Darrell

I'm small potatoes compared to some of you. The Colt 1911 was my father's. I'm 65, and I remember him bringing it home when I was 8 or so, and how heavy it was then. I keep waiting for the Mustang to grow up.

Guilty, I guess. I moved here from Washington, does that count as "Yankee"? WA didn't become a state until 25 years after the civil war.

She should be charged with reckless endangerment! Holy Crap! Her career is definitely over, there is no way that another cop could ever work with her.

Me too!

That situation exists in Japan, too. Not because the Japanese fear harsh punishment, but because they value their good standing in society. We have a saying here that the squeaking wheel gets the grease. The corollary saying in Japan is, "The nail that sticks up gets hammered down," Of course there are honest and dishonest people everywhere. A friend went to Tijuana with me to shop for a pair of cowboy boots, and she left her purse in the store when we left. The store-keeper chased us down two blocks away to return it, and that after I'd done my best to haggle the price of the boots down. I was impressed.

A little off-topic here, but it reminded me of a story one of my coworkers told me years ago. He heard some noises in the wee hours, went into his daughter's bedroom gun-in-hand and found her boyfriend coming in through the window. I guess they had a man-to-man discussion while Rich held a gun in the young fellow's face. THAT could have ended badly, but didn't. I imagine it left a life-long impression on the lad, though.

Just a quick update. "Katy" was pretty much hands-off for five or six weeks. But in the last week she's decided that she wants to be petted pretty darned often. She sticks right to my side on our walks in the woods, and pushes her wet nose into my hand every ten steps or so. She's figured out that her kennel and house are hers, and she'll go in there whenever she wants a break. I fly model airplanes and helicopters, and she REALLY wants to eat one, but so far she's respected my "no's" on that. She's still lean but one can no longer see her ribs and spine sticking up, and the flea collar has done wonders for her biting and scratching. Off to the spay clinic as soon as I can get an appointment, and she's due for a full set of shots. But I guess she's family now and we'll do what we can for her.

Probably fair. Consider becoming a Benefactor and listing them for sale in the "Gear" section of the classifieds.

Once a month Google sends me a little map that shows where I've been. (I live in a small world!) I rarely carry a phone with me, so Google doesn't know all, but it's still creepy.

Thank you all! Just shows to go ya that a fellow can learn something everyday.

I thought I had a bunch of 7.62 x 39 cases. I don't reload this caliber, so after identifying one case I just visually put a bunch in the same pile. Wrong answer! Almost all the cases are physically smaller than the 7.62 x 39, but the head stamp doesn't identify caliber, only the LC mark. What do I have here? Thanks!

This is Katy. She showed up uninvited about six weeks ago, skinny and afraid to be touched. She's proven to be a sweet, gentle, but worthless hound, and I guess she's adopted us and has moved in permanently. She doesn't like to pose for photos, though.

Right you are. But like you, I saw a few typhoons while I was in the Corps. Semper Fi!

I'm a bit of a fatalist, I guess. The area where I live has some very old barns that have been standing for 100 years or so, even though they've been rickety for the past 30. I look at those and reckon the chances of a tornado hitting me are pretty small. And I live in a log home that's pretty darned stout. The roof might come off, but I think the walls are likely to remain. I have a large closet and a bathroom with no external walls, and if that doesn't work, well, sayonara.

Actually, I kinda like that idea. I have about 1000' of frontage on a public road, and every other week I pick up a dozen or so empty beer cans and often an empty liquor bottle. There's a LOT of drinking and driving going on. I spent 25 years as a volunteer fireman / EMT, and the vast majority of the auto accidents that I responded to were alcohol related. Hear hear!

I'm finding powder here and there at something around $35 a pound. And I just bought 1000 Berry's 30-carbine bullets for $100. The last primers I saw for sale at a retail store were insanely priced. Premium bullets continue to fetch premium prices, but plinkers are available. I check Hodgdon and Powder Valley just about every day looking for some Retumbo or H1000, but no luck so far. When a powder comes available you'd better be ready to push the "buy now" button, as it won't be available for long. I've seen Varget at suggested retail price twice in the past couple of months, and it's gone within an hour. I cast bullets for quite a few of my handguns and a couple of rifles. I have a fair bit of lead on hand, so I should be able to continue with that for a few years. But finding tin to mix in has become more and more difficult. My local thrift shops probably think I collect pewter pieces, but it gets cut down and tossed in the pot.

Seems a couple of folks were looking for this earlier.

That Colt in 38 Super is on my list, too. What do you think of it?

In that case it may be that the one bullet that stuck just didn't get fully seated. Perhaps you didn't cycle the press fully. If you have other cartridges from that batch of reloads, and all of them will cycle correctly with no marks on the bullet, then my guess is that you had a one-off failure to seat fully. That would also account for a lighter crimp. It's always best to be critical of reload failures and figure out the cause. Sounds like you have it under control.

And he was also the first Grand Wizard of the KKK, which is what those opposing the statue were most opposed to. I think we could "cancel" just about every one of our past "heroes". George Washington owned slaves, Jefferson had children with at least one of his slaves (Sally Hemming was also his wife's half-sister) and kept those children in slavery, Lincoln suggested that blacks should be sent to Liberia after the war, Tennessee's own Andrew Jackson slaughtered Indians, Woodrow Wilson has a reputation as a racist. All those were men of their times. Virtually everyone was a racist in Washington's time. Better to acknowledge the faults of America's past leaders and to consider their accomplishments in context with times in which they lived.

And did you then cycle the cartridge successfully? The only reason the bullet would remain behind is that it was pushed into the lands, and the tension of the lands was great enough to overcome the tension of the mouth of the case. The rule I follow is that the OAL of the cartridge should be no greater than the bullet just touching the lands, and usually a couple of thousands less. You can test this pretty easily by loading a dummy round (no powder or primer and no crimp) and "painting" a bullet with a felt pen. Leave it a bit long, chamber it into your rifle so that the bullet is pushed into the case. If the bullet is left behind then the case will have marked the deepest penetration of the bullet by scratching the felt pen marking you made. If the bullet comes out with the cartridge then you can measure directly. You just need to seat a couple thou deeper into the case and maybe crimp a little tighter. And case necks do become thinner over the course of many reloads. The hotter the load, the more the case may stretch. But it's been my experience that the neck will split when it becomes brittle from over-work. I don't think you'd ever reach a point where the neck became too thin to hold the bullet, more likely the brass would split at the neck first.

Was it a reload? If the OAL is a bit long the bolt can push the bullet into the lands hard enough to leave the bullet behind. Not common, but certainly not unheard of. If you've got reloads, then you probably didn't get the bullet seated quite deeply enough and perhaps had too little crimp. If they are factory loads, they you might consider complaining to the manufacturer.

44 Mag dies for sale on this forum here:

So can we assume that right now you have no reloading gear at all? The place to begin is to purchase a good reloading manual. They all include instructions on reloading, and will give you a good idea of what you need to start. You don't need to invest a whole lot of money to begin, but be warned, you can spend a butt-load of money if you're so inclined. Right now is a tough time to begin reloading, as components are harder to get than they have been in the past. But components are out there. I live about an hour from Oliver Springs, but if you want to come this far I can give you a demo of loading both 45-70 and 44 Mag.

As a recent transplant from the Pacific Northwest, I can tell "yall" that one hits the nail on the head.