Shooting Glasses

Thus far I've come across three types of shooting glasses that accommodate prescription (Rx) inserts.

1. Radians StrikeForce and StrikeForce II (8600 & 8650), which use the RX-85 inserts
2. Revision Bullet Ant, Desert Locust, and Sawfly, which use the Rx carrier
3. ESS Profile NVG and Advancer V-12, which have an available Rx carrier

Radians is the cheap solution, but the Rx insert sits such that the top of the insert is slightly above the outer lenses, which is pretty uncool.  Revision or ESS are much more expensive, but appear to be much more rugged.

Charisma Man

Charisma Man is an amusing, if not chauvinistic, comic about a Canadian dork who goes to Japan and manages to get girls—except when his arch-nemesis Western Woman shows up and ruins the effect of his "special charisma".

Some people have commented that the perception of Japanese woman going ga-ga for Caucasian men is racist.  However, I've seen it in action enough that I consider it a fair assessment.  I've found it completely annoying when a girl is hanging off the arm of a total dweeb, way out of her league, who wouldn't be able to get a girl back home, which is probably what drove the authors to write the comic.

I would make the point, too, that some Caucasian women, particularly American women, have gotten too big for their britches, e.g. excessively liberated, and they could use a dose of reality.  Perhaps if enough eligible bachelors find mates elsewhere, Western Woman will have a change of tune.

Japanese women's discretion has improved in recent years due to the popularity of American TV shows in Japan; at least they have a cultural frame of reference, however exaggerated.

Full-Auto Battery-Launching Airgun

This is bad-ass.  This would be a cool project, except I'm more interested in launching smaller, more practical projectiles!

NSNs

I've seen NSNs on listings of military surplus (both used and new-old stock) for a while, and determined that only the items that actually had a NSN shown were the genuine article and not repro.  There's a site ArmyProperty.com that has a lookup of NSNs to goods, which is pretty handy.

As far as gas/water cans go, olive-drab.com has some detail on how they went from metal to plastic.

The "War" on "Terror"

Excellent.

There is no War on Terror. If there was, the whole nation would be told to take up arms. Everybody would be armed, even on aircraft. Inexpensive AK47s would be stored in every closet, much like arms are stored in homes all over Switzerland because the Swiss government has nothing to fear from its populace. There is only a war against our freedom in the name of a created threat that doesn't exist. We have been duped into surrendering our liberty in the false name of security by a government that sends us out into the "War On Terror" unarmed because we cannot be trusted with guns. The most basic of all rights is the right of self defense against criminal attacks. A great equalizer between the weak and the strong, guns in the hands of women could reduce assaults upon them by stronger male attackers by 80%. How can it be said that women have equal rights if they cannot carry, yet Dianne Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush all hide behind guns for their protection because they're much more important than our wives, sisters and daughters? Again, the only 'war' is on our freedoms.  (Jack Duggan, "The Bear That's There")

CCW AAR & Lessons Learned

One gunblog had a link to an after-action report on Arfcom of a shootout between a concealed-carry type and a bad guy.  There are two lessons to be learned from this: 1) Carry a weapon without a grip safety, as you might not be able to operate it with your hand(s) shot, and 2) Either carry a weapon without a manual safety, or leave it off, since the bad guy might hear you switching off the lever.  #1 kind of disqualifies 1911s and XDs from being a good CCW gun.  Maybe they're ok for competition, but there are features that compromise their usefulness.

Build Your Own First Aid Kit

Yet another prepper site, BePrepared.com.  The build your own first aid kit page is a neat idea; too bad they're low on interesting items like NPA/OPA and coagulant.

Mall Ninjas

Apparently the term came from forum posts on GlockTalk and later HK91 from a seriously delusional individual.  They're archived on LonelyMachines, as they should be because they're truly legend.

Load Calculation

In lieu of a real structural engineering calculation, from various reading online, here's how I gather it's done.  In my application, I need to calculate the minimum number of jack/trimmer studs to support a 24 ft roof truss span with a 2 ft overhang to get a clear opening of 6 ft.  The load factors are the dead load of the roof weight itself and the projected roof snow load.  Live load is irrelevant since the snow load will exceed the live load requirements.  One concern is that I don't know what kind of wood was used in the construction of the house, so I need to determine that as well as the relative strength with respect to the wood specified in the tables.

The Southern Pine Council has some nice resources to calculate spans and such, of course using southern pine for framing.  The Headers and Beams document contains information to calculate the header needed for a given span, as well as the allowable roof load given a header and number of trimmers.  The latter is what I was looking for, and the illustration for the load calculation is quite helpful.  (This is the ref207.pdf file, numbered page 27, which is 29 of 36 in the PDF.)

eHow has an article on the calculation of roof snow load based on ground snow load and the pitch and area of the roof.  The article makes reference to a Cornell University snow load calculator, but doesn't provide a link.  A search turned up a course page with a calculator.  (Perhaps I should buy the textbook, Structural Elements for Architects and Builders, by Jonathan Ochshorn.)

