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The comment period for ATF Proposed Rule 41P ends Monday, December 9th, but there’s still time to make your voice heard if you have not already. The American Silencer Association, a group of silencer manufacturers that have banded together to make their voices heard, has made up some sample letter templates that you can download, modify to match your circumstances, and send in. Note that they have two different sample templates, one for folks who already have a legal entity (trust, corp, etc)…

and one for those who do not. The link above contains both the sample letters and the information on how to submit them. Some people are of the opinion that the proposed changes may make the CLEO in their jurisdiction more likely to be willing to sign, but there are indications that may not be true, including some CLEOs who have made their refusal explicit (pdf warning). Every voice counts, so make yours heard.

The .9 millimeter strikes again, this time in the form of a revolver, as WALB News 10 reports on a convenience store robbery in Cordele, GA. When three masked men burst in, one carrying a gun, Marvin Shanks was in the back filling a bucket with water. He looked up and “seen a .9 millimeter revolver waving it.” Note that he did not say “point nine,” that was whoever wrote the news story, but he did say “nine millimeter revolver.” Does a 9mm revolver even exist?

This isn’t new, but it’s apparently making the rounds again on Facespace and the like. It’s an article with a series of videos teaching a lesson on how insecure those little gun “safe” lockboxes are. I’m still not terribly impressed by the video of the three and four year olds opening the boxes, because they’d clearly been heavily coached on how to do so, but the videos on how easy it is for adults to open them should be a lesson that these boxes are only the thinnest of security, and should not be relied on to keep guns out of the hands of anyone but an infant. Remember that all these videos are available with just a moment’s search on YouTube, and therefore are well within the reach of anyone old enough to reach a keyboard. They might be slightly more effective than simply putting your gun on top of the refrigerator, but only slightly.

If you know anyone in the vicinity of Bushkill Township, Pennsylvania who recently came into possession of a Colt 10mm Stainless Gold Cup or a black Ruger .22 pistol, ask ’em how good a deal they got. It seems a local resident lost a couple of bags off the back of his truck on Saturday. One was a brown bag with the two guns and some ammo, the other was a blue bag with boring stuff like clothes, medication, and a dop kit. The blue bag was found, all pockets opened but contents intact, but the brown bag is still missing.

mattv2099 loves to make gun videos involving food, whether it’s torture testing his GLOCK-brand GLOCK with peanut butter or just blowing up some pancakes. He decided to make a short video spoofing Richard Ryan’s Tech Assassin series, titled “Picnic Assassin,” complete with information screen and way too much detail. Probably the best possible use of Coors that I’ve ever seen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAj49B9BYj8
I thought the tablecloth puffing out below the table before the bullet hit the beer cans was kind of interesting. Some sort of pre-bullet shock-wave?

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53 COMMENTS

  1. Honestly, does anyone actually think the ATF gives a rats ass about what us peasants think? It’s not like the ATF is elected or accountable to anyone. It seems like commenting on the new restrictions (lets face it, it’s going to happen – the fewer people with NFA items, the better – according to the ATF) is just going to get you put on a list as a “person of interest”.

    • I take it you know the attitude of the ATF and the people working there through personal experience? Did you realize that the ATF actively helps enthusiasts who want to build and posses firearms of all (legal) types?

      I don’t agree with most if any of the laws the ATF is tasked with enforcing with many of its past and current decisions or the actions of many of its agents over the years but if you wanted to build your self a .50 BMG a short barreled shotgun or your own hairbrained contraption the ATF dose a fair job of assisting you an staying out of prison while being able to posses a wide variety of weapons.

      Of course they shouldn’t be tasked with such things but that is another matter entirely.

      • “I take it you know the attitude of the ATF and the people working there through personal experience? Did you realize that the ATF actively helps enthusiasts who want to build and posses firearms of all (legal) types?”

        and

        “…if you wanted to build your self a .50 BMG a short barreled shotgun or your own hairbrained contraption the ATF dose a fair job of assisting you…”

        Those are the funniest statements ever. The ATF is here to help and assist us. OMG. Really??

