Gun & Prepping News #19

Just some articles that caught my attention for one reason or another: 

• It's Friday, so time for another of Greg Ellifritz's Weekend Knowledge Dumps. In this issue he links to articles on training (and encouragement to spend our precious time and money on improving the fundamentals), magazine springs and maintenance, self-defense for children, why you need to practice using your sights even though you likely will not see your sights in a stressful situation, a sort-of-sling bag for carrying a firearm (it puts the firearm over your chest), a disappointing result from Hornady defensive shotgun loads, and more. For those of you worried about armed conflict and civil war between different groups, you might want to check out the article entitled "Guns are not just for conservative white men." Everyone is arming up.
• Speaking of the possibility of armed conflict: "Terrorists in Uniform"--Active Response Training. Take note of this comment by the author:

I have a friend who worked on an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force in one of the largest cities in the USA.  His unit investigated regular burglaries of dry cleaning businesses for years.  In these burglaries, the only items taken were police uniforms that officers had dropped off for cleaning.  This has been happening for almost 20 years and you don’t hear a thing about it in the media.  We’re ripe for an attack of this nature.

• "Despite ATF’s Pistol Brace Ban Being Vacated, the Rogue Agency is Still Trying to Jail People Who Use Them"--Shooting News Weekly. The difference is that the ATF is now taking the position that any type of pistol brace attached to any type of handgun turns said handgun into an NFA item.
• "Building A Budget Battle Shotgun"--Guns Magazine. The author describes how he took a $262 Mossberg Maverick Security 88 shotgun and accessorized it to bring the total cost up to just under $1,100 including red dot sight, weapon mounted light and sling. 
• "KelTec PR57 Rotary Barrel 5.7x28mm Pistol at SHOT Show 2025"--Ammo Land.  This seems to be an interesting and outside the box solution to a lightweight concealed carry pistol with a more than adequate magazine capacity for 99.9% of the situations where a civilian would need to use a handgun. And it can mount both a pistol optic and a light. But KelTec, while offering innovative products, often falls down in execution, especially as to availability and reliability. But this should be an interesting weapon to follow.
• "The 3 Golden Rules of Defensive Carry" by Richard Mann, Outdoor Life.
• Rule No. 1: Defensive Carry Means Having a Gun (i.e., a gun on your person).
• Rule No. 2: Nothing Is Certain (i.e., your shot(s) may not be disabling).
• Rule No. 3: Carry Whenever Possible (i.e., you really need to have a gun on your person).
  
• "Rifle Roundup: Military Armaments Corp MAC-5 Pistol With A Sightmark Optic"--Shooting Illustrated. This is an H&K MP5 clone retailing for around $1,100. 
• "The 5 Best Gun Cleaning Solvents"--Field & Stream. And they are:

•     Best Overall: Hoppe’s No. 9 Gun Bore Cleaner
•     Best Non-Toxic: CLP by Sage & Braker
•     Best for Rifles: Hoppe's M-Pro 7 Gun Cleaner
•     Best Spray: Ballistol Multi-Purpose Gun Oil
•     Best Cleaner and Lube: Break Free CLP

• "British 3D Gun Printer Walks Free"--Impro Guns. An excerpt:

... A jury heard how 19 year old James Maris had assembled the FGC-9 9mm semi-automatic carbine using a 3D printer he received for Christmas as a fun technical curiosity, having developed a fascination with firearms after watching The Royal Armouries’ Youtube channel. Judge Lady Hood ruled that it was acceptable for a young man to have an interest in firearms and that no harm was intended by his hobby. ...

• "Viktor Bout: The Merchant of Death"--Guns America. Bout is one of the most notorious gun smugglers in history. He was the primary inspiration behind the title character in the 2005 movie Lord of War.  Bout was eventually arrested by Thailand in 2008 and extradited to the U.S. in 2010. He was convicted and imprisoned in 2011. President Biden, however, traded Bout to the Russians in order to win the release of WNBA star Brittney Griner. 

Viktor Bout returned home to a hero’s welcome. He voiced support for the invasion of Ukraine and promptly entered politics, winning a seat in the Legislative Assembly of Ulyanovsk Oblast. Now he also appears to be hawking AK74 rifles to the Houthis in his spare time.

