Dusty Devil Dale

The short-tall thing has come up a number of times at our range. We have a mock-up western town with fixed windows, doors, and walls. A year ago, after a near accident, we went through the entire range, lowering window sills to accommodate short folks loading DBL shotguns, raising window tops so that tall folks with back laminectomies could shoot without painfully bending over, and raising doors to prevent tall folks hats from getting knocked off and heads bruised. Setting out of targets also needs to consider short and tall people. I'm a kind of short guy at 5'9". I've included a photo of a "Procedure Trap" that recently caught me, costing me a "P". (It probably should have been a No Call, due to obvious target interference.) Mine was the shot in the top right corner of the lower, front target. I was shooting the upper (rear) target. This is a good example of why space for a clean miss is needed. A tall person would see a very different, separated-target picture. Usually we review stage set-ups for clean miss space around plates, prior to a match. This one got past us.

This works pretty well with SS pins (at least for. 38 and shorter cases.) Take apart an old computer hard drive and recover the incredibly strong neodymium magnet inside it. Or just buy a large (1.5") neodymium magnet. After THOROUGHLY drying the cleaned cases, spread them out on an aluminum cookie sheet. Pass the magnet very closely over the cases in some regimented pattern. Any shell case with a pin inside will move. Tap its mouth with the magnet and the pin will jump out to the magnet. Or arrange the cases mouth up, and pass the magnet very closely over them. The pins will jump out to the magnet. I usually do this only as final clean-up after passing the cases through the separator, which gets rid of 90% or more of the pins. Alternatively, put the magnet into the separator and tumble it with the cases. Eventually all the pins end up adhering to the magnet. But this can be quite time consuming. Any way you do it is going to take time and patience.

Doesn't the bore and chamber accumulate leading? Or do you also routinely scour the bore? My (albeit tight bore) rifle requires considerable scouring with a bronze brush and solvent after every day's shooting. Even then, it takes about five or six cleaning patches to come free of lead flakes.

Why not just clean out the goo? That seems way less complicated than trying to modify the shape of the lifter or front lever surface (as a kitchen table gunsmith) while trying to keep the action properly timed.

Your point above raises a side-bar question about gun cleaning. It reads like it is an uncommon thing to disassemble these firearms. Am I misreading? In my own case, after every day of shooting, I typically remove the side plates and disassemble (where needed), clean and re-lubricate the receiver contact surfaces, bolt, extractors, carrier (all surfaces), lifter and lifter pocket, toggles, and grease the leaf spring articulation surfaces on the lever and lifter. After every full match, I usually remove the stock and clean/lubricate the mainspring and trigger/safety parts. I've taken some friendly kidding in the past about "cleaning guns with a screwdriver". So am I alone in taking 73 rifle routine cleaning this far? Seeing how much powder residue makes it into the receiver area suggested to me that not only reliability, but also speed would rely on clearing out all that crud. Anyone agree or disagree? Am I overworking the screws, springs and other parts by all the disassembly and reassembly? What level of cleaning does everyone else do? (not wanting to hijack FM's thread here, perhaps this side-bar should have been a separate track)

I continually ponder why, when I was young, I shot thousands of rounds of trap, probably that many more rounds with target pistols, hunting guns, and some big caliber rifles like. 416 Rigby or .375 H&H mag. I never wore any ear protection, in fact, I never even thought about it until about 20 years ago. I never experienced displeasure. But now, without my ears in, the report of even a small caliber revolver or shotgun seems numbing and unbearable. Is that a natural feature of the aging process, or is ammunition much, much louder now. (I'm asking seriously).

Thanks. Found it at last.

Has anybody found the posted results from last week's California State Match?

I've personally had a 1/2" x1/4" deep cut to my nose, directly between my eyes, from pistol splatter. I was standing at my gun cart, well behind the loading table. So now I wear wrap around PC safety glasses, regardless of their non-cowboy look. When spotters, TO or others are getting regular excessive splatter, it probably means a change is needed in the target hangers, target surfaces, target angles, or target distances.

On a monthly match, the solution is for the shooter to be given the benefit of the doubt, call it clean and move on. Failing that, rather than make a big ruckus, the shooter ought to just go home, look at the score sheet afterwards, mentally subtracts the 5 seconds and figure that was his/her real rank position. No big deal. On a bigger match, TO should look at the targets, seriously discuss them with the spotters, and give the shooter, in this case, the clear benefit of the doubt (especially if at least one other spotter saw it clean too) - - but the TO has to make the ultimate call - - and the TO maybe also needs to either wake up the spotters, or replace them. If this went to an appeal, and the spotters refused to change their call, even after seeing the evidence on the target plates, the probable outcome would be a "clean" call anyway, based on the empirical evidence. So why not save the posse delays and disruption and call it clean to begin with. Regarding equity with other shooters, the TO has to make the call for each shooter, discussing the evidence with spotters in each particular case. Mistakes always will get made, even by very good match officials. Short of video tracking, there is no way around that--its just a part of our game.

But do watch behind you for hungry bears.

Agree. I'm definitely an "aren't", as my stage times and "P"s often show. It is great to be able to speak our minds among friends, with no one feeling need to be disrespectful.

Again, with due respect, I have to stick to my original comment. I've shot on posses that had Loading and/or Unloading Officers doing their own C&B loading, working on their own or others' guns, or doing other personal tasks at both the loading and unloading tables. They honestly thought they were multi-tasking just fine (about like people think they are doing just fine to text and drive). And several times, I've seen that multi-tasking attempt result in shooters getting SDQs on the next stage, simply because too much was going on at the UL Table, and a pistol didn't get completely unloaded. I'm sure folks will pile on here and tell me how ridiculous I am being. And that's fine. I am really not intending this as personal criticizm of anybody. Rather, it is an assumed OK widespread practice that I am questioning. I strongly agree with the SHB that the Loading and Unloading Officer jobs require close and undistracted attention. That's really all I have to say on this sidebar issue to the original topic.

With due respect, I feel need to express some disagreement here. I'm not sure I would be comfortable sharing a posse with somebody who is distracted as an Unloading Officer. In particular, C&B loading requires careful attention due to potential for very serious errors. So while you're loading, who is making sure others guns are being properly unloaded? I know that when I am an Unloading Officer, it pretty much takes all of my attention to make absolutely sure that shooters guns get safely and fully unloaded, and nobody gets an SDQ, or worse yet, has a serious accident because of my inattention. Keep in mind that a long gun left partially unloaded usually ends up in somebody's gun cart, often with its muzzle pointed directly at them when changing between stages. I realize actions are supposed to be open, but we've all probably seen cases where actions were inadvertently closed. I know I have. IMHO, Loading and unloading officers have serious jobs. They have plenty to do, and usually all of the space at the tables is pretty well needed for their intended purpose. I would discourage you from seeing and using that as a loading opportunity. Same is true for Loading Officers. In addition, I think I may have an issue with a Tupperware container of BP sitting open on the same table where people are ejecting hot cartridge cases, and could be smoking. Let's all think about safety first.

BTW, I think you meant .90 and .115 INCHES. .155 thousandths is very, very, very small.