Modern Shooter gets a first-hand look at the creation of functional art with a visit to Turnbull Restoration Company.
Face it, owning a piece of artwork is a dull proposition. Unless it’s one of the masterpieces created by Doug Turnbull.
Working in cold steel and hot gold, the master firearms restorationist and his team at Turnbull Restoration Company take the ordinary and make it extraordinary. Beyond that, the guns that receive their once over are more than pretty faces, mere “wall-hangers.” They are 100-percent functional and ready for the toughest hunts and most rugged use. Honestly, what good would they be otherwise?
Turnbull (the man) practices what he preaches when it comes to utilizing what he creates. Showcasing a personally restored and customized Winchester 1886 rifle, the master craftsman proudly proclaims it does more than demonstrates his talent. With more than 70 animals to its name, it proves a dependable hunting rifle.
A point of pride, Turnbull’s team customizes guns exactly to the owner’s specifications. Most opt for the company’s vivid color-case hardening, a signature of the firearms virtuosos. But as far as engraving and inlays are concerned, Turnbull will put scrollwork down to the screw heads if requested. Simply put, the sky is the limit when a gun goes under his studied eye and steady hand.
Beauty, function and reliability. Doug Turnbull’s results speak for themselves.
Catch the rest of Turnbull’s incredible creations in this episode of Modern Shooter 10:00 p.m. EST Friday on the Pursuit Channel. The episode rebroadcasts Monday at 12 p.m. EST and Tuesday at 11:30 a.m. EST.
Given a sight picture varies with range and size of the target, how much is adequate in a self-defense situation?
Building a sight picture:
Arms in full extension.
Sights aligned properly.
Front sight at six o’clock or dead on the target.
Focus on the front sight.
Some shooters wonder how much sight picture they need. According to Gunsite Instructor Cory Trapp: “If you have the physical space to bring the handgun up to full extension, you should be looking for a sight picture. Some contend that’s simply too slow, or that at close range point-shooting works perfectly well.
In this diagram, the front sight is shown in four different positions. If you fire a single shot with a duty handgun, using each of the four sight pictures shown, you will still have a group of about 10 inches at 5 yards.
My response is, ‘If you don’t think you have time to aim, I doubt you have time to miss.’ The only way to be certain of the alignment of the pistol is to look at the sights. The problem is when we say, ‘sight picture,’ most think we mean a perfect view of the sights.
“The reality is, the amount of sight picture you need to see varies with the range and size of the target. I run a drill where you hold center at 5 yards, then move the front sight out of the notch to the left, then right, then all the way down and all the way up, firing one shot with each change. With full-sized pistols, many are amazed to see all the shots are still in a 10-inch circle.
One can shoot quite well with no sights, just using the shape of the slide itself as an oversize set of sights. Learn what the limits are with your own handgun and your speed will increase when you simply see only what you need to see to get the hits.”
Do you want more consistent handloads? Then develop a consistent cleaning regimen for your reloading equipment.
Tools for maintenancing and cleaning reloading equipment:
Bottle Brush
Solvent
Rags
Cotton Swabs
Ultrasonic Cleaner
Toothbrush
Gun Oil
Hoppe’s Gun Medic
Brake Cleaner
Reloading is such a wonderful hobby; it can be economical, educational and — I dare say — romantic to its own strange degree. The diligent hours put in at the reloading bench seem to be reverted to a simple pile of brass in a fraction of the time while seated at the shooting bench, but once you’ve got the reloading bug and have fallen down the rabbit hole, there’s no turning back. But, things back at reloading bench can get dirty, sometimes filthy, and cleaning your gear is a necessary evil.
The set of 40 S&W dies was stored for a while, and it developed rust inside and out that must be removed.
We need to use lubricants for resizing our brass — doesn’t matter if it’s a graphite lubricant, aerosol or gel — and invariably, that lubricant and little bits of brass will end up everywhere. Shell holders, die bodies, expander balls and seating plugs can all get gunked up with a lovely amalgam of brass shavings, powder residue and lubricant. Rust can always pose an issue, especially if you live in the more humid climates, and it will be a concern if you store your dies for extended periods. It must be dealt with accordingly. Let’s examine some ideas — some obvious and some not so obvious — to keep your reloading gear clean and in top running condition.
Love For The Loaders
For the single-stage loaders, the operation can be easily halted while you clean any one of the components. For the progressive press crown, a gummed-up die can screw up the works very easily. A routine cleaning of your dies for the progressive press is a very good idea.
Redding has actually taken this into consideration, with their new Premium Die Set for handgun calibers. Using their Titanium Carbide sizing die — no lubrication is needed, and therefore less goo ends up in the die — resizing brass is a quick and simple procedure. The Special Expander Die is an eye-opener, as it uses a unique expander specifically designed to best prepare the brass cases to receive the projectile. What’s more, the expander has a proprietary coating that will not get gunked-up with brass flakes or any other dirty concoction of lube and metal filings. I like them for single-stage work, but in the progressive presses they really show their value.
Detailing Dies
Cleaning a reloading die isn’t exactly a difficult process. I like to disassemble the die, as far as I can, for cleaning. I want to remove any foreign materials, and I want to take any and all residue out of the die. You can do this with a bottle brush and some solvent, or even a rag twisted into the die, but I prefer a two-stage cleaning method.
Redding’s new Premium Die Set for pistol cartridges is a perfect choice for the progressive presses; the proprietary coating on the resizing die keeps things much cleaner.
I like to use a rag or cotton swab to get the majority of the gunk out of the die body, and to remove any loose material from the rod and expander ball. Then, I give the parts a good bath in an ultrasonic cleaner; you’d be shocked as to how much material will come out of a die that you’ve just cleaned with a rag or brush. The same goes for the shell holders: The little crevices can build up that gooey mixture that has actually made placing a cartridge into them a difficulty.
I use a toothbrush to give the textured expander balls a good scrubbing, and then I start the drying and reassembly. If it’s summertime, I’ll set the dies in the hot sun to fully dry, and then reassemble, using a light gun oil to coat them, wiping off any excess. In the winter, I’ll put the dies on the heat grate to dry. Both get the job done, but I want all of the liquid solution to evaporate thoroughly.
I keep a dummy round for each bullet I use in a particular caliber, with the bullet seated to the exact depth I use. This allows me to reassemble the dies and get the seating plug very close to where it needs to be by setting it to the dummy’s length. I generally don’t move the lock rings — especially if the die is set up for roll crimping — unless things have gotten very rusty.
Rust is a problem if things are left for a while, or, if you’re like me, the salt in your hands nearly melts steel. Seriously, I can wear the bluing off a rifle on a 10-day safari, and my hands have the same effect on steel reloading dies and press parts. I save the little silica gel packs to place in the die boxes — you can find them in beef jerky packets and shoe boxes — to keep as much moisture away from my dies as possible. To keep them rust-free, I like the Hoppe’s Gun Medic cleaner/lubricant in the spray can; it’s not as sticky as RemOil, and it spreads easily. I use it on the dies and presses alike.
Stop The Presses!
Brass chips, lubricant and other gunk builds up inside your reloading dies, and it needs to be removed regularly to maintain proper and precise function.
Speaking of presses, I like to give them a good cleaning every now and again. The threads are definitely a place where gunk and goo can and will accumulate, and I like to take some solvent and a toothbrush to get in there and give them a good scrubbing. There’s no sense in taking all the time to clean the die bodies (and their threads as well) just to screw them into a set of grimy threads on the press.
My favorite press, the Redding T7 turret press, has more moving parts than most of the single-stage presses, and I like to clean and re-lubricate it from time to time. It requires a bit of disassembly, but I feel better once all the grime is removed from the rotating head. I like to degrease all the hinge points of a press with some good old brake cleaner, and I give it a shot of the Hoppe’s Gun Medic, or even better some M-Pro 7 gun oil (that stuff is great) to lubricate the hinges.
Polished Brass
To minimize the amount of residue and debris, I clean and polish my brass before I resize it, removing as much of the powder residue as possible before introducing the cases into the resizing die. I also use a soft, clean cotton rag to wipe off as much of the lubricant as possible after sizing. If I need to trim the cases, I use a good case brush to remove as much of the lubricant as possible, thereby keeping the seating die as clean as possible.
Even shell holders can build up residue and debris, and they will rust from being handled often. A good scrubbing with an old toothbrush and light lubrication will keep them in good shape.
It may be a small factor in the overall accuracy and consistency of your ammunition, but regular cleaning extends the life of your gear, and that’s always a good thing. While I’m nowhere near as meticulous in cleaning my truck — or any other faction of life, at least according to the Mrs. — keeping my reloading gear clean is an important step in the process of developing the best ammo I can create.
Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared in the July 2018 issue of Gun Digest the Magazine.
Tests can contradict each other, so how do you go about figuring out what defensive handgun and ammo you should choose?
Parameters to make a defensive handgun choice:
Caliber adequate for defense
Concealable
Ample capacity
Accurate for your proficiency
Many organizations, agencies and even individuals have developed theories to rate the effectiveness of defensive handgun ammunition. Most of the results, though they seem definitive in nature, are contradictory. Here’s a brief snapshot of more than 100 years of speculation.
The search for the perfect defensive handgun load has spawned elaborate testing contraptions and procedures, all looking for the magic bullet that doesn’t exist.
In 1904, U.S. Army Captain John Thompson and Major Louis LaGarde shot live steers and dead humans to determine which cartridges were most effective. Julian Hatcher, a former Technical Editor at American Rifleman, based his theory of Relative Stopping Power on this study, concluding the .45 ACP twice as effective as a 9mm. In 1975, the National Institute of Justice finalized what they called the Relative Incapacitation Index, which was later updated in 1985. This study was based on hypothetical assumptions and a computer-generated man. The study rated the 9mm twice as effective as the .45 ACP.
After the shoot-out in Miami in 1986, the FBI began basing its ammunition opinions on bullets fired through various intermediate barriers and into 10-percent ordnance gelatin. The FBI’s conclusion was that the minimum acceptable penetration was 12 inches. This is how we ended up with the 40 S&W. The supposed bad bullet that prompted the FBI’s now legendary testing protocol, surprisingly performed very well in a 1987 test conducted by the Secret Service. It was based on a bullet’s ability to deposit energy in the first 5.9 inches of 20-percent ordnance gelatin. The supporting logic was the greater the energy deposit, the greater the potential for tissue damage.
In 1991, a privately funded research group began studying the physiological effects of bullet impact on medium-sized animals. The objective was to isolate the mechanism responsible for rapid incapacitation of man-sized targets. This event — though some contend it never really happened — became known as the Strasbourg Tests. Supposedly, more than 600 goats died during the experiment.
That same year, the Naval Weapons Support Center (NWSC) tested a bunch of 9mm loads. Along with terminal performance and reliability, accuracy was also evaluated. Unlike the FBI, the NWSC used 20-percent ordnance gelatin because the Wound Ballistics Lab at the Letterman Army Institute of Research determined it best simulated muscle tissue.
Conducting independent testing on your own is a good way to learn about terminal performance so you can make an educated decision when it comes to ammo selection.
All this illustrates is that nobody seems to agree on, well, hardly anything — at least when it comes to stopping bad guys with handguns. The problem is, humans cannot resist the urge to rate everything from football teams to members of the opposite sex with numbers. College basketball fans know how effective the numerical rating systems are; just this year a 16th ranked team beat a No. 1 for the first time in playoff history. Similarly, there’s very little consensus on whether Britney Spears is a 5, 8 or maybe an 11. A shooting is a chaotic event and numbers cannot value chaos. And, no matter the criteria, the bias of the evaluators always creeps in, and anomalies always exist.
