Jonnin

    It is deceit.  I flat out heard the guy selling ammo at over 60/500 that it was "the last of it" and the he "got this batch off the black market".   He was trying to scare someone into buying it with BS, period.   A willing buyer that has been lied to perhaps deserves the life lesson, but the guy doing the lying is still in the wrong and deserves whatever bad publicity his stunt brings upon him.    Or take it the other direction.   DO we as conservatives actually support *true* capitalism?  Where cartels and monopolies rule, shoddy products sold to gullible buyers is ok,  heavy markup after elimination of competition is acceptable, and so on?   The ammo thing is exactly that... they buy up all the supply and jack up the price --- the definition of a monopoly.   We regulate those because somewhere in the 1920s and 30s someone realized what happens if we don't.

I fully support the right to charge people whatever price and make profits.  Fine.   But unethical people deserve to be called out, loudly.    I have the RIGHT to charge old, senile people an arm and a leg for some "service" or to trick them into signing their property over to me in exchange for "whatever".  This is unethical but not illegal.    I have the RIGHT to buy something at walmart, quadruple the price, and sell it to idiots.  This is unethical but legal.    I have the RIGHT to cater to stupid, handicapped, sick, or otherwise judgmentally impaired folks and rip them off.  See?   See where this is going?  Charging a new gun person 80 bucks for a 20 dollar box of ammo is beyond "making a living" and has edged into taking advantage of the (apparently) mentally disabled.   Giving someone $200 on a $600 gun because it is lightly used is crooked.  Buying guns at super low prices from widows etc is dirty.    Time was that I felt gun people were a community bonded together, loosely united with a common cause (protecting our rights and enjoying the sports/hobbies/etc).  No longer.  These days I feel like all gun sellers are on par with used car salesmen.   I do not know if something changed or if my eyes just opened as I grew older and wiser.   Time was I cared to buy from local vendors and gun shows to keep them in business.  Today, I could care less if the majority of them died in a fire -- and it would be a tossup whether I would pee on em to help.

Heh I am all over this contract.  Its like paying yourself to work for em sometimes....   getting your taxes back and then some.

electronic does not have to mean online/network toys.   I would be just as happy to have a working flashlight (all light bulbs will be blown, including led etc,)  or other simple items. 

sig 938 is pricy and might be over your limit.  The 380 version has dropped into your price range (p238).   Shield is excellent in spite of the slightly inferior trigger.     938 has ambi safety but RHO mag drop.    If you want something small but not pocket, the best I have is the cz rami, also not left friendly.  Almost nothing decent IS left friendly --- you either get a no-controls gun with a 40 pound trigger or you get RH controls that can't be swapped.  NANO for example is perfect for left hand and has an unpullable trigger.

I did well today, Chattanooga small show.   Traded away a revolver my wife changed her mind on, used that and my now depleted gun fund for a colt woodsman and got a nice sackfull of interesting hand-made knives for $150 (mostly a kitchen set + a cheap toy + a cool looking useless one).    Usual suspects had jacked up ammo so we totally skipped several shady vendors (both those with the $60 22 and those I remember from before who were taking advantage). 

  I do not know HOW humanity is going to SURVIVE the SHORTAGE OF PEOPLE from lack of making babies.   We are down to ONLY 7 billion, a slight increase since 1900 of only 4 billion or so.

flip primers?  They are 99.999 % all going the same way in their original box, for every brand I have tried.  Open them slowly and transfer them carefully and flipping should be minimal?   All I do is see which way is the top, flip it upside down,  slide it onto my table, lift off the tray, and what remains is a grid of 100 all going the same way.

  I could, but only if it were something like  this one:  (from king tut's stuff)   http://www.kidspast.com/images/kingtut-dagger.jpg

heh, really, you gotta train to use a freaking CLUB?    Its like the first weapon invented.  You hit someone upside the head a few times, and they stop bothering you.  How hard is that?

I have been waiting on th e next book for so long ive about given up.  I know better than to start reading an incomplete series, but got sucked into it when I got stuck out with nothing else to read.   Its OK, in a "where is it going" sort of way.     SPOILER ALERT [background='#000000']Left me hanging with zombie mrs stark about to pwn the female knight. [/background]   It reminds me of Robert Jordan, in the "is there even a real plot anymore" kind of way.

blade should be plain or have something simple --- that mess ruins the whole effect.

