Seed Season
Now that the holiday rush has disappeared into the rear view mirror, it’s time to start thinking about spring things. Garden seeds are already flying off the shelves, and at least one online retailer of heirloom seeds is on its second “pause” in a month in order to catch up on shipping existing orders before accepting more.
Yep – it’s looking like Pandemic Gardening Part Deux is in the works for many people – as it is for me.
Where do you get seeds, besides the store or online? If you have to ask, then I have to wonder what you did with the “guts” of your Halloween pumpkin? How about the butternut squash you served for Thanksgiving? Did you eat all the seeds from that “organic” tomato you bought at the whole paycheck store? Where do you spit those pesky things when you’re eating your summer watermelon?
Have you even thought about what you do with fruit and vegetable seeds before? If not, I’m going to present you with a few reasons that you should start paying attention – especially if you want to be a “prepper” or just more frugal with your money.
Honestly, I’m still really low on the learning curve with this. My gardening efforts are only a couple seasons old and I’m reading and learning as I go. But I thought I would share some of the things I have learned in case there are people even lower on the learning curve than I am.
Seed saving has been a human activity for at least ten thousand years. Early humans couldn’t just order a packet of seeds from Amazon. They started with wild seeds, and then as they domesticated these plants they carefully hoarded and saved seeds from one growing season to the next. It was necessary to preserve them from rot or mold or being eaten by animals over the winter – so that they could start next year’s crop in the spring. This was a vitally important activity – if you lost your seeds your entire clan could potentially starve.
Colonists, immigrants, and native tribes have all carried their favored seeds along with them when they pulled up stakes and moved to new territory – whether the move was voluntary or not. That’s partly why we have such wide genetic diversity of edible crops available to us now. But even so, that diversity is only a small subset of what “used” to exist.
People of the more recent generations – the ones who lived through the Great Depression or who cultivated Victory Gardens in WWII – had especially adept green thumbs by necessity. Some took seed saving to a new level. In fact if you ask around you may find you have friends and neighbors who still have seeds from their grandfather’s favorite tomato variety or their great aunt’s snap beans. That’s how you end up with heirloom varieties. If you are really nice to those folks they may even share a few of those precious seeds and give you pointers on how to grow and save them.
Unlike our ancestors, we have the internet for guidance. I needed information, so for reference I perused sites such as:
You also shouldn’t overlook your state/county agricultural extension service for good information that is specific to your growing region.
There are three main reasons to save seeds from your produce – Replanting, Human Consumption, and Animal Consumption.
Replanting
Seed saving for replanting may be just a fun experiment now, but in the event of a societal collapse (or even just a serious economic depression) seeds may become unavailable or priced out of your range. Seed saving is virtually free and ensures you’ll at least have “something” to plant if events beyond your control go south. Kinda like last spring when suddenly everyone was planting a pandemic garden and retailers were quickly stripped of seed stock.
Beware hybrids that won’t breed true though. Because hybrids are a “blend” of genetic types, the seeds produced (the offspring) won’t necessarily have the exact characteristics of the parent plant – they may favor the grandparent plant instead. If you want to be sure that your seeds produce the exact plant you grew this year, you need an heirloom “open-pollinated” variety rather than a hybrid.
Thus, before you save the seeds you may have to do a bit of research to know whether that supermarket tomato is a hybrid or not. The same is true for farmer’s market produce. The farmer may be quite willing to talk your ear off about the produce they grow though, so consider them a possible learning resource.
The other thing to beware of with supermarket produce is that these varieties have been bred and selected to withstand machine picking and shipping, and be “pretty” – but not necessarily for their flavor or suitability for a home garden or even for your geographic area. So even if they aren’t hybrids these may not be your best choices for seed saving long term. If you want to try it just to get started or it’s your only option then have at it, but there may be better options for the long term.
If you have the wherewithal to buy seeds, it may pay you to look into heirloom seed companies. They often have varieties for almost every growing zone niche. These varieties are tasty and interesting but are just not profitable enough or practical for factory farms to grow for various reasons. Two good places to start for that are Baker Creek and Seed Savers, but there are many others. Once you have your heirlooms planted, then you can save your seeds from those and you may never have to buy seeds again.
As an FYI – Baker Creek is currently experiencing demand five times larger than this time last year and are struggling to keep up with orders. So plan accordingly. The pandemic seed rush isn’t over.
Consumption
Replanting is not the only reason to save seeds. In many cases you’ll have way more seeds than you need to plant next year and can use them as an additional food source. Pumpkins and butternut squashes are good examples of this. Many of these seeds are good for consumption by both humans and animals.
Corn
Unfortunately with corn, the part we eat IS the seed, so you will have to sacrifice some ears for your seed-saving project. The other problem is that a lot of the sweet corn varieties out there are hybrids, so they are great for eating fresh off the cob, but for seed-saving, not so much.
I’ll be trying a second raised bed of “three sisters” this year, so I’ll probably do one plot for eating and one plot for saving. I’m still learning about all the different corn varieties and and their uses, so you’ll have to do some of your own corn research too. Or – throw caution to the wind and just plant something and see what happens. Sometimes experience is the best teacher!
Squash
Larger seeds such as those of winter squashes can be roasted and eaten as is. Many people dress them up with various spices as well for a crunchy fall/winter treat. They are high in protein, potassium, and vitamin A.
Some seeds can also be ground for use as a wheat flour substitute. I recently tried this with pumpkin seeds, and the results weren’t too bad.
Although I don’t have any personal problems with gluten I do have a muffin recipe that uses exclusively buckwheat flour, just because I like it. For this recipe the diminished rise and lack of gluten was already accounted for so I thought it would be a good candidate with which to try out my pumpkin seed “flour”, and it worked!
Speaking of buckwheat, I found some buckwheat seeds which have pretty pink flowers, so I may try to sow some of those on a patch of embankment at the edge of my yard. Buckwheat isn’t actually wheat – it’s a seed that you can grind and eat like flour. If it works, it should be a pretty ground cover and I may be able to harvest a few handfuls of actual buckwheat from it. We’ll see. I’m really working on having not just a garden, but a “yardstead”, and buckwheat would be another step in that direction.
Bird Food
One of the easiest ways to utilize your saved seeds from larger veggies such as butternut squash or pumpkin or even sunflowers (if you don’t want to plant them or eat them) is to simply use them as bird food. I’ve done that several times this year with satisfying results.
I looked up the information from the Audubon Society, and created a concoction of peanut butter, cornmeal that was getting old, and the cleaned and air-dried squash and pumpkin seeds.
I pressed the mixture into some old plastic fruit cups that I saved (I am not a hoarder), then unmolded and froze my new birdie treats.
I’ve been adding these to the regular food at the feeder at the rate of one or two a week since Thanksgiving. These treat cups seem to be second in popularity only to the the meal worm blocks. I suppose that’s due to the protein and fat content for the winter. It’s fun to watch the backyard residents pecking away at something I made myself.
I decided that I’m going to grow sunflowers this year to help save on birdseed as well. According to the internet, saving and drying sunflower seeds – either for human or bird consumption – isn’t difficult, so I’m going to give that a whirl too.