        They are going to help and assist you like they did Randy Weaver at Ruby ridge? Yea? Shot his son and dog in the woods. Shot his unarmed pregnant wife in her own home?

        You need to go here:
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Ridge

        and connect the dots.
        This is the agency you are defending. Did any ATF or FBI get any criminal charges against them? Did they see some prison time? I don’t think so.

    • Do you understand that by law, any issues of substance that are raised in the comment period have to, by law, be answered by the ATF? For example, if the ATF says “It will cost this much and take this much time” and a bunch of learned people submit comments saying “You’re wrong, it will cost 4x your estimate,” the ATF has to reconcile that problem? That’s just an example, but you get the idea. That’s the whole point of the public comment period.

      As far as getting my name on some list, well, fuck it. Bring it on. My name is now on a list with several thousands of other folks, many of whom are much bigger fish than I am, should they decide to use that list in some nefarious way.

      You gotta stand up sometime.

      • Right, because we all know that the ATF follows the law…

        There’s a difference between standing up when it will make a difference and standing up when the outcome was already determined before it started. The ATF has their orders from Obama / Holder to limit NFA items and they’re going to do it. I’ve already got enough red flags that I don’t need some jackass ATF agent reporting me on “suspicion of illegal NFA items” (simply because I emailed them about this issue) or whatever excuse to send an armed hit squad smashing through my window at 3am.

        • If you have enough red flags from far worse things, I doubt hitting SEND in the comments section would be the straw that broke the camel’s back….
          You can take the tin foil hat off now.

        • Tote, always encouraging others to stand up and fight the man. But sending a little email has the yellow fluid running down his legs.

        • OK, I give up. There’s clearly no talking to you on this. I’ll be sure to let you know when the hit squad comes through my door at 3 am. I’ll put it in my will for my next of kin to post it here.

        • Good news for you Tote, the ATF doesn’t just get to change its *written* rules like that, though apparently it can just enforce any way it wants going by past events. A court (that one that just got packed with appointees?) is going to look it over and decide whether the rule change is valid and not arbitrary going by testimony and comments given. Same sort of dealy that went down in all those townships with testimony on proposed gun bans that went on early this year. And which seems to have been summarily ignored for the most part. I forget my point, I ended up depressing myself there.

        • @JWM

          There’s a huge difference between fighting for a cause that has even a slim chance and fighting a battle that was lost before it began (as I already pointed out). I know, you’ve shown us time and again that you have a single digit IQ, but there is a distinction between the two.

        • Make all the excuses you want totesack. You are always rattling your sabre trying to get others to go over the top. Any personal risk to you is avoided. Lack of formal education does not mean low IQ. You’ve stated that you make not much more than a soldier. You’re a 30 yo single man with no kids and a Mcjob is the best you can do?

          Poor old dumb jwm is debt free with a paid for house. In the bay area.

  2. Yes, several 9mm revolvers exist. I believe S&W experimented with one 20 yrs ago or so. Plus Taurus makes the Pitbull, which I believe is chambered for 9mm as well as .40 S&W. And Ruger make convertible Blackhawks in ..357 and 9mm with a separate cylinder for each (I have one of these).

  6. Ruger made the Service Six and Speed Six in 9mm. Most were sold overseas. A few here when new and some have been re imported.

  7. Apparently one of the primary rules of writing a legal brief also applies to gun blogs: Never ask a question. You might just get an answer.

    • Heh, especially such an easy question. Usually I do my research first, but it was a fun story and I was being lazy.

    • In a legal brief you are trying to win an argument. In a blog you are trying to learn or edumacate the masses.

  8. The (point) .9mm revolver is a rare Liechtensteinian pistol commissioned by Prince Franz I during WWI. It launched a 7 grain lead semi-wadcutter hollow point bullet at 5700fps from a 4.5″ barrel producing just over 500lb/ft.of muzzle energy (Liechtenstein, like the United States never signed on to the Hague conference’s ban on expanding ammo). It was the most powerful handgun ever produced until the .357 magnum was introduced in 1934. During the 30s the American market was flooded with Liechtensteinian Army surplus revolvers and units in unfired condition could be had for as little as 25 cents. Most of these weapons however made their way to Mexico where they were favored by the Sinaloan drug cartel since the Mexican government did not recognize the .9mm Franz (as it was informally known) as a military cartridge and were therefore legal to posses in Mexico. Today they are quite collectable, but no ammunition is available from any major manufacturer, so it is generally considered a reloader’s cartridge.

