They were still setting up the displays when I left the SHOT Show site at the Sands Convention Center tonight, with the Show officially scheduled to open tomorrow, on Tuesday the 19^th. I was able to attend one of the three “Media Day” live fire gatherings held for the firearms press traditionally on the day before opening, which this year was Monday the 18^th.

The one I attended featured Smith & Wesson guns, including their subsidiary, Thompson/Center. The latter firm introduces a cool new camouflaged turkey gun, a 12 gauge with red dot sight in their lightweight single barrel/single shot format. For those who are confident enough to feel they don’t need a fast follow-up shot, it will be slick.

T/C’s Venture rifle is a low-priced bolt action that has the same minute of angle (i.e., about an inch at 100 yards) accuracy guarantee of their more expensive models. The trigger was sweet on the .22/250 test sample I shot, mounted with a very nice Trijicon scope, and while the indoor test range didn’t give us much distance, the groups showed that it should live up to the promises its manufacturer makes for its accuracy.

S&W has some nice updates of old favorites. The hammerless lightweight snubbies will now be made in .22 Long Rifle (ideal for cheap practice for those who carry their larger caliber brother guns), and .22 rimfire Magnum, which holds promise for self-defense in the hands of those who are recoil-sensitive, and would also be a handy short-range pest control device on the farm. The company introduces lightweight Scandium-frame hunting revolvers, a 7-shot .357 Magnum with 6” barrel and a 6-shot .44 Mag with a 6.5” barrel.  The improved Performance Center trigger group is now available on the standard size Military & Police polymer framed auto pistols and not just the 5” barrel match gun: my buddy Steve Denney shot an exquisite group with a test sample in .40 S&W.  My pick of the litter among improved older models is a 625, the .45 ACP “moon clip” revolver, with a shortened cylinder and 4” barrel. I’ve ordered one I hope to shoot in the soon-to-come Florida State IDPA Championships, if I get it in time to sight in and practice a little. Yes, it’s that good.

Also attended a briefing on two radically new (for S&W) handguns, which will carry a respected old S&W name: the Bodyguard series.  We were asked not to say anything to our readers until 9AM Pacific Time tomorrow, the 19^th, when the guns will be officially announced at the SHOT Show. (S&W’s top PR guy, Paul Pluff, was staring at me pointedly when he made that announcement.) So, I’m writing it now, the night before, and will try to pull the trigger on the blog post from the press room at the convention center first thing in the morning.

These new handguns seem to be S&W’s answer to Ruger’s hugely successful LCR and LCP lightweight compact handguns. The .38 revolver version is a five-shot of totally new design – the cylinder turns clockwise like a Colt instead of the traditional counterclockwise rotation S&W is famous for – and its cylinder release latch is (gasp!) on the top of the gun.  The .380 auto is polymer framed, with thumb safety, good sights, and a double action only trigger.  

Each of these handguns will come with an integral laser sight from InSight in New Hampshire. When you consider that laser sights cost hundreds of dollars as aftermarket accessories, the pricing ain’t bad. The Bodyguard .38 revolver will carry a suggested retail of $625, and the Bodyguard .380 auto will go $575. Both shot well in our limited testing. I particularly liked the .380…well, as much as I like any .380, anyway…

More tomorrow when the Show officially opens.

Steve Denney’s fingers show the number of shots, 5, he fired into this tiny group with new service-size M&P .40 pistol with trigger system from S&W Performance Center.

S&W’s latest Model 625 revolver, with shortened cylinder and 4” barrel turned deeper into the frame. Caliber is .45 ACP, with super fast “moon clip” reloads. Action has to be felt to be appreciated.

S&W’s new Bodyguard .38 has cylinder latch ambidextrously located at upper rear of frame, and integral laser sight.

S&W’s new Bodyguard .380 auto pistol has thumb safety at left rear of frame, and integral laser sight under the barrel.

Mas enjoys the sweet trigger pull of Thompson/Center’s new economy-priced, guaranteed accuracy bolt action center fire rifle.

Thompson/Center’s new turkey gun is an ergonomic, purpose-built 12 gauge shotgun.

Share or Bookmark

Extravaganza! Good Lord, I love that word.

But for firearms folk, the SHOT Show (the Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade exhibition) early each year is THE big industry show for the firearms industry. It’s in Las Vegas this year (as it is most years). And, yes, I’ll be there to cover it for you.

More or less…

I got to Nevada ahead of the show, to sit down with a guy and his attorneys in regard to a Murder charge lodged against the guy in question. This person is a law-abiding armed citizen who shot and killed a robber, and stands charged with Murder. Looks like clear-cut self-defense to me: we’ll see, before too terribly long, what the jury decides.  Suffice to say that things like this take precedence on my schedule over cool new firearms.

This coming Monday is the day scheduled for us gun writers to go to at least three separate firing ranges in the area to test-fire new guns. I’m going to miss some if not all of that.  At least part of my Monday will be spent finishing a few days of seminars that encompass both bare-handed martial arts and the use of the gun in defense of the innocent. Frankly, learning survival skills that you can pass on to others who needs them is ALSO more important than shooting cool new guns.

