Columns

Need a small, affordable and compact keychain knife? SOG’s Micron II is exactly that. Priced below $25, it’s not a bad buy.

Everyone needs a plan B. And that got me thinking. From everything I see, there is a “master plan” that will lead us to a directed outcome, yet there is no way to tell what that is coming. You can’t take all of your survival supplies with you in daily travels ,and what are the statistical chances that you will have your survival supplies at hand should “the big one” pop? What if I’m on the way back from Legoland with my kids and there is a roadblock between me and home? Granted, at some point you have to accept that the One Above is in charge, but I do believe in due diligence. You can drive yourself nuts with the what ifs, but is it wise to hide some survival supplies, especially outside of your property? What kind of storage will last for years, and protect the contents inside from pests and water damage? I found a couple of large military containers that are cheap, and from what I can tell so far, they are also bone dry and indestructible.

Looking for an in-depth understanding of your Springfield M1A? Check out AGI’s Armorer’s course. If you’ve ever wanted to know what makes the M1A tick, this is your chance.

I like to share my failures with you all along with my successes, and I have to to tell you, water, the most important resource of all, is a tough thing to collect and store successfully. I set up my own collection system over a year ago, when I first started this column in March of 2014, and water was my very first actual article. For me, the most bang for the buck was to buy some used IBC totes, which I showed you in that article. Then I had gutters installed on my house, with the downspouts directly feeding into the tanks. The result was a lot of water, but a year and a half later, it’s not as simple. I also tried an alternate water collection system, as I’ll explain, and that is still giving me fits.

It is fairly rare for some museums to display guns. Most are associated with cowboys or wars, but aren’t the focus. But the Saunders Museum in Berryville, Arkansas has one of the best collections of guns around. If you like old guns, this should be a destination.

Finding the sweet spot on a 1911’s trigger isn’t Voodoo. You just need to know your hand and understand how the trigger works. We’ve got some pointers for all of you single action fans that will help improve accuracy.

I try to take nothing for granted. For some people it is probably a no brainer to have a couple hurricane kerosene lanterns on hand, and I’m sure a lot of you have at least one Coleman white gas lantern with mantles. But did you know that both of both of those will work with much more common fuels, and have you thought about whether you should store some extra wicks and mantles? How long does fuel last? How cheap can you get extra lanterns, and what is the best choice for fuel conservation? There are also some really good and cheap LED options for survival lighting these days as well. So for this week we take a opportunity to consider a few inexpensive approaches to light. There is a pretty good chance you will want to see at night once the lights go out. And you may feel confident that you have a plan for emergency lighting, but what will you do when the lights go out for good?

I’m sorry that I didn’t get this out quicker for those of you who have deer season kicking in this week in your state. This product, the Walker Game Ear, shocked me when I got to test it this summer, and I had in mind that I should run the story before deer season, because it is an absolute secret weapon. If you haven’t tried these things, they have super sensitive microphones embedded in them, so they not only protect your ears from your eventual gunshots, they also allow you to hear like…well, a deer.

If you’re big and tall, should you hold your rifle a certain way?