Gun Reviews

Since its inception in 2003, Troy Industries has brought some very innovative products to market. In 2012, Troy began manufacturing military grade rifles that were met with great success. During the 2018 SHOT Show Troy, debuted the TROY Side Action Rifle (SAR).

SHOT Show 2018 has just under 2,000 vendors on site this year, so there’s lots of new long-range shooting gear to see. Better yet, the Range Day outing Monday before the show opens has a 1,000-yard range where some vendors provide the opportunity to try new guns, ammo, and gear. Here are some of the interesting long-range shooting products we found this year.

The wares at our local gun emporia are beginning to look a bit repetitive, my friends. There are AR15 variants for every taste, proclivity, and budget. The counters are awash to their gunwales in plastic pistols. There’s the obligatory smattering of scatterguns, precision rifles, and wheelguns, but that really is about it.

At this time of year, many of us are taking to the field for hunting. Unfortunately, hungry predators are also gearing up for winter, which always leads us to a discussion of bear and mountain lion guns. Archery hunting is fun and all, but a bow is not what anyone wants to be holding when we find ourselves between a momma and cubs. The problem with most guns of caliber big enough to stop a bear is that they are heavy and unwieldy.  Smith and Wesson, always innovating in revolver design, has stepped in to fix that with the Combat Magnum Model 69.

We hunters, especially those of you – who like me – enjoy carrying a bolt-action rifle for big game, owe a helluva lot to a German gentleman named Mauser. Peter Paul von Mauser, to be specific. A brilliant designer, Herr Mauser gave us not only the 7×57 and 8×57 cartridges, but the Gewehr 98 rifle, which would set the standard for bolt-action rifle reliability that stands to this day. The Mauser name – synonymous in the firearms world with the reputation that German engineering has secured – is one that hunters have come to rely on for a century and a quarter.

Several weeks ago I was walking around my favorite gun store, BMC Tactical in Albuquerque, New Mexico, when I saw a fancy looking Glock lower frame sitting in a plastic jig. “What is that?” I inquired. [one_half] [/one_half][one_half_last] [/one_half_last] The clerk working the gun counter pulled the assembly out of the case and explained that [...]

Glock recently announced that they were going to introduce the on the commercial market and buyers could not be happier. The Glock 19X is the pistol they designed for the U.S. military’s Modular Handgun System, or MHS. Ultimately Glock did not win the contract but . Glock’s MHS pistol was more expensive than the competition [...]

Not only are the new Aegis Elite 1911s cut for mini red dot sights, these guns come with Vortex optics installed from the factory.

Feeding from 5-, 10-, 15- or even 20-round magazines, this shotgun offers drum mag volumes of ammo in a tidy, compact package.

Archon Firearms, recently renamed from Arsenal Firearms, debuted the newest iteration of the B pistol dubbed the Type B. The company is rebranding to avoid a possible trademark dispute. The Type B pistol was formerly known as the Stryk B.

The P365 is a hybrid subcompact that fits inside a single-stack package that holds an industry-leading 10+1 capacity of 9mm Luger.

Yes, you read that correctly. IWI, a long time leader in bullpup design, now has a shotgun in the lineup and we spent time with it on the range. Given the history of the Tavor family of weapons, it should come as no surprise that the Tavor TS-12 is also a bullpup. The standard 18-inch barrel gives an overall length of 28-ish inches, keeping everything just above board for legal purposes.

Hunting styles vary greatly across our country, with spot-and-stalk in the west, sitting on stands in the east, corn feeders in the south and even deer run with dogs in certain states. Travel outside of our borders, and you can find an even wider variety of methods, not to mention specific customs, traditions, and expectations. What may seem natural to you or I can seem completely against the grain in a foreign land.

The Nazi’s inability to conquer Europe wasn’t their only failure of the Second World War. They also failed to invade Russia, exercise basic humanity, march-like normal people, and a host of other blunders. Suffice it to say that in 1,000 years they won’t be remembered as successful, virtuous, or honorable.

It is not often I find a firearm that actually changes my core preferences. Being a soldier is a strange mix of knowing when and where to adapt, without falling prey to every new whiz-bang improvement that comes down the line. It’s safe to say the SIG Sauer P320 X5 has me trading in my other favorite polymer pistols.

One of the hottest firearms introductions of 2017, announced at the SHOT Show in Las Vegas, was undoubtedly Mossberg’s 590 Shockwave, which was originally chambered in 12 gauge. Right on its heels came Remington with the 870 Tac-14, another wildly popular defense shotgun, and yet another confirmation of the worth of a compact shotgun that can be had without climbing a Mount Everest of bureaucratic red tape.

Today, we finally get to talk about the new XD-S Mod 2. This is a difficult gun for me to review, for a number of reasons. First, I have said about all there is to say about the Gen 1 XD-S. I have carried the 3.3 model since 2013, and I reviewed the 4-inch model.

Last month, I was handed the new SIG Sauer Virtus rifle for review, my first test item in the MCX family. Though initially, I was skeptical, the Virtus turned out to be very impressive weapon system. It uses a unique operating system, an entirely new piston driven action developed in-house by SIG Sauer.

Unconstrained by conventional handgun design, the Bond Arms BullPup9 squeezes the longest possible barrel into the shortest possible pistol.  We take a detailed look at this unique bullpup-style pocket pistol.

Glock is hard at work expanding their core product line with new Gen 5 versions of their Model 26 and Model 34 handguns for concealed-carry and competition.

In our continuing coverage of SIG Sauer Suppressors, this week we busted out the big bore. The , for that most American of cartridges, the .45 ACP. Most people assume that .45 is the perfect suppressed round since most of its loadings are already subsonic. That briefs well, but so far has not been my [...]

Ammo Incorporated’s “glow” or “cold tracer” ammo Streak Visual Ammunition doesn’t burn and is safe to use indoors and out.

You may ask, Why did it take so long? It has a lot more to do with engineering than marketing.

An ideal home defense Ar-15 should be lightweight, modular, decently accurate and equipped with a light, laser, and a red dot sight. Smith and Wesson’s new M&P15T with M-LOK and Crimson Trace LiNQ System, perfectly fits these requirements, and I recently had the pleasure of testing one.

“Competition Breeds Excellence” is more than a fanciful quote.  To the guys at in Mesa, Arizona, those three words fuel the fire of creativity and drive them to build better and better handguns. It also has the founder of the company, Angus Hobdell, traveling to IPSC matches the world over to prove it’s more than [...]

This week, I got my hands on a rifle that is destined for greatness. Springfield Armory has surprised all of us by chambering the M1A in 6.5 Creedmoor! I am not generally a fan of what I consider ancient weapons, but I am prepared to make an exception for this one. The History of the [...]

What do you need to do a Glock to make it an awesome combat gun? Well, if you ordered it with tritium factory sights, take it out of the box and put bullets in it. But sometimes we want something else. A gun is a very personal item to some of us, and we grow fond attachments to our favorites. At some point in your life, you are going to want to customize one.

It is pretty hard to get excited about an AR-15 in the current marketplace, which as a consumer is a good problem to have. I am certain there is an analogy in me somewhere that is family website friendly but let’s all just use our own imaginations instead. I have reviewed three SAINT models in the last 365 days if you count the pistol, and I count the pistol. It was going to have to be spectacular to get my attention.

And on this one, Springfield Armory delivered in spades.

It has been almost a year since Smith and Wesson introduced the M&P 2.0 upgrades, and the market agrees with me it was a fantastic set of improvements. Smith and Wesson actually listened to consumers over the decade since the original M&P series, fixing every major complaint with the 2.0. I haven’t heard one bad [...]