Which study should you believe? Trust? What cartridge/load should you select? Do the research and conduct your own tests. I have, and I encourage it — not because you’ll discover a magic bullet, but because you’ll learn stuff. I have my theories, but guess what? They’re no more valid than others. Still, there’s nothing wrong with a practical approach, consistent with the doctrine I think best employed with almost everything in life: Keep it simple.
Though vastly underrated, Remington’s Black Belt ammunition performs very well — and it’s proved reliable in many handguns.
Here are three keep-it-simple rules for defensive handgun and ammunition selection:
Rule #1: Carry the largest caliber, highest-capacity handgun you can comfortably conceal on a daily basis.
Rule #2: Load it with flawlessly functioning ammunition, delivering high energy levels and deep penetration, for your cartridge of choice.
Rule #3: Prove you can consistently use that combination to put five shots, inside a 5-inch circle, from 5 yards, in less than 5 seconds.
I’m constantly asked what ammunition I trust in the handguns I carry. What might surprise you is that I’m not all that picky. For me, priority No. 1 is reliability. If it does not go bang every time, the most wicked cartridge, loaded with the most wicked bullet, will only result in one hell of a wicked let down.
Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared in the July 2018 issue of Gun Digest the Magazine.
The Kolar Arms Over/Under Shotgun is making waves in trap, sporting clays and skeet.
Kolar Shotgun Models
MAX Trap T/S
MAX Trap T/A
MAX Skeet
MAX Lite Sporting
MAX AAC All Around Combo
The Kolar Max Skeet over/under is the epitome of classy sporting shotguns today.
Kolar is a name in shotgunning that is not well-known to those outside the high stakes world of professional skeet shooting. But to those in the know, it’s the sporting scattergun to have if you want to compete against the best in the business. Kolar guns are entirely made right here in America — in Racine, Wisconsin, to be exact. But how did the Kolar over/under come about?
Don Mainland is the man behind the Kolar concept. In the 1960s, ‘70s and beyond, Mainland was making parts for the auto and aero industries to tolerances of +/- .003-inches — unheard of at the time. Pioneer Products (one of three companies he owns) had more than 50 parts on various space shuttles.
2015 National Sporting Clays Champion Pat Lieske.
Mainland was shooting a lot of skeet in the early 1980s with Ed Scherer and Debra Raschella, both Skeet Hall of Famers. For those who don’t know, skeet is a four-gauge game involving the 12-, 20-, 28- and .410-gauge shotgun. Leading up to the 1980s most competitors shot four-barrel sets with one 12-gauge receiver using interchangeable 12, 20, 28 and .410 over/under barrels, thus the term four-barrel set. But coming on strong by the early 1980s were “tube sets.”
These were light aluminum alloy full-length tubes precision fit to individual 12-gauge barrels. The tubes were tapped into place with a tight fit and had stainless-steel chambers (titanium chambers for lighter weight were later used).
It was Ed Scherer who suggested Mainland meet with Larry Kolar. During that time Kolar was making skeet tubes under his own name and was initially reluctant to sell. But after Mainland visited for several days Kolar decided to sell his sub-gauge tubes. Today these are called Kolar Max Lite AAA Sub-Gauge Tubes.
Kolar AAA sub-gauge tubes allow shooters to compete in smaller gauge competitions.
Sometime around 1990, Remington Arms had an idea for a single-barrel trap gun that was eventually called the 90-T. Don Mainland made ten of these trap guns under contract with Remington. After extensive testing, Remington gave Mainland a contract to manufacture the 90-T. So, all Remington Model 90-T trap guns were made by Don Mainland’s company, not Remington.
Gun companies were very concerned about barrel blowups, which were often caused by overloads with reloaded shells. Mainland developed the technology to measure wall thickness the full length of the barrel. For the Remington 90-T, Mainland’s company rejected any barrel that was out of tolerance by +/- .003-inch wall thickness down the full length of the barrel. He told me that Remington did extensive testing trying to blow up 90-T barrels, but they couldn’t.
Inside the Elite Shotguns traveling mobile sales van, where many high-end Kolar shotguns are on display and for sale.
Remington was going through a sale of the company when it came time to renew the contract for more model 90-T trap guns. Perhaps because of the impending sale Remington did not want to renew the contract for additional 90-T single-barrel shotguns. So, what was Mainland to do with the tooling he had set up to make this Remington trap gun?
He made a few starts trying to make over/under shotguns for at least one other manufacturer, but then he got the backing, in the way of orders, to come up with his own Kolar shotgun — the gun originally named the Kolar Competition — and the first orders came from Hal DuPont and Robert Paxton, both very well-known names in clay target competition. Later in this article Paxton gives more insight into how the Kolar gun got started.
In coming up with the design of the Kolar, Mainland already had the concept and technology to make barrels of consistent wall thickness, i.e. no thin areas. He also looked at areas that had failed in other competition shotguns, even if those failures took hundreds of thousands of rounds before occurring.
Mainland redesigned these parts, made them stronger, removed sharp corners and more. He also beefed up the sides of his new receiver, adding more strength. As Mainland put it to me, “I overbuild everything.”
The Kolar triggers went through three generations of design. Some of the trigger design changes were to ensure the gun wouldn’t fan fire. The latest triggers were also designed so they could quickly be changed back and forth between pull and release. Release triggers are of great importance to trap shooters.
The look of the standard-grade Kolar receiver with nickel finish.
Mainland also designed the Kolar O/U so it would be easy to work on. No complicated tools were required by a gunsmith other than those virtually all gunsmiths had on hand. This is not true of many other shotgun receivers.
Enter John Ramagli, who came along during the early years of Kolar gun production. Ramagli was particularly interested in .410 patterns. He used Mainland’s indoor range for seemingly endless experiments.
Ramagli described those experiments. “In those years, used .410 Remington semi-auto 1100 barrels could be bought for as little as $50. I’d take them to Kolar’s indoor patterning range and start cutting barrel muzzles back a small amount at a time, thus reducing the choke trying to see if I could improve .410 patterns. I also painstakingly polished chokes, thus polished away some more choke … to see if I could improve those .410 patterns. But my results were sketchy.
“Next, I started overboring those Remington 1100 .410 barrels from .410 to .412 to .415, to even .420. It was overboring that improved my .410 patterns. This was the technology that we began building into our .410 sub-gauge tubes. Eventually, we overbored all our sub-gauge tubes.”
A highly engraved Kolar receiver — beautiful and functional.
Back to chokes. Another thing Ramagli discovered with his choke experiments was that a conical shape worked best in sub-gauge tubes. Most of us have always assumed that a parallel/taper was the best way to build a choke. After all, the latter way is more time-consuming and expensive, so it should be better. Not so according to Ramagli’s experiments.
If discovering the benefits of overboring was the first bonus Ramagli brought to Kolar, it wasn’t the last. He invested in the company and is now President of the company. As Don Mainland had been the guiding and shining light behind the Kolar gun concept, Ramagli was getting ready to take the gun to new heights.
“Shooters are going to see more innovation at Kolar in the next 10 years than they have in our previous 10 years,” Ramagli said.
Kolar over/under sales started only with Hal DuPont and “K Guns” and Robert Paxton with Paxton Arms near Dallas, Texas. After a few years, Ramagli spread sales of the Kolar to several other high-end dealers, but his current financial plan has been to reduce the number of gun shops that sell it to a select few.
Robert Paxton is still on, big time, as is Pat Lieske with the Bald Mountain and Island Lake Shooting Centers in Michigan, the Indiana Gun Club with Phil Baker and their mobile sales units manned by John Harden, and now the joint venture between Dan Lewis on the West Coast, Murry Gerber’s Elite Shotguns in Pennsylvania, and mobile sales units manned by Aaron Willoughby.
The typical high-quality checkering pattern on the Kolar Max.
What shot the Kolar over/under through the figurative roof in popularity is not only the company’s financial plan, but also its shooters. And Kolar relies heavily on these shooters (as well as regular Kolar customers) for input on how to make the Kolar O/U better. In the skeet realm it has been mainly Paul Giambrone III. He not only shoots a Kolar and has for years, but also has provided suggestions for the current Kolar Max Lite Skeet model. Guys like Giambrone don’t suggest major changes, but the little tweaks are what make great guns better. For close to 10 years, Giambrone has been just about unbeatable on skeet’s biggest stages.
For trap input, Ramagli relied heavily on All-American Ricky Marshall (now an employee) and other All-American trap shooters. While the Max Trap is still available with an adjustable rib, with Marshall’s input (and other trap shooters) the Kolar has recently reintroduced the fixed rib — both a standard and an elevated one. Other subtle changes have gone into the current Kolar trap model.
Similarly, Kolar has listened to their customers and professional team members to tweak the shotgun for sporting clays. One result: the Max Lite Sporter. This input came from shooters like Doug Fuller, who won the National Sporting Clays Championship in 2000; Pat Lieske, who won the National Sporting Clays Championship in 2015 and the National F.I.T.A.S.C. Championship in 2015; and Derrick Mein, who won the National Sporting Clays Championship in 2017 and the 2016 World F.I.T.A.S.C. Championship in Italy.
Murry Gerber of Elite Shotguns.
Another aspect that keeps the Kolar models ahead of the competition is the wood. “Dollar for dollar we put on the best walnut of any gun in the industry,” Ramagli said. “We know our shooters love a great piece of wood on their gun, and we go overboard to produce for them. Great wood is not easy to find. I’ve spent two decades contacting the best wood producers.”
In addition to superb wood stocks, the company is also putting more and more emphasis on engraved guns. The Standard model is engraved (with either a blued or nickeled receiver), but an increasing number wear significant engraving that pushes price tags to well over $100,000. These high-grade Kolars are selling about as fast as engravers can turn them out, according to Ramagli.
The lockup system of the Kolar is super strong, with two lugs protruding from the sides of the inside of the receiver that fit into two recesses milled into either side of the barrels upon closing the gun. Barrels pivot on trunnions. Receiver wall thickness is wider than most at .329 inch. When Ramagli started with Kolar he wanted a lighter receiver. Mainland was dead set against doing that. These days, Ramagli admits Mainland was right. Other over/under manufacturers have redesigned their receivers similarly.
“The receiver is the key to virtually everything about the Kolar,” Ramagli explains. “Strength is only the beginning. The gun stays in balance whether we hang 30- or 32-inch barrels on that receiver. However, most importantly, it’s how easy the receiver is to take apart, repair and put back together. That’s Don Mainland’s genius. Virtually every gun that comes in for service goes out the same or next day. They are that easy to take apart, that easy to service. And no special tools are needed to undress a Kolar receiver. “Recently a very low serial number Kolar came in — I think #244. It was bought by a trap shooter in 1996. Reportedly, he had shot over two million rounds through the gun. It had never been to Racine for any service! That says a lot about how well these guns are built,” he said.
“I’m so proud to have been a part of this Kolar story,” he continued. “The success certainly has not been all my doing. The sales team that’s now assembled with Robert Paxton, Pat Lieske, Phil Baker, Murry Gerber and Dan Lewis — we’re going to be around for a long, long time.”
To get more of the Kolar story, I next spoke with Jeff Mainland (Don’s son) and Jeff’s son, Sean.
Another engraving style offered on the Kolar Max series.
