Trailrider #896

At one point, Congress mandated we switch to the metric system. In point of fact, NASA, SpaceX, et al, show velocities and distances using both metric and English. But, except for European import vehicles, there was/is too much "inertia" in our manufacturing system to change over. The cost would have been enormous!

Depending on the wound, the surgeon might have said, "Roll up your sleeve. Orderly, get me a scalpel and my saw!"

And within days many troops received orders to get ready to transit to the Pacific, to prepare for the invasion of Japan, with over a million casualties expected. Fortunately, President Truman made a different decision. Saved a lot of lives on both sides!

Years ago, when the first OMV's came out in .44-40, the first one I bought had a bunch of bad chambers. I contacted Ruger, but they stalled a bit, so I had a gunsmith fit a .44 Mangle-em cylinder to the gun. The Ruger said to send it back and they replaced the .44-40 cylinder. The magnum cylinder still worked fine, so it gave me a convertible. When SASS went to two gun scenarios, I bought a second OMV with a .44 Magnum cylinder. I happened to find a .44-40 cylinder, and had my 'smith fit that, which gave me a pair of convertibles, one with a 7-1/2" and one with a 5-1/2" barrel, which became my main guns. Now, both .44-40 cylinders had the tight throats. Of course, everyone knows that is no good, and I should have the throats reamed out to .430. Well, I left them alone! With hard-cast .430" bullets, both guns will shoot 1-3/8" 5-round groups, shooting with my elbow resting on the bench! How can that be? Apparently, the bullets swage down going through the throats, but because the dwell time is so short, the compressive stresses built up in the metal doesn't disipate in the form of heat, so the bullets re-expand into the rifling. Loads consist of 8.0 gr. Universal, which gives 950 ft/sec from the 7-1/2" barrel. From a 22" barrel rifle (Rossi M92) the MV is about 1185 ft/sec. With Universal no longer available, you could substitute Unique.

Ahhh! Now I see it!

A little boy asked his father where he came from. The father, thinking the kid was wondering about the facts of life, started to explain all about where babies come from. The boy looked at his dad and shook his head. "No, Daddy," he said, "Jack next door comes from Philadelphia. Where do I come from?"

Guess not, but I've seen a bunch of full size Atlas Snap Track, ties and all sitting at places near the BNSF/UP Joint LIne.

Most of the track work is now done by machines, especially where continuously welded track is used. Back in the day, they must have used some sort of gage to get the distance between the heads of the rails correct. I doubt if it was a giant National Model Railroad Association (NMRA) track gage, say 87.1 x that of an HO scale gage.

I would expect he wears a vest under his outside clothes. A vest apparently saved the life of the Secret Service officer. The problem with a vest is it doesn't protect you from a head shot, as witness the first attempt on Trump, which would have succeeded had he not turned his head at that moment! Not sure what practical solution would be.

If I could qualify and be trained to work the "carrier", I'd love to shoot that 35mm job with the airplane wrapped around it. I bet Custer would have loved to be able to call for an A-10 strike danger close!

Heavan forbid...the Air Force would have to change the words to our song: "Off we go into the wild green yonder, Right down into the weeds!"

The Key West Agreement needs updating with relevance to close air support! Give the A-10's and pilots and support personnel (although I doubt those troops would like having to change dress uniforms), like the Marines do. Won't happen, but it should have...a long time ago.

I have two canine critters. One is a 3-1/2 year old Cocker Spaniel. He is a dog. The other is 5-months old, and is part poodle and something else. When people ask what breed he is, I tell them he is a D-A-W-G, dawg!

The fighter Mafia will continue lurking, just as the bomber Mafia contended heavily armed bombers wouldn't need longrange fighter escorts.

I recall that in the T.V. series "The Dakotans", Jack Elam would cant his Colt's slightly sideways. But that was because he was blind in one eye!