It can be hard to find the perfect gift for someone. It can be harder if they’re into shooting and you’re not – harder still if you don’t have a firearms licence and can’t legally purchase the things they would like. However, there are a few go-to things you can consider, and they won’t break the bank either.
Things made out of ammo that aren’t ammo
Shooters like things that go bang. However, the next best things might be something that looks like it goes bang. However, not all mementos are created equal. Ask any golfer, and they’ll tell you every year they get terrible golf-club or golf-ball shaped items to bury in a draw somewhere. Every now and then they get something that’s actually kind of cool. It’s pretty similar for hunters.
It’s hard to find a cooler bottle opener than this .50 cal case from Gunworks.
A barbecue lighter shaped like a shotgun may not get someone’s juices flowing, but a bottle opener made out of a .50 cal. case with a 750 gr A-MAX projectile seated in it might just get the right reaction. Yeah – 750 grains – that’s four to five times the average .308 projectile weight. My wife and I got one for my father-in-law last Christmas – and I liked it so much I got myself one too. The brass is obviously softer than bottle caps and will mark after use, but hey, it looks so freakin cool. You can get them from Gunworks in Christchurch, and because it’s not live ammo it can be sent anywhere. They have other options too.
Another cool ammo-looking option can be cuff links. These can be done poorly or very well, so be selective. The imitation 12-gauge cuff links my wife got me are not only well made, but look pretty damn good too.
A magazine subscription
If you’re significant other or best friend has a hunting magazine lying around but they don’t have a subscription to it, that could be a great option. Look for the subscription page and photocopy or scan it, or find the magazine’s website. It’ll be pretty obvious if you tear out the page…
Make sure to take a picture of the product code so you can find what you need at the store.
While everything and anything can be found on the internet, gun magazines are a great way for shooters to enhance their knowledge of local shooting spots, new equipment or competition results.
Reloading supplies
Well, you can’t buy ammunition for your partner if you don’t have a licence, but if they reload, you can buy them everything they need to make their own. You’ll still need to have ID, as primers and powder are explosives.
How do you know what to get? Go over to their shooting bench and see what’s running low. Make sure to take a picture of the item or the product code to show the guys at the gun store. Also, make sure to shop around. When you’re spending near a hundred bucks on projectiles or a box of primers, looking at different websites or stores can save you around 10 per cent.
Prvi Partizan ammo has been on the market for years – decades even – but has only just started to make an impact in New Zealand. Or so you thought. Abbreviated to PPU, Prvi Partizan as we know it today has been around since the 1940s, although the company traces its roots back to the late 1920s and has had a few different names as wars and politics have shaped Europe.
My Serbian friend tells me it’s pronounced “pr-ah-vi”, not “privvy” as most people sound it out. It translates roughly to “first partisan” and gets its name from the long and thing rifles produced for partisan forces by the factory in earlier years.
War – what is it good for?
Well, most of the sporting arms and ammunition we enjoy today share their history with their military counterparts. A tonne of the most popular hunting and sporting cartridges today are military cartridges from the past 100 years or more, including:
7.62×51 NATO (.308)
5.56×45 NATO (.223)
.300 AAC Blackout
7.62×39
7.62x54R
6.5×55
7.5×55
7.92×57 Mauser
30-06
.303
.338 LM
.50 BMG
The price of PPU makes it hard not to stock up.
Not to mention the endless array of pistol ammunition too. Of course the search for bigger, better and boom-ier things has led to a surge in development in the cartridge market today, much of which is driven by shooters who demand a high level of accuracy. Ammunition that used to only be available to wildcatters for varminting or bench rest shooting is now common place in the USA and is making its way over to New Zealand as well. Rimfire is also growing in leaps and bounds with the .17 WSM making waves in the shooting community.
But what about those stalwarts of scrub hunting and cheap and cheerful plinking? The cut down .303 bush guns and the semi-auto fun-makers in 7.62×39? Well, PPU is your knight in shining armour. For those that love shooting their military calibre rifles without breaking the bank, the ammunition produced by Prvi Partizan is worth your consideration.
