Feature Articles

As AR pistols get smaller and smaller, they loose power. And the blast is hard to handle. The pistol caliber carbines have been slow to catch on, but that’s about to change. CZ’s new 9mm powerhouse, the Scorpion, is epic. It is exceptionally well built, and the price is going to knock you over.

If you own a pistol with a SIG Brace, or the like, you need to read this. The BATFE has just issued an open letter to all of us that says we can no longer shoulder our arm-brace-equipped pistols unless we register them as short barreled rifles. This is the single biggest industry news of 2015, and is going to make a lot of folks really angry.

Our last visit to the topic of perimeter security took a look at a really nifty tripwire system I found on Ebay. It busts a .22 caliber nailgun blank, and you can hear it for miles on a quiet night in the country. It is extremely low-tech and electricity free, and it works. For this article I am following up with a couple of wireless options, one expensive and one pretty cheap, and both also work really well. Nobody wants to rely on batteries, but any tripwire system is going to have several basic drawbacks:

Choosing a gun for home defense can be tricky. Few people choose to wear their home defense pistols concealed, so guns chambered in .45 ACP are a popular choice. We’ll take a look at 5 of the most popular choices for full-sized .45s, and look at what makes each a solid choice for home defense.

If you think about it, communication with the outside world is going to become really important in the weeks and months after a system collapse or major disaster. You may have food and water for months, but you don’t have it for years. And as I explained in my article on seeds, growing your own food just isn’t that easy. But as several commenters pointed out on the first radio article in this series, there is a strong argument to maintain radio silence. Any experienced radio operator can triangulate your position as soon as you press the send key, and in any survival situation, you can bet that there will be hostiles out there listening for where they can steal some supplies. Radio silence has to be weighed against the benefits of reaching out to the world outside.

Some high-end 1911s are exceptionally well-built works of art that don’t seem to be designed for daily carry. They’re pretty. Not this one. The Christensen 1911 Commander is one of the most complex versions of the old Browning single-action I’ve ever seen. This titanium framed .45 ACP is built for several lifetimes of daily carry.

We take a look at 5 guns that made a difference at the Battle of New Orleans 200 years ago. The British Brown Bess, the American 1795 Springfield and the rifles both sides used on line Jackson at Chalmette Plantation. No alligators minds were blown during the writing of this article.

Fans of the venerable 10/22 typically have only one gripe with the gun: the trigger. Even so, the stock triggers on 10/22s are better than much of the competition. But Ruger now offers an improved trigger for the 10/22 and Charger. The BX-Trigger is a vast improvement over the stock Ruger triggers and is incredibly easy and quick to install.

The Magnum Research Desert Eagle is a big gun. It is Hollywood large. The pistol is so big that it isn’t practical for much of what we use pistols for. Yet the beast of a gun is a heavy hitting .50 AE with a lot of personality. And now, in the all stainless version, the Desert Eagle looks even better. And the built in compensator makes it even more practical. A practical Desert Eagle? Yes. Read on.