.950 JDJ in Action!

American Specialty Ammo posted a picture of a .950 JDJ rifle on Facebook (in which I had a passing interest), and one commenter linked to a YouTube video of the rifle actually being fired.  Talk about bad-ass!

If I could only afford one larger-than-half-inch-bore rifle, I think I'd have to take the .950 JDJ over 20 mm.  I mean, just think of the incredible amusement in having a .950-caliber (24.1 mm) firearm that's not Title II!

50shooter

Found a site that has some very interesting methods for reloading .50 BMG.

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.

Another BMG

Another .50 BMG rifle is available, from Desert Tactical Arms.  Ronnie Barrett created a monster!

Large Caliber Miscellany

So I was searching for information on loading large caliber projectiles.  Though I haven't even gotten my .50 yet, I'm already looking at larger bores....  Having found a source for 20mm Vulcan brass, I was curious about what it takes to load the monster.  That led me to a site on THR that has a bunch of links that are useful, as well as information from a guy who shoots PTRD and PTRS rifles.

The useful links:

• Reloading the .50 BMG - Good info on how it's done!
• CH4D - Reloading equipment for eccentric calibers such as 20mm Vulcan, Solothurn, and Lahti.
• The Gatling Gun - History from an Army website.
• Bartlett Reloaders - For once-fired brass.
• Pat's Reloading - .50 BMG projectiles.
• Hi-Tech Ammunition - .50 BMG projectiles.

.50 BMG Eye Candy

A forum topic on Primal Rights has some pictures of various flavors of .50 BMG rifles.

.950 JDJ

I just read about the .950 JDJ. That is one badass caliber! The trail of links that led to me finding this: was checking out the Tactilite .50BMG conversion, and the owner has a blog, upon which he posted a blurb about the 0.95. The post links to another guy's blog, which has a teaser picture and links to other source of information: a picture of the rifle, a McBros 95, and a picture of the ammo. The Guns Lot comments included text from Wikipedia that's enlightening. One guy commented that "20mm shits on that", except that the .95 is 24.1mm. Granted, the .95 bullet weighs 230g and goes 670m/s, whereas the Vulcan 20mm is 100g and goes 1030m/s, so the Vulcan has slightly higher muzzle energy.

Apparently SSK Industries has another cartridge that has a "sporting use" exemption: the 14.5mm JDJ (.585). And here I thought the .50 was the biggest cartridge that didn't require an NFA tax stamp (for a Destructive Device). Sweet!!

Edit [2012.03.11]: The 14.5mm JDJ link moved.

Bohica

Just when I was thinking about ordering a FAR-50 from Bohica Arms, I noticed that the website no longer listed Primal Rights on the front page as the official accessories store. So I found on the Primal Rights' forum that they'd had a falling out with Bohica. The thing that bugs me is that Bohica isn't shipping orders to PR even though they were already paid for. It sucks to screw one's customers over—even though they bought through PR, they were buying Bohica products.

I'd thought about getting an ALS, and right before I pulled the trigger on it, news of two kabooms showed up in the news. The way ALS isn't coming clean on the circumstances of the "safety recall" kind of rubs me the wrong way.

The one left that I'd be interested in is the Ferret-50, mostly because people are winning competitions with them. It's spendy and not very attractive, though. Or I could go ahead and try ordering the FAR-50, since at least that didn't involve a safety issue. Fuck, why do things have to be so difficult?

ALS Kaboom

A few weeks ago when I was looking into getting an ALS, I noticed the safety notice on their website that wasn't there before. Turns out that at the FCSA World Match, an ALS fired out of battery, causing serious injury to the shooter. Furthermore, it came out that this was the second incident. The first incident was not widely reported, and the shooter received much more serious injuries, namely the loss of an eye and other bodily harm.

Note to self: When shooting fifty cal, always bring a buddy—he may need to cart you to the hospital.

.50 BMG Price List

I thought I'd put together a fairly complete list of .50 uppers, but it looks like I missed a few. AR15.com has a price list that includes all available firearms chambered in .50 BMG, along with prices.

Anzio Ironworks

Now this is fucking sweet: a magazine-fed 20mm rifle from Anzio Ironworks. Yeah, it's a "Destructive Device"—put a suppressor on there and it's the coolest two-stamp gun out there!

They also have a .50 BMG model (actually, several), although I'm less interested since none are AR-15 upper conversions. Point being, if one just wants a .50-cal, it's better that the government not know about it, since they'd have a harder time confiscating if things came to that. With a 20mm, there's no such loophole, so one would be stuck in any event. This is a slightly cheaper alternative to a Solothurn, and since it uses M61 ammo, perhaps finding ammo would be easier.

.50-Cal Uppers for AR-15

I thought I'd linked these here before, but they don't turn up in a search, so here they are.