The other concern is wind load, since we get a lot of wind on the hill.  The IRC has something to say about that, which I have yet to research.

Of course I'd feel more comfortable having a professional do the calculation; the conundrum being, am I neglecting my due diligence if I don't?

Sleeping Bags

So I was looking at the sleeping bags that FDG carries, as I've been considering what I ought to add to my prep kit.  There's the military ECW gear that costs some serious coin.  FDG has Wiggy's bags.  I was intrigued because supposedly the military uses them in some applications, but there're some forum posts that totally trash their performance.  Recommended in place of Wiggy's were Western Mountaineering or Kifaru.  Finding good gear without buying a bunch of not-so-good gear is difficult.

Apparently the buzzword in insulation is "continuous (filament) fiber", which doesn't require baffles or attachment to the bag shell.

Silhouette

Interesting device to "print" out cut stencils.  The wife might find this useful, so it could be a neat Christmas present for her, albeit a bit of a spendy one.

Seven Steps

I've heard repeated mention of the "seven step" method to sales.  At length, I finally looked it up, but there appear to be varying definitions.  From one in particular that's most straightforward, the steps are:

1. Greeting
2. Establishing a relationship with the customer
3. Qualifying their needs
4. Presentation, demonstration, and information
5. Transforming interest to desire
6. Overcoming objections
7. Closing the sale

Now I know I'm a lousy salesman, but those steps could be useful for "selling" other things like Appleseed.

Shooting Jackets

Fred's is now out of the XL shooting jackets, and apparently the manufacturer has gone belly-up.  A search turned up a few other choices, such as Creedmore Sports and Champion's Choice.  CMP also sells one, but it's blue.  Military Logistics has cloth jackets for reasonably cheap; the details are scarce and the country of origin isn't indicated.

OTs-38 Silent Revolver

I thought the Nagant M1895 revolver was the only one capable of using a sound suppressor.  Apparently there's also the OTs-38, which has an integral suppressor.  It fires through the bottom cylinder, like the Mateba and Rhino.  The cartridge is 7.62x42, and appears (from the photo) similar in shape to the 7.62x38R cartridge except longer and without a rim.  I'd love to get my hands on one of these guns!

PPPoE

When putting an integrated DSL modem into bridge mode (RFC 1483), one loses the capability to access the web configuration of the modem, because the router doesn't pass LAN packets out onto its WAN port.  The usual option is to take down the Net connection by unplugging the modem from the router's WAN port and plugging it into a LAN port.  Apparently there are a few other options, but none of them are really satisfactory in that they either cause additional latency (through use of a switch between the modem and the router) or route instability (via wacky topology).  If using a Linux-based router, there appears to be a way to force the system to pass the reserved address out on the WAN port:

#!/bin/sh

#IP Address of the modem, must be a different network from your local LAN.
#If you use 192.168.x.x for LAN then use 10.0.0.x for modem, etc (basically, pick a free IANA reserved range)
#Obviously you need to configure the actual DSL modem to use the address you select in MODEM_IP.
MODEM_IP="10.0.0.1"

#IP address that will be bound to vlan1, usually safe to just increment MODEM_IP by 1.
VLAN_IP="10.0.0.2"

#Setup network interface and firewall rules.
ifconfig vlan1 $VLAN_IP netmask 255.255.255.0
iptables -A forwarding_rule -d $MODEM_IP -j ACCEPT
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -d $MODEM_IP -j MASQUERADE

Saiga Conversion

It's possible to modify a Saiga rifle to an AK-47esque pistol-grip configuration.  Apparently a different modification is necessary to make the rifle compatible with standard AK-47 magazines.

Thoughts on Building a Vault

This turned up in my framing search, which I thought was amusing.  Arfcom has the most out-there posts.

Framing Code

I've been looking for guidelines on framing of a 6' rough opening.  A couple contractors I've talked with seem to think it's ok to widen a 5' 10" rough opening by either removing one trimmer/jack stud 2x4 on either side, and replacing it with a 1x4 board.  According to the International Residential Code (IRC 2009), for a ground snow load of 50 psf, which is specified by Minnesota State Building Code, regardless of the building width, at least two jack studs are required for each end.

The free online IRC isn't searchable, so the code finder from This Old House is useful.

This is problematic.  Perhaps I should consult a structural engineer regarding the engineering margin.

