rgaper

Nope. It's a linked photo from the safe manufacturer's website.

This. I could have saved myself a ton of time and money if I had started out with a Glock 19, a quality holster, quality belt, quality mag carrier, and quality training. For civilian self defense purposes, the Glock is a tough gun to beat. If you don't like the gun, you can sell it for nearly the same price you paid for it. The out of the box trigger is much better than most guns and with the $0.25 trigger job + the competition spring, it's just about perfect for me. I find that most people who don't like the Glock trigger are not the type to have trained on trigger reset, etc. In that category you have folks who swear by Glocks and M&Ps. (like me) What's troubling to me is that a lot of the guys here who don't like Glocks are concerned with it being "ugly" or the unattractive shape of the cocking serrations. Seriously? If I have to present my pistol in a self defense situation, the last thing I'm going to be concerned with is if the bad guy thinks my gun is ugly. All I care about is that it works, and it does that very well, every single time.

Inside a locked safe would be a major improvement. YMMV, but I usually leave an AK on the dashboard with an extra mag stuck in the 8-track player...

Try the following: Dear Merchant, I respect your lawful right to prohibit law-abiding permit holders from patronizing your business. This is your right and I will respect it accordingly. In the spirit of exercising other Amendments (since you don't seem the like the 2nd one) I will resort to the exercising the 1st. I will be printing up 50 fliers letting anyone interested know that there will be no armed citizens in your business to promote a safer environment for everyone. I will leave these posted outside of the release doors at the Shelby County Jail. Again, thank you for taking these steps, even criminals deserve a safe working environment. Thank you. *heavy sarcasm of course*

This. I hang the target, hit the timer, initiate a standard defensive response (2 rounds center mass) and use that time/performance as my baseline. The bad guys don't let you get warm-up shots. I keep a training notebook and work on specific skills & drills based on how often much live fire I've done, how much dryfire work I've done that week, what I need to work on, and revisiting fundamentals. I guess it's easy to answer this question because I'm not a recreational shooter per se, it's about working on a potentially life-saving skill.

I wonder if we can find out who the franchise owner is for this one. It's not clear if anyone has communicated their displeasure with the posting, and when you stop going somewhere but nobody notices or knows why, you're not really doing anything helpful for the cause.

They're good stuff. Up at our hunting camp in the Adirondacks we have a standing rule that if you want to hunt there, you need to have a Garmin Rino. The 100-series radios are fairly weak and if you get into any kind of cover (pines for example) you'll lose your satellites real fast. It also seems that they take awhile to acquire the satellites. About 2 years ago I upgraded to the 500-series and it absolutely corrects all of the issues described above, but they're big bucks in comparison.

Correct. The P250s are back at Sig and the legacy Sig pistols (P229/P239) are back out in the field. For those that are interested, attached is a link to the GAO response to Sig's protest after they were eliminated from the BATFE trials. My favorite quote is as follows... "Sig Sauer also contends that ATF placed too great an emphasis upon reliability in determining which offers should continue to phase III." Seriously? U.S. GAO - B-402339.3, Sig Sauer, Inc., July 23, 2010

I know! Carrying a pistol that you can depend on from a company that will stand behind it is so overrated anyhow...

The Sig P250 is perhaps the most disappointing pistol to ever come out of Sig Arms. The concept is really neat, but that's where the excitement ends. Rather than give you my first person perspective on shooting the pistol, here's some food for thought... The Federal Air Marshal Service purchased the P250 to replace their aging P229s. Due to poor performance of the P250, they stopped deploying additional P250 pistols and redeployed the P229s. The BATFE rejected the P250 due to reliability issues and it ranked well below the competing Glock and M&P. Specifically, it was "excluded from further consideration as unacceptable with respect to reliability." A month ago, the Dutch police canceled a 45,000 unit order of P250s due to concerns about the pistol in a vote of no confidence. Do your own research on the gun, but the reason you're seeing these deals is that Sig likely doing what they should have done a long time ago... dumping the gun.