So bottom line – seeds are an investment in our nutritional future. If you’re planning a garden this year you’d better get on the stick and get your order in. Unless you are already ahead of me and are an heirloom seed saver from way back. But even if you’re not, all is not lost. Look at the produce you already have and see what DNA-packed goodies may lie just beneath the surface of that vegetable – just waiting for some soil and sun and a little TLC.
The Ithaca 37 – An American Icon
When I get to do nerd stuff with shotguns, I get giddy. Really giddy, and recently an original 1950s Ithaca 37 fell into my lap. I’m cleaning it up for a friend, and in doing so, I get to shoot and test it, of course. The Ithaca 37 is a historical shotgun that’s served generations of hunters, law enforcement, and military forces. It’s carved its way into the shotgun hall of fame, and today we will discuss why.
Specs and Details and History
The Ithaca 37 is a John Browning design, and very few people credit Browning with the design. I feel this is often ignored because Browning didn’t work for Ithaca. He worked for Remington when he designed the Remington Model 17. The Model 17 was a lightweight 20 gauge shotgun, and the Model 17 patent eventually expired. This allowed Ithaca to beef up the design to 12 gauge and release their very own shotgun. That being said, Ithaca made a few changes to make the design more affordable to produce.
The Ithaca 37 hit the market in 1937 and didn’t do great. The world was on the verge of a World War once more, the great depression was raging on, and honestly, it seemed like the worst possible time to release a sporting shotgun. Ithaca could have been left holding an expensive bag, but the wartime need for handguns and long guns gave Ithaca an infusion of much-needed capital. The Model 37 was even adopted for limited use in the war with the changes necessary to make it a trench gun.
Post-WW2 Ithaca 37
The war ended, and Ithaca began producing the sporting variants of the Ithaca 37 once more. The gun started life as a hunting shotgun and was a popular choice, quickly becoming a favorite of duck hunters. Enough so that Ithaca did some fancy inscribing work and left some of the higher grade models adorned with ducks flying.
The Ithaca 37 quickly became the American standard in modern magazine fed shotguns. It packed a variety of modern features into a very simple and reliable pump-action shotgun.
Like most shotguns, the Ithaca 37 saw more widespread use in the tactical world as well. It was adopted by the military outside of just WW2. It served in Korea, as well as Vietnam. In Vietnam, it gained an excellent reputation for durability and reliability with special operations forces. It shrugged off the austere environment that is the jungle. It was also a popular choice for police forces, not to mention that Detective Ricardo Tubbs used a Stakeout model in Miami Vice.
The Ithaca 37 Featherlight
Ithaca graced the 37 with the title featherlight, which seemed like an odd title for a 7.5-pound shotgun. To be fair, other slide-action shotguns like the Model 1897 weighed 8 pounds, so the Ithaca was lighter than most. This model is outfitted with classic American walnut furniture. This includes the corn cob forend and wooden stock outfitted with a plastic butt plate. No rubber limb saver pad here.
The length of pull is 13.5 inches, which is a little long for some smaller shooters, but much better than the modern obsession with 14.5-inch LOPs. It is extremely comfortable and shoulders naturally. The weight is locked to the rear, and the barrel is somewhat thin. This is good for a natural swing and something I’d imagine most bird hunters desire. The Ithaca 37 is also easy to hold in the firing position for a long period of time.
The controls are well done with easy access safety and pump release. The safety is better suited for right-handers, but the pump lock is easy to reach with either hand.
Overall, it’s a well balanced little gun, and I can see why it’s the longest produced pump-action shotgun on the market. Even with the modernized variants of the Remington 870 and Mossberg 500 series, the Ithaca 37 remains in production.
What Separates the Ithaca 37 from the Pack
The Ithaca 37 loads and ejects from the bottom of the gun. The original Model 17 did the same, as does the BPS. This bottom-loading design makes the shotgun highly desirable for a number of reasons. First, it’s perfectly ambidextrous. Lefties and righties can both use it to great effect.
The Ithaca 37 became particularly popular with duck hunters due to this bottom ejecting design. In a crowded duck blind, the shells eject downwards instead of into your friend’s faces. The bottom ejection also keeps the shells in a boat and not dumped into your local pond.
The bottom ejection design also means there is only a single slot in your gun. This makes the gun a tank capable of resisting dirt, grime, mud, and snow like an M4 Sherman throws off German infantry. This is valuable in duck season when it’s wet and muddy and in the Vietnam jungle, where this shotgun earned its reputation for reliability.
The closed receiver lets nothing in and doesn’t allow the gun to be filled with anything but shells and hate.
Another feature in Ithaca 37’s produced prior to 1975 is the lack of a disconnector. This means if you hold the trigger and pump the gun, it will fire as soon as the pump closes. This makes dispensing those shells and that hate very quick. This 1950s built Ithaca 37 lacks the disconnector, and I will say it’s a very effective technique that makes it easy to empty a magazine tube in mere seconds.
The recoil is fierce, admittedly, and from the hip, it’s a bit more fun and easier to control than doing so when shouldered.
The Ithaca 37 Downsides
If you look around today, you’ll see plenty of Ithaca shotguns still in use. They are a favorite for hunters to this day, but they’d faded away from the tactical scene. One of the big reasons is the single action bar. Modern pump shotguns use a dual-action bar for increased reliability under stress and smoother pump action. Dual-action bars are hard to jam up, where single bars can twist and bind, making pumping difficult.
The lack of a standard ejection port also makes port reloads and slug select drills somewhat difficult.
The forged receiver is also an expensive proposition, and that’s why your modern produced Ithaca 37’s cost right around a grand.
The Ithaca 37 is an all American shotgun. It represents American design and innovation alongside a certain degree of craftsmanship we often see today. The Ithaca 37 is a workhorse and has proven itself over and over. Shotguns like my example are still fully functional weapons that don’t require a soft hand or a kind touch. If you’re lucky enough to have a classic model, appreciate it, love it, and shoot it. Shoot the hell out of it.
True North Concepts GripStop: The First and Original Gripstop
Since knowing True North Concepts, LLC the company has shown that it cares about advanced design and products that can be used to truly improve the users ability to do their job. In this case, weapons handling.
The Company
Sitting down with the owner and founder of True North Concepts it was instantly known that his mind came from a place of engineering and problem solving. That is exactly what his company aims to do. “True North Concepts, LLC designs and develops solutions to problems that haven’t yet been solved. Across all industries and applications, True North exists to create the finest tools to prepare men and women for any challenge that comes their way.”–truenorth-usa
It was also plain to see where the true passion came from with his company, military folk who need truly thought out equipment. The True North Concepts GripStop was made for that need.
Understanding how we got here in the first place…
The Idea
Innovation, a term that is easily thrown around without proof of concept. Seven years ago the innovative GripStop began. It is the first and the only true GripStop.
It began with the same mindset that the owner has, how do we fix a problem, how do we truly make something that “pushes the envelope of design”, True North goes on to say. Weapons handling was that avenue of approach.
The C Clamp, gripping of the magwell, etc. These techniques go all the way back to the Vietnam War Era.