On the plus side
While you might think Prvi hasn’t been in the New Zealand market for a while, it actually has. If you’ve shot Highland ammo, you’ve shot PPU. It’s the brand they’ve been using down here. In terms of military cartridges, Highland hasn’t been the cheapest, but it’s a step up from the dirty steel-cased stuff from Russia. It’s certainly better than putting corrosive ammo through your firearms, especially if you’re not that thorough with your cleaning.
Annealing marks on .303 and 7.62×39 PPU factory rounds.
Prvi Partizan ammunition is brass cased and generally considered to be good brass for reloading. Many Swedish Mauser fans rate the 6.5×55 PPU brass behind Norma and Lapua, but ahead of the American-made stuff. In terms of how soft or long-lasting it is, I can’t personally say. I’m on my second round of firing with this lot of brass and haven’t seen anything untoward yet, but we have a ways to go before anything should be cropping up. When I do get my brass into the higher firing counts I’ll post again to let you know, but considering I have over 140 cases for 6.5×55 alone, I doubt that will be any time too soon.
Considering how good the brass is, it’s certainly worth the price. This is especially the case with calibres like the .303 where you might only have a few options, all of which are more expensive. Not only do you get an acceptable level of accuracy out of it, but you have (I’m guessing) between 6 and 10 more reloads out of them – if not more.
What is the cost? I’ve seen the blue boxes cropping up in a few stores around the country and they’ve ranged in price from $31 to $36 for big rounds like the .303 and 6.5×55. The 7.62×39, which I’ve bought for a reloading experiment, runs at around $30, but if you go to the right Hunting & Fishing, you can pick it up for $25. Most stores will give you a bulk discount if you buy a few packets anyway.
How accurate is it? Well, how long is a piece of string? How accurate a particular round is will be determined by many contributing factors, not least of which are shooter skill and the particular firearm in question. The picture below shows PPU 139gr FMJ 6.5×55 three shot test groups, one is about 1.5 MOA and the other is 2.6 MOA. These are shot from my cut-down 20.5″ barrelled Husky M38. The other target, for comparison, is another reasonably priced brand, Sellier & Bellot 140gr SP, at 2.4 MOA.
PPU 139 gr FMJ and S&B 140 gr SP
This is not bad, considering many are happy to get 3 or 4 MOA groups with milsurp rifles and cheap ammo. However, you don’t get many people bragging about S&B brass for reloading. The picture below shows the S&B group with an unfired round for reference. Bearing in mind that the orange circle is about the size of a kill zone on a deer, this is very reasonable accuracy. If these groups were zeroed in, every shot would be a clean kill.
S&B 2.4 MOA group with unfired 6.5×55 round for comparison.
The negatives with PPU
Well, no one on the range is going to look at your ammo tin on the range and think your other car is a Porsche. But, if you don’t mind that, there’s not much to gripe about with Prvi Partizan. So far I have only shot .303, 7.62×39 and 6.5×55 in PPU and each has performed better than I would expect budget ammo to. I also find it to be quite clean, generally speaking.
However, if you’re wanting superb accuracy without hand loading your own ammo, this may not be the ammo for you. I would suggest trying it – your rifle may love it – but you may be better off paying one and a half or two times the price to get match-grade ammo.
0.64 MOA group shot off a bi-pod with PPU brass, Federal Match primers, 142 gr SMK HPBT projectiles and 34.7 grains of AR 2208.
There may also be variations in weight of brass and even wall thickness or hardness. This is pure, untested speculation. The only reason I say this could be possible is that the low price indicates that the machinery that produces this brass may not be as thoroughly regulated or maintained as those operated by Hornady or Lapua. The staff may not be as well compensated. But who knows?
What you may wish to do is individually weigh up the clean and empty brass out of a box or two, and see what the variation is between cases. Some spread is to be expected, but too much could have an effect on reloading. You could also see how much water each case holds to determine case-wall thickness and internal capacity. Anyway, I’ve been managing to get smaller than 1 MOA groups out of this brass, so I’m not complaining.
