#22

I don’t usually read The Daily Mail for its authentic and informative stories about the world, but some pretty interesting stuff does sometimes come out of it. Such as this story about a British parish council chairman in Suffolk who amassed over five hundred firearms in his house. We a story earlier back about an American in California who had thousands of firearms confiscated from him when he died, and in a similar case, this British gentleman passed away before any legal ramifications could be had for him. Comparing gun ownership in Britain to the U.S., that’s alot of firearms! Apparently most of them were illegally owned, but I’ve got a hunch that there might be more to the story than this. This might be a long stretch, but I’m willing to hedge a small bet, that the overwhelming majority of these “firearms” were actually deactivated. Although the problem is that I can’t see any evidence to support this in the pictures, and it doesn’t say so throughout the article. What makes me say this, is that the guy has over five hundred firearms, but apparently not a single round of live ammunition. The report claims that there were “200,000” rounds of ammunition also found, but in all the pictures of this “ammunition”, they either show just bullets without shells, or shells without bullets/powder/primers. Knowing English gun laws are extremely strict, I wouldn’t put it past the police to simply say these were firearms, because maybe they had been deactivated in the 1990s or so, but hadn’t followed any of the additional deactivation laws. For more information on this, see my article on the London Proof House. But essentially, Britain has passed a number of deactivated firearms laws, and with each law, the deactivated firearm has to be brought up to standard, by filling the barrel with lead, or slotting the chamber, or any other such method. Maybe this guy had all these deactivated guns, and just got tired of following each new law, and thus simply didn’t. Because I can’t see how even illegally, one has a huge amount of firearm

Browning has announced the release of the suppressor ready versions of their unique “85%” sized 1911 .22LR handguns. The handguns are available in two sizes, “full” and “compact”; which I put in quotes as they not not quite the same size as their parent platform. The full size comes equipped with a 4.25″ barrel and the compact in at a 3.625″. Both barrels are threaded 1/2×28″, common to the .22 caliber.

Tactical Solutions is a company that focuses on innovating in the field of rimfire firearms. Their booth at the show was filled with plinkers of every shape, size, and color, and it would take several posts to cover all their different offerings in depth. The company featured two .22 pistol conversion kits, one for a single-stack 1911, and the other for a Glock 19 or 23, which replace the slide assembly with a new assembly designed to fire .22 Long Rifle ammunition and feeding from new magazines that fit right into the gun’s existing magazine well. These new slides are offered in both threaded and plain barrel variants, with MSRPs between $345 and $575.

Ruger continues to expand its operation into areas it was previously unwilling to enter. This latest entry is a .22 caliber suppressor/silencer that fits their line of threaded .22 caliber rifles and pistols, like the 10/22 and the SR-22. Ruger said the following about the new suppressor, on their website:

I ran across this story recently, and at face value I found it hard to believe, but after some digging it turns out to be true. I’d certainly like some of our Mexican readers to weigh in on it, but within the entire country of Mexico there is one legally operating gunshop, from which qualifying citizens can purchase firearms. Of course I am aware that Mexico has a large illegal firearms problem, but this is about legal firearms. The gunshop is on a military base, in Mexico City, and by Mexico’s constitution, the shop cannot even advertise its existence to the Mexican public. It is completely run by the military, with even military clerks behind the counter. It sells around six thousand firearms a year, mostly handguns in .22 LR to .38 caliber, and sporting rifles and shotguns, of which most are single shot if I read correctly. The display cases also appear to hold a number of modern day battle rifles such as ARs and Galils, but these seem to be just for display and not for sale. The prices are much higher than in the United States for the same firearms. This is probably because of the import taxes and similar regulations. They also have optics and various other accessories for sale.