• Some firearms history: "Innovation from Isolation: The SS-77 Machine Gun"--The Firearm Blog. During the apartheid era, South Africa was subject to an arms embargo requiring it to develop its own weapons. One of these was the SS-77 machine gun--a general purpose machine gun that eventually went into production in 1986. It, in turn, spawned a light machine gun version using 5.56 mm. 
• "How to Make Lard Bread"--Organic Prepper. This is a bread recipe that is a variant of an Italian bread called Casatiello, but using lard or bacon fat in place of the eggs and butter.
• "18 Practical Ways to Use the Ashes from Your Fireplace"--Organic Prepper.  Everything from pest control to uses as an abrasive in cleaning to even removing skunk scent from a dog's fur. Check it out.
• "How to String a Fishing Pole: A Step-by-Step Guide"--SHTF Preparedness. The author also has a companion piece on setting up a fly rod.
• "The Magnetic North Pole Has Officially Changed Position"--Science Alert. 

"Magnetic north has been moving slowly around Canada since the 1500s but, in the past 20 years, it accelerated towards Siberia, increasing in speed every year until about five years ago, when it suddenly decelerated from 50 to 35 kilometers [31 to 22 miles] per year, which is the biggest deceleration in speed we've ever seen."

• "Everything You Thought You Knew About Tetanus is Wrong"--Popular Science (via Get Pocket). 

But counter to what rusty nail warnings might have you believe, the disease has nothing to do with iron oxide, the chemical compound more commonly known as rust. Rather, tetanus is a product of the bacteria Clostridium tetani, which is in dirt, dust, and feces—in other words, everywhere. It can enter your body through puncture wounds, yes, but also through superficial cuts, bug bites, surgical procedures, and any other rupture to your skin. It can come from stepping on a rusty nail, or tending the soil in your garden. That's why it's so essential to track your booster shots: You need one every decade, not just when you rip your palm open on a rusty chain link fence. Waiting for a classic tetanus injury won't work when anything could, in theory, be a tetanus injury. 

The article notes that tetanus has a 10% mortality rate in the U.S., and probably worse in areas with more limited medical care.

• A tale of survival: "My Wife and I Tried to Walk Home in an Arctic Storm. We Almost Died"--Outdoor Life.  The couple was living, at the time, in Point Lay, Alaska, working as school teachers. Because the town was so small--they indicate that they could walk from one end of town to the other in minutes--they one day decided to hoof it from their house to the school, a distance of only a 100 yards. Unfortunately, a blizzard hit and school was cancelled, and they eventually tried to make it back to their house through the blizzard. 

We bundled up and stepped outside. We were nearly blown off our feet by the blizzard. Winds blasted in excess 75 miles per hour, with gusts close to the century mark. With windchill, the temperature was close to 120 degrees below zero. 

They almost didn't survive the 100-yard trip back to their house. An interesting story, so check it out.

• Sort of like bugging out on foot: "History Friday: The Handcart Saga"--Chicago Boyz. For a brief period of time, Mormon pioneers crossed the plains and Rocky Mountains pushing handcarts rather than using horse or oxen drawn wagons. 

During the 1840s and 1850s, wagon train pioneers heading west to California and Oregon usually transported family, goods and required supplies in wagons most often pulled by two or three pairs of draft animals. That was also the means most often utilized in the first decade of emigration by LDS converts and believers to Utah. However, by the mid-1850s straitened circumstances and shortages of funds hampered efforts to bring LDS emigrants to Utah, while at the same time an enormous backlog of converts built up in the British Isles and on the Continent. Hundreds had come by ship to the East Coast, and then by train as far as the Mid-West – but then, how would they make the last 1,300 miles? Brigham Young conceived the notion of light two-wheeled carts, pulled by the converts themselves on the last leg between the railhead at Iowa City and Salt Lake City. Each cart company would be accompanied by a few regular wagons, carrying supplies, bedding and tents. And most wagon-train emigrants in earlier years had walked much of the trail anyway … so there was a cheaper solution for LDS believers, eager to get to their Zion. 

I don't have the exact statistic at hand, but the survival rate seems to have been much better for these handcart companies than for Oregon Trail pioneers in general. According to the National Park Service, 6-10% of all emigrants of the trails succumbed to some form of illness. But, "[n]ot counting the Willie and Martin companies, pioneers who traveled by handcart experienced a 4.7 percent mortality rate." And the overall mortality rate among all Mormon pioneers was only 3.5% (including not only those that died on the trail, but that died within a year of arriving in Utah). It would be interesting to see a study of why the Mormon pioneers fared so much better than the average. Was it just the fact of stopping in Utah instead of pushing on to Oregon and California?