Overall, I think it is well worth the purchase. The accuracy is good enough for hunting ammo if you get the soft point variety, and there’s certainly a place for it in the safe if you just want plinking ammunition or a source of cheap brass.
There are a lot of guys who go out hunting or shooting to escape everyday life, and for some this means domestic bliss too. And fair enough. Everybody needs some downtime – a hobby or pursuit where they can unwind. However, there are also distinct advantages to shooting with your significant other, whether you’re a man or woman. And I said shooting with. Not shooting.
Learn new skills
I go out shooting with my wife a fair bit. And since she has taken up shooting sports we have tried out several clubs and different guns, and we’ve both tried things we wouldn’t have otherwise. We’ve also both found different things that we are good at.
Where I like to technically analyse every part of my shoot, from my reloaded ammo to the wind dope and projectile weight, my wife is very good at reactionary shooting – such as trap shooting. Which, if I’m honest, I’m hopeless at. With a bit of practice, I’m sure I could get the hang of it, but it’s not for me.
Establish yourselves
Shooting is a great way to bond as a couple. I’m not about to give relationship advice on my firearms blog, but suffice it to say that picking up a hobby and spending time together certainly doesn’t hurt when it comes to getting to know each other a bit better.
My wife shooting her .22 at the NZDA Auckland 100 metre range.
Become competitive
Whether you like to compete against yourself, each other or other participants, shooting sports are competitive. And the great part is, you don’t need to be particularly athletic or gifted to be moderately competitive at a club level.
This is a great way to enjoy the thrill of and success of competition, and will enhance your enjoyment of your shooting. Get out and try local competitions and learn more about the kind of shooting you like. You’ll also meet some great people who have plenty of advice to give.
Spend more money
Having a buddy on the spotting scope or putting up targets is another advantage.
Let’s be honest, every time you try and justify the cost of some new rifle part or reloading accessory – the last one you’ll ever need, promise! – it doesn’t go down too well. I know people you hide their hobby expenditure from their partner, using cash jobs to pay for ammo and new toys.
If your husband or wife is just as into their shooting as you are, it’s easier for them to understand why that new shooting rest or a higher magnification scope is actually necessary.
Share the load
If you’re out hunting or setting up targets on the range, it’s great to have a buddy around to help lug things about or give their opinion when necessary. If you’re shooting partner is your spouse, well, you’ve pretty much always got someone you can count on to help you on the spotting scope or skinning a deer.
It’s not for everybody, but for some, taking your spouse to the range or teaching them how to reload could be a great way to enhance your enjoyment of the sport you love.
It’s an unfortunate fact of life for reloaders – at some point, you’ll need to pull bullets and start again. For me,this happened recently when I made a mistake with my mechanical scale while reloading for 6.5×55. I was tossing up between a press mounted bullet pulling die and a ‘hammer type’ inertia puller, when my mind was made up for me.
As often happens when you’re at your local gun store, you see something that you’ve been meaning to get for ages. For me, it was a bullet puller (as well as some dies, a cleaning rod, solvent, shell holders and more, but hey…). My initial leaning towards an inertia bullet puller was (typically) the cost saving. Most hammers are able to handle a huge variety of calibres, while a bullet-pulling die requires a collet for each calibre you’re pulling.
When I saw the Lyman Magnum Inertia Bullet Puller under the glass counter, the decision was made. Most of the impact-type pullers I’d seen did not cater for larger rounds like .416 Rigby or .338 Lapua Magnum, or even Winchester WSMs or Remington Ultra Mags. According to the packaging – the Lyman does! While I didn’t need to pull a big game magnum round any time soon, I liked the idea that I could if I really wanted to.
Putting it to the test
The Lyman Magnum Inertia Bullet Puller has all the instructions you need on the packaging.