Maybe ground the box?  This may be overkill, but IIRC (my electricity and mag physics is rusty) EMP can jump thru minor shielding and grounding it should help redirect it away from the inside.  Someone else may know if this is the way to go or not.   I have only used a cage to stop interference from small sources, not a heavy hitter,  such as shielding a cable from an motor or the like...  its not the same.   I dunno, a phone, a laptop, radio, lights and batteries,  anything electronic or electric that you would put into your bug-out bag should go in this.   I also can't remember if emp can set off ammo under some conditions (???).

I always recommend not having ammo in the safe in case of fire.  Just on the off-chance *some* of the guns *might* survive the fire, a large ammo explosion puts an end to your luck.  A cheap safe might be in order as an ammo cabinet if you think someone will steal it.    One nice way to store 223 is in your mags...  at some point more mags is silly and pricy but at least 10 or so is a solid investment and good storage, depending on your paranoia level and budget...   Otherwise, what people here said is all great.  Cool dry place,  moisture control if needed,  stack it somewhere sturdy in rugged stackable containers or on rugged shelving.  DIY  thick shelves can hold hundreds of pounds over a 2-4 foot span, 6 or so shelves from floor to ceiling would hold 10s of thousands of rounds of common ammo.   For really long term storage you could paint over the primers to seal them or do a light vacuum seal (dont suck the primers and bullets out the case, but get most of the air) with one of those food storage devices.  For that matter quart jars can be lightly air-sealed with one of those devices. 

Nice, ty for checking

HOW the hammer is cocked should not matter, it should SIT in the same notch/position regardless of how it was done.     So I agree... sounds like maybe some sort of hammer block safety is gummed up?

The scoring is not well thought out.   Its TN.  I can have all kinds of real guns.  Why in the bleep would I spend a buttload of money of FAKE TOY guns like paintball or airsoft when I have the real thing?  We are penalized for not having toy guns.   They should score it once for owning any sort of training weapon platform, and a second column for having a functional weapon and ammo capable of actually stopping said zombies.   That paintball gun wont stop a determined poodle, let alone a zombie.   If I had to score it, I would just have - prepper stores (food, meds, survival stuff, 1 month supply or better) - bug out  (ability to go rual, far from major cities and infestations) - firepower (actual weapons and ammo) - training (as said) - environment (grow / find edible plants/food?  extreme conditions like alaska?  Island, trapped like hawaii? ) - military presence (big firepower)   and other such things.

This is not news.  Its just that it takes some big old nads to say the truth, which can be summed up in 2 statements:   - poor areas have a lot of crime and violence.  This includes inner city ghettos and suburban trashy areas and even rual trailer parks.  The nature of cities being a large population,  the # of shots fired will, therefore, be highest in the city ghettos, even if the %s are similar with rual poor areas.   - poor people in these areas are often hooked on government "aid" and therefore vote democrat.   Problem is that saying the above gets the idiots to go haywire trying to censor the person saying it with cries of "racism" or "victim blame" or other nonsense.   There is no need for a study and if they do one, the results will be as expected.   Human nature is quite predictable:  humans are generally a sorry lot of mean SOBs that are prone to violence..... this surprises no one.   Take a group of humans with nothing to lose, and much to gain, what you think is gonna happen?   Hats off to captain obvious and his well written piece -- I wish him the best as he bucks the censorship machine!

Glad no one was hurt.    I have to stress this --- be nice, but tell folks.  He probably had no idea his shots were doing that, a gentle "excuse me, ..."  can lead to a positive response and maybe help everyone be safer.   Or if uncomfortable talking to the shooter, there has to be someone there who took your $$ or something (?) to complain to.  Holding out pieces of bullets that hit you will get someone to lend you an ear....     Sometimes ppl don't know, sometimes they don't think, once in a while they don't care but more often its just a mistake.   I hit a friend once (piece of a target came back and cut his arm).   Learned that steel is just not worth the "fun" of shooting at.  I will never again shoot at hard metal that is not part of a validated target system designed to be shot.

