May 12, 2017 -- A Quick Run Around the Web

"How to Make A Centershot Snakey Recurve Bow Part 1"--BackyardBowyer (11 min.)

A video tutorial on making a recurve bow from PVC. See also Part 2 and Part 3.

Firearms/Prepping/Self-Defense:

• TGIF: Greg Ellifritz has this week's Weekend Knowledge Dump with lots of articles to make you a better shot, a better protector, and a better person. A couple that jumped out at me was an article on terrorists using vehicles as deadly weapons, and an article giving advice on how to tighten up your groups when shooting handguns. But be sure to check them all out.
• I hate to kick a dead horse, but here is yet another article on ".223 Remington vs. 5.56 NATO: What You Don’t Know Could Hurt You." There are some slight differences to the case thickness and dimensions, but the critical difference is the difference in leade--the distance between the tip of the projectile and when it contacts the rifling.

       On a .223 Remington spec rifle, the leade will be 0.085”.  This is the standard described by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute, Inc. (SAAMI).  The leade in a 5.56 NATO spec rifle is 0.162”, or almost double the leade of the .223 rifle.

       A shorter leade in a SAAMI spec rifle creates a situation where the bullet in a 5.56 NATO round, when chambered, can contact the rifling prior to being fired.  By having contact with the rifling prematurely (at the moment of firing), chamber pressure can be dramatically increased, creating the danger of a ruptured case or other cartridge/gun failure.

The opposite situation--a .223 in a 5.56 mm chambered barrel--creates no problem, other than a potential loss of accuracy, because you will have extra leade. I have seen this in action once, and, mind you, this was before there was an widespread understanding of the problem--manufacturers weren't even careful in their labeling of the two. I was with a friend who wanted to demonstrate why his AR was superior to the Mini-14 I owned at the time. He started shooting, and with almost every round, a primer would pop out of round just fired and fall into the action, jamming the trigger. Of course, the Mini-14 had no problem with digesting the same ammunition. I had great fun rubbing this in his face. Looking back, of course, the problem was not his rifle, per se, but that he was shooting 5.56 in a .223 weapon.

• The New Rifleman has updated his article, "The Data Driven AR15: Or Why the Best AR15’s are Data Driven" to reflect the MLOK versus K-Mod testing results that were publicized recently.
• "Blast from the Past: Popular Police Speedloaders of the 1970s"--Revolver Guy. Some good gun history for all of you. Although speedloaders (including the speed strip) of various types had been adopted by competition shooters, in 1970, very few police used them--in fact, some departments specifically disallowed them. This started to change after the April 6, 1970, "Newhall Shooting" that left two California Highway Patrol officers dead in the wake of a gunfight. One of the officers, James E. Pence, Jr., was shot in the head just as he was closing the cylinder on his revolver after making a reload with cartridges from his dump pouch. The article goes on to document the change in police doctrine to allow for or, in many cases, require that officers use speed loaders, as well as a history of the development of speed loaders in the ensuing decade. Although several designs fell by the wayside, one design from 1973, the HKS "Six Second" speed loader is still with us, and, according to the article, still the most popular speed loader on the market.

• Related: "Twosies and Threesies, a Speedloader Comparison"--Priority Performance. A comparison between the Safariland Comp II and Comp III speedloaders. In not so many words, the Comp II is better for concealed carry because it is less likely to get hung up when trying to insert the cartridges into the cylinder. 