Jeff Mainland, President of US Competition Arms, Inc. (the company is the affiliated entity that produces the Kolar), explained that Kolar barrels have gone through a few changes over the years. Input from shooters advised that original barrels were a bit heavy. Jeff attacked this issue first by overboring the barrels — first to .740 inner diameter, then to .750, then even more — to reduce weight.
Those significant inner bore dimensions were abandoned when it became evident that .740 inch offered the best patterns. Jeff and others worked on the technology to machine metal from the outer diameter of the barrels instead. The result is an even greater weight loss compared to boring metal from inside the barrels. Recall earlier how Don Mainland developed the technology to measure barrel thickness every few inches to ensure uniform thickness. The net result of reducing the outer diameter of the barrels was the removal of 8 to 10 ounces of barrel weight. Now the new Kolar guns became even more lively.
The further result was the introduction of three new guns — the current Max Lite Skeet, Max Lite Sporter and Max Lite Trap. These three guns are the current state-of-the-art from Kolar, and are winning big in serious competition. When it comes to new skeet guns sold, 99 percent are shipped with 30-inch barrels as well as the Kolar Max AAA Sub-Gauge Tubes. Most are sold with a low-profile adjustable rib and comb (all Kolar guns now come with an adjustable comb — save the ones that are individually fitted to a customer). All three models are stocked with a 14.75-inch length of pull (LOP).
As Jeff says, “Few shooters require a longer stock than that.” If necessary, reducing LOP is easy. All stocks come with a Monte Carlo step-down at the rear (see photo). This stock configuration reduces felt recoil as the gun tends to come straight back — not up into the face.
Full-length view of the Max Lite Sporter.
Four different stock configurations are available in the skeet, sporting and trap models, and left-handed stocks are offered as well. All stocks are crafted in-house via close-tolerance CNC machinery. Jeff has become a master stock fitter, and with many of the Kolar guns sold customers come into Racine for his special fitting. This takes all day. After considerable work fitting a customer, he uses CNC machines to mill small segments of the stock — always leaving a bit of extra wood. Final stock dimensions are completed by hand.
According to Jeff Mainland, one customer from Utah asked for trap guns that printed patterns 80 percent above the point of aim, then ordered additional Kolars that shot 100 percent above point of aim. More and more Kolar trap guns are going out the door with these two configurations. The idea behind the very high shooting guns is that the rising trap target is still in view when the trigger is pulled. With patterns printing 50/50 the bird is usually covered by the barrels, thus not seen when the trigger is pulled. According to him, Kolar has 20 different stock/rib choices for trap shooters.
Jeff’s son Sean came on at Kolar a few years ago. That makes three generations of Mainlands at the company. Sean is the one who attends many of the trap, sporting and skeet competitions. These events are attended to obtain shooter input that will make a great American-made competition gun even better.
What about the special distributors that sell Kolar competition guns? The first to come on board was the aforementioned Robert Paxton. Paxton is one of the most seasoned shotgunners to ever break clay. A many-time All-American and member of the Skeet Shooting Hall of Fame, Paxton’s introduction to Don Mainland came via phone. Mainland had ordered a competition over/under with a set of sub-gauge tubes. A few weeks later, he ordered another gun and set of tubes, then a third, fourth — perhaps a fifth set — all within only a four-month period. Paxton was thinking, “This is my best customer!”
Shooting the Kolar is an experience that is tough to put into words. There’s a reason why competition shooters are flocking to the brand. And new shooters, too.
Eventually, Paxton asked Mainland what he was doing with all those expensive guns and sub-gauge tube sets. Mainland was dissecting them, cutting them into small pieces trying to find out what made them tick, thus how to make his gun better. When Mainland bought Kolar Sub-Gauge Tubes, Paxton was the first on board to sell them.
Mainland made his first 12 prototype Kolar shotguns and gave them to a dozen serious shooters with the request they shoot them for two years and report back. Robert Paxton received #4 and, like the other field testers, shot that prototype for two years. Skeet-shooting legend Wayne Mayes also received one of the prototypes. From 1994 until his untimely death, Mayes shot the same Kolar O/U. In fact, Mayes was significantly involved with Mainland and Ramagli as an adviser.
“This is a great American story – not just a gun company story,” Robert Paxton began. “When Mainland retired from bicycle competition he was looking for something new to do. His successful companies already employed hundreds, thus he began making a shotgun — not out of profit motive but of a genuine love for the shotgun game. You can see that by his creating twelve prototypes and giving them to serious shooters to shoot for two years. He wasn’t about to rush into anything. He was taking his time!
“It has been great to work with not only an American gunmaking company, but to work with one of the finest companies anyone could work with. Kolar has always been about quality, not quantity.”
Phil Baker, another Kolar distributor, heads up the Indiana Gun Club where only shotgun shooting takes place — trap, skeet and sporting clays. But this club also has an extensive gun room where all the popular competition guns are displayed and sold. “The Kolar guns outsell any of the other high-end shotguns,” Baker said. “We sell mostly trap guns, but also sell our share of sporting and skeet guns.”
Baker also has a mobile sales unit run by John Hardin. The vehicle is filled with all the competition guns Baker sells at the Indiana Gun Club, with a special concentration on Kolar models. The mobile unit stays on the road visiting the bigger shoots — especially trap shoots — showing shooters the guns inside often with the offer to test fire them for a round or two. This traveling truck has been a very successful way for Phil Baker to market more of his shotguns.
Jerry Stillions’ highly engraved Kolar Max Lite Skeet. Stillions spent a full day at the Racine, Wisconsin, factory to have Jeff Mainland do a custom gun fitting. When you order a Kolar, it will fit you like a glove.
Pat Lieske has two gun ranges — Island Lake Shooting Range just north of Ann Arbor, and Bald Mountain Shooting Range near Detroit. His gun shop is in Bald Mountain. Both clubs offer sporting clays, trap, skeet, 5-stand and rifle and pistol ranges. Lieske is no stranger to clay target shooting. Previously a many-time skeet All-American and multiple skeet champion, Lieske found sporting clays some years ago and, evidently, has never looked back. Some of his wins have been highlighted previously. He negotiated with John Ramagli to become a Kolar dealer. No doubt winning the National Championship with a new Max Lite Sporter sealed that deal.
Actually, Lieske shot a Kolar years before when barrels were a bit heavier, but he told me the new Max Lite Sporter was a significant improvement. “The balance, dynamics and lack of recoil put this current Kolar Sporter in a class by itself,” he said. Lieske hasn’t been the first person I’ve talked with who is adamant about the Kolar’s lack of recoil.
He now shoots a low gun at sporting clays unless the targets being presented suggest a mounted gun. “When shooting low gun, the balance and dynamics of a shotgun are even more important than when shooting a mounted gun. Here again the new Kolar shines.”
He also told me that both he and his customers like dealing with a company that makes its guns right here in America. “Further, this is the only gun ever designed from the beginning to accommodate sub-gauge tubes. Small-gauge sporting competition is becoming more important, so the gun’s design for 12-gauge and sub-gauges again set the Kolar apart.”
Murry Gerber started Elite Shotguns, based north of Pittsburgh, five years ago. In a short time, he and his staff of only two have experienced a meteoric rise in shotgun sales, especially Kolars. When Gerber was starting his gun shop he had several choices for a high-end clay target over/under. He and his partners researched the possibilities and found Kolar was an American company. The fact that Kolar guns were made in America made the decision for them. But how to convince Kolar to have Elite become a distributor?
A CNC milling machine is used to rough out the shape of all Kolar stocks prior to extensive handwork and application of the finish.
Gerber and partner Don Watt flew to Racine after they had set up a meeting with John Ramagli. In addition to promising to place a significant order with Kolar, Ramagli wanted more and Gerber wanted to give more. Elite was adamant about giving customers exceptional service. Elite also committed to support clay target tournaments.
Regarding those promised tournaments, Elite became a sponsor of what had been the Great Eastern Skeet Championships. The last two years the tournament has been called the Elite Classic, so this relatively new company has made the commitment to support competitive shooting. But Elite has gone further, supporting such events as the World Skeet Shooting Championships, National Sporting Clays Championships, and the U.S. Open Championships in both sporting and skeet.
Unique in the world of clay target shooting, Elite is the driving force behind their Pro Shooters Weekend. During this springtime event, Kolar pro shooters are invited to Western Pennsylvania for a three-day shoot. For a small entry fee, participants get lessons from these pros in trap, sporting and skeet, including shells and targets. “This is a prime way of giving back to our customers,” said Gerber. “Once we sell them a great clay target gun we want them to use it most effectively.”
Paul Giambrone III, longtime Kolar champion skeet shooter and advisor.
“This is clearly a world-class product,” said Gerber. “More and more shooters are seeing the gun’s advantages and switching to it. When customers come to us with a problem, Kolar has been so cooperative. Their customer service is exceptional, and customer service is a main reason our company was started.”
Two years ago, Elite Shotguns teamed up with Dan Lewis, who is based in California. Lewis had become the top Kolar distributor in the Western U.S., and Elite was the leading sales shop in the East. Since then, the two have purchased space on Industry Row at the National Gun Club in San Antonio, another venue to sell their shotguns.
Your ammo choice is more important than what you attach to your quad rail.
Considerations to find the best AR-15 ammo:
Chambering
Ramp Type
Case Material
Twist Rate
Bullet Style
Choosing ammunition for your AR is as important as every other gear consideration. You have to feed the machine in order for it to function properly — and “properly” starts with reliability. Accuracy, which becomes more critical as distance increases, is another consideration. For defeating a violent attacker, the round has to stop the threat as efficiently as possible. And let’s face it: The AR fires a small round, and the smaller the round, the more critical ammunition becomes.
Loading For Reliability
Choosing ammo starts with identifying how your AR-15 is configured. Start by determining what chamber your AR has. There are three type chambers you’ll come across — discounting aftermarket variations like the .300, 6.8 and 7.62 versions. AR-15s come with a .223 Rem. chamber, a 5.56 NATO chamber and the .223 Wylde chamber, and they’re all slightly different.
You can fire .223 Rem. ammo in the 5.56 and Wylde chamber. And, 5.56 ammo can be used in a Wylde chamber. But never shoot 5.56 ammo through a .223 Rem. chamber. Chamber size is usually stamped in the barrel, along with twist rate, but if you’re unsure, contact the manufacturer to confirm.
What type feed ramps does your AR have? The feed ramps are located at the end of the barrel extension and guide the bullet into the chamber. Older ARs usually have “rifle” ramps that don’t extend down into the upper receiver.
Newer ARs have M4 ramps. These are cuts machined in the upper receiver that lengthens the ramps to ensure feeding of longer bullets into the chamber. With M4 ramps, there shouldn’t be any problem with any bullet type you choose to shoot. Some older rifle ramps, however, will have problems with different types of bullet tips, such as soft points. Just be sure to test fire enough ammo to ensure it feeds in your weapon — every time.
In addition, I use brass-case ammo almost exclusively. The AR was not designed to cycle steel-case ammo, so if you choose to shoot it, you’ll need to keep an eye on a few things: Clean the barrel and chamber more often.
The receiver on the left is cut for M4 feed ramps. This provides a smoother transition for the round to feed from the magazine into the chamber. At right, the receiver is a “rifle” receiver, or older-style AR. This design can cause feeding problems with some types of ammo.
Steel doesn’t expand as much or as fast as brass, so there’s more blowback of powder residue and carbon into the chamber. And if the chamber becomes too tight due to residue, cases start sticking. This is especially true if you switch to brass-case ammo after shooting a lot of steel-case rounds. Steel is also rougher on the extractor than brass, so inspect it and the extractor spring regularly, which you should do anyway.