Well, how did it work? Simply and easily. I did make a simple mistake, which I’d be remiss not to share. I didn’t want to mark the plastic of my brand-new-hammer-looking-thing, so I started rapping it on a piece of timber. No dice. Then on a laminate bench. Damn… That bench top now has a massive bulge in it from being hammered into oblivion with no bullet-pulling success.
Resigned to the fact that I had made a dud purchase, I gave it a few quick raps on the concrete floor, and lo-and-behold – success!
The long and short of it
Using the Lyman bullet puller is extremely easy. It covers just about every calibre you can think of and is a cinch to use. You simply select one of the two collets, depending on the calibre you are dealing with. You slip the loaded round into the collet so the rounded edge is facing the primer end. It will sit nicely in the extractor groove.
The next step is to put the loaded round in the body of the hammer, while the collet keeps it suspended. Screw in the retaining cap and give it a few good whacks on some concrete or something to separate your ammunition into powder, projectile and primed case. I found the end cap could come a bit loose, which may require tightening after a couple blows – not a big deal really.
The instructions are on the packaging, including the size of collet you want for various calibres, so the whole process really is super easy.
I don’t like pouring powder back into the container once it’s been loaded for a while. No particular reason, I just don’t. I prefer to know the powder I’m using is 100% what it’s supposed to be when I’m loading fresh rounds. So, for that reason, powder from pulled rounds gets put straight into the hopper and used for plinking ammo. Or, if I have another jar of powder that is almost empty, I’ll put it in there and use fresh powder from a new bottle for my target loads.
My freshly pulled SMK ready for reloading.
The bullet itself is obviously reusable. The primed brass is too – unless, you are taking your round apart because of an issue with the primer. Now, do not try and decap an unfired primer. I shouldn’t need to explain this, but it’s basically crushing the primer from the anvil end – which will make it go bang. Not fun for your decapping pin. Not fun for you. The best way to get a primer out so you can reuse the brass is to fire the round in your rifle. You can simply load the primed case into your gun and pull the trigger (outdoors, with the muzzle pointed a safe direction – i.e. the same way you would treat it if it were a normal round). Now you can decap.
What you shouldn’t do with an inertia bullet puller
A pulled bullet resting in powder.
Lyman recommends on the packaging to not use the product without safety glasses. There’s not much danger in it, but you can guarantee that if anything is ever going to go wrong, it will be the one time you’re not wearing protective gear. So, as with your regular reloading (because you’re working with explosive components), chuck on some safety glasses.
You should never try and pull bullets from rimfire ammunition. It will go bang. You will regret it.
You shouldn’t expect perfect bullets if you’re using projectiles with plastic tips. Kerry from thebloke.co.nz tells how his Nosler Ballistic Tips were damaged when using this exact same puller. Bear in mind, when a bullet is moving at supersonic speeds, there is a cushion of air in front of the projectile, which means slight deformities aren’t the end of the world. This is why hollow points aren’t less accurate than FMJs. They are often more accurate because of the weight distribution.
The collet sits in the extractor groove, holding the round in place.
That’s the theory behind Sierra Matchkings anyway, and it seems to be working well so far. So, while I wound’t mind if my lead- or plastic-tipped rounds got a bit of a crumple in them, I wouldn’t use them for target loads. Repeatability leads to accuracy. I would use rounds like this for hunting at normal ranges or general plinking or practice – they’ll still do their job and expand on game.
If you are concerned about the condition of the your match rounds or long-distance projectiles, a press-mounted bullet puller might be what you’re after. However, I have used the Lyman puller for SMKs, and it’s worked out just fine, with no damage to the projectile tip that I can see.
Firearm maintenance is different for everybody. For some it’s a sacred ritual after every trip to the range or field, and for others it’s a chore that’s completed as quickly as possible. Either way, the products we use play a big part. I’ve always liked Hoppes No. 9. To be fair it’s not the best cleaner on the market, but it works – and has done so for over a century.
