Columns

Springfield Armory has overhauled the XD, and the new gun is worth a look. Start with the grip. Their new Grip Zone design is like Velcro for you hands. It is sticky in all of the right places. But that’s not all they’ve done. They’ve taken a good pistol and made it much more ergonomic and effective. And we have one to give away. Want the details? Read on….

I’ve just come back from my first black powder hunt and I’ve learned a few valuable life lessons that I’d like to pass on. Learn from my mistakes and my successes, and you may have a much more productive hunt–even if the only thing you bag is a big fat rat.

The Troy Pump Action Rifle may look like an AR-15, but it isn’t. While Troy’s Sporting Rifle shares many of the same characteristics and parts, the basic operational mechanisms are unique, and built with compliance in mind. The Troy PAR is 50 state legal, and ideal for hunting, and capable of extraordinary accuracy. If you think this is nothing but an attempt to appease politicians, you need to think again. The PAR is fast and accurate.

If you live in the northern climes it is getting to be that time a year again where you worry about getting caught in the cold with no electricity and no chance of it coming back on anytime soon. As I explained in my article on water, the best thing you can do to gaurantee yourself fresh drinking water and a warm enough place to sleep is to build a greenhouse. If you have the land, a greenhouse will melt your water all winter long, no matter how cold it gets. You can also put a tent inside your greenhouse and sleep in there, and with the double insulation, it will be warm enough, most of the time. A supplemental wood stove or other alternative heating system certainly won’t hurt, and I found a really inexpensive stove that works great.

Occasionally in this column we devolve into the reasons why many of us feel that some sort of survival strategy at this juncture is prudent. Most people are on a budget, so to divert some of your family resources to prepping that you may end up laughing about 10 years from now can seem a little, well… nuts.

I have pondered the subject of perimeter security for some time and I have decided that it is probably the hardest to come up with a hard and fast rule. You have to sleep at some point. And even if you have enough people to keep watch, how much advance notice will you have? I have looked into 12 volt motion detectors, but so far I have not found a better option than these hand welded alarms on Ebay. They use a standard .22 short nailgun blank, available at Home Depot. If you are handy you could make them yourself, but at $20 each they are a pretty cheap investment for a pretty important aspect of long term survival.

In a survival situation you can’t take anything for granted. Cleanliness is absolutely required, and soap is something you already should be storing in decent quantities. You don’t have to make it yourself, but I just realized that I might as well share how to do it. I’ve been making soap for over a decade and my only warning about making soap is that if you plan to give some to your friends and family, don’t, unless you want to start a free soap business. Homemade, cold process soap made from vegetable oils will eliminate most dry skin issues, and used as shampoo, it will do away with the need for dandruff shampoo. Believe it or not, I’ve even had reports from friends that it gets rid of hemorrhoids. Soap is an interesting product because you aren’t allowed to advertise it with any health claims, but suffice it to say that store bought soap just isn’t the same as homemade.

The .308 battle rifle is making a comeback. Ruger released their SR762 to high praise. Colt’s modular 901 can accept uppers in .308 and .223. The AR10 is still alive and kicking, and rocking throwbacks, like Springfield Armory’s MiA line, manage to be both nostalgic and innovative. What is it about the hard-hitting 7.62 x 51 that makes it so appealing? Wasn’t the high-pitched crack of the AR-15 sound the death knell of oversized, overweight, overkill? Apparently not. There’s more staying power in the old-school battle rifle than the slew of 5.56 rifles would have us believe. None of this is news to the fans of the H&K G3. Yet import restrictions make the G3, and the H&K 91 (the civilian version of the G3) hard to come by stateside. Don’t give up hope. At the upcoming SHOT show in January 2014, PTR will launch a new version of the Classic Wood 91, the KR. The K is for Kurz, which refers to the 16-inch barrel. The R denotes a welded rail. With a shorter barrel and a rail, the new iteration will appeal to those who respect the classic look of an old G3. It will also speak to those who want a hard-hitting CQB rifle with manageable length and the option to more easily add optics. If you are looking for heavyweight precision, with just a hint of German engineering, take a good long look at the PTR 91. These American-made 91s are taking the iconic H&K design to new levels of precision and reliability.

We know how viruses spread. If you stay in your house and don’t have contact with other humans, it is impossible to get a virus. Viruses need a host organism, therefore they cannot be spread through water supplies, especially chlorinated water supplies which most of us drink. Out in public, Ebola can most likely spread through the air, from sneezing or coughing, but there are simple precautions you can take if you absolutely must go out to the store, which I will get into below. Treating Ebola is a crapshoot at this point, but I will explain the splintered logic as to what your options are should you contract the disease.