Most steel-case ammo is loaded with a bullet featuring a steel jacket with some sort of thin copper coating over the steel. There’s a big debate on whether steel-jacketed bullets are harmful to the barrel or not. I think they do harm the barrel. An average shooter may not have a problem, but a full-time shooter will shorten their barrel life by about 50 percent, from around 10,000 rounds down to 5,000 or so.
During classes, I see more function problems with steel ammo than with brass rounds because steel-case ammo can cause additional feeding problems by binding up in the magazine — it’s not very slippery. My advice: If you’re spending a lot of time and money on a shooting trip, take brass-case, high-quality ammo. And no matter what, always test-fire enough of any ammo to make sure it functions properly in your gun.
After you’ve selected a round, you’ll need to test-fire it for function. When you’re at the range, inspect each round prior to loading it in a mag. Ammo companies are running high production rates, and increased production means more faulty rounds. Physically and visually inspect each round before jamming it into your mag.
There’s no reason your AR should not be reliable. Keep it well lubed, clean as necessary and feed it the right ammo, and it will serve you well. If you try to run questionable ammunition through your gun, you’re going to see problems. For plinking on the range, this might not be an issue, although I can’t abide it. When shooting in a match, for hunting or for personal defense — life and death — a stoppage due to faulty ammo is unacceptable. Good ammo ensures you hit the target time after time.
Loading For Accuracy
There is a variety of ammo available for the AR. You can easily identify the type of tip the bullet has, but to know the rest of the details — including bullet style, weight and length — you’ll have to check the manufacturer’s specs.
The definition of accuracy is very subjective. For precision shooters, accuracy is hitting the target at hundreds of yards. For many military applications, it doesn’t really matter where you hit them, as long as you hit them — though precision is always best of course. A sniper needs pinpoint, surgical accuracy. For defensive purposes, things are going to be a lot closer, usually “handgun” distances. So, the question becomes, “How much accuracy do you need?” For self-defense, a round that will hold 1 to 2 minutes of angle is more than suitable.
One of the big considerations is the twist rate of your barrel. Heavier bullets, which are longer, require a faster twist rate. The original 55-grain M193 round worked well with a 1:12 twist rate. As bullets began to get heavier and longer, the twist rate increased. Today 1:7, 1:8 and 1:9 twist rates are the norm, and each will stabilize heavier, longer bullets that weigh 60 grains or more.
Loading For Self Defense
Manufacturers invest a lot of research and study into designing, testing and constructing a round for defensive purposes, and the various departments and agencies on the ground will research, study and test when choosing their duty ammo. Selecting ammunition for self-defense is just as serious.
Self-defense ammo must stop the threat efficiently, transferring its energy into the body. The better the round dumps its energy into the body, the less chance of over-penetrating and passing through the threat. I still like the original M193 55-grain full metal jacket round: It tumbles and fragments in the body, creating multiple wound channels. Just be careful when purchasing it. True M193 has an exposed lead base at the back of the bullet, hence the “explosive” results.
Due to environmental concerns, a lot of companies make a “M193” round, but with a copper jacket that covers the entire bullet — including the base — in order to reduce the shooter to lead exposure created by that round as it’s fired. This completely changes the dynamics of the round, and it doesn’t perform the same as the exposed-base design.
Accuracy is subjective. What might work fine for self-defense may not provide the accuracy necessary to place a surgical shot at 100 yards. Think about your application, then don’t get too caught up in how tight a group your AR can shoot. Most of them shoot much better than we’re capable of as shooters.
Steel-case “ball” ammo should never be used for self-defense, unless it’s “the end of the world as we know it” and that’s all you have. Steel-jacketed rounds punch right through the threat, doing little damage — and over penetration is also a major concern. The same is true of M855 “green-tip” penetrator ammo. I’m also not a fan of soft-point rounds. Often, these will not deform, expand or tumble, leading to over penetration.
Matt Weathers, Chief of Alabama’s Conservation Officers, issues his officers a 55-grain hollow-point round. He has personally had to shoot over three hundred deer in his career — putting down severely injured deer and for fetal research — with the .223/5.56 AR. This field research has shown that the 55-grain hollow-point performs best, with little chance of over penetration. For interior work, such as personal defense in the home, a 40-something-grain hollow-point reduces the chances of over penetration even more.
Remember the research that departments and agencies put into choosing a duty round? Their concerns are the same as yours (military matters are completely different.) This might mean the ammunition they use is a good candidate for you, too.
Final Thoughts
The ammo you choose is dictated by what you’re shooting at. Make sure the ammo fits the application — taking into account chamber size and barrel twist. Then, test for function to ensure reliability and accuracy. And then practice. After all, the purpose of shooting is to hit, and hitting the target depends on your skill.
Modern Shooter gets a first-hand look at firearms training taken to the next level.
This isn’t your everyday defensive shooting class — not by a long shot.
Specializing in tactical training, Houston-based MAST Solutions’ courses are akin to boot camp at Paris Island, with potentially as many superlatives. Physically and mentally challenging, the advanced weapons training steeps its students in more than simply the art and science of modern combat. It breaks down and rebuilds its pupils, forming a knife’s edge, ready to operate at the highest level under the most demanding circumstances. And it boasts the personnel to get this job done.
One such example, Ray “Cash” Care. A former Navy SEAL, the MAST instructor knows about the next level — he’s lived there most of his professional career. Through some pretty unorthodox methods, Care hollers and challenges his students to do the same, pushing them to the brink until the beg to go over. Extreme it may be, but it serves a purpose.
Beyond honing everyday armed citizens, MAST counts the U.S. Military, Homeland Security, Border Patrol, DEA and various SWAT teams among their clients. High-level operators require high-level training. And at MAST the focus far exceeds mere firearms. Hand-to-hand combat, knife combat, CQB, fitness, emergency medical procedure and leadership are all part of the curriculum. Be you professional or citizen, MAST strives to teach you how to tap into you’re A-game.
Catch more of this extreme form of firearms training on the next episode of Modern shooter, 10 p.m. EST Friday on the Pursuit Channel. The episode rebroadcasts Monday at 12 p.m. EST and Tuesday at 11:30 a.m. EST.
The backbone of a concealed-carry system, don’t waste time on anything other than quality gun belts.
What to look for in quality gun belts:
Quaily leather or synthetic material
Ability to hold holster and gun in place
Comfortable to wear throughout the day
Lightweight
Resistant to stretch
Gun belts don’t get the respect they deserve. All the glory goes to that top-notch pistol you spent weeks if not months poring over, nailing down every pertinent particular. It goes to the ultra-concealable, not to mention comfortable, holster that took forever to find and now feels like a second thought. It even goes to the defensive ammo you researched and test shot and compared against a litany of other viable options.
Bigfoot Gun Belt Leather Gun Belt
When it comes to a belt, typically, there isn’t any enthusiasm left. Any old one will do, right? Maybe, you can save a buck, passing off your everyday dress one for a while.
If this sounds comparable to your experience, don’t feel alone. Perhaps no other concealed-carry accessory is more overlooked by newly minted armed citizens. Yet, perhaps no other single piece of gear plays a more important role in ensuring a successful concealed-carry system.
Get it right and a gun belt enhances every aspect of carrying a defensive handgun. Choose wrong or ignore it all together and it will leave you dragging.
What Gun Belts Do
Feel the middle of your back. Unless you’re a jellyfish or sea slug, you ran your fingers over that familiar vertical stack of 33 bones known as your spinal column. It’s the support system that makes walking, running, sitting, lifting objects and nearly any other activity consider human — or mammalian for that matter — possible. Pretty important, to say the least.
Crossbreed Crossover Gun Belt
A quality gun belt plays a similar role. It’s fair to consider it the backbone of your carry system. All other aspects of how you carry and how well you do it branch off this simple strap around your waist, so you’d better know what your getting when you go to buy.
Similar to any accessory, gun belt makers promise all sorts of benefits to their product. The intricacies shouldn’t be ignored, but any quality gun belt should be capable of the following:
Hold a pistol and holster in place
Distribute the weight of gear
Resist stretching over time
Aid in concealing a handgun
Prevent a gun drop
Enhance the ability to access a firearm
Additionally, a gun belt should be comfortable, because you’ll curse the day you bought it if it isn’t. And it won’t hurt if it looks good. A minor point, but stylish gun belt options abound today, so might as well take advantage of them.
How A Gun Belt Does Its Job
Hang a gun off your dress belt and almost immediately you’ll see a couple things happen. Right off the bat, it will likely twist, jutting the gun’s grip away from your body. And it will probably transfer a great amount of the pistol’s weight to your britches, inevitably making them slouch like a high school freshman. Neither is ideal, making concealment difficult and a clean draw more like a comedy routine.
Hank’s Belts Gunner Freedom Belt
The simple reason why this is, the belt was designed to hold the weight of your pants, little else. Gun belts are devised for much greater loads, 20-ounces-plus of holster, pistol and perhaps extra magazines. And there’s little secret to how it accomplishes this feat —better material, more of it and, in many cases, reinforcement.
Leather Gun Belts
Top-notch gun belts are made from double-thick leather, stiff as an oak stave and, in heavy-duty models, wrapped around a solid core. In many cases, the core is Kydex, a strong yet flexible type of plastic, favored in holster making. But in the top-of-the-line variety, the reinforcing material is spring steel. The combination of this material, when properly constructed, a belt is malleable enough to comfortably serpentine around the waist, yet yields little to vertical pressure. Leather is by far the most common material available and options abound, including excellent examples from Bigfoot Gun Belts and Alien Gear. On the plus side, they’re extremely durable and typically sharp looking. But, over time some show surface wear where the belt contacts the holster loops.
Synthetic Gun Belts
Like leather gun belts, the synthetic variety get the majority of their strength from extra material. Thick nylon webbing provides support, but they are also available in reinforced models with a steel or synthetic cores to increase stiffness. Though tactical in appearance, thus perhaps not the three-piece-suit armed citizen’s cup of tea, synthetic gun belts tend to offer more comfort and flexibility. Not limited by pre-punched holes in most cases, the belts easily adjust to fit perfectly every time. Older models did have some wear issues, fraying at the tip after time. In recent years, companies have addressed the issue through the use of epoxies, such as with Galeco’s Instructor’s Belt, which virtually eliminates this unsightly erosion.
Gun Belt Considerations
Aside from a gun belt’s functionality and comfort, holster compatibility is of significant importance. If the two don’t play nice, well then you’re not going to get the most out of your system. In general, gun belts come in 1 ¼- to 1 ¾-inch width, so check your loop size before you buy.
Galco Instructors Belt
Size is also an extremely important consideration and sometimes a frustrating number to come up with, simply because how makers measure. Some start at the loop at which the buckle attaches, others at the end of the buckle. You should plan on legwork to eliminate guessing. Get on the gun belt makers’ websites or give them a call and find out how they want you to measure your size and proceed accordingly. They want to get it right as much as you do, so take advantage of their expertise.
Parting Shot
Concealed carry is greater than simply the gun, like good marksmanship is more than just front-sight focus, grip or trigger pull. It’s a system — from mindset to training to gear. And, inevitably, it’s only as strong as its weakest link. Given the wealth of options and superior modern construction, there’s no excuse to allow something as simple and vital as a gun belt to turn into the faulty linkage.
For more information on concealed carry holsters check out:
Ensure your AR is safe, secure and ready at a moment’s notice.