I’m hooked up with a group called the ProArms Podcast . Last year, their producer and editor came down sick, and Dave Duffy at Backwoods Home was kind enough to let them copy my Backwoods Home blog entries on the new stuff to their forum.

Well, it seemed like I needed some payback given my scheduling situation, so producer/editor (AKA: PrEditor) Gail Pepin at ProArms Podcast gave me permission to reprint THEIR blog-site here. Quid pro quo. Pro-Arms honcho Jon Strayer, a Five-Gun Master shooter, also runs one of the coolest gun shops anywhere, and had a chance to attend a pre-SHOT Show live-fire test of some of the new stuff.

And…before you can find it most anyplace else… you can find it HERE!

Enjoy, my friends: before too long, I’ll be at the SHOT Show myself, and giving you my take on the new introductions for 2010 that I find there.

Share or Bookmark

If you don’t know about Wounded Warriors, you should. This wonderful group is dedicated to the American men and women who’ve been maimed fighting in the service of the United States Military. Info can be found HERE.

Ali Palmos, speaking on behalf of International Supplies just informed me that the company is raffling off a couple of primo handguns to benefit this most worthy organization. The pistols are donated by Colt, which introduced the classic 1911 in the eponymous year and has manufactured them without interruption for almost a century since. They’re the “1918” version, true to World War I styling but made with modern metallurgy and heat treating. The couple that I’ve shot fed flawlessly with modern hollow points.

Each would be worth about a thousand dollars by itself, but each has been worked over by my old friend Wayne Novak to the tune of about $6,000 worth of additional customizing apiece. Wayne runs Novak’s .45 Shop and is famous as the outside armorer who built the guns for FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Unit, as well as countless discriminating pistol enthusiasts. To show you how high my regard is for Wayne Novak, I gave each of my daughters a Novak Custom 9mm Browning Hi-Power. These are the sort of guns to which you can trust the lives of those you most love.
The raffle was planned for the industry’s big annual bash, the SHOT Show coming up shortly in Las Vegas, but I asked Ali if there was any way our Backwoods Home readers could participate. Ali did some digging, and advises the following:

“Good question! I just got off the phone with my client…so what we’re going to do is this. For those who want to participate in the raffle but cannot attend the SHOT Show, they may write a check to the Wounded Warrior Project and send it to the following address:

Attn: Doug Pircher’International Supplies
945 West Hyde Park Blvd.
Inglewood, CA 90302

“Checks must be received before the Friday, January 22nd 2 PM drawing. Once check is received, their name will be immediately submitted to the raffle. International Supplies will also send an email to confirm receipt. Winner does not need to be present. But they must include their address and contact information with their check so we know where to send the guns.”

Raffle tickets are $5.00 apiece.

An eminently worthy cause, with way cool guns to win. Who could ask for anything more? Thanks again, Ali!

Share or Bookmark

My Christmas gift to myself was a carbine I’d always wanted: a lever action Winchester complete with saddle ring. It was the iconic gun of the Western movies. If it was good enough for John Wayne, it was good enough for me.

As a child of the East, not the West, I wasn’t much of a horseman.  The closest I ever came to having one of my own was when I owned a Ford Bronco.  It took a good part of my life to figure out exactly how that damn saddle ring interfaced with the saddle: you never saw THAT in the cowboy movies.

Another New Englander, one C. L. Innis of Westminster, Massachusetts explained it in the July, 1964 issue of Guns magazine, a publication I would later proudly serve as handgun editor. Mr. Innis wrote, “I’m not trying to start a controversy but in my younger days I homesteaded for nine years in Campbell County, Wyoming. My Model ’94 Winchester .25-35 carbine was equipped with a saddle ring as were most of the lever action carbines of strictly civilian calibers that my neighbors had. The popular method of slinging a rifle to the saddle was to run one of the saddle strings (by the horn, either side) through the ring and secure with a single bow knot for quick release.”

My example also an old working gun, and also a Winchester Model of 1894, but in the more common .30-30 chambering. The serial number dates it to the year 1926. This short-barreled rifle’s gray patina indicates that it spent much if not all of its 84 years on this Earth in the woods or on a farm, and so do the many dings on its time-darkened walnut stock and fore-end. It still has the old-style steel crescent butt plate, which can make the mild recoil of the .30-30 actually hurt. Yet its bore is bright and smooth, and its well-worn action works like glass.  I took it to my hundred-yard range, and from my solid Caldwell bench rest table it still kept all its shots in a group the size of a deer’s heart with both 170 grain and 150 grain hunting loads. It had been sighted for the latter, and I left it that way. For the relatively small deer around where I live, a good 150 grain softnose at sedate .30-30 velocity will do just fine.

It’s a piece of history. Every time I handle it, I’ll wonder how many meals it brought from the woods to family tables, for generation after generation.  I hope I can function as well as it, if I ever attain its age.

Got some old classics with stories they could tell, if only they could speak? Share them here in the comments section!

The Saddle Ring sits amidst 84 years of honest wear and tear.

Old rifle plus modern ammunition equals performance that’s more than “good enuf.”

Honest scars and cracks…and a crescent butt plate that does NOT reduce recoil!

Two of millions of Winchester ’94 .30-30s. At left, the saddle ring gun from 1926, and at right, a superb specimen from circa 1955 production.

Share or Bookmark