Tree Headstones

While looking for more information on Occupy Wall Street's origins, I ended up at AdBusters' site.  There was an issue with a cover of a guy shoving two guns through the side of his face and out his mouth, so I clicked on it, and there was an article entitled "The Holy Shit", so of course I had to see what that was about.  The article itself is an idealistic piece, but the interesting tidbit was the concept of a tree headstone.  That is, when you die, you're buried in a biodegradable coffin a couple feet below the surface with a tree planted over the coffin.  The tree would then grow from the decomposition of the body and so a bit of the essence of the deceased would continue to exist.

I didn't particularly like the idea of being cremated or being preserved, so this might be how I'll ask to go.

Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs died today.  I liked his company's products, and although I didn't care for his politics, his philosophy, as quoted in the press, is something that I can appreciate.  On television:

When you're young, you look at television and think, There's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That's a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It's the truth.

On work:

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

On death:

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Eastern White Pine

So my silver maple decided to break in a strong wind, and I'm considering replacing it with an Eastern White Pine.  Apparently the needles have more vitamin C than lemons?!  Anyway, prices for larger-than-seedling trees on one site are $140 for an 8 ft, or $220 for a 10 ft.  Not too bad.  I have a feeling that the expense will be in removing the old tree and stump and planting the new tree.

5.56 Propellants

While searching for information on WC867 and WC872, an article came up regarding a Vietnam-era controversy regarding propellants for the 5.56x45mm cartridge in the U.S. military.  Sounds like a sordid mess, but it's good history to know.

Ammunition Manufacturing Business

In case anyone's thinking about starting an ammunition manufacturing business, I found a useful bit of info on THR regarding the requirements:

You will need
to comply with local zoning for a firearms and manufacturing business
Type 06 FFL $30 for 3 years
ITAR registration* for $2250 per year

*ITAR is the International Trade in Arms Regulations and is the US State Department's jurisdiction (ie the ATF can't and doesn't enforce it directly). Basically in a nutshell everything firearms related including ammunition and components is a "defensive article" and the manufacturers must be register and pay that stupid fee. I have found an exception and will share it, but will not hold anyone's hand during the process or offer any additional advice beyond what's posted here.

If you are a manufacturer of "whatever" and intend on solely selling it to
Domestic civilains
Domestic dealers or distributors or wholesalers
Domestic civilian law enforcement agencies (ie cops)

you can submit a Commodity Jurisdiction Request to the US State Department requesting determination of whether your products are "defensive articles" having a military application. This must be a letter from scratch (no form letter is provided or "out there") detailing what you make, whom you sell to, and whom the end user is. You will need to submit drawings, blueprints, techinical documents, etc. If they determine you are not manufacturing for any military or paramilitary force, they will not make you pay ITAR.

That's it for the licensing BS.

Now the business aspect.

Marketing is fun and a PITA all at the same time. Buy the book "Guerrilla Marketing" and read it cover to cover. Not the gospel but gives a different perspective than "buy a magazine ad and wait for the phone to ring" mentality of marketing. The book explains it all but here's my perspective:

Marketing isn't about getting a sale. It's about setting up a client relationship. The last thing you want is a customer. A customer comes in, buys some ****, and leaves. That's not good. You want a client. You want long term, loyal, repeat business. Marketing is showing them your product/service, informing them of the value, and showing how you will be there to support them after the sale.

OK, now insurance. If you think you can form a fancy corporation and be protected you are dead wrong and I just saved you millions of dollars. GET LIABILITY INSURANCE!!! It's a couple thousand dollars a year (as in less than $200 per month) for a basic $1 million policy. If $2,000 a year is too much, STOP. You are not cut out for this business. Operating without liability insurance is simply retarded for any business. That's settled. Get insured or go flip burgers.

Equipment. Have to go blue here. Dillon is your brand. Learn it, love it, live it. For the type of loading you are doing, you will need volume but not primer pocket swaging. Get at least one Dillon 650 press with case feeder for each press. Get one set up for small primer and large primer. Then change out the other stuff for caliber changes. This will give you 800-1000 rounds per hour production. That's a good start. If you can't load at least 500,000 rounds annually, it will be a hard living, even as a part time retirement income source.

Then there's the FET or Federal Excise Tax (I don't care if it helps wildlife crap, it's retarded and a burden to my business and you end up paying the tax anyway because me and every other manufacturer rolls it into the cost of the ammunition). Tax is 11% on the sale price of ammunition you load. Exceptions are
Local (non-federal) law enforcement agencies
Department of Defense including the Coast Guard
Reloading customer brass

Hit up www.ttb.gov for more info. Basically if you buy brass, load it, and sell it as ammo, FET is due. If you sell to law enforcement other than federal or DOD, no tax due. If you reload customer brass and you ship it as ammo (no substituting your brass for their brass or replacing worn brass with your brass to make even count), no tax due. Tax on ammunition is 11%.