we had a 709 and I really liked it.   Sold it as the wife has gone revolver over auto, not because of any issue.   It was reliable and small, best way I could describe it is a lot like a small glock would be.   Not a fan of DAO so the tcp is not something I have tried.  Likely it is also reliable, if you can manage to pull the trigger.  So, basically, its a smaller caliber in a harder to use gun, and in every way I can think of apart from the dimensions (in which case, by the way, both lose to smaller pistols), the 709 is 'better'.    I know you said keep it to those 2 but I recommend you consider anything and everything.  There are tons of other small pistols in the 380 and 9,  and again, given how different these 2 are, I can't think of a common theme to even make a suggestion, all I was able to get was {small, possibly must be taurus brand}.

Reliability issues are just not a valid complaint.  I could take a glock, gut it, and put in bubba joe's  home-made hand milled parts and make it unreliable.  I could stick cheap no-name brand mags in it and have issues.  I could get an offbrand clone that fails if someone made such a thing (atm no one as actually copied a glock to my knowledge, oddly, give it time).  I mean, I own one of the most reliable guns ever made, the makarov.  And I actually did put in a hand made part that we machined for it.  And it screwed the gun up immediately... so makarovs must not be any good after all?     He is not completely wrong.  The classic 1911 is a heavy beast with a low capacity, and no one argues that.   Many modern guns are well designed, no one argues that either.   Give me the same # of manufacturers making spare parts, modifications, and clones of glock and TRY to tell me that SOME of those will not be total garbage....  that not a defensible position.   You get 50 manufacturers making stuff that is of varying degrees of quality and may or may not all fit together right, you will get messed up machines.   AR has the same issues, ever heard someone having trouble with a thrown together from parts AR?   Or a cheap brand AR that has issues?  Think about it.     If his main issue is the unreliable junk pistols that are out there, then he is making a change for the wrong reason.  If his issue is the whole package (heavy, low cap, expensive, etc) then sure, there are options to get more bang for the buck, so to speak.

  Nope.  But like selling 350 AR-15s each month, there is probably a line where is no longer considered individual sales and at the very least someone might ask a few questions.  And yea, its off on a tangent.   I mostly bothered to post to warn about trying to sell reloads, since it sounded like he was only a tax sticker short on that in a couple of posts.

it is a state sales tax.   If you live in GA and come to TN, you pay it if you buy a box.  If you live in TN and buy in GA, you don't pay it.     If you make your own, you don't pay it.     And, FYI, you can NOT sell reloaded ammo without a LOT of hoop jumping.   Its more than the tax stamp you need to worry about here, you need a lot of other paperwork first.   If you re-sell the ammo *as a business* I think you MUST have stamps.   However not 100% sure on individual sales.  I have very much seen ammo being sold by commercial/professional re-seller.  It does not have 2 sets of stamps, so they clearly did not stamp it to re-sell it.   I think individual sales are clear.  I am NOT sure that you CAN re-sell ammo as an individual legally or not??  It may be kind of like selling guns to individuals --- long as its not a LOT, they don't look at you?? 

I have an honest to goodness functional flail.  It has 2 spiked balls (dull spikes) on a chain on a handle, the balls probably weigh in at about 1 pound each.   If someone breaks into my home, I will hit them with it  repeatedly if it happens to be what is in reach.   I would absolutely choose this over one of my longswords; I am so out of practice with a sword as to be useless but the flail is a brute force weapon,  throw all your weight behind it and it will break something wherever it hits.

  Its not hard to explain.  If i make a 'spring' for your shotgun by rolling a piece of string around a bar, it will not work.  Why? Because string does not make a good spring; it does not have the property of returning to a shape, it is limp.  If you use the wrong material, or if the material is somehow polluted or stressed or flawed, or the process producing it is flawed, or whatever, the spring will fail.  If you over-compress or over-extend a spring, it will fail.   If you make it of the proper material and use it within its functional operational parameters, it will keep on springing for a long time.  Eventually, all springs do wear out, but it should take a long life of many compress/decompress cycles to do it.  Anything else indicates the spring was either poorly made, the wrong spring for the job, or it was abused.    So, some engineer messed up when picking the spring for that gun, or you got a defective one, unless you pulled it out and messed it up without telling us.  Period.