• Yeah, right: "US Army Considers Ditching 5.56 NATO Round"--The Truth About Guns. The article indicates that the Army wants to get manufacturers to offer a new round and a rifle to shoot it that might replace the current 5.56/M-4 combination. Absent some advancement like telescoping ammunition using a polymer casing, or caseless ammunition, it isn't going to happen because no other round offers the combination of ballistic performance, recoil and weight. Just another attempt to find the mythical "one round to rule them all." One person in the comments sarcastically suggests that the Army adopt the .22 LR. A more serious article on the topic is "Caliber Configuration: How It Got to Where It’s At, and Where It’s Headed" by Nathaniel Fitch. 
• "THE SILENCING COMETH: USMC Unit Deploys to Norway with Suppressors, Doesn’t Want to Go Back"--The Firearms Blog. Primary factor is command and control: the troops can hear their orders. Of course, it is probably nice to be able to hear after the shooting has stopped. The author predicts that in 10 to 15 years, it will be expected that all individual combat arms be issued with silencers. 
• Some legislative news: Texas' bills to allow so-called "constitutional carry" died in committee; Florida has strengthened its stand-your-ground law by providing a lower burden of proof for someone asserting self-defense.
• "Movie Theater Safety Tips"--Active Response Training. Addressing some of the special defensive issues presented by a movie theater (or any similar environment), including seating, compensating for darkness, and the increased distance you might need to shoot if dealing with an active shooter.

Other Stuff:

• Separate but equal: "Detroit School to Hold ‘Muslim Girls Only’ Prom"--Heat Street. The article explains:

With the goal of creating a “safe space” in mind, a Detroit school has set out to hold a girls-only prom to celebrate traditional Muslim customs. It’s being created for girls who would otherwise be prohibited by their ultraconservative Muslim families from going to regular proms, where attendees are allowed to have fun and dance with members of the opposite sex in good old American tradition.

What's the point? If they are good Muslims, they shouldn't be listening to music or dancing, let alone having fun. And if they aren't good Muslims, they can just go to the regular prom. 

• Say it with me ... one ... two ... three! Diversity is our strength: "'See you in hell': How teenage girl MS-13 gangster 'tortured her love rival, cut off her tattoo and killed her with 13 stab wounds in bitter power struggle over gang leadership'"--Daily Mail. 
• Unsurprisingly, polls show that the people most opposed to building a border wall are single white women.  If you want to know why, watch this video (19 min.).
• Heh. "Mexicans Are Upset About Immigrants Bringing Crime To Their City"--The Daily Caller. "Tapachula is near the Guatemalan border and besides immigrants from Central American countries, there has been a recent influx of African immigrants entering Mexico seeking to eventually get to the U.S." 
• It's back ... "Ebola: Three people killed in Democratic Republic of Congo as new epidemic declared by WHO"--Yahoo News. The Democratic Republic of Congo says that the outbreak is in a remote area of the country and under control.
• This doesn't support the narrative: "Study: 89% of colleges reported zero campus rapes in 2015"--USA Today. The article is quick to point out that according to some Obama era Department of Justice report, 80% of women don't report a rape or sexual assault. Of course, how can you trust such a study when the terms "rape" and "sexual assault" have become so malleable that they no longer have any real meaning.
• "Ransomware infections reported worldwide"--BBC News. "There have been reports of infections in more than 70 countries, including the UK, US, China, Russia, Spain, Italy and Taiwan." More at Deutsche Welle. 

• Related: "FBI has reportedly been advising Hollywood studios to just pay hackers' ransoms"--Daily Mail. The article reports: "The FBI's Los Angeles office has reportedly been so overwhelmed by hacks against Hollywood that they have been advising studios to just pay ransoms."

• "J.C. Penney spirals down as retail's dismal week continues"--CBS. I can't remember the last time that I shopped at a J.C. Penney; mostly it is because I hate going to a large shopping mall, but it is also because tracking down a sales clerk in order to make a purchase is difficult, at best. Anyway, the article indicates that Macy's, Nordstrom and Kohl's also reported declining same-store sales numbers. 
• Those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad: Police in Seattle no longer allowed to use the term "suspect," but must instead use "community member." 
• This is important--read it: "Men's Depression is Different"--Dr. Helen at PJ Media. Most of you are aware of the recent suicide of Bob Owens, one of the editors of Bearing Arms. Using that incident as a springboard, the author discusses some of the important ways that male depression can differ, especially in its symptoms. "It isn't a feeling of sadness. You're irritable, irascible, short-tempered. Often, you feel unusually tired, often achy -- it feels like you have a bit of a cold, or maybe the flu. You're not hungry, or you're hungry but nothing tastes good, nothing is appealing." It may also be marked by sleeplessness. The author notes that men are 4-5 times as likely to take their own life than women.