That's exactly what the trigger is designed to mimic - Kahr even advertises it that way. I've had a PM9 for about a year and I'm not a fan. I upgraded the awful sights to Heinies and bought a couple of different Comp-Tac holsters to give it a fair shot. I really wanted to like this gun and have it fill the niche of super-light carry. The trigger pull is looooooong and smooth like a S&W revolver, but so is the trigger reset. Seriously, you could fire a round and go out and get a cup of coffee and when you come back, the trigger is still on its way to resetting. IMO, the Kahrs are fine for folks who like magazine-fed revolvers, but that ain't me. Leroy, the trigger is not to be messed with, it's take it or leave it. Read at the link below for some good info: Kahr trigger mods.... anyone do anything to change your trigger - AR15.COM Little bit of background on the founder of Kahr Arms as well for those that enjoy trivia. Moon Kook-jin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I agree. A questionable lower is often an indicator of a series of bad purchases, and is rarely the source of the issue by itself. I will say this - Given the choice of a crappy lower or a crappy upper, I'll take the crappy lower every day of the week. When you do see a lower-related problem, it's almost always the LPK in the form of a crappy two-stage trigger that doesn't hold up. Other than that, pin holes being out of spec is probably the next most common I've seen with lowers. Last year I was helping 3 guys from TN do a 300 round ramp-up for their first carbine course. One of the guys had a DPMS lower where the holes were "close enough" to let it function, but far enough off that it was wearing unevenly. The long term health outlook for the gun wasn't good due specifically to the lower.

You said a mouthful. Whether it will "work right" for you depends on the job that you give it. As stated elsewhere, the majority of owners will never know the difference. Take a guy who has a hobby gun manufacturer lower that runs fine for him in his monthly 3-gun shoot and throw him into a 1000-1500 round carbine course and the wheels start coming off. I've seen plenty of guys who have had a gun "for years" show up at a course where the round count and tempo of shooting is different and find out that their lower is doubling, that their pin holes are drilled out of spec, etc. Uppers/BCGs are more common see problems in, but lowers/LPKs are not immune. So, my rhetorical question is - if we all agree that buying top quality parts is the safest way to ensure that you'll get a trouble-free long life out of it regardless of how you use it, why not just buy a known, top-quality lower and then just not worry about it, especially when the price difference (lower vs. lower) is so minimal?

The last few replies did a decent job of summarizing some of the factual information. With respect to the internet/gun rag/gun store mythology about almost all of the lowers in the world being produced by one manufacturer and "they're all the same except for the name on the side", my suggestion is ignore this information. There are a handful of manufacturering & machining companies that historically, have been rumored to be manufacturing the bulk of the lowers on the market. CMT, LAR and JVP are a few of the companies most commonly quoted. I use the word rumor because these companies have NDAs in place so that you'll never find out who does what. Even if you do find out who was making the lowers, there's no way to confirm it (unless they say they're making the lowers themselves - example, LMT) or if they have a known connection in business together (example CMT/Stag). As I'll point out in a second though, none of this matters. Even if every single lower was manufactered by the same machine shop, it would mean nothing. Each company provides THEIR spec to the manufacturing company and they produce the lower based on that spec. That means that you could have wildly different lowers coming out of the same shop based on top quality specifications and bottom quality specifications. Last, but certainly not least, "fit and finish" are not indicators of a quality, in-spec lower receiver, and I constantly see guys getting stuck on this. A tight-fitting receiver does nothing but make it hard to remove the upper. A "pretty" lower is just that. Some of the worst receivers I've seen, from manufacturers that I wouldn't recommend have tight-fitting uppers/lowers, with seemingly beautiful finishes... If you're a shooter, all that should matter to you is that it's in-spec, and there are manufacturers you can rely on for this.

