The Firearm Blog

There is in interesting discussion going on at the Castle Argghhh blog about the appeal of shooting. It is worth a read.

thepittsburghchannel.com has published an article on the increase in woman buying guns.

While there aren’t statistics kept on the number of women who buy handguns every year, if you ask just about any arms dealer, licensed instructor or law enforcement official, they’ll tell you handguns aren’t just for men anymore.

Instead of shopping or having lunch, some women take a shooting class at Anthony Arms in West Mifflin.

“There are so many acts of violence against women,” said Maureen LaBella, who is a nurse. “I think it’s not a bad idea to own a gun and know how to use it.”

More here.

B.B. has written an interesting article on early target shooting with the Zimmerstutzen rifles.

The Zimmerstutzen was the ancestor of the 10-meter target [air] rifle and extends back to at least 1840. Zimmerstutzen is the rough translation of “parlor rifle” in German. The first zimmer was powered by a percussion cap that propelled a small lead ball through a short rifled barrel.

What I found fascinating was that there were 25 different Zimmerstutzen calibers!

A Zimmerstutzen comes in the nominal caliber 4mm, but in fact there are over 25 discrete calibers that range from 4mm to 5.55mm, in half-milimeter increments.

Zimmerstutzen vs .22LR

Read the article here.