During these early conflicts we see infantrymen making their own accessories. Some using extra pistol grips and some making them straight from wood. 40 years from then and still no significantly innovating products despite a clear need.. until Mr. Reed Knight and the truly innovative Knights Armament Company’s design of the Rail Interface System (RIS). This development enabled operators to put the tape away and finally mount their lights and other accessories on a true mounting system, the picatinny rail. This developed standard pushed forward more accessories, including the Knights Armament Vertical Foregrip.
A lesser known fact, “Mr. Reed Knight believed in this product so strongly, that it was added to the supplied rail cover kit-roll for free, because of the lack of enthusiasm shown for it by the government, when looking at a contract for their rail forearm.” -True North Concepts
With the KAC Vertical Foregrip reinvigorating weapons handling accessories, we now see shooters start to modify their grips such as cutting them down into shorter stops.
#embrace the radius
With each of these modifications, True North Concepts saw one thing that stayed true, shooters wanting to “fill the dead space of a right angle” with their hand.
Research and Development
The best designs that we see are made from the ground up. The GripStop literally started out as putty. Placing a bracket with epoxy putty onto a rail and molding a hand around it as it would naturally grip a gun. Genius right? Don’t design the body around the equipment, design the equipment for the body.
In relation: Setting out a tripod for sitting position? Sit down first then adjust the tripod to your natural position. Don’t adjust your natural position to the tripod.
True North then took those molds and sent them out to multiple facets of Military folk to use and give feedback on. This doesn’t mean that the company sent them out to writers or influencers or people with a name.. He literally sent them out to gunfighters who were using their equipment to protect their lives each day. That takes a large sense of responsibility when designing a piece of equipment.
The GripStop that we have now was overseas in gunfights before it was agreed upon to be the last and final design.
Functional vs Cosmetic Accessories
The GripStop is a truly functional accessory. When talking to True North he often brought up how versatile the product is. Users have the ability to run the radius forward, run it backwards, use it was a barricade stop on round railings. It is designed for the user, any user.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CFnpTcLJE_q/
The texture, like everything else, had tremendous thought placed into it as well. It features a type of versatile bite that won’t wreck your hands or police cruisers doors as your using them for support.
Mounting
The GripStop directly mounts to your M-Lok or Picatinny Rail using two allen head screws. Previous grips within the firearms world had to be attached with another picatinny section. This means that you would have another piece of hardware plus your grip both being forced back on. Parts can come loose.
When mounting to a rail that you don’t want to uninstall, install the M-Lok plate onto the screw before so it will grip the space inside the rail. Push through the rail. Once the plates are through the rail turn, the screw just enough (90 degrees, 1/4 turn usually) to get the plate to grab onto the rail where you’d like, it then pull up (away from the rail). This will allow the plate to put pressure onto the railing and give you the ability to tighten down the screw.
Specs and Options
The GripStop comes in two size options and three color options.
Everything is made with strong 6061 Aluminum Construction and uses Milspec Type III anodizing. These products are made right next to other anodized military products.
Which also means…IT’S MADE IN THE USA.
They are light in weight. Both K and Standard models weighing 2 oz with hardware and the Picatinny version weighing 1.7 oz.
Other Products
True North Concepts also makes a Modular Holster Adapter that changes the game on mounting the different kinds of holsters and hardware that are being run.
They say that those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. True North Concepts used every failure point and every move towards success as a true teaching moment. They learned and designed a product that we can fit to our body and technique. A truly innovative product.
Sig Sauer Releases the M18-Commemorative
The limited release of the M18-Commemorative Edition of the official U.S. military service pistol, a variant of the SIG SAUER P320, is now available. The M18-Commemorative pistol shares the same components, coatings, and markings as the firearm that was awarded the U.S. Army contract for the modular handgun system (MHS), and was recently chosen as the official sidearm of the U.S. Marine Corps.
To complement the M18-Commemorative, an exclusive M18 Collector’s Case is available and features a slate-grey flocked foam insert and precision laser placement cuts for the pistol, the official serialized M18-Commemorative Certificate of Authenticity, and the serialized M18-Commemorative Challenge Coin.
While the M17 was selected by the US Army as their sidearm of choice, the M17 and M18 were developed in tandem with the rest of the P320 line and the M18 won selection in the remainder of the services.
The principle difference between the two is slide and barrel length. The M18 uses a shorter slide and barrel while still set to accept the HRS optic and IR capable laser/light that are also part of the Modular Handgun System competition. Units can up kit or down kit their guns as need dictates.
The commemorative guns come in handsome clean wooden cased and are fine pieces to add to the collection. They are limited in their runs so using one as an EDC, while entirely your choice, not what the intention is with this particular production unit.
The M18 uses the Carry/XCarry layout which retains its 17/21 round capacity while shortening the slide and barrel to the compact model length. This, in the conjunction with AXG grip makes for an absolutely phenomenal shooting package.
Does the FAL hold up?
The FN FAL, ‘Right Arm of the Free World’ (because most people are right handed, I assume) How does it hold up today?
Mike ‘GarandThumb’ is back with another review video on the DSA FAL. The FN FAL is one of the three legendary .308’s of the Cold War Era and probably holds the most distinguished career. The Germans, as you may know, started with the FAL as the G1 rifle but went to the enhanced CETME design that became the G3 thereafter, playing off of their perfecting the roller delay systems that H&K would become known for, through sheer stubbornness mostly.
The FAL was even submitted here in the US as the T48 but was ultimately rejected for the third in the trio, the M14, for a mix of good reasons, made up reasons, and the Army’s institutional love of .30 Cal and the M1 Garand.
It isn’t that the M14 didn’t run, it did. It is that the M14 was functionally obsolescent when it was chosen. Better designs existed, but the US chose to invest heavily in a surpassed technology. Now look at us, reviving the ~6.8mm Battle Rifle with the NGSW, on an evolved variant of those designs.
But such is the path we walked, we have made some very nice .308 battle rifles because it was the chosen caliber. Then the 6.5 Creedmoor finally broke down the blockade into the ballistic efficient (widely accepted) chamberings for 100-150 grain projectiles. Humans can be slow and stubborn creatures. I didn’t want to abandon my trusty ACOG for a “fragile” LPVO or put a red dot on a pistol, and those turned out to be silly notions to cling upon.
But, as you enjoy Mike’s, and Ian and Larry’s, videos let us discuss the state of the FAL.
Obviously the rifle is still in new production with DSA. They make several variants and have successfully adapted many modern features to the platform including folding/adjustable stocks and negative space rail systems. The rifles start at about $1,500 retail for a basic 21″ barreled Bolivian FN Pattern gun to the $2,300 range for a fully-featured variant.
So, it is a legacy platform with a good reputation that has modernized options to keep it viable. Sounds like something else I was just talking about.
Yes, the FAL stands up. Willingly accepting the limitations of the 7.62/.308 because it still holds major strengths (like production capacity and international acceptance) the FAL is a highly viable platform and will remain so for decades to come. The limitations of .308 aren’t really all that limiting if it is the can of ammo you have.
What the 21st Century of firearms development is showing us is that the major leaps were made in the 20th. The 21st is about refinement of the lessons learned in the 20th and beyond. Each iteration of the M16, DMR, Battle Rifle, etc., is still essentially these same rifles with a few more lessons learned smoothed into the designs, and some of those lessons we knew all the way back in WWII’s timeframe.
