot.com

It is an 1848 Colt Dragoon, carried by her father in the Civil War. She declares to Rooster that, "I intend to kill Tom Chaney with it, if the law fails to do so". To which he replies, "Well, that piece will do the job".

I reckon it would. It is a six-shot, .44 caliber revolver using 50 grains of black powder to propel its bullet.  A powerful weapon, it was an evolution of the even larger 1847 Walker Colt.  You may have noticed that the cylinder does not extend all the way to the frame.  There's a reason for that; in the Walker model, it did, allowing for 60 grains of powder, sometimes resulting in cylinders being blown apart by that charge.  Shortening the cylinder precluded that possibility.

Rooster has, as his main sidearm ...

 From www.imfdb.org

From www.imfdb.org

... An 1873 Colt Single-Action Army in .44-40 Winchester caliber.  The caliber is not mentioned in the movie but is mentioned early in the novel, and later confirmed when Mattie is surprised by Rooster using the same cartridges to load that pistol and his rifle.  That, after all, was the whole point of making the pistol for that particular round.

Rooster also carries two of this model ...

From www.imfdb.org

... in saddle holsters hung from the saddle horn.  This is the Model 1851 "Navy" Colt.  It was never adopted by the Navy; it was so named because (early models at least) came with an engraving on the cylinder of a scene of the victory of the Second Texas Navy at the Battle of Campeche on May 16, 1843. (07 DEC 2019 - See Update near end for youtube video about this battle.)

When this model came out, metallurgy had some ways to go, and guns had to be more heavily built to handle the pressures of the powders used. The use of .36 caliber for this model resulted in a weapon not as powerful as its .44 caliber brothers, but still powerful enough to be taken seriously.

It was lighter than the Dragoon, beautifully balanced and superbly accurate, making it a favorite of people who depended on the weapon for their lives, including (among others) one James Butler "Wild Bill" Hickok.

That Rooster carried a pair, in saddle holsters, is another nice touch. He was supposed to have ridden with Quantrill during the Civil War. Quantrill equipped his men with four revolvers each, two carried on their persons, the other two in saddle holsters, giving each man 24 shots without reloading - quite a bit of firepower when they fell upon their prey.

And, finally, the Texas Ranger LaBoeuf favored ...

From www.imfdb.org

... the Model 1874 Sharps Cavalry Carbine, in .45-70 Government caliber.  Every bit as accurate as LaBoeuf bragged, and perfectly capable of the shot he made.  There were various .50 caliber models of this weapon available, but an awful lot of Army models in the .45-70 caliber wound up in the hands of the Texas Rangers, so there's nothing at all strange about him having that particular weapon.

One of the things I really loved about the remake was how much they got right.

Update - 12 Jun 2011 - Perceptive readers will notice the addition of two new labels: "History";  which has been retroactively applied to some of my other posts as well, and "Guns";  first applied to this post.  From its addition, you may correctly assume that it is a subject I plan on revisiting from time to time.

Update 07 DEC 2019 - History Guy - Battle of Campeche ...

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