In terms of self-defense, an unloaded gun makes a dandy club, not much else. But does it always make sense to have one in the chamber, particularly when it comes to firearms that aren’t on your person continuously? Say an AR-style rifle.
One of the most popular options in home defense, AR-15s and M4-style carbines take consideration as to how they’ll be secured, yet kept at the ready. The bad news, there’s not a set-in-stone correct answer. Much of it depends on your lifestyle and living conditions, say if you have children or others in your household who might gain access to your guns. What mode they should be kept in the home takes a bit of consideration.
Breaking down nearly every potential condition – if that term can be loosely applied to a long gun — shooting instructor Ken Hackathorn gives shooter some valuable food for thought. The brass tacks of this conversation, how the gun is stored should reflect the state of readiness you deem necessary for your personal situation. For some that means a loaded magazine secured away from the rifle, others a fully chamber gun that simply requires a flick of the safety to be ready for action.
Obviously, this takes some forethought and reflection on what makes the most sense for you. It also requires being honest with yourself and accurately assessing your circumstances. Do these things and the answer should become self-evident.
For more information on Colt, please visit: www.colt.com
Given its near-global presence, the Browning Hi-Power goes by many names.
Hi-Power name variations and acronyms:
Hi Power
Hi-Power
High-Power
High Power
Inglis
HP
GP
BHP
P-35
What do we call this pistol? Verbally it is no problem, because all the choices, save one, sound the same. But is it Hi Power? Hi-Power? High Power? Or High-Power? FN and Browning varied the spelling over the years and have even used a variant of these to describe the bolt-action rifles FN made and Browning imported. The editorial form is Hi-Power, but advertising over the decades has used all of them.
Then there are the acronyms. There’s HP, GP, BHP, and P-35, the year of introduction. If you travel in Canada, you’ll run into shooters there who call it the Inglis, and on an expedition to (of all places) the island of South Georgia, I ran into a former British serviceman who simply referred to it as “the Browning.”
A pedant would scatter the spelling throughout a scholarly work according to the time, place, and origins of the model being discussed. While precise, it would be somewhere between annoying and maddening to read, and best to be avoided.
Me, I opt for the shorthand (BHP) where I can get away with it. Hi Power everywhere else unless it is a specific model like the Inglis. And “Browning”? In Britain, there may be only the one, but for the rest of us there are more than a dozen Browning guns worth considering. Make it Hi Power or BHP for me, then.
For more information on the Browning Hi Power pistol: Eulogy to the Browning Hi Power Upgrading A Surplus Browning Hi-Power The 9 “Best” John Browning Firearms France, Belgium, Nazis and the FN Hi Power
Building from the bottom up, the first step to solid pistol marksmanship is a good grip.
Intricate and nuanced, pistol shooting – done well – is about sweating the small stuff. Not exactly college-leave linear algebra tough, it requires particular attention to where you focus when aiming, how you present the gun and the steadiness of your trigger squeeze. This is especially true in the beginning, before you program muscle memory to auto drive. At the base of it all, before you learn to concentrate on the front sight or how to break a shot like a dry twig, is a proper grip.
Often overlooked for sexier aspects, if you don’t have a solid handle on your gun you’ll never truly build the speed and accuracy of a proficient shooter. As hand placement on a baseball bat is the foundation of slugging, grip on a pistol lays the groundwork for marksmanship. And few men or women and speak more knowingly on the matter than Mark Redl.
Multiple practical pistol titles to his name, the professional shooter stresses the importance of accurate shooting starting from the ground up. Breaking it down step-by-step, Redl gives you the inside on how to properly grip a semi-automatic pistol so you have the most control over the gun and greatest potential for accuracy. Correctly executed, these simple tips should have you managing recoil better, shooting faster and placing more rounds where you want them to go.
An addendum to anything along these lines, it, of course, takes practice. But a little sweat equity perfecting your grip pays big dividends in the long run.
For more information on Colt, please visit: www.colt.com.
Holster selection for women gets dicey because a lot of holster stuff on the market is designed by and for men. Thus, many of the principles in previous chapters need to be looked at differently to ensure comfortable and successful carry. “Concealed carry for women poses some important questions and challenges,” the blog Well ArmedWomen.com declares. “Women have some unique challenges to effective and safe concealed carry such as: holster locations on our curvy bodies, a variety of clothing styles that can make concealed carry challenging and the way a woman lives out her life.”
Demonstration of the notorious Flashbang bra holster. It clips to the band between the cups and holds the handgun front-and-center for quick deployment.
Overcome the Clothing Challenge
As a man attempting to write generalities about how women should dress I might as well just stick my head in the microwave and hit the popcorn button. But a few observations are warranted, like how tight-fitting, thin materials don’t bode well for concealing things like handguns and extra ammo. Concealed carry is not just about picking a gun and a holster. It entails a radical change in lifestyle, and that seems especially true for females. If you’re a woman you can still be fashionable, but you may need to rethink how you dress. Don’t shoot me, I’m just the messenger.
Yes, it’s true there are holsters to cover many of your existing styles. We’ll cover some of the better-known ones here. But also keep an open mind in looking anew at your wardrobes. Surely some of your stuff will work with the right holster, but there may be even better dress options for that holster and gun combo. Concealed carry is an awesome responsibility, so make it central to everything and dress around it, rather than trying to cram it into your existing daily dress.
A few tips on clothing include working a gun belt with jeans or slacks into your daily wear. A belt holster is one of your best carry options, and the gun belt is, well, a necessary part of the support system. Consider a loose-fitting vest or light over shirt as an outer concealing garment. Lower-riding jeans will help offset a shorter torso, giving you enough room to get a grip on a beltholstered gun, and still be able to draw. This is one of the biggest challenges handgun trainers see when trying to teach women in concealed carry classes. A handgun that rides too hide for your body’s length simply won’t leave any room to grip and draw. Men — don’t give your wife (girlfriend, daughter, etc.) your belt holster and gun belt and assume that because it works for you that it’ll work for her. Holster systems are like clothing, they need to fit the individual, or you’ll virtually guarantee she has a frustrating and unsuccessful experience.
Belt Holsters for Women
Due to the shape and angle of a woman’s hip platform, many of the holsters on the market — which seem to have been designed for men — simply don’t work when used in the strong side position. However, there are a few ways around this conundrum.
“With practice, you will find a place on your figure that is least susceptible to printing a holstered gun,” writes Gila Hayes in Concealed Carry for Women. (Available at GunDigestStore.com). “For women with a less curvy ‘boyish’ figure, this spot may be immediately behind the strong-side hip; for ladies with a very curvy hourglass figure, it may be just forward of the strong-side hip or in cross draw position just in front of the weak-side hip. A short-barreled gun carried at an angle right behind the strong-side hip conveniently allows you to conceal the gun with even openfronted jackets and vests.”
More and more women are finding success with appendix carry, at about the 1-2 o’ clock position in the front. The Crossbreed Appendix Carry is an inside-thewaistband holster designed specifically for this use.
Recently, my girlfriend decided to become armed and we tried several holster options for carrying the Sig P232 — an all-steel single-stack .380 ACP. She is quite petite and very shapely, and likes to wear tight jeans. Ultimately she settled on an outsidethe- waistband holster from Pure Kustom, positioned at about the 4-o’clock position just behind the hip platform. It was mighty comfortable, and with a light shirt over it, completely concealed.
Another good option for women seeking a spot for comfortable belt holster carry is appendix carry. An inside-thewaistband holster located just to the side of the navel in the front is very concealable and many women have found this to be the best solution to comfortable carry.
Shoulder Holster Carry for Women
In the holster type discussion back in Chapter 2, I noted that shoulder holsters are somewhat of a niche application not widely used. However, they do happen to make an excellent choice for armed women. For one thing, they keep the handgun up above the waist and hip platform, the region that causes headaches for so many. For another, they work well with business casual dress.
Many women find shoulder holsters appealing and comfortable. Just be sure you take into account the lines of your torso and choose one with a downward, vertical orientation so it doesn’t print through your shirt. Photo: Concealed Carry for Women by Gila Hayes.
“Most men, in my experience, don’t have the upper body flexibility necessary to draw efficiently or safely from a shoulder holster,” Grant Cunningham notes in the Gun Digest Book of the Revolver (GunDigestStore.com). “Most women do. The more muscular the man, the less likely it is that he’ll be able to make use of the shoulder holster, while women seem to not be so limited regarding their figure. For this reason I tend to recommend shoulder holsters for women more often than I do for men.”
Ankle Holsters
Ankle holsters are another option for those women who can’t find any other carry method or position for a given wardrobe. This method should be reserved for a backup gun, as access is less than ideal. But if there really is no other option it’s better to have a piece on the leg than none at all.
Ankle holsters should be carried on the inside of the leg on the weak-side of the body. Experts advise wearing two pairs of socks — one under the rig for comfort and to prevent abrasion; the other pulled over the holster to aid concealment when the pants leg lifts up, as in seated positions. Speaking of the seated position, Hayes cautions that while the ankle holster is virtually impossible to draw from while moving — running or walking — it is a very good choice for vocations where one is seated or driving.
Thigh Band Holsters
For women wearing dresses or skirts the thigh holster is an option. For men wearing dresses or skirts I can’t help. The thigh-band holster is like a larger version of the ankle holster, and sometimes ankle holsters are actually modified for use on the thigh. They wrap around the leg with either elastic or Velcro to keep the handgun concealed inside the thigh. This is not to be confused with the military or police-style thigh, drop-leg or tactical holster, which attaches to the belt and hangs the handgun in a low position on the outside of the thigh.
Thigh band holsters are basically just ankle holsters only made to wrap around the upper leg. Photo: Concealed Carry for Women by Gila Hayes.
In Concealed Carry for Women, Gila Hayes describes this holster as a “a deep concealment option” sometimes referred to as a “garter holster.”
“Most come with the addition of a nylon waist strap and at least one garter, and often two, attached to the thigh band as insurance to keep it from slipping down,” she writes. “Unlike the belly band, which stops at the hips if it slips down, there is nothing but the tight elastic to keep the thigh band up without the garters.”
You’ll find good thigh band holsters made by Galco, The Well Armed Woman and UnderTech to name but a few.
Bra Holsters
This idea isn’t new and actually has some historical use dating back to the good ol’ days. Today, the brassiere scabbard has been perfected by Lisa Looper of Flashbang Holster fame. Looper’s Flashbang rig wraps around the center support strap of the bra and hangs a smallish pistol or revolver just under the breasts in the front. To draw, you simply “flash” — by yanking up the shirt — and then “bang.”
The Teddy from Flashbang Holsters, attaches to the bra.
I’ve seen mixed reports about this holster design and, like every other holster for women, it comes down to an individual’s physiology. My girlfriend tested both the Flashbang and the Marilyn (which attaches to the shoulder strap and top of the cup, is accessed via the neck opening of the shirt) and did not like it at first. All holsters take some getting used to, but I reckon hanging a pound or pound-and-a-half piece of steel from one’s bra makes for a very unusual day. Even so, every woman who carries should have a Flashbang and Marilyn in their holster drawer and give it a try because it does open up more concealment options. See more on bra holsters in the next chapter.
For more information on concealed carry holsters check out:
Making a single gun fit multiple purposes, conversion kits are proving the wave of the future.