The era of the box magazine fed rifle.
So no, don’t rush to trade out your cold-war “relics” for NGSW inspired new hotness. Sure, buy the new hotness as it comes. Run and experience the improvements. But just as a new computer graphics processor doesn’t make an older one stop working, newer better firearm tech does not make legacy systems lose effectiveness. They are as efficient and reliable as they were made, developed, and improved. They simply exist within their design, both its strengths and limits, while new designs can learn from those legacies.
As we navigate this time of strife upon the world stage, many have discovered (or rediscoverd) the importance of personal armament. This comes with entering a world full of information, and just a full of conjecture.
Fudd-lore is alive and strong, the thing that you heard from the one buddy one time, or it ‘always worked for so-in-so,’ or you have a sibling who was in the military, or any number of other quick pieces of (probably) goodwill intended wisdom that lacks the context to make it of real value so its probably more harmful than good… exists in oil tanker sized caches upon the tides of the internet.
But a mature gun design with a well earned reputation is worth the investment in a way that a new radical wizz-banger AR thing from a company you’ve never heard of but, “Man its only $800, during a pandemic! And they’re all made in the place anyway.” just won’t match. Ever.
PHLster Enigma review
If you’ve ever googled “how to carry while running,” you’re not alone. Many carry permit holders have to deal with the problem of carrying when they can’t wear a belt or traditional pants. The existing solutions, like belly bands, fanny packs, or off body carry aren’t great. Then along came the mad wizards at PHLster. Enigma isn’t a holster, it’s a chassis to carry your holster…in whatever clothes you like.
The folks at PHLster sent me an Enigma to review, so I immediately threw an LCR holster on it and put it on under my silkies. It worked so well that I could do kettle bell swings with a gun on for the first time with no discomfort. While that was a fun exercise, after living with Enigma for over a month I’ve come to a few conclusions about the chassis.
What is Enigma?
First, let’s explain what it is, and what it does. The PHLster Enigma is designed to carry your “wing” equipped appendix carry holster without the need for an external belt or belt loops. It fits any non-light bearing holster that accepts common “wing-tuck” attachments, such as the PHLster Pro Series holster, the Dark Star Gear Orion, or the JM Custom Kydex Wing Claw 2.0. The holster attaches securely to Enigma’s face, and then the whole rig is secured around your waist with the included nylon belt and buckle system. The belt can be sized up or down depending on your body size. My 32 inch waist needed a lot of slack taken out of the belt, and then I trimmed the excess off. When you assemble the chassis, make sure to follow the video directions posted online.
Versatile CCW options for the real world
Thanks to the multiple attachment holes for setting up the belt, Enigma provides incredible versatility because it’s user adjustable for ride height and amount of butt-tuck. A high ride height for a gun makes it easy to draw quickly. Low ride height makes the gun easier to conceal. That means Enigma can be mission configured for your environment. Going for a run and want the gun fast and ready? Go high. Going into an environment where being “made” would have negative outcomes? Go low, or even entirely under the waistline, for max level concealment.
How people are using Enigma
Let’s look at some use cases for Enigma. Obviously, running/exercising is that forefront of my mind, because that’s a regular part of my life. Since getting the PHLster Enigma I’ve done several weighted rucks with a 35lb pack, and have not had any issues with the holster/band combo supporting a Beretta APX Centurion. But there’re a ton of other uses for it, like people who wear scrubs all day. In fact, one of the inventors of Enigma is a healthcare professional and this was one of the considerations when designing the product. Another great use case for Enigma is because it’s not attached to your belt or pants, you can tuck a shirt in over the entire gun, allowing you to wear business/professional/formal attire without relying on a jacket for concealment. Sure, your draw will be slower, but it beats not having anything on you at all.
Carry more gun
One of the oddest side effects of Enigma is that I hardly carry small revolvers anymore. Previously, my “beltless carry” option was a J-frame or Ruger LCR in a holster with a DCC monoblock clipped to the waistband of my pants. Cinch the drawstring tight and it was…mostly okay. With the PHLster Enigma, I can carry the aforementioned APX Centurion, which holds 15+1 rounds of 9mm and conceal it as effectively as the small revolvers. Any time I can triple my ammo capacity without reducing my effective concealment is a win.
Game changing concealment option
Is the PHLster Enigma going to completely replace belts and holsters? Not for me. For other people it’s now their standard EDC, but for me I spend most of my days wearing jeans anyway, so a traditional belt/holster setup is still my go-to. However, what Enigma lets me do is replace all the belly bands and other crappy methods I had to carry a gun while I wasn’t wearing a belt. That’s a huge benefit, because now I don’t have to choose between “carrying a gun” or “wearing comfortable pants.” I can do both, and have 15 rounds of 9mm. If that’s not a game changer, I don’t know what is.
Obsolete, Obsolescent, and “Useless”
I just read a post upon the expanse of the interwebz that espoused the belief that a popular training drill was ‘Useless.’
The drill, the 10-10-10, also called “The Test”, is a fairly common one used among pistol shooters and trainers to evaluate themselves or their students respectively. The argument was, essentially, that because drills are a situational scalable training tool and because there are similar drills both higher and lower in difficulty that “The Test” was useless.
This ignores two critical points
- A drill that cannot be scaled for individual/group skill or logistics isn’t very useful to begin with
- A “Test” is an objective standard to take a measurement
- We use that measure to determine a regimen for skill development, and/or whether or not we have confidence a certain level of proficiency can be expected
- Also, “The Test” is not the only test you should be using
So the argument that the test is ‘useless’ is nonsensical. But what about obsolete? What about obsolescent?
That’s right folks, we are talking about words again.
So, you are the caliber of shooter that can easily clear “The Test” with 100/100 points earned. Excellent! The 10-10-10 drill, for you, is not useless, but it is obsolete. For you. You have progressed, or if you are an instructor taking a measure of your students they have progressed, to a different level of skill development and different tests may now provide more information to drive training on.
Dot Torture is a similar item where if you are shooting it clean at 3 yards, that variant of the test is now obsolete. Again, for you. For the majority of the shooting public these tests will never become obsolete, although they should strive to make them so.
So instead, you use your grey matter and make the drill into a ‘variant’ and do a 10-10-25. Or you are rounds limited (as are we all) and make it a 5-5-10 or 5-5-25. The first number being the number of rounds, the second being the number of allotted seconds to complete the drill, and the third being the distance in yards/meters to the target. You are using your head to make situational variations to the drill based on data you have. Data you collected from the 10-10-10, now or in the past, or a similar measurement taking test. This is the nature of measuring skill development.
Now, let’s take a look at it from another perspective
Is the venerable M16 rifle Obsolete, Obsolescent, or Useless? Specifically talking about the A4 variant pictured in the title, but you can use this analysis on any variant, or any firearm for that matter.
Both major ground force arms of the US Military have moved on from the M16. The Marines have opted for the M27 and M4 rifles while the Army has opted for the M4A1. The NGSW is also coming down the pipeline and we will address its implications here also.