I came across this on accident, but there is a Facebook Group, based in Libya that is completely centered around the illicit small arms trade in that country. There is nothing surprising about the huge trade of illicit small arms in war torn countries, but the absolutely blatant exist of such a group is what really got me. The group has almost 9,000 members and is completely public on Facebook, not even secret or a members only section, just all out there for the world to see. It is almost as if Lord of War has entered the social media age in the form of online buying and selling. Everything from rare FN FALs and suppressed Beretta Model 70s, to complete rocket launcher systems and RPGs are sale. The posts read exactly like many of the legal and local firearms selling groups in the United States that I am apart. From places of sale, negotiable prices, bump posts, and reposts of items not sold. Except that potential customers are clamoring for M240s or Benelli M4s instead of Remington 700s or mint 1911s. I find it to be an extremely fascinating look into just what is out there on illicit small arms trade in other countries, almost a case study just by scrolling through all the for sale posts. I’ll attach some of the more interesting stuff I saw on it, but anyone with a Facebook account can log on and see every post in its entirety. If you can’t read Arabic, use google translate to work through the whole thing, and you’ll get a pretty good gist of what is being said.

3D printed firearms have faced much stigma since designers and engineers have began dabbling with different design concepts, and halfway 3D firearms in the case of 3D printed AR15 lowers. However from various conversations with law enforcement, it seems that the general professional consensus is that they are not up to the standard that they would have to be, in order to be a threat to Law Enforcement, and a benefit to criminals worldwide (criminals already have a long history of improvised firearms). Most of the 3D printed firearms out there cannot last a significant number of rounds, and are certainly not semiautomatic by themselves (users must add parts that cannot be 3D printed). In addition, they all need various pieces of metal or other material to effectively function.

1969 was a year of great optimism and achievement for the United States. NASA’s space program took humans to the Moon in July of that year, while the Mariner 6 and 7 probes gave humanity its first close look at the planet Mars. The Boeing 747 “Jumbo Jet” took to the skies for the first time in 1969, and that year also marks the sending of the first ARPANET data packet, heralding the very beginning of the Internet age. In 1969, it seemed as though there was nothing that America could not accomplish, if it wanted to.

Riding on the enormous popularity of the AR15 post we recently completed concerning the feedback from Battlefield Las Vegas, we’re now bringing to you the handgun section that the manager, Ron has so diligently posted up on AR15.com. I’ve combined all of his relevant posts on the forum, to make one solid block of information about mostly handguns, but he’s also included some NFA machine guns, and some suppressor tidbits. I’ve edited some of it just so it flows and makes sense to the reader, but didn’t touch any of the actual information.

Now this is a move I’ll admit I did not see coming, but am very much a fan of. Ruger has released a hardwood stock variant of their 10/22 and American Rifle hybrid American Rimfire. The new version comes complete with all the normal American Rifle goodies including adjustable trigger, free-floated barrel, etc.

A TFB reader sent this into us about the Chinese Type 05 Police revolver in their new 9mm round. China adopting a 9mm revolver for their police forces is old news from last year, however the particular round they’ve adopted has apparently been featured on the Chinese CNTV station, and a look at the gelatin test and some of the comments made by the Police forces bring about some questions about the actual round .Our reader was gracious enough to make GIFs out of the footage and translate it for us from Chinese (excerpt from e-mail is unedited)-

The quest for a .22 LR conversion kit began when I took my Kimber commemorative Custom II to the cleaners. I had ordered a Caspian frame, along with some Ed Brown and Wilson parts, and thus was left over with the original frame. All the internals had been transferred over to the new pistol. The idea for getting a conversion kit was for two reasons. I introduce alot of people to shooting and wanted a .22 handgun so they could work on the fundamentals more. And the backwords compatibility of still having a full size 1911 being able to work in all my existing holsters, use the same procedures and techniques as with the .45 ACP versions.

As a (previously) avid 22LR shooter, I have bemoaned the continued lack of (relatively) affordable ammunition, principally CCI Mini Mags. As such, I have searched for a cost-effective replacement and air guns have been a natural fit for the thrifty shooter. It seems that I am not alone in this thinking.

2,000 rounds per minute out of a single barrel. Let’s let that sink in…. 2000 RPM!

Gun writer, photographer and Youtuber ( FearandLoading Channel), Guy J Sagi sent us this photo of s .22 Umarex MP5. Guy did not realize he was photographing in the midst of poison ivy until it was pointed out by a colleague, fortunately for Guy he is not allergic. I on the other hand feel a rash coming on just looking at that photo.