Getting more out of a gun, what shooter wouldn’t be intrigued? For the most part, the industry has moved this direction in recent decades, fueled, in part, by the versatility of AR-style rifles. Modular in design, jumping between calibers and configurations generally is no more difficult than removing a few retention pins and swapping parts. Like wildfire when it comes to long guns, this simple and versatile concept has lagged behind in handguns — until recently.
Spurred on by the U.S. Military’s Modular Handgun System competition, pistols that jump caliber and configuration are starting to swamp the market. One might even argue, they’re the wave of the future. Most certainly, they’re light years away from what it used to take to modify an existing handgun, which required enough effort that it was likely cheaper just to buy a second gun that met your desired specifications.
Before manufacturers took up the cause, a pistol conversion kit generally involved a competent gunsmith, plenty of hand fitting and time. It still takes time to modify the likes of a SIG Sauer P320, but it’s measured in seconds, not weeks and months. The results are quite striking, allowing many pistols to jump from full-sized to compact in just over the wink of an eye. There’s even the potential to incorporate specialty features, such as reflex sights milled directly into a slide, while maintaining a gun’s overall practicality.
With conversion kits, the only limits are the marketplace and your imagination.
For more information on SIG Sauer, please visit: www.sigsauer.com.
It May Be Surpassed, But There’s Nothing Like a Genuine Browning Hi Power!
Basics of the Browning Hi Power:
Designed from 1914 to 1935.
Served from 1935 nearly to present day.
One of the most widely used military pistols in history.
Chambered in 9x19mm, 7.65x21mm and .40 S&W.
10- to 17-round capacity, depending on caliber.
Lock-breach semi-auto.
Browning discontinued production in 2017.
The Browning Hi Power is still an entirely suitable pistol for everyday carry, or EDC. However, you must want one for sentimental or historical reasons, because it will cost you more than a modern polymer handgun.
In the immortal words of the great Dr. Who, “There comes an end to everything. The last door you walk through. The last room you enter.” To which I add: The last Browning Hi Power to be made.
The question is, which one was last? What was its serial number? Where is it located today? I don’t know, because, well, Fabrique Nationale just doesn’t talk much about what goes on inside the walls of their plant. What happens in Liege, stays in Liege, I guess.
But you can hardly buy a brand new Hi Power any longer, and those who import them, or try, can’t get them. How did this happen? To figure that out, we must go back to the beginning.
After the Great War, aka World War I, the smart military establishments planned and stockpiled for subsequent conflicts. However, governments and people were tired of paying for war and, as a result, budgets were tight. It took a while to get around to purchasing new handguns.
The FN-Browning Connection
When the French Army came looking, FN turned to the late, great John Browning as they had for so many previous firearms. He worked up a prototype and it was a doozy. Browning’s creation was chambered in 9mm, held 17 rounds, and the slide portion of the firing mechanism could be removed as a complete assembly. It was, in that regard, just like the Savage pistols. Potentially, you could change the same pistol from a duty trigger to a target trigger and back again in a few seconds. The Browning Museum, in Ogden, Utah has the prototype on display.
The original safety was hopeless. This is the one Ted Yost uses in his builds. It is beautiful, but you must have Ted build the gun to get the safety.
Alas, before he could complete it, John Browning passed away. Work on the pistol then went to Dieudonné Saive, the FN designer who would later design the FN-49, the forerunner of the FAL. Saive ironed out the details of a double-column magazine, which fed to a single feed point, for use in pistols.
By the early 1930s, the French Army was ready to begin trials but, (and apologies here) being French, they just couldn’t decide. After a few fruitless attempts at trying to satisfy the French, FN made the pistol its own as the P-35. (In the end, the French selected a single-stack .32-caliber pistol, which used a cartridge remarkably like the .30 Pedersen. It was designed and manufactured in France.)
The P-35 was hardly through its initial production run when the whole world came apart. In 1940 the Germans overran Belgium, and once the Nazis had cleared the dust and rubble from the machinery in Liege they had the plant up and running again for the Reich. Despite the quick advance, a few of the essential staff and designers managed to get out of Dodge, as it were. The Hi Power blueprints were spirited off to Canada, where John Inglis & Co. set up production for use by the Allies. Thus began the decades-long irony of both sides in a conflict using a pistol of the same design.
The Germans produced hundreds of thousands of the P-35, noted in inventory and marked as the “Pistole 640(b).” Pretty much everywhere they went, when the Germans took over they kept the production lines of whatever was being made going in their name. Those 640(b) pistols were, for the most part, shipped off to the Eastern Front where they were used, captured, picked up, and later stored in Soviet warehouses.
The Canadian model, the Inglis P-35, went to the armed forces in Commonwealth service, as American troops received 1911A1s and various Colt and Smith & Wesson revolvers, for use in the war.
Sweeney Discovers the Browning Hi Power
My first introduction to the Hi Power came when I was working at The Gun Room, a gun store I called employer from 1978 to 1982 or so.
Collectors get excited over things like this. For a while, Canada used decals to mark property. To find a Browning Hi Power with the decal still more-or-less intact is wondrous.
One time, we had a weekend barbeque at the boss’s house out in the country. This included shooting all the odd, rare, different or just loud firearms that we had in the shop or in our personal safes. When the rain began we retired into the walk-out basement and fired out of the sliding door, across the patio. (A brief aside: when firing a handgun chambered in 7.63 Tokarev from inside of a room, it is best to be wearing both earplugs and over-the-ears muffs.) I was handed a Browning Hi Power to shoot.
To give you the full flavor of the event, the pistol was a commercial-polished blue, pre-war, tangent-sight model, but with Waffenampt proofs. It was a pre-war commercial gun, cut for a shoulder stock as many back then were, that had been appropriated by the Germans while still in the FN vaults, stamped, and issued for use in the war effort. It was most likely shipped to a Waffen SS or Fallschirmjaeger unit.
I slapped in a 20-round magazine and began shooting. “Hmm, the recoil seems a bit sharp compared to the other handguns. It does hit to the sights. The grips are a bit blocky.”
Just as I was finishing, my internal monologue was interrupted by the owner. “What are you doing?” Looking down, my reply was, “Bleeding, I think.” The sharp recoil was caused by the hammer biting the web of my hand, and the result was me bleeding all over the Browning. Sorry about that, Roger.
Two valuable lessons learned that day: The P-35 bites if you use the then-new IPSC hand grip. And blood, when properly cleaned from blued steel and wooden grips, does not leave any lasting marks or stains.
Think so-called hi-cap magazines are new? Here is a pair of 20-round Hi Power mags, complete with belt pouch, for use with a Hi Power.
Hi Powers in WWII
During the war, we bombed and rained artillery down on the FN plant in Liege to deny its output to the Germans, and when they had to leave, they returned the favor. The place was a wreck by late 1944. The Belgians cleaned up the mess, rebuilt the plant, and began planning. You see, the war had changed many things, including the tools to be used in the next war. Nearly everyone took the lessons learned and began improving what they had. But not us. We pretty much stuck with what we had. Hey, we won the war, and what we used had won, so there wasn’t much pressure to change or upgrade.
A lot of countries felt differently. The rifle got the most focus. Once the U.S. Army had forced our allies to adopt a “new” rifle cartridge — the .308 Winchester — new rifles were needed for it. The .308, aka the 7.62 NATO, is essentially a .30-06 with a shorter case and ball powder, which takes up less volume for the same energy. The difference between them is essentially naught.
In the U.S., the rifle change was to adopt the M14, which is pretty much an M1 Garand with a 20-round box magazine. Even the Italians rebuilt their Garands into the M14 configuration, calling them the BM-59.
The rest of Europe went a different route. Saive, still at the helm at FN, took the 10-shot box magazine-fed FN-49 rifle and changed the externals, which produced the FN-FAL — a 20-round box magazine-fed battle rifle of amazing durability, adaptability, and reliability. It was also almost four feet long, but in the 1950s that wasn’t seen as that much of a problem.
How, you ask, does the worldwide adoption of the FAL figure into the history of the P-35, the Browning Hi Power? Simple: the same FN salesmen who were making sure the FAL earned the name “The Free World’s Right Arm” were also busy pushing the P-35. And why not? If you are going to re-arm your military with top-of-the-line battle rifles complete with service, repair, upgrades, and warranty, why not do the same with the sidearm?
It didn’t hurt that it used the ubiquitous 9mm Parabellum cartridge, and that it was used with great enthusiasm by all sides in World War II, and that it was made in the world-famous FN plant in Liege.
An FN pistol taken into police service in 1946. The proof marks and inspectors’ stamps tell an involved tale. Whole books have been written on marks alone.
A Hi Power for the World
That’s how the Hi Power ended up in service in pretty much every noncommunist (and even some communist) countries. The Commonwealth countries were going to use the Hi Power once it was officially adopted by Great Britain. That meant Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and all the colonies.
Even after they shrugged off the status of a colony, a lot of the new countries kept using the Hi Power. Once in service, it was treated to various modifications, improvements, markings, and tests. The sights were changed and finishes applied. Generally, since there were a million of them out there, the users (or rather, the using organizations) felt free to try their hand at improving it any way they thought possible.
There were other countries that were more interested in having the production of essential arms in-country, and they licensed the manufacture from FN.
The handmade prototype that John Moses Browning had developed before things changed.
Argentina, for one, and Canada kept on using the ones built by Inglis and added more as they needed them. India, after becoming independent, began using the arsenals built by the British to manufacture firearms for their own use. The Indian government licensed the manufacture of the Browning Hi Power from the Inglis company and began making them in Ishapore. One of the other places those pistols went was Nepal.
In my travels around the world, I keep an eye out for the local police and military (in some places one and the same) to see what they are using. In Nepal I saw a truly historic range of firearms.
One museum had two Gurkha guards. One was armed with the utterly wretched Indian-made AK clone-compromise, the INSAS. It takes real work to make an AK-derived firearm that is unreliable, but trusted sources say the INSAS comes as close as any. The other Gurkha guard was armed with an Enfield three-band model 1853 rifled musket, complete with bayonet. I asked if I could take a photo and was given a smiling “No.”
The author hard at work on 300-meter pop-ups, dropping them like bad habits with a Hi Power. Later that day, at the entrance to the local army base, I saw a sergeant armed with a holstered Hi Power. It had to have been either a British pistol dating from WWII or an Indian-made Inglis-licensed copy, but it was a Hi Power.
Later that day, at the entrance to the local army base, I saw a sergeant armed with a holstered Hi Power. It had to have been either a British pistol dating from WWII or an Indian-made Inglis-licensed copy, but it was a Hi Power.
Which brings us to the question.
Why Did the Hi Power Remain in Service for So Long?
The size and shape, to start. The pistol held a useful amount of ammunition, 12 or 13 rounds of 9mm in the magazine. The grip, depending on the panels installed, ranges from comfortable to alluring.
Its size is not burdensome to pack. It isn’t a bundle, as even the smallest carbines of the day would have been. As lightweight and handy as the US M1 Carbine is, it is still a carbine with a stock. Yes, that’s better than a handgun when you need to shoot, but until then a lot less handy, and a lot more of a hindrance than a holstered handgun.
Before the Hi Power, a British officer would likely have carried a revolver like this Webley in .455.
Pistols smaller than the Browning Hi Power often don’t hold sufficient ammo or, if they do, it’s of an undersized cartridge. A sidearm larger than the Hi Power starts to verge into M1 Carbine territory, more hassle. The recoil was not a big deal, as some shooters back then (and yet today) felt the .45 ACP presents.
In many militaries and police departments worldwide, a handgun is a badge of office. In many places, the police are armed with the same rifle that the military uses because law enforcement is just the army dressed in blue instead of green.