Several companies manufacture "uppers" for AR-15 rifles. The nice thing about AR-15 uppers is that they don't require an FFL to purchase, so even if the ATF is conducting illegal recordkeeping of firearm transactions (they're not supposed to retain that documentation except in the case of NFA items), there's no way they would know. That is, unless the manufacturer itself is reporting sales. The general idea isn't for criminal action on the owner's part (.50-cals have never been used in criminal activity), but rather that if a .50-cal ban occurred and confiscation were attempted, one wouldn't have to yield to the government's illegal actions. Just because the government makes a law doesn't mean its right. The existence of "jury nullification" is legal evidence of that.

Anyway, here are some selections:

• Advanced Long-Range Systems LLC's ALS 50 BMG: single-shot bolt-action, 33-inch barrel, 35 lbs (upper only)


• Safety Harbor Firearms' UltraMag 50: magazine-fed bolt-action, 29-inch barrel (19-in and 22-in also available), 15.5 lbs (upper only)


• Serbu's BFG-50 (Big Fucking Gun, get it?): single-shot bolt-action, 36-inch barrel (22-in and 29.5-in also available), 32 lbs (upper only)


• Bohica Arms' (as in, "bend over, here it comes again") FAR-50: single-shot bolt-action, 36-inch barrel (16-, 24-, and 30-in also available), 25.5 lbs (upper only)


• Ferret50's eponymous conversion: single-shot bolt-action, 36-inch barrel (19-in and 29-in also available), weight not listed


• Ligamec Corp.'s Ultralite50: single-shot bolt-action, 29-inch barrel (18.5-in and 22-in also available), 12.2 lbs (upper only)


• Watson's Weapons' .50 BMG Upper: no details on website (there are more details about the carrying case than about the upper itself!)


• L&G Weaponry's .50-Cal Conversion: single-shot bolt-action, no further details

.50-Cal Ranges

Finding ranges where one can shoot .50 BMG is problematic. There are at least a couple in MN:

Oakdale Gun Club
Gopher Rifle and Revolver Club

There's a range nearby that might allow .50-cal, though I have yet to find out. Byron Sportsmen and Conservation Club's website is rather meager and references several PDF files, none of which seem to be accessible.

.50-Cal Hysteria

CNN has an anti-gun article that appears to be an attempt to garner negative public opinion of firearms using the .50 BMG cartridge. I submitted a comment on the article. CNN probably won't post it, so here it is:

While I don't doubt there's a problem in Mexico, in the U.S. there is no recorded case of a .50 BMG weapon being used to commit a crime. The rifles used to fire this round are huge and not easily portable because of the heavy action, long barrel, and the need to otherwise suppress recoil. Since .50 rifles aren't a problem in the U.S., what needs to be questioned is how the guns are getting into Mexico. It's illegal for non-immigrant residents to purchase firearms in the U.S. It's also already illegal in the U.S. to move firearms across borders without declaring them to CBP, and it's probably illegal in Mexico to take firearms across the border as well (I'm not familiar with Mexican law). Someone's not enforcing laws already on the books. Maybe this is another reason to put up that border fence.

Further comments:
.50 BMG is a very expensive cartridge, costing over $4 a round for surplus. Often times surplus comes belted, and must be de-linked before being fired in a non-belt fed rifle. Unless the agents found a real Ma Deuce (Browning M2 machine gun), this statement misleads readers to thinking there was one. An M2 is even less portable than a Barrett, by the way: over 120 lbs without the ammunition!
FN's 5.7x28mm cartridge is a carbine round, not a rifle round, meaning that it's closer to the 5.56x45mm cartridge, aka .223 Remington, used in the M-16. (The M-16 is indeed a carbine, not a rifle, and is maligned at the end of the article for being too weak. That may be true, but then why does the U.S. military still issue them, and why does U.S. law enforcement still buy them? For reference, a .22LR cartridge is 5.7x15mm!) A certain type of 5.7x28mm round is considered to be armor piercing, but it is for military use only and its sale to civilians is illegal. The attraction of the Five-seveN is that it uses the same cartridge as the P90, and has 30-round capacity magazines.
If the Mexican police really captured that much ordnance from criminals, why don't they use that equipment, or use the $200M to buy better standard issue arms?

Overall, this article was very misleading, and should be considered anti-gun propaganda. When it comes to firearms-related topics, CNN is absolutely biased in the negative.

Watson's Weapons & Raufoss

For biiiiig guns, check out Watson's Weapons. Mostly .50BMG stuff. You can get armor-piercing incendiaries! Now only if one could get Raufoss Multi-Purpose rounds, some Norwegian AP ammo that apparently the Navy uses. The stuff uses RDX high-explosive, and detonates within the target after penetration. Ouch. I hear it's $30/rd. Now that'd be worth buying a 50-cal for!