Development of Hoppes Bore Cleaner
However, according to the Hoppes, it’s this very legacy that has resulted in the new synthetic blend. I say new, but it’s been around for a couple years now. Compared to 110 years – it’s still fairly new I guess. While the original No. 9 was developed to deal with the corrosive nature of the, then, new smokeless powders on the market and used by the military. The new synthetic blend is claimed to be an advancement with the modern firearm in mind.
Hoppes’ website says that the new blend is safe on the materials used in modern guns – and let’s be honest, things have changed in the manufacture of firearms. The manufacturer also states that it is biodegradable and non-flamable – not what you’d expect from your average gun cleaner. It’s nice to know that not everything in your garage is harmful to your health and the environment – so that’s a plus. It even smells the same – and you know you love the smell of old No. 9.
Superior penetration is another claim made by Hoppes, and this is something that you should get excited about. I’m one of those gun owners that likes to run a wet patch through before storing firearms, and a dry patch through when taking them out – given time to work in the bore, you’d be surprised at how much more fouling will come out. So I really appreciate the fact that the new blend is thicker than the old one.
New and improved
The Synthetic Blend says so on the label – so you won’t get confused.
The higher viscosity of the new blend means it’s more cloying – it clings to the inside of your barrel better. A patch will still clean it out, but what I’m talking about is the ability of the cleaner to work it’s way into the grooves and stay there. You’ll notice when you wet a patch that your cleaner on your fingertips is thicker and stays there if not wipe off, whereas you’d barely notice the old No. 9 and it would evaporate or dry fairly quickly. You may also notice reside when you retract your cleaning rod – more proof that the cleaner sticks where you put it.
I do like Hoppes, and will continue to use the new synthetic blend. I’ll have to do another test against some other bore cleaners in the future, but in the meantime, this is one I’ll stick with.
Smith & Wesson is well known for their popular sporting rifles and innovative firearm designs. They also make many hunting and shooting accessories, including the SW990 knife. It’s a tactical-style knife at a CB price-point, what’s not to love? Here’s my review of this offering from S&W.
The purpose of the knife
As long as you buy this knife for the purpose for which it was designed, you should be happy. This is not your main skinning knife or an 18th birthday present – it’s a functional backup knife with some pretty cool features.
Firstly, this knife comes in two designs. There’s the drop point blade in a bead-blasted, stainless finish. There’s also the modified Tanto-style, which has more of a tactical look, and a black oxide finish. The blade itself is 440C stainless steel. This type of stainless steel is very common in knife-making and features a very high carbon content and corrosion resistance.
It’s a full-tang design, which means optimal strength. The blade and zytel handle are both skeletonised, which may be to reduce weight, etc, but realistically I think is just because it looks cool. The thumb ramp and finger guard are both notched for better grip. The overall length of the knife is 170 mm, with a 75 mm blade. Including the sheath, the length comes to 195 mm – it’s a pretty compact unit.
This knife comes with a plastic sheath that is meant to be hung around the neck or attached to a backpack. My particular knife didn’t come with the ball chain I see advertised on other sites, but I didn’t pay much for it, so I can’t really complain. The sheath has two small holes to loop the chain through so that you can attach it to your pack, or as mentioned before, hang it from your neck.
The nearly indestructible plastic sheath also features an emergency whistle, which is a great thing to have if you’re hunting or climbing and the darkness or weather rolls in quicker than expected. The sheath also has a very positive lock, keeping the knife in place, even when it’s hanging upside down.
Although designed and marketed by S&W, the knife is produced in China. Worried about quality? Well, there’s not much that could go wrong with this simple, no-frills design. The only negative thing I have to say about this cheap and well-made knife is that it is not as sharp as I would have expected. Of course, this is easily remedied with a bit of sharpening – which is not unusual with a new knife.
Overall, for the $10.50 it cost me on Trademe, plus the $5 overnight courier to my work, I’m very pleased with this knife, and it will be going on my backpack before the next time I head out.
If you’d like to know where you can get one of these (aside from a quick Google search), leave a comment and I’ll give you the name of the Trademe trader I bought mine off – he (or she) seems to have plenty more.