That's about it. The rest is on your own just like I learned the hard way. Give 'em hell!

The excise tax kind of impacts profit, and the ITAR registration and insurance definitely eliminates anyone thinking of a small-time operation.

Berkey Filter Problems

Apparently the Big Berkey black filters had manufacturing problems from the end of 2010 to mid-2011, as noted on APN and SB.  That sucks for people who thought they'd buy the Berkey system and put it away for SHTF: right when they need it, it might be unusable!

I'm glad I tried mine, which I got in April before the price hike, because one of the filters busted.  However, I have the additional problem that I have several units that I gave to family members for put-away purposes, so I need to go through the hassle of having them check.  Or perhaps I should just supply a tube of silicone caulk, although somehow I doubt that's food safe....

Cases for .50s

I saw an ad in VHP magazine for SKB's new .50-cal case, model ATA 50, so I had to look up the price.  Ouch.  $450 is a lot of money for a large piece of plastic.  Pelican's large case, model 1770, is similarly priced.  For that much, the Americase Aluma-Trans aluminum-shell case, model AT-50CalW, seems like a better buy.

PBF

The Perry Bible Fellowship has to be the most disturbing webcomic I've yet to come across.  Given that statement, it's probably a good thing that it isn't posted regularly.

Brass Case Weight

The approximate weights of fired cartridge brass, from a post on THR:

• 9mm, 59.46gr/ea, 117.7cases/#, 8.5#/1000
• 38spl, 68.06gr/ea, 102.8cases/#, 9.7#/1000
• 40s&w, 70.1gr/ea, 99.9cases/#, 10#/1000
• .357mag, 78.3gr/ea, 89.4cases/#, 11.2#/1000
• .45acp, 89.58gr/ea, 78.1cases/#, 12.8#/1000
• .223, 95.28gr/ea , 73.5cases/#, 13.6#/1000
• .44mag, 114.38gr/ea, 61.2cases/#, 16.3#/1000
• 50bmg, 865.26gr/ea, 8.1cases/#, 123.5#/1000

All weights are uncleaned fired cases with the primer remaining.

Obama's Halo

A while back, I saw seen an index photo of a bunch of press shots of Obama with a halo.  I haven't been able to find the same picture recently, but I did find a page showing a bunch of the original images.  No media bias, none whatsoever.

Have they forgotten that Obama said himself that he'd be a one-term president if he didn't turn the economy around in three years?  We'll see, eh?

Practice Rifle Grenades

Searching for some practice rifle grenades for an M4 (even though they usually have the M203 launcher), I found a forum post on Arfcom that linked to a set on Numrich.  Unfortunately they're out of stock at the moment, but it'd definitely be neat to play with, given enough room to shoot them (a few hundred yards, at least).

The description from the poster:

Current military issue. Used by the IDF for training purposes on M16 and Galil .223 rifles. Fully-inert 14" grenades are patterned after the IMI BT/AT-44 dual-purpose rifle grenade. New set is packaged in the original wooden crate, dated 1-98, includes 6 grenade assemblies and the following repair parts: 40 plastic fins, 32 body tubes, 12 outer sleeves, 30 spacer rings, 24 locking nuts, 2 nut wrenches, 1 key wrench, 20 M16 ladder sights and 30 Galil ladder sights in 35/60/85 meter graduations (197 pieces total). Weight, 27 lbs.

Copycat KC Masterpiece BBQ Sauce

Might be worth trying:

Secret Recipe #1 for KC Masterpiece BBQ Sauce:

This copycat recipe is supposed to be a close version of the original Masterpiece BBQ sauce.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups water
• 3/4 cup light corn syrup
• 1/2 cup tomato paste
• 1/2 cup distilled white vinegar
• 3 Tbls. molasses
• 3 Tbls. brown sugar
• 1 tsp. liquid smoke
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/4 tsp. onion powder
• 1/4 tsp. black pepper
• 1/8 tsp. paprika
• 1/8 tsp. garlic powder

Directions:

1. In a saucepan over medium high heat, bring all ingredients to a boil. Be sure to stir constantly.
2. Reduce the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, and cook for about 45-60 minutes, or until the sauce thickens.

Secret recipe #2: Copycat recipe for KC Masterpiece BBQ Sauce:

I haven't tried this recipe yet, but I like that it has Agave Nectar which I use all the time now in place of sugar.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups water
• 1/2 cup agave nectar
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/2 cup tomato paste
• 1/2 cup white vinegar
• 3 teaspoons molasses
• 3 teaspoons turbinado sugar
• 1 teaspoon liquid smoke
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 1/4 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 1/8 tablespoon paprika
• 1/8 tablespoon garlic powder