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Blogging to you from the Northeastern Badlands of The County of Lake, in the state currently known as Fatmanistan, DEEP DEEP DEEP DEEP DEEP inside the heartland of the Banana Republic formerly known as the USA, WELCOME TO THE NEXT CHAPTER! WARNING! ALL FORMS OF SOCIAL MEDIA ARE ADDICTIVE; EXCESSIVE USE MAY LEAD TO MENTAL HEALTH DISORDERS, REDUCED JOB PRODUCTIVITY, INSOMNIA, SOCIAL ALIENATION, GENITAL ULCERS, BLINDNESS, POLITICAL EROTICISM, AND / OR DEVIANT FUNAMBULISM. NOTICE: NO GUNS OR AMMUNITION ARE FOR SALE VIA THIS BLOG. (No, I will not trade my Colt Python for some lubricious adventures with your trophy wife and a future first-round draft pick.) CAVEAT: This blog is not suitable for viewing while at work, while inside a public library, while inside any public or private school, or while inside any public or private restroom. Do not view this blog while driving a motor vehicle or while piloting an aircraft. Viewing this blog may be illegal inside the EU, NYC, Chicago, Seattle, and other parts of the Third World. THIS BLOG CONTAINS (albeit often very childish) ADULT-CONTENT. DISCLAIMER: This blog is a hobby, it is not a livelihood. Even though much of what I blog about relates to firearms collecting and recreational shooting, I am not an expert (by any measure) on any facet of guns, shooting, hunting, or personal defense. Entries at this blog are akin to good old-fashioned campfire chats or post hunt bourbon-fueled barroom-bluster; I offer no opinion on what you should or should not purchase, or what you should be using or doing. What does or does not work for me could be rugged-country-miles away from your tastes and your needs. All products, places, and miscellany that I review for this blog are purchased / rented / leased at retail price by me. I do not accept payment, gifts, discounts, freebies, products on loan, distilled spirits, recreational pharmaceuticals, plea-bargains, probation, parole, Papal Blessings, Presidential Pardons, or sexual favors for doing any review or blog post. TRACKING COOKIES: Google et al stick tracking cookies on everybody. If you are online, you are being spied on via one method or another, for one reason or another; 'nuff said. You may be able to minimize your online DNA residue by using Tor and Duck Duck Go. Vive la liberté! Vive all y'all! Ante omnia armari. To each of you, thanks for stopping by!

Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Smith &Wesson 442 Airweight .38 +P range time at 5 Star Firearms in Zion, Illinois

IMHO, one of the sweetest concealed carry handguns on earth is the S&W 442, be it carried in a pocket holster, IWB holster, OWB holster, or a shoulder holster.  It is ever so light and easy.





IMHO, the 442 loses all of its sweetness once the trigger is squeezed and a cartridge fires.  Recoil is stout even when using mild loads.  Using the +P (SAAMI Plus P Loads) in this light alloy-frame revolver becomes very challenging.  Further, the sights on this short barreled J frame S&W are rudimentary; distance multiplies errors in aiming.





For this venture, using +P 158 grain semi-wadcutter hollow-points, I decided to shoot the equivalent of what Illinois requires for obtaining a concealed carry license (15-feet, 21-feet, 30-feet, 10-rounds each distance; 21-rounds of the 30-rounds fired have to land inside the scoring zone).





Since the pseudo-qualification turned out okay, I decided to have some fun and I switched over to 130-grain standard pressure FMJ loads and then rolled a fresh target out to 70-feet.




Wow, that kinda sucked.  At 70-feet my first shot was "on paper, in the pink," but just barely (it was not inside the scoring zone, so it counts as a miss).  I decided to roll the target back out to 70-feet and try it again.



Double suck; same thing, I scored another miss.  No doubt about it, 70-feet is far beyond my level of competence with this revolver.  Don't get me wrong, in a quality machine-rest the S&W 442 is probably capable of putting all shots inside the 10-ring of the target at this distance, but my handgun skills are not anywhere near up to that task.





Sooooooo I ran the target to 50-feet and finished off the remaining ammo as fast as I could load and fire.   Heh, a quarter century ago a target 10-feet downrange with holes sprayed all over like that was as good as I could score with the airweight.   With practice, maybe by the time I am 200-years-old ...


Thank you 5 Star Firearms for having Monday as Senior Citizen Rangetime Discount Day!  Your team is always polite, friendly, and professional; your facility is just downright outstanding.  You are a treasure to Lake County, Illinois.





8 comments:

  1. Zowie! Fifteen rounds of standard pressure .38s through a 442 and my hand will be aching.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey there Comrade. Thanks for stopping in!

    Yeah, I really over did it; three fingers on my right hand are still numb all the way to my aching wrist. I was going to try for some practice with the 638 airweight bodyguard next week but I think I am through practicing with alloy revolvers until after the beginning of the new year.

    ReplyDelete
  3. nice shooting there, partner! Nice gun too!

    ReplyDelete
  4. El Fisho my friend! My gosh it is good to hear from you. You were getting fires near your area when the hurricane was flooding everything south.

    Be well!


    Zack

    ReplyDelete
  5. In my experience, 130 gn standard 38's hit much differently than combat rounds. They are very useful for sight alignment and trigger control. Try a group at 35' then correct for 70. If you had bigger paper your 70' target might have looked good.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks for that insight, Punzdeleon. I appreciate you stopping by!

    ReplyDelete
  7. FYI - getting "adult content" warning when I link to your page today. Never happened before. I guess Google is really clamping down on folks who like the 2nd Amendment.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Thanks Zendo Deb. I set that flag, Google is innocent for a change. If people think this is a porn site maybe it will generate more traffic ;)

    ReplyDelete

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