The guy in charge of the local group has a holstered handgun because it is his job to supervise the rifle-armed guys, not enforce the laws himself. The holster marks him as the head guy in charge. For that purpose, pretty much anything that fits the holster and fires a bullet will do the job.
Two police pistols. On top, the author’s Novak FBI Hostage Rescue Team clone. Below, a Belgian police lightweight BHP turn-in exchanged for something more “modern.”
Hi Power, High Rank
The panache of the Hi Power extended beyond issue handguns. It was apparently not uncommon to see someone in the Vietnam War, someone who just couldn’t quite be placed as to what organization they were with, armed with the Hi Power. (That was true for non-GI rifles and submachine guns as well.)
Then again, if your senior NCO didn’t object, what was carried as personal gear in Vietnam seemed to be pretty much whatever you wanted. Some organizations were a lot more freeform than others.
The Browning Hi Power was more than just a badge of rank.
The frame was made from forged steel, with the magazine well, slide rails, and other openings machined from the forging. The barrel used the John Browning tilt-down method.
The slide and frame were locked together for a short distance until a cammed face on the bottom lug of the barrel struck the cross-lug in the frame. This caused the barrel to cam down out of the path of the slide, as the slide continued rearward.
Once to the rear of its travel, the slide moved forward, propelled by the recoil spring underneath the barrel. The slide forced a round out of the magazine, collected the barrel, then cammed the barrel up to lock it. Once closed, it was ready to fire again.
Aluminum frame shaves 6 whole ounces from the weight of a comparable all-steel Browning Hi Power.
The locked-breech design allowed the Hi Power (and all other locked-breech pistols) to readily handle the recoil forces of the cartridge.
Without some means of locking the slide and barrel together at the start of the cycle, the upper limit of force the pistol cartridge can generate is limited — limited by the weight of the slide and the force of its spring, and the ability or willingness of the shooter to fire it.
For handguns chambered in anything larger than the .380 Auto cartridge, weight and required recoil spring forces become too great to make a handy pistol, or to find willing shooters.
The efficiency of the cam surfaces makes the Hi Power function with a relatively light slide and recoil spring. That means less weight to carry and less force needed to initially work the slide.
High Power Downsides
However, the design is not without its costs or drawbacks. One is the lack of a barrel bushing on the front of the slide. This makes barrel and slide manufacturing easier, as it eliminates several machining steps. But, the barrel can only be removed from the slide through the rear — unlike the 1911’s barrel that can be removed out the front or rear once the bushing is unlocked from the frame.
This became a stumbling block for pistolsmiths wishing to improve performance decades later. Fitting a replacement bushing in a 1911 allows for a more precise barrel fit and can improve accuracy. You can’t do that with the Hi Power.
When compensators or muzzle brakes became popular in IPSC competition, the Hi Power was left behind. On the P-35, once the brake or comp was attached the barrel could not be removed from the slide. This made cleaning a bit more difficult. On the 1911 it was easy to remove even with a comp or brake installed.
Another obstacle to pistolsmithing was the barrel lockup — specifically, the frame and what FN calls the “barrel seat.” The 1911 cams up and down on the slide stop pin, a removable, replaceable, and easy-to-fit part. The timing can be adjusted by using different-sized barrel links.
The Hi Power employs a cam that is pressed and staked into the frame. It cannot be serviced by anyone but the factory. The cam surfaces on the barrel are machined to a given dimension. Again, they are not serviceable by a pistolsmith, unless he or she obtains a barrel that has those surfaces over-sized and files and machines them to fit the frame and slide.
The Browning’s Trigger Pull and Other Issues
The trigger pull is a problem. When it’s good, it’s fine. When it isn’t, it’s hard to work on. The 1911 (the exemplar here) has a few parts that operate in a simple manner, and many, many replacements to be had. The Browning Hi Power? The trigger pivots or cams against a lever, which likewise pivots, pressing down on the edge of the sear. Working on the Hi Power trigger requires the patience of Job and specialized skills.
If Ted Yost built it, you’ll know it.
The thumb safety is worse. It is small, unusable as-is, and difficult to replace. You see, the thumb safety shaft is the hammer pivot shaft. Replacing a safety can adversely affect your trigger pull.
In a military setting those were not obstacles, they weren’t even noticed. If a slide, frame, or barrel became unserviceable, it was simply exchanged for a replacement part. That the new part fit somewhat loosely was not a problem, the old one was often no better.
Military organizations were interested in “minute of opponent” accuracy at just-outside-of-the-foxhole distances. And the standard carry method of a handgun in military service was with the hammer down, safety off, and chamber empty. Thumb safety shortcomings were not even noticed.
But, those were big deals to competition shooters and especially American users, who were interested in better ergonomics. Unlike most of the world, where the sidearm is a backup and often even just the badge of rank mentioned above, we Americans view the handgun as a fighting tool.
Yes, you use it to fight your way back to the rifle or shotgun you should not have put down, but you fight with it. It isn’t just a status symbol, and in many instances it is the only tool used.
Two .40 S&W Hi Powers. On top, the author’s range rental score, and below, his Ted Yost custom. One is an off-the-rack, the other a bespoke suit.
The Browning Hi Power in Competition & Police Use
In the early days of the now common but then radical competition known as IPSC, the Hi Power acquitted itself well. Today, IPSC is seen as a 9mm or .38 Super competition. Back then, it was a .45 competition. And yet, of the first four IPSC World championships, two were won with 9mm pistols, and one of those was a Hi Power.
Back in that era, the Hi Power was involved in one well-known conflict where both sides were armed not just with the same pistols, but the same rifles and machine guns as well.
We won’t go into the ownership of Las Malvinas, or The Falklands, but I do point out that the British and the Argentines used Hi Powers, FALs, and MAG-58 GPMGs all made by or under license from FN in Liege, Belgium.
I’ve been to the islands a few times and it is interesting to note that pretty much every bar or restaurant, museum, or public office has a captured, welded-inoperative FAL on display, but there are no Hi Powers similarly shown.
Not only did Charles Daly bring in Hi Powers, but improved the safety. These guns are very good, too bad they’re virtually impossible to find.
Hi Powers and the FBI
Here in the U.S., one agency that showed a lot of interest in the Hi Power was the FBI, specifically for its Hostage Rescue Team. Although, that was back when the FBI allowed personal weapons for service and the Hi Power was on the approved list.
They went to a great deal of effort in the mid-to-late-1980s to have Wayne Novak build up a batch of Hi Powers for them.
The initial build was to install Novak sights on the pistols, but after various shipments, returns for repairs and overhaul, and requests for improvements, they were a buffet of 9mms with a host of custom features. The plain guns went to the field agents, and (no surprise) apparently the ones with the custom features went to supervisors, office heads, and the like.
What the FBI found out was what we IPSC shooters had learned some years before: the original Hi Power was not a heavy-duty pistol. The FBI did not feed its Hi Powers anything but a steady diet of standard-pressure 9mm ammunition, unlike the U.S. Army and its first problems with the M9 pistol.
The M9 had issues in part because the idea of 9mm ammunition was new to the army. To the FBI, not at all. And despite using only standard pressure (not +P) ammunition, the FBI found, as the rest of us had, that the Hi Power couldn’t take the volume of shooting IPSC required.
In the days of Bullseye competition, you’d be hard pressed to shoot more than 5,000 rounds a year. A match ran you 50 rounds of ammunition. If you shot a match every single weekend and practiced once in between, that came to 5,200 rounds a year. That was considered a lot of shooting.
When I began IPSC competition I was shooting 10,000 rounds a year, and I was not keeping up with the Joneses. When I went to a Dillon loading press, I jumped up to 35,000 rounds a year and kept at it (or more) for the next 20 years.
A 1911, even when firing .45 ACP +P, or 9mm +P or +P+ ammo, can do that for as long as the barrel’s rifling holds up. Once you’ve worn out the bore, you can refit the slide to the frame, install a new barrel, and start over again.
I have several 1911s that have had 100,000 rounds or more through them, and you’d be hard-pressed to tell them from the lower mileage pistols. I am a slacker, as I know of people who have much more than that through their 1911s. The Hi Power? Tens of thousands in the old Mk II or earlier guns meant the end of service.
A Look at the Market
Browning was the importer of Hi Powers made by FN. When Browning wasn’t bringing in as many as the market wanted, other importers shipped in pistols made in places other than Liege. Sometimes, especially once the patents expired, the manufacturer would see if an American importer wanted to buy a batch of “just like Liege” licensed Hi Powers.
I have one like that, which was imported under the Charles Daly name, back when. These were Hungarian-made clones, and while I haven’t tried to see if small internal parts fit (none have shown signs they need to be replaced) magazines and grips fit just fine.
Interesting tidbit of info: they were imported as parts, assembled and fitted here in the U.S. — hence the “Made in USA” markings they bear.
Don’t get me wrong, the Hi Power will still be dependable even when heavily used. Our gun club’s treasurer a couple of decades ago, who used to work for the city of Detroit, carried a brace of T-Series Hi Powers.
This was during the bad old days when Detroit was aflame, and no one who needed a CPL back then could get one. He carried anyway. He used his so much that the recoil springs were more than a bit tired. I had a spring tester and the standard Hi Power recoil spring measured at 17 pounds.
His two 9mms had springs worn down to 10 and 11 pounds. They still worked.
But when parts start breaking or falling off, it’s time to move on. And move on we all did. So did the FBI HRT. One agency I still wonder about is the Hong Kong Airport Police.
I encountered them while traveling to the 1999 IPSC World Shoot in the Philippines. We changed planes in Hong Kong and the police made us get off the plane and identify our bags, and inspected our firearms transport paperwork.
They were bored, we were fascinated. We closely studied (all of us were gun geeks, there were 30-40 IPSC competitors for the match on that plane) the MP5s they carried, their handguns, holsters, etc. One thing we got tired of studying was their sloppy gun handling.
When one supervisor had trouble reading the paperwork in the fading light (we were out of the plane, on the tarmac, with the other passengers peering out through the plane’s windows at us), one of his subordinates lifted his MP5 over the boss’s shoulder and clicked on the light on its handguard.
Me, I looked around to see what I could hide behind should the inevitable accidental discharge happen. It didn’t, thank goodness.
FN’s SFS, or Safe-Fast-Shooting system, is immediately obvious, in part due to the odd hammer. And the real clue: the hammer is “down” but the safety is on.
FN Struggles with the High Power
FN tried to keep up. One such change was the SFS. The Safe-Fast-Shooting system was an attempt to gain the benefits of a double-action (DA) pistol while retaining the upside of a single-action. The main benefit of the SFS was that the hammer was down. This made it appear to be a DA pistol and not one with a cocked hammer.
Once you loaded the SFS, you pushed the hammer down with your thumb. When it clicked into place, the thumb safety popped up to engage the system. You now had a hammer-down pistol with a thumb safety. On the draw, you could thumb the safety down, which caused the hammer to automatically pop up, ready to go to work.
.40-Caliber Hi Powers
The one big change that made a difference was the introduction of the .40 S&W cartridge. When Jeff Cooper and others were experimenting with a cartridge that was called the .40 G&A, they used a Browning Hi Power as their base pistol. They were happy with the results, but when the actual .40 came out in 1990 (their experiments had happened in the 1970s), things were different.
The prevailing wisdom of the time was that a .40 S&W pistol could be had simply by plugging a .40-caliber barrel into a 9mm model and installing a stiffer recoil spring. When the various pistol manufacturers did that, they found that the job was a lot tougher than they thought. It took a few years and a few model variants for everyone to work out the details.