  9. Not only are 9mm revolvers made (god knows why), but technically a .38 spc or .357 revolver is a ‘9mm’, which while technically confusing to gun guys would still be an accurate assessment of the bore of the weapon. 9mm is, after all, .35 inch.

    • Yeah, I thought that might be true, and I considered looking it up, but as I’ve said elsewhere… lazy.

      • lol well there is that. I’m a veteran of the caliber wars so long that I know all the comparisons: 9mm=3.5 inch 10mm=.40 inch 8mm is basically .30 cal and .45=11.43mm.

        That said, if the fellow in the article was trained on metric and a really good judge of measures under pressure while at the same time being unfamiliar with guns he might well have accurately called the muzzle he saw a 9mm when it was actually a .38/.357. I’m splitting hairs perhaps, but it’s possible.

        BTW a “.38spc” is actually .35 inch in diameter, a fact that seems obvious but is sometimes lost.

    • I wish someone would do a write up about the guns in this caliber. If a .38 is really .35, why do they call it a .38? (And I thought it was rally .357 in bullet diameter at the muzzle, which is where the .357 got its name–but what do I know? Nada.) Colt made any number of .36 pistols, but you use .375 or even .380 balls. Now I know these later are shaved when you press them into the cylinder, and then they go through a forcing cone–so is it called a .36 because that is the final bullet diameter? But if this is true, why did a gun rag writer of some repute (Duke) say that the cylinder conversions (from a .36 to a .38 special for black powder pistols) don’t shoot accurately because the .38 bullet is really .357, but the barrels of the Colts (and replicas) are .375??? And if 9 mm is the same size as a .38, which is really a .35, why do they call the .380 a .380?

      • I Think .38 is named for the inside diameter of the chamber. I remember reading that the case on a .38 is .379 inches and its pretty standard in machining to have a .001″ difference in diameter for things that are supposed to fit inside another. Just speculation based on a mashup of different things I think I know, though.

      • And a .44 magnum, or special for that matter, is a .429 caliber. The .38-40 is a .401 caliber. A lot of it is just marketing. Whoever makes such choices in the company says to themselves,”What sounds better in an add campaign….”

  10. Well Matt, As I remove my .45 1911 and my .380 backup (technically a 9mm and actually a .35 cal) from my person I assure you they do! However the .40 offers in my opinion the best balance of power and capacity of the 9mm to .45 spread. If I had to choose a single pistol for actual combat it would likely be a hi cap .40. In my world these days my pistol is something that is oft carried and seldom used. Also, my long experience with the 1911 offers me advantages in terms of speed and accuracy that would take months or years to learn on another platform.

    All that aside I’ve always loved the .40S&W and have owned both HK-USP and Glock pistols in that caliber.
    Carry on my friend, carry on . . .

    • I prefer the 10mm to the .40. Think of it as a .40 magnum. I have a 1911 in 10mm, as well as one in .45. The conversion only requires a barrel, bushing, extractor, ejector and magazines to switch from one caliber to the other.

  11. Might I add: If anyone in the Ashland KY area recently got a deal on a Springfield XD.40 that was too good to be true it was likely stolen from a friend of mines car a couple of weeks ago. I’ll just about bet he’ll pay whatever you did to get it back.

  12. From the video:

    The 308 ak47 was used by Vasily Zaitsev to assassinate 6463 Nazi officers??? No sniper in history has killed more than 1000 people – let alone officers.

    Coors was not commercially available until 1945??? Coors existed before prohibition and was based out of Colorado. Coors was founded in 1873 – NOT 1876 and it was founded by Adolf Coors (a German). Russia had nothing to do with Coors to my knowledge.

    Where does he get this information? Total fabricated nonsense.

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