The M16 has been removed from service as a ground combat rifle, it is therefore Obsolete
No, not obsolete. The M16A4 has been found suboptimal in the role because the limitations imposed by the longer barrel and fixed stock outweigh the advantages. But the rifles employed to replace the M16 with frontline forces can’t even be called the descendants of the M16, more like the younger siblings. As 5.56 service weapons go the M16 can still serve in the role exceptionally well, but certain features have been found more desirable and so selections were made and changes implemented.
Obsolete would mean that the M16 has been surpassed by a substantial margin in most meaningful ways that it offers something beneficial to the users. Instead, more realistically, we have found more preferred variations on the theme of the M16.
Namely
- Adjustable Stocks
- Shorter Barrels
- Free Floating Barrels
Along with continual improvements in material quality and increased understanding in the efficiencies of making the guns run, we have surpassed the M16A4’s base offerings in most ways. But we have not done so to a substantial degree, only a marginal one.
Compare that with, say, the M1903 Springfield and the M16 clearly makes the 1903 obsolete. Also the M1 Garand and M14, although the M14 is the closest peer and meets the criteria of obsolescent instead.
All the features of the M16A4 have been surpassed, it is therefore Obsolescent
We are going to give this one another no… followed by a tentative maybe when we touch on the NGSW program.
Yes, the adjustable stocks and shorter freefloating barrels surpass the M16A4, but it would be very simple to also do two of those three improvements to the M16A4 and bring it right back into the modernized forefront. There would even be an arguable advantage to a 20″ freefloating barrel and the velocity it offers the shooter for effective range and terminal effects.
Obsolescent means that the newer iterations surpass the M16 in enough ways that you would choose the newer platform.
“But Keith, that sounds exactly like what you are saying between the M16A4 and the current rifles. Isn’t it?”
No.
And the reason comes down to caliber. 5.56x45mm is still the standard and that keeps the M16 among the “performs to the standard” group of rifles. Everything else is a small quality of use shift to the positive. Adjustable stocks better matching more shooter body types, shorter barrels allowing improved movement in tight confines, and freefloating improving both inherent and practical accuracy.
The M16 is still capable in all those categories though, until we change caliber. The NGSW specifying a 6.8mm ballistic efficient projectile with the openly stated goal of making the rifle effective to 1,000 meters will be the shift that makes the M16 obsolescent, by virtue of making the 5.56 start the slow walk to obsolescence.
However it will be advancing from powder burning, auto-loading, perhaps even projectile weapons entirely, that signals the shift to obsolete.
Again, I say the NGSW is a tentative maybe toward making the M16 obsolescent because we do not have hard data on the performance of the guns yet and ease of use comparatively. Troops will be taking an ammunition capacity hit and that is not an insignificant consideration. But the shift from 30 to 25 or 20 is not as drastic as back to 8, or 5 even, and losing the box magazine capabilities. The two leaps being sought in the NGSW are range and terminal effectiveness.
We do have to get soldiers shooting better though… significantly better. But people are working on that too.
Now the question with the obvious answer. Is the M16 “Useless?”
Obviously not.
But going back to the comment on the 10-10-10 drill, we like to throw that term around. The M16 is far from useless, the M14 isn’t useless, the M1 Garand and M1 Carbines are not useless, the M1903 isn’t useless.
Taken on the large scale, they all occupy the same superior place and are peers over non-repeating firearms, and those aren’t useless. Take those, including the single shots, and compare them against something like the crossbow, or bow and arrow, and those are not useless, but the firearm is superior. Adding those in, they all occupy the same superior niche of launched, mechanically or chemically, assisted projectile weapons over something thrown like a javelin. A javelin isn’t useless. But it is sure as hell obsolete compared to an M16.
SG 550-1/Krieg 550 from Counterstrike: 9-Hole Reviews
Sniper to 500yds: Practical Accuracy
While the video gaming aspect of this video is a lot of fun, I am actually sharing it point out the GP90 ammunition that the SG 550-1 is designed to use and the SG 550’s role in Switzerland, it’s nation of origin. Because that ammo is neat.
The Swiss culture around firearms is one of the more permissive in the world, especially on the European stage. They use a national militia structure where all of their young men, with women volunteers, are a conscripted part of the on call Swiss military and thus receive firearms training. The Swiss military functions much like the Reserve/National Guard here in the US, drilling on an abbreviated schedule.
Their issued rifle is the SG 550, a classic 80’s Sig from the Swiss arm of the company, and the ammunition they use is the GP90 5.6x45mm. This round is interchangeable with 5.56x45mm NATO ammunition, but is optimized for the native 1:10 twist barrels of the SG 550 rifles. SG 550’s with 1:7 barrels are also in circulation for use when integrated with NATO forces or for clients who had wanted the use of the Swiss rifle but the NATO standardization on ammunition. The slightly heavier and GP90 round does well in barrels and is an accurate 63gr lead core FMJ, instead of the 62gr SS109 Belgian round with steel under the jacket.
Recall that the 1:7 barrels were chosen not for the SS109/M855, but to accurize the companion M856 tracer, which is a much longer bullet. So 1:10 at 63gr does very well, just as 1:8 twist barrels become increasingly popular here in the states because the 55-77gr commercial loads that we shoot (or shot… RIP ammo availability) stabilize very well in that twist rate. We aren’t dealing with the long tail of the tracer rounds.
That isn’t to say 1:7 guns aren’t accurate, they are very accurate, but choices in equipment design were made for a reason and among those reasons was that the overly tight rifling rate wasn’t overly detrimental to the non-tracer ammunition while providing the needed stability for the tracers that slower twists didn’t.
So the 5.6×45 GP90 is a “5.56 NATO” round in function, the rifles can also shoot 55-77gr .223 Remington. Ammunition that is available to Swiss citizens to shoot their service rifles should they want, a common Swiss pastime and national competition.
But back to the 550-1
During the latter half of the 20th Century several terroristic and hostage incidents worldwide highlighted a need for a “Police” sniper rifle that, while precise, needed to operate in a very different manner from military weapons. The environment and mission goals were changed.
Where military snipers needed precision and observation power at distance and to be able to deliver damage on target to kill, wound, or disrupt enemy actions, the police sniper was/is a rescue tool. Police snipers worked at much shorter distances and with very complicated environments where there were often small moving targets next to hostages and with backstops that would not stop a missed shot, making it an increased hazard also. Rifles and rounds specialized for these environments were different animals than the 800, 1000, or 1400 meter effective range systems the military utilizes.
The 550-1 was a system intended to serve police in that role. It has since been overshadowed by the DMR concept guns that the military has utilized to great success, but with ammunition suited for the complex material environment of the police sniper. Systems evolve and as missions blend, gear does too. The role of the police precision rifle vs. the military precision rifle are still quite different, but the capability parallel and overlap is not.
The military precision rifle, the Mk12 or M110A1 DMR’s, allow a squad about a square (circular) mile of coverage where they can observe and deliver precise direct fire to disrupt enemy action. This could be offensive or defensive fire in nature and will almost certainly be used in combined arms to support to direct conventional infantry to engage at closer range and/or heavier supporting fires from CAS, IDF emplacements, or naval support.