FN built some .40 prototypes on their Mk II frames and tested them. Those R&D guns died in an embarrassingly short time span. The word on the street was that they lasted about 2,500 rounds, and then were simply scrapped.
The problem? The frames. A forged frame, one in which 85-90 percent of the steel is machined away, simply cannot be all that tough. So, FN went to cast frames for the Mk III.
Since the machining needed is just for cleanup or to reach the final dimensions, they could make the frames of much, much tougher steel. I have one of these, and Wayne Novak built it into his top-end clone of the HRT gun.
Testing the High Power
During testing for an article of the time, I put 23,000 rounds through it. I had two malfunctions in all that time. One was a low-powered lead bullet reload that had somehow gotten all the way to the chamber (but only partially into it) with a great big glob of bullet lube stuck to the case. The other was a seriously tired old 20-round magazine.
The spring, when I extracted it, was a full inch shorter than the spring in a brand-new 20-round magazine. So, both malfunctions were blamed on things other than the pistol.
For those willing to indulge a Major League Baseball analogy, these were chalked up to errors on the part of the fielders, and so not hurting the Hi Power’s ERA.
I have two other Mk IIIs, one a box-stock .40 that was a rental gun at Double Action range in Madison Heights, Michigan. They lost count of the ammo that had gone through it, but other than the usual handling and shop wear from going through a thousand hands, it looks, feels, and works fine. The other is a custom .40 built by Ted Yost. I managed to acquire it for less than the cost of the custom work Ted had done, so it’s a keeper for sure. It is also a tack driver.
The rarest one I have is a lightweight Hi Power. These were made a few times, and only in short runs with aluminum frames, which pared a few ounces off the weight.
A “Made in the USA” Hi Power. Well, assembled in the USA from parts made in Hungary.
Custom & Collectible Hi-Powers
Just before Hi Power production ended, Nighthawk Custom imported a batch of FN Mk IIIs and built them into custom guns. The result was a hi-cap 9mm with more style than most people could handle but at the price of a custom 1911.
They also solved the hammer bite problem by welding on a tang to protect your hand. It was a love-it-or-hate-it proposition. If you must have the ne plus ultra of 9mm pistols, then track down a Nighthawk Hi Power. There will be no one who is not envious of you.
The Hi Power has a lot going for it — mystery, panache, style, grip-fit, and great looks to boot. So why has FN stopped making it? And why should you acquire one anyway? The word is that the tooling is worn out.
Me, I don’t buy it.
Modern CNC machining uses slabs of steel called tombstones to hold the parts. The “tooling” consists of the cutters that are shaped to make the exact cut needed for a part or dimension. Cutting tools are purchased by the gross by big-time manufacturers.
No, the truth is much simpler: the polymer-framed, striker-fired pistols have won. The soul-less, industrial, common-as-dirt with no heart pistol has taken over.
No one wants to pay what it would take to make a competitive Hi Power when you can literally buy a ready-to-go polymer handgun for half that amount.
The author’s Novak BHP on a pile of brass and the stacks of ammo it chewed through during testing.
Oh, FN could make a ready-to-go Hi Power, one with a nice trigger, no bite, durability, and a thumb safety you could use. It would cost as much as two Glock G17s or more, and it would still, at best, hold 15 rounds to the G17’s 17+1.
Luckily, there are still makers of Browning’s Hi Power, but those that are not Liege-made will be rougher, and you may have to do some persuading to find a pistolsmith to tame them. My advice? Get a Liege-made one now, while you still can. The Browning Hi Power, there’s nothing like it.
True-to-life courses and the high-stress to succeed, the competition pushes shooters to their limits and asks for more. While pro’s such as Mark Redl make it look like a stroll in the park, when the safety is off and the pressure is on most find it’s anything but. Of course, the Aguila Ammunition-sponsored shooter — self-taught for the most part — has spent decades honing his craft to collect a trophy-room full of championships.
The Modern Shooter crew catches up with the sharp shot in this week’s episode and do more than marvel at Redl’s game-winning practical marksmanship. They get down and dirty, running the courses and try their hand at besting the champ. Note, they “try.” While none can get the upper hand on Redl, through his deft coaching they find out the secrets of scoring big when running and gunning.
While it might sound counterintuitive, putting two on target is possibly the easy part of a shooting competition. Forethought, transition, reloads and safety — these are all essential to a top performance and, if executed imprecisely, are wet sandbags weighing one down. Sharpen up those aspects and you’ll run a course like a pro. Luckily, Redl gives the crew and you the tips you need to take the next step in the competitive game.
For more information on Aguila Ammunition, please visit: www.aguilaammo.com.
Shooters do not live by firearms alone. Find out the great new must-have gear that will make carrying, shooting and caring for your firearms easy as pie.
The Safariland Model 575 holster is a multi-fi t inside the waist belt holster, shown here with the Glock 19X.
I’ve been using the Safariland 575 Pro-Fit for some time. As I’ve had to move my concealed carry pistol to the front at times, the 575 Pro-Fit is a good IWB alternative for so-called AIWB carry (say, at 12:30 – 1 o’clock or so). The Pro-Fit accepts takes a wide variety of handguns with minor adjustments. I’ve used this for the Glock 19 Gen4 and Gen5, and the Glock 19X — as well as the S&W M&P9 M2.0 Compact and the new Ruger Security-9. The holster features the “GLS” Grip-Locking System. Seat the gun into the holster and it snaps into place. When you take a firing grip, the middle finger of the shooting hand has to occupy the same space as the lever, releasing the gun. Foam pads are included and can be located in one of two places to force the muzzle out and the grip back into your body, hiding the gun under a shirt.
The same maker offers the Model 7371 7TS ALS holster, which is a compact paddle design. A secure rig, the automatic locking system (pistol locked into the holster simply by seating the gun fully) is as fast and as simple as any open-top holster can be. Closing your hand into a firing grip causes the thumb to draw the ALS latch back, freeing the gun. Like other 7TS holsters, the 7371 is durable, weather- and temperature-resistant. Made for the Shield, Glock 42, 43, Ruger LC380, LC9 and LC9s, the 7371 comes with the 571BL Paddle.
The Safariland Model 7371 features the auto-lock system. The thumb-tab release is visible from the back of the holster. Note the small paddle.
I found that my front IWB holster for the Glock pistol line, the Eidolon by RCS, didn’t work for Gen5 Glocks. Enter the Perun. It’s a modular rig that works on either side of the shooter and for southpaws. It’s a “pancake” style rig with the mounting attachments fore-and aft, not behind the holster pouch. The holster is supplied with three pair of 1.5-inch belt loops to allow different modes of carry. The Perun uses a retention slider to adjust the holster to the gun, and it features both inboard and outboard full-height body shields, an open muzzle and will accommodate suppressor-height sights and red-dot optics. You can get it to fit the Glock 17 (22), Glock 19 (23) or Glock 43. For less than $40, there may not be a better modular synthetic OWB available.
Carry For Larger Guns
I’ve recently come to use discreet gun bags, one for an AR pistol and the other for the Ruger Pistol Caliber Carbine. The first was for the Springfield Armory Saint AR pistol. I found the gun fits into the large but “non-gun” looking Elite Survival Systems 7725-B Stealth Covert Operations Backpack without being disassembled. There’s room for magazines and other gear — but consider weight — and the Saint-P just barely fits, which is perfect. Padded sides and bottom keep the gun from unnecessary dings. As the Saint I have is configured with Troy Industries flip-up Battle Sights and the Aimpoint Micro T-2 red-dot sight — and still fits — I’ll be interested in seeing what happens when a light gets attached.
The Elite Survival Systems 7725-B Stealth Covert Operations Backpack is a fi t for the Springfi eld Armory Saint pistol with an optic.
For the Ruger PC Carbine, I found the Copper Basin, LLC Gen 3 Takedown Firearm Backpack. An attractive pack with modern sport styling, it doesn’t scream “GUN!”. Originally designed for the Ruger 10/22 Take Down models and other takedown guns, I’d wondered if it’d fit the new Ruger centerfire take down. The website now shows it does accept the PCC — and I’ve confirmed it. If you’re trying to be discreet about being a gun owner — think burglary prevention — having a run-of-the-mill, nondescript bag to throw into the car is a big help to maintain a low profile.
Needed Tools
I always keep a lookout to find easier ways to get maintenance done. Lyman now offers Pachmayr Master Gunsmith Screwdrivers. The Master Gunsmith 10-Piece Screwdriver Set includes a “3-wing” handle design to enhancing turning force while preventing the screwdriver from rolling off the bench. Tips are magnetized and parallel-ground, and included are T-10 and T-15 size six-lobe drivers as well as a 5/32-inch hex driver.
In addition, I received some tools from Real Avid. These included their Accu-Punch Hammer and Punches kit. The hammer face can be brass, steel, rubber and nylon, which is a handy touch. The 10 steel pin punches are labeled for size and feature rubber gripping rings. Made from non-scratching, non-marring materials, the Accu-Grip Picks and Brushes really get into the crevices and recesses of the gun.
Tools from Real Avid included their Accu-Punch Hammer and Punches Kit, and Accu-Grip Picks and Brushes.
I also just received the HolsterOps Rogers Enhanced LCR Grip. Adding support for the full hand, the stock moves the hand higher on the back strap of the revolver to substantially reduce muzzle flip. The material allows a smoother draw from pocket holsters and prevents the grip from grabbing clothing while drawing, and the aggressive textured pads increase control of the revolver while firing. Tabs protrude on either side of the trigger guard allow it to catch and sit on top of the belt so it can be worn as an IWB without a holster. I found out a few things: The hammer can’t reach the distance needed for the single action notch to catch, but the gun can be fired double action. Also, the nice high horns on the stock deliver a resounding blow to the thumb. I imagine these would be just the thing for the .22 caliber LCR lines, but it can get dicey for 38s.
Hearing and Eye Protection
Top focal eyewear from SSP and new, high-quality amplified ear protection from Safariland, the Liberator HP
I saw the news about Safariland’s U.S.-designed and manufactured Liberator HP advanced hearing protection headset. The Liberator HP headset offers dual-mode electronic noise compression and active noise cancellation with sound localization for maximum situational awareness and sound detection. Some would consider it pricey at nearly $260, but what’s your hearing worth? You can’t find this kind of quality cheaper with a comparable feature set.
I recently discovered Specialized Safety Products. Makers of SSP Eyewear, I found their “Top Focal” shooting glasses. Featuring a magnifying segment atop the lens (unlike bifocals with the near vision enhancement at the bottom), they sharpen the view of the front sight — not so much for me with handguns, but definitely when shooting carbines with iron sights. Kits are available with amber, clear and smoked anti-fog lenses, and a zippered pouch.
Range Estimation
Vortex Optics Impact 850 laser rangefi nder.
Since I’d had several trips to Wyoming on rodent-strafing safaris, my inability to effectively estimate range has bothered me. I also used it on the club range on some of the range bays. During a recent trip, I took the Vortex Optics Impact 850 rangefinder to our second pistol bay – which is unmarked. I was working out with new pistols and wanted to nail down distances. The Impact 850 quickly sorted through those chores, but I also checked distances to various other locations. Use of the device was quick and easy, the controls intuitive. I had to do nothing to set it up beyond installing the battery. It’s a steal at the mid-$200 price range.
Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared in the Great Gear 2018 issue of Gun Digest the Magazine.
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