You got it exactly bro. Too many guys - especially those that don't train - completely "game" how an imaginary defensive shooting will work out in their head, and that's what they prepare themselves for. As part of this fantasy, all of their equipment works 100%. These are often the same folks who don't carry their with a loaded chamber because "I'll have plenty of time to chamber a round", pocket carry, etc. Magazines fail, magazines catches can fail, magazines can get ejected while you're in a struggle with a bad guy... there are a million things that could happen where having an extra magazine would be a good thing. We know that statistically, most defensive shootings aren't long and protracted, and that they're at a very short range with a very low round count (the rule of 3's) but isn't it really nice to have options? An extra magazine means that you've got options. Glad to hear you're there.

With the preface that my favorite IWB holster is the Comp-Tac MTAC, I wasn't able to make their IWB mag carrier workable for me. First, adding another item IWB starts to get impractical. Second, based on the small size, the material, the depth that the mag is seated in the carrier, and most body types, it has a habit of at best being slow. I found that even with my body type, I had to lean toward my gun side (away from the mag carrier) to be able to use it.

Wow... this thread turned out to be way crazier than expected. Having lived in the heart of America's firearms industry & firearms history - the Connecticut River Valley - for a few years, it is definitely quite ironic that the bulk of the iconic firearm/firearm parts/firearm accessory manufacturers are located in CT and MA. I could leave my place and be at Marlin, Mossberg, Ruger, Colt, Lyman, C-Products, Stag, PTR, CMT, Mec-Gar and numerous other manufacturers in literally a matter of minutes. Winchester's former facility where so much history had been made was only right down the road. As for why they don't move... it's hard and it's expensive. Plus, many of their employees have been with them a long time and wouldn't relocate, so there's the human aspect to it as well. As I mentioned in my earlier reply, the legislators have tried to introduce laws that (so far) have been thwarted by the significant efforts of the shooting public, in-state pro-gun organizations (not the NRA), and the manufacturers listed above. If some of them ever made it into the books, such as micro-stamping, it would cause an exodus, and for the time being, the legislators seem to get that.

I concealed carry a Glock 19 every day along with at least one extra magazine and my body type is on the small, thin/average side. After trying a number of different mag carriers, I use (and wholeheartedly recommend) Kaluban Cloak single mag carriers. They fit close to the body, have positive retention, and are very low profile. Whatever you get/try, make sure you train with it to ensure that it works for you. Some of the setups out there are nothing more than marketing crap. Carrying an extra mag is not about carrying an extra mag, it's about carrying an extra mag that you can actually use under stress. For example (no offense to the posters) look at the pics in this thread of the holsters where there's an extra mag carrier combined with the holster... see any problems? Not only does the extra mag's location prevent the shooter from getting a final firing grip on their pistol at count #1, but folks are absolutely dreaming if they think they're going to that mag out of the carrier that's on their gun side.

It may be time for you to switch to decaf. I'm the guy who knows a lot more people who work for Colt Defense than you do. That good enough for you? 16,000 sq ft is not a big facility, that was my point which is not at all controversial. Your posts are filled with emotion and drama... try to relax a little, I didn't call your baby ugly.

Connecticut certainly has not been friendly to Colt with the CT AWB specifically damning Colt in a big way for its citizens. In recent years, Gen. Keys' Colt has been extremely involved in helping to make sure that no additional laws get passed, sending his legal team to public hearings and sending a message straight to the lawmakers that "if this law gets passed, Colt will leave" which pissed some lawmakers off for sure... of course the law didn't happen, so hey, it works! Not to be a negative post, but given the fact that the Hartford facility is 100,000 sq ft, 16,000 sq ft is hardly even interesting. I know a number of small business owners who have 12,000-18,000 sq ft facilities.