The police precision rifle is for the more tailored mission where an individual might need to be shot to generate the best possible outcome and end a threat to the community, officers, or even the suspect themselves.
While taking place at much shorter ranges the environment is filled with intermediate obstacles, not all of which can be removed. Glass, vehicle panels, even thin walls might all need to be shot through. These intermediate barrier scenarios are often a reason semi-autos are a valuable tool. One round takes care of the barrier and the second or subsequent rounds deliver the effect on target, which may not be lethal as seen above. It does, however, require precision.
A missed round in combat happens, follow up, you are disrupting enemy action and driving the enemy. A missed round in a police action may trigger the absolute opposite outcome from intended, and may do so in very short order. That isn’t to say military snipers will never be in a situation where positive first round effect on target is essential, but in police action it is almost exclusively first round must have desired effect and, if planned, follow on rounds also.
The military sniper or DM does tremendous damage with a low round count. The police sniper does the absolute minimum amount of damage necessary to achieve the desired outcome. Sometimes both of those situations require doming someone.
When The Lights Flickered
I spent a couple hours in the dark last Friday evening. Actually not totally in the dark, because I was prepared. That’s what I wanted to talk about today.
It was just about dusk when the lights at home flickered three times and went out. There was a few minutes of twilight left, which gave me time to gather my back-up lights and start planning – after the first second or two of profanity that is.
I reported the outage and then logged onto social media to my neighborhood page to see how widespread things were. I learned that there had been a wreck down the road which took out a transformer. Hopefully that meant that this was a short-term inconvenience rather than a days-long problem. But I was still prepared for either.
I still had my battery operated Christmas candles sitting out, which had come on automatically on a timer, so one of those is what I took to the bathroom with me and to grab my other back-ups.
I am a freak about open flames in the house and will only light a candle if it is sitting on top of my stove with no flammables nearby. That’s why the battery candles. But that also meant that I had a ready supply of light available within easy reach. These pillar “candles” run on two D-cells and are LED, so I haven’t changed the batteries since they arrived around Thanksgiving.
A “candle” is good for background light enough to maneuver around a room or to see down the stairs (or to the bathroom). But how about something more powerful?
The next thing I grabbed was the bright LED solar flashlight that I keep charging in the kitchen window. I keep it there in case I need to check out anything in the backyard. Also always charging in the window is a solar power bank for my phone and a solar inflatable lantern.
Those are in addition to the flashlights I keep by the bedside, by the microwave, the Surefire I keep in the car, the camping lanterns that are in the basement and the headlamp I keep in my hunting pack.
Since the porch light was obviously out and my daughter was not yet home, I placed the inflatable solar lantern on the porch to light her way to put the key in the lock.
I checked the charge on my phone and on the e-reader I was using when the lights first went out. Those were good for awhile, so I didn’t need my solar charger yet. I checked my large power bank that I would need to plug the fridge into if things went on too long, and that was good too.
So I relaxed a little and went back to my e-book, content in the knowledge that things were under control. The lights came back on about 3 hours later.
Bear in mind that I don’t pretend to be an expert in any of this stuff. I don’t live in a hurricane zone and have never lived through an extended power outage. But I do try to keep myself prepared – short of shelling out the cash for a whole house generator that is. Short outages like this give me an opportunity to test my plans.
For the winter I have a gas furnace, but the blower and igniter are electric, as is the thermostat. I don’t have a fireplace, but I do have a gas stove and oven which I can hand light to generate heat. I also have a small propane-powered space heater which is approved for indoor use. And I have a plan for how I would seal off unneeded parts of the house to keep the heat in the kitchen/living room area where I would sleep. It wouldn’t be balmy but it would allow me to stay in my own home and not have to bail out to elsewhere.
For the summer I have a rechargeable fan which I can plug into one of my solar power banks. Also in the summer I can cook on the propane grill or Silverfire Rocket Stove outside to keep the cooking heat out of the house.
The average full freezer should be good for 48 hours without power if unopened, but the average fridge is only good for about four hours. Thus you need to plan for ice chests or an alternate power source in the event of an extended outage – especially if anyone in your family requires refrigerated medication.
I sprang for a solar rechargeable power supply last summer which was advertised to be able to run a full-size refrigerator. I haven’t needed to try it out yet, but the reviews were good from people in hurricane country. My plan is to alternate it between the chest freezer in the basement and the fridge/freezer in the kitchen, with the solar panels placed at the south-facing kitchen slider or deck for recharging when needed. At least that’s the plan.
Fortunately, because I was prepared and because this outage was short, it didn’t turn into a major problem. But one never knows when a storm will take out local lines or even major regional towers as happened 20-some years ago. That one left some family members without power for three weeks in January in upstate New York.
You just never know. So if you don’t have a plan for an extended power outage, you should probably make one. Mother Nature (and random drivers) are not always predictable.
Anti-Gunners Attempt to Rewrite 2A History
(from bearingarms.com)
[Ed: Republished by permission of the author, from Bearing Arms 12/30/2020.]
What did the Founding Fathers think about our right to keep and bear arms? According to historian Saul Cornell, founders like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and James Madison would be far more likely to side with Everytown for Gun Safety than the National Rifle Association if they were alive today, because in Cornell’s view, the early republic was chock full of restrictions on gun owners.
In a new piece at The Conversation, Cornell lays out five types of gun laws that he says the Founders wholeheartedly embraces, starting with gun registration laws.
Today American gun rights advocates typically oppose any form of registration – even though such schemes are common in every other industrial democracy – and typically argue that registration violates the Second Amendment. This claim is also hard to square with the history of the nation’s founding. All of the colonies – apart from Quaker-dominated Pennsylvania, the one colony in which religious pacifists blocked the creation of a militia – enrolled local citizens, white men between the ages of 16-60 in state-regulated militias. The colonies and then the newly independent states kept track of these privately owned weapons required for militia service. Men could be fined if they reported to a muster without a well-maintained weapon in working condition.
What Cornell is describing isn’t a registration of privately owned firearms, and he provides no evidence whatsoever that the various colonies actually kept track of the rifles and muskets owned by militia members. Cornell is correct when he says that those mustering for militia service could face fines if their firearm wasn’t well maintained, but that has nothing to do with any sort of registration or list of guns in the hands of private citizens.
Next, Cornell claims that the Founders loved the idea of restricting the right to carry. For this argument, Cornell reaches way back to English common law and claims that there was no “general right of armed travel” at the time of the adoption of the Second Amendment. Were there any actual bans on traveling while armed? Cornell doesn’t cite any specific examples, though he is correct when he points out that by the mid-1800s many states had either banned or limited the practice of carrying concealed. What he doesn’t point out is that by attempting the manner of carrying arms, those same lawmakers were tacitly acknowledging a more general right to carry.
The Fordham University historian also argues that the Founders would also have been opposed to “stand your ground” laws, even though the Castle Doctrine had been a part of common law for centuries by that point.
The use of deadly force was justified only in the home, where retreat was not required under the so-called castle doctrine, or the idea that “a man’s home is his castle.” The emergence of a more aggressive view of the right of self-defense in public, standing your ground, emerged slowly in the decades after the Civil War.
I’m honestly not sure where Cornell gets the idea that deadly force was only justifiable in the home. I can think of one very famous case from the 1770s where that wasn’t the case. Most of the British soldiers who opened fire on a crowd of angry Bostonians who were throwing chunks of ice and razor-sharp oyster shells at them on March 5th, 1770 were ultimately found not guilty of murder because a jury found that they were acting in self-defense (two others were convicted of manslaughter).
Cornell goes on to claim that the Founders were on board with storage laws, based solely off of a 1786 ordinance in Boston that required guns had to be kept unloaded. His last assertion is that “the notion that the Second Amendment was understood to protect a right to take up arms against the government is absurd. Indeed, the Constitution itself defines such an act as treason.”
To wage an offensive war against the United States is indeed treason, as defined by Article III of the Constitution. To take up arms in defense of a tyrannical federal government, on the other hand, was most certainly acknowledged as a right of the people by the Founding Fathers. Here’s James Madison writing in Federalist 46.
Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made. Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger. The highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth part of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield, in the United States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men. To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence.
Saul Cornell has likely forgotten more history than I’ll ever know, but he’s off-base in asserting that the Founding Fathers embraced the idea of restricting the right to keep and bear arms. There’s simply no evidence to support the idea that the laws pushed by gun control activists today, like bans on commonly-owned firearms or magazines; gun licensing; gun rationing; or bans on carrying firearms would have found favor with the Founders or the early Americans who argued against ratifying the Constitution until a Bill of Rights was included and the pre-existing right of the people to keep and bear arms was protected.
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— Cam Edwards has covered the 2nd Amendment for more than 15 years as a broadcast and online journalist, as well as the co-author of Heavy Lifting: Grow Up, Get a Job, Start a Family, and Other Manly Advice with Jim Geraghty. He lives outside of Farmville, Virginia with his family.
All DRGO articles by Cam Edwards
Review: Vortex SPARC SolAR
The Brand New Vortex SPARC SolAR.. Sol-ARE.. or maybe Sol-A-R. I am not entirely sure if they intended a different pronunciation than solar power or solar system but they emphasis on the platform is noted. This is a carbine dot meant to do carbine dot work.
The new Vortex is entering a crowded field, something that the original SPARC didn’t have to contend with. When the original SPARC came out, the market was just beginning to notice and acknowledge a middle ground for red dot optics at all. I’ve had the SPARC for a couple months. I received a pre-release production unit for Vortex to get my thoughts on it and now that I’ve shared my thoughts with them, I will share them with you.
So what does the SPARC Solar do that other competing sights don’t do?
Nothing…
Seriously, nothing.
But the SPARC wasn’t meant to. That wasn’t the goal with this sight.
So what was the goal?
First, let’s take a look at the “King of the Red Dot’s”
What does this dot, the Aimpoint CompM5 do?
A: It is a durable, power efficient, 2 MOA optic with manual brightness control. That’s it.
So what does the SPARC Solar do?
It is a durable, power efficient, 2 MOA optic with manual brightness control.
The SPARC Solar is supplemented by solar power for a very long battery endurance. It’s environmentally durable and not recoil sensitive. Now you can’t deep water dive with this like you could with the CompM5 but you can trip and fall in a pond or stream and it will be just fine.
We know there are varying degrees of durability to optics.
- ‘Hobby‘ Grade would describe something that will survive if treated with care, generally very inexpensive
- Will not stand up to harsh use or impacts
- Best used as stand-in, prop, or toy (airsoft, nerf, laser tag)
- ‘Duty‘ grade is probably the most broadly assigned, and thus the most vague term, but it is used to describe durable and dependable optics for what we will call ‘permissive’ environments
- Optics can stand up to harsh use like a multi-day course, multi-stage match, or similar use
- Optics can get wet, dirty, and be dropped moderate distances or fallen on with little concern of rendering it unusable
- Optic and associated rifle are stored in a maintenance permissive environment and can be given care in short order
- Optic and associated rifle are not exposed to harsh elements for long durations, stored in a police cruiser or building even while ‘in use’ is a good example.
- ‘Military‘ grade is also an often abused term, but in this context it describes an optic hardened beyond duty grade to survive ‘non-permissive’ environments, it otherwise holds the traits of a ‘Duty’ optic
- Hardened for use away from easy access to maintenance
- Optic may see nothing more than a dry brush and a fresh battery for months
- Hardened for longer term exposure to harsh elements like snow, sand, mud, and water
- Often includes an extreme depth rating for water-proofing, optics with this are truly submersible and can be safely taken underwater for arrival or egress and at much higher water pressures
- Optic’s surface and controls keep longer term exposure in mind when picking coatings, finishes, and treatments
- Hardened for use away from easy access to maintenance
Putting about a chest of gold doubloons worth of ammunition under it (at today’s prices not as much as I wanted or would normally) I found the Vortex SPARC SolAR to have
No wandering zero
Not recoil sensitive to hard shock from piston guns (SCAR17, AK Ultimak Rail) or heat from the sustained fire rate of running rifle drills.
Emitter doesn’t star or blur with my astigmatism, something I am noticing from newer LED’s in good optics.
The Vortex SPARC Solar is solidly ‘Duty‘ grade.
Physically, the SPARC Solar is another T1/T2 footprint dot
It can be low mounted for guns like the AK with an Ultimak tube or an MP5. It can be mounted in the 1.6-1.9″ mount height range that is popular with AR’s and it’s peer group of rifles too. I’ve got in riding on a Scalarworks ‘Lower 1/3’, but the SPARC Solar comes with mounting hardware for both a low base and “lower 1/3” mounting solution in the box. It will also support being offset on any T1/T2 pattern option.
The control surface is a horizontal pad with a +/-
+ increases brightness, – decreases brightness. Simple.
Clicking either button will turn the SPARC Solar on, and holding either button for a few seconds will turn it off. Again, simple. There’s a theme here.
The turrets are uncapped and recessed slightly. Capped turrets are an either love it or hate it feature for many, personally I don’t like misplacing turret caps. The clicks are positive and the recess should be enough to protect from most inadvertent adjustments.
The adjustments are 1 MOA, instead of the industry standard .5 MOA, we will cover more on that in a minute.
The battery cap is a knurled affair for a CR2032, which it does come with. The cap also comes featuring a nice pair of retained lens covers that can stack onto the cap itself while you are using the sight. If you, like I, prefer not to use them you can pull the caps off with their rubber retention ring from around the battery cap to store in your bag or wherever is convenient.
The SPARC Solar’s utility is in its simplicity
2 MOA Dot
The SPARC Solar does not use the multi-reticle system of some of its direct competitors. It isn’t a necessary feature. It is a feature that drastically changes the battery drain rates on those sights that do use it.
Manual Brightness Adjustment
Automated brightness, whether by fiber optic like the ACOG or with a sensor of some sort, has never worked out as well as we would like. Most users will opt for the manual modes, even if automatic is offered. The SPARC Solar uses the solar cell for power augmentation only.
1 MOA Adjustments
While the industry standard is .5 MOA, 1 MOA significantly simplifies the zeroing process. It does so by simplifying the factional math a shooter must do as part of the zeroing process.