Not sure what you may be referring to or confused on with the Colt information about caveats. Colts are just as modular as any other AR15-style rifle, so you can pick, choose, add, subtract and modify as you please. As far as civilian available models, they don't have a ton of options because, frankly, they don't need to. Colt is the gold standard that all other AR15s follow. The elusive "mil-spec" that is thrown so wildly around is embodied in the TDP (technical data package) that Colt - and only Colt - is allowed to utilize on the open market. Have other companies embraced the need to give the enduser a tier 1 quality firearm? Absolutely - and notoriously, "the chart" kept a very close comparison of who they are. Consistently, Colt, Bravo Company, Daniel Defense, and LMT topped the charts. LMT made some moves in the wrong direction at some point to keep pace with the 2008 demand spike, so they've since been downgraded. That said, when it comes to M4-pattern carbines, the Colt 6920 is still the standard to which others are compared. Why is BCM loved so dearly? Because they build their stuff as close to the Colt TDP as possible - closer than anyone else - and are good at what they do. Let's just not kid ourselves about Colt's product. Does that mean I'm a Colt fanboy or that I'm trashing Bravo Company? Absolutely not. All of my guns are Colt, BCM, LMT, and Daniel Defense. As I mentioned above, I think Bravo Company provides the best value for the money, and per "the chart" they are very much on par with Colt, with the key difference being that they cater to the open market so that a user can get different configurations just a mouseclick away. Dolomite is absolutely correct about BCM's customer service as well - Paul and the rest of the guys at BCM are truly class acts and take good care of their customers... no matter if the gun's hardest use is going to be under a camera flash in someone's parents' basement or if it's in Afghanistan killing Hajis. One thing I will say for sure is that IMO, more than any other company I think BCM owns the mid-length gas system market. Their guns run incredibly well and as this configuration picked up in popularity, some had issues. BCM has not.

FYI, as of the last week there are no firearms-related signs or notices at this park.

BPE, First off, big kudos to you for asking questions before buying. Many ARs look the aesthetically the same and it's always disappointing watching the guy with the DPMS, Olympic, Rock River (insert any hobby manufacturer's name here) find out that there's a lot more to it... the hard way. Unfortunately, I've got to see a lot of these guys first hand as their gun goes dead, and it's fairly predictable. The important question you need to answer before anyone can provide valid advice is what do you intend to use the rifle for? If you intend it for purely casual/recreational use to familiarize yourself with the platform, and have a fairly low round count per use, that's one thing, and you can get away with a lot. If you intend to eventually take carbine courses and put it to more serious use, I would encourage (from a brand perspective) buying Bravo Company, Colt, or Daniel Defense. Bravo Company is very tough to beat on price, quality, and options. There is a lot of information out there, and most of it is really bad, misinformed stuff, so tread carefully and take things with a grain of salt. That said, you do have some very good resources you can rely on, but the first bit of feedback really needs to come from you. Good luck! Gaper

I haven't bought or sold a firearm in Tennessee, but I think a very safe bet would be seeing the buyer's Tennessee HCP as this would confirm not only their residency, but also that they are not a felon, and that they are able to purchase a handgun. I don't know how quickly TN yanks HCPs if a permit holder becomes a prohibited individual, but in other states I've lived in, it's one of the first things they do. As far as recording information, having that person's name, their phone number and seeing their TN HCP seems like due diligence IMO. If the HCP has a unique permit # that's not a TN DL#, that would be a good piece of info to record and there's no associated risk of identity theft there... but I believe the DL # is used.

This is almost verbatim what I was going to type. I've had an AA kit for a G19 since about 2008 and my only complaint is that out of the 20 or so magazines I have, they get retired or designated as a training tool (malfunction prone) faster than 9mm magazines do. I've got both the metal feedlip and polymer feedlip mags and see equal issues. My average per-use round count with the kit is probably 250-350 rounds per outing and I find that right around 150 rounds, it needs to be disassembled and at the very least wiped down and re-lubricated. I use mine solely as a training tool for single trigger press drills, etc. since the kit obviously isn't representative of a full-power cartridge in multi-shot drills. Only modification I made was to put Heinie Ledge rear and Tritium front on it to match my 9mm slides.