4 Clicks = 1 inch at 25 yards/meters
2 Clicks = 1 inch at 50 yards/meters
1 Click = 1 inch at 100 yards/meters
All roughly speaking. Adjust until you group is centered at the desired distance.
Additionally, using the new US Army M16/M4 Series Zero target will give you a precise 1 Click = 1 Box of movement adjustment, at 25 meters.
This change to 1 MOA doesn’t compromise the available precision from the optic. Each click will move the dot only half the width or height of the dot, and that is when the SPARC Solar is turned down to minimum visible brightness for lighting conditions. This on a platform that will, at realistic best, be shooting a 1.5 to 4 MOA group to adjust from.
Realistically, .5 MOA adjustments are overly precise for red dot optics in the same way that .1 Mil adjustments are on LPVO non-precision platforms. They don’t increase the gun’s precision, just the number of clicks to zero it.
Trijcon’s HRS RMR (For the M17/M18) uses the same 1 MOA adjustment and it works out very well as an offset rifle optic, a very viable option for the SPARC Solar as well.
Shake Awake
Shake Awake technology was one I was hesitant about when it first started popping up a few years ago, it seemed like a failure point for a gimmick. Now having seen, and own currently, several optics with it, and never having turned any of them off, I am convinced they have it working fine.
Speaking on the Trijicon HRS RMR again for a moment, it uses a parallel but different concept for battery endurance. Instead of shaking awake, it goes into an automated brightness sensing mode after several hours and will dim the dot as ambient light dims. This makes it power efficient in the dark while keeping the brightness around an appropriate level for lighting conditions in the environment.
Hitting the + or – on the HRS switches it to manual for specific brightness, it stays in manual for 16.5 hours after the last adjustment. It then defaults to automated again.
It is fairly complicated but I see where Trijicon was coming from (and it was a Military contract optic)
Both methods have merits for power conservation and battery endurance. The shake awake is more basically intuitive, it simply turns on again at the last power setting. User can then adjust for conditions. The auto-adjust function of the HRS is more ‘environmentally prepared,’ perhaps is the term, for use at a given lighting condition, but that isn’t perfect and may need to be adjusted for conditions anyway.
Neither is perfect, but I feel shake awake encourages the user to actively check their optic for conditions and make adjustments more than the automated system, which could inure complacency. I have and use both systems, I am more endeared to the shake awake.
Conclusion: Less is More
The Vortex SPARC Solar offers the foundational frame of what we want out of a modern red dot sight. If you aren’t springing for a CompM5 and you don’t need the multi-reticle system, the Solar is very much worth your consideration.
4 Ways to Mount A Pistol Red Dot
Pistol red dots are a significant innovation in the combat pistol game. They are in no way new, and you can find numerous examples going back decades. What’s changed is that the latest trend is focusing on concealed carry and duty guns. Prior to that, the pistol red dot was regulated mostly to ‘Open’ series competition guns. In the last few decades, we found a way to mount smaller red dots in less intrusive methods.
Today, we are talking all about mounting pistol red dots and which systems work best.
The ‘Worst’ Way – Dovetail Mount
The Dovetail mount is a plate or even section of rail that replaces your rear sight with a base to mount optics. Most of these dovetail mounts suck. If it’s on Amazon and costs 19 bucks, you can assume it sucks.
There are a few inherent issues with using a dovetail to mount a pistol red dot. The first is the height. The dot will be taller and the gun taller.
Second dovetail mounts replace your rear sight and eliminate your ability to use a rear sight. The cheaper designs are prone to bend and break when pressure is applied in nearly any direction. This throws the dot off.
There are only two no-mill dovetail pistol red dot mounts I’d trust, and that’s the Dueck Defense model and the Raven Concealment Balor mount. Both of these are sturdy and incorporate a rear and front sight for backups. The two issues with these mounts are the height and the cost. The Dueck is around 130 bucks, and the Balor is around 200. For that cost, you could have your slide milled. But if you don’t want to mill, they work.
The Better Way – Plate System
The Glock MOS system introduced a factory means to allow shooters to accommodate a wide variety of pistol red dot optics. The idea is that a shooter can purchase a Glock MOS and use a dozen different types of red dots by swapping mounting plates. The mounting plates allow the Glock to accommodate various optic footprints. The base slide has a universal footprint to attach the various plates to. S&W has something similar with the CORE series.
This is probably the best quasi-universal option on the market. If you were on the fence or just wanted to try a red dot enhanced handgun, then the CORE or MOS might be the best option to experiment with. The CORE and MOS systems work but do have a few small issues. The slide + plate + optic means the sight is higher.
Second, there is a set of screws that attach the plate to the gun then a set that attaches the optic to the plate. That’s four potential failure points. The Glock plates have also been known to bend and warp, but luckily the aftermarket is producing better plates that are less likely to warp. A small but very annoying issue is screw length. A screw too long will bend the plate, and a screw too short will not hold the optic to the gun.
The Weird Way – Frame Mounted
Frame-mounted pistol red dot optics are nothing new. This was the competitive solution way back in the day when C-More sights were as small as it got. Companies like ALG made solutions like the 6-second mount that attaches to the rail and then to the frame and allows you to mount an Aimpoint Micro to your Gen 3 Glock. This was a purpose-built solution for a Counter-Terrorism unit according to ALG and proved to be a very stable and reliable platform for mounting a red dot.
Other frame mounted system allow various optic’s options for SIG, 1911, CZ type pistols, and beyond. These systems do not reciprocate with the slide so tracking the dot is exceptionally easy to do. The lack of riding on the reciprocating slide may even extend the optic’s life.
These systems have been used extensively by pro-competitive shooters, and while they work, they also have a few issues.
First, they are massive and semi-complicated to install. They tend to also be expensive and often require a professional touch to install. These systems eliminate concealment options and leave you with minimal holster choices. Oh, and of course, the optic tends to be quite high.
The Best Way – Milled Slides
The very best way to attach a pistol red dot to your gun is the purchase a milled slide or have your own slide milled. There are tons of good companies out there these days that are doing some outstanding work in the world of red dot milling. As long as you choose a quality custom shop, you’ll experience the best pistol red dot fit possible.
Slide mounted options sink the optic low and reduce failure points. Attachment is easier, and this has become the industry standard for a good reason. Milled slides provide you the most stable, lowest profile, and least complicated system for mounting pistol red dots. Even price-wise, this can be an affordable option. Brownells own RMR cut Glock slide can be had for under 200 bucks.
If you are looking for good companies, then you can’t go wrong with Jaegerworks, ATEi, or Primary Machine are all well respected for their slide milling capabilities if you choose to take that route.
Pistol Red Dot Optics Options
Pistol red dots are most certainly becoming mainstream, and these days optic’s compatibility is quickly becoming the standard. SIG, FN, Glock, S&W, Walther, CZ, and more are making their newest guns optic’s ready off the bat. The Pistol red dot is here to stay, and if it’s a route you want to take, make sure you approach it with a little bit of know-how to make your choice. Your choices and experiences may vary, but after numerous bits of experimentation, the above is what I’ve found to be true.