Got any . . . don't know about guns stories!

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Prof Young

New member
Lots of well-meaning people have guns that they just don't know anything about.

True story of a man who flew for a missionary organization in Africa for most of his adult life. He had a "gun" in the plane "just in case." When he retired he planned to dispose of the gun but thought he should at least shoot it once. Yes, for years he had a "just in case" gun that he had never shot. Turns out that the gun was a small 22 cal revolver and the only ammo he had for it were shorts. Really. Anyway he loaded the gun for the first time, took aim at a stump, and . . . nothing. The humidity over the years had ruined the ammo. Whole box of duds.

And I mean no disrespect to the man. He lead a life of true service to humanity. Just never had been taught anything about guns.

Got any stories to share?

Life is good.
Prof Young
 
A friend of mine bought a .223 WSSM when it was the new "King of Speed" and marketing was full-bore. It was his first centerfire rifle, his first personal firearm purchase, the first real 'hot rod' that he had any experience with.

A few weeks later, he asked for advice. It wasn't shooting well any more.
I found this odd, as he had only taken the thing to the range twice. That meant that it shot well once. And then poorly the next time.

Long story short, we eventually used the jet engine bore scope at work to take a peak inside. The throat (and beyond!) was absolutely TOAST. It looked like an Apollo program heat shield, after re-entry.

Some questioning finally got him to admit that he only shot the 40 gr Winchester factory load in it. A little more questioning finally revealed that my genius friend had fired over 300 rounds of that 40 gr 4,200+ fps factory load in less than 2 hours.


-- I must note that the Winchester 40 gr factory load is the one that "dethroned" .220 Swift as the king of speed, but then got neutered to lower velocity than Winchester's own .220 Swift load, due to barrel burning.
Additional note: Like nearly all other Hornady Superformance loads, the same thing happened to the original .204 Ruger load that made that cartridge the 'new king'. Hornady still advertises the same muzzle velocity, but the ammunition doesn't reach it, even in rifles that did so with early production runs.--
 
A friend bought a shotgun but never bothered to learn how to use it. I offered to take him shooting but he was always too busy to make time to learn how to use it. He got himself in a stressful situation one night confronting a robber who had broken into a building on his property ordering him to the ground at gun point. The guy refused to comply and under stress he didn't know how to load the gun so he closed on the guy and struck him in the face with the barrel. The guy went to the ground and said, "owe, why'd you hit me", then the guy got up and ran away into the night..... My friend was lucky the guy didn't shoot him. Learn how to use your gun. Otherwise you should just have a club! It would be more effective.
 
FrankenMauser, I have a similar story to yours.

My father and I were shooting at the local range with a gentleman that was running tons of ammo through his Winchester 70. After striking up a conversation with him we found out that it was a hot loaded 220 swift, and he was on his third barrel in 5 years. He claimed that the past two ones were junk as he only got top accuracy for 1000 rounds then they started to group poorly.

After watching him put 50+ rounds through the Winchester in 20 minutes my dad turned to me and said" looks like he is planning on buying a 4th barrel for that rifle "

It was a shame to see him ruin a new barrel on a beautiful rifle.
 
My club was having some engineering trouble with the fans at the 50’ indoor range and it was the dead of winter in a cold snap so I went to the gun shop range close to my house. They’re expensive but good guys so I splurged, even though their farthest distance is 15 yards.

I put an NRA 50 foot target down range at 15 yards and went about my quest to determine what sort of ammo it liked best. I shoot one handed. I was slowly putting 18 shots of Aguila standard velocity on to the paper.

The fellas in the other lanes were blazing away at FBI body targets at five to seven yards and I was glad I had plugs and muffs. They were having fun, but they seemed to be able to generally hold a group inside a manhole cover sized circle at 5 yards. Lots of big Glocks.

One my third cylinder I paused, ejected my .22 brass and placed my pistol muzzle down range with loading gate open. It was quiet around me. A nice fella tapped me on the shoulder. He and his buddy.

“New gun?” He asked.
“Yeah, it’s cute, isn’t it?”
“We’re about to leave, you should try shooting at a target. We can give you one” the nice guy says.
“You should use two hands, too” his buddy offers.
“But I am shooting at a target” I said with some confusion, flipping the switch and reeling in my nra target.

The men seemed surprised, they had not seen my target the size of a piece of a magazine at 15 yards when all the boys were shooting at refrigerators at 5 yards.

I turned to tug my target off the clips. It was not great but they were at least all on the paper, grouping left.

By the time I turned back to continue the conversation, all I could see was the door closing.

I felt bad. I wasn’t trying to show off and it’s a cowboy gun not a bullseye pistol and I used to be pretty good but nothing like the Camp Perry guys.. But some fellas have never seen what a pistol can do at distance with practice and really taking time to aim.
 
My neighbor, a somewhat, sort of prepper type, has 17 unfired rifles in his safe.

He bought/traded for them for home protection, most are AR15/AR10 style rifles, some new, some used. Some have sights or optics, some have nothing.

He has ammo for most of them, but even the ones he has ammo for, he has personally never fired.

Has had some of them for close to a decade, some for a couple months.

Dosent hunt, dosent target shoot. Pulls them out of the safe to show them off, then sticks them back in, about half still have the factory tags and stickers on.

It blows my mind. When I get a new gun, I can’t wait to go try it out. Have taken a day off work just cause I didn’t want to wait till the weekend to shoot a new one.
 
You mean like the first time I fire a 12Ga shotgun as a 12 year old that was too big for me so my uncle said lean back against the tree (back of the same shoulder the gun was on) to stabilize the gun, then pull the trigger and ...........

I never did that again. (And didn't listen to that uncle much either after that)
 
Went shooting with some friends and one person had their thumb pressed against the back of the slide on a striker fired semiauto pistol.
I was able to stop them before they fired it.
 
Just this week had a guy bring in a Mossberg 500 in 410 that had been cut off and a brake added to make 18". Said he could only get one round into it. I suspected it had a plug, so I took it into the shop to test it. Shoved 5 410s into it! Took it back to him and told him it takes 5 rounds, and he wanted me to show him how. I took my dummies and loaded them into the magazine from the bottom just like in the movies. He had a funny look on his face, then said that's not how he was trying to load them. I didn't even ask, just gave the gun back to him. He said he might call me with more questions. I told him to youtube it.
 
TXAZ said:
You mean like the first time I fire a 12Ga shotgun as a 12 year old that was too big for me so my uncle said lean back against the tree (back of the same shoulder the gun was on) to stabilize the gun, then pull the trigger and ...........

I never did that again. (And didn't listen to that uncle much either after that)
Click to expand...

I had to twist around to get a turkey in my sights and did that once accidentally with a 2 oz 12 ga load. Won't do that again.
 
Years ago I got a phone call at the shop from a customer asking about rifle scopes.

HIM: What does it mean if a rifle scope is a 4x-32?

ME: That means it's a four power scope with a 32 mm front lens.

HIM: What does 4 power mean?

ME: That means if your target is 100 yards away, it appears to be only 25 yards away.

HIM: Does the bullet still have to go the whole 100 yards?

Long pause.

ME: Yes, sir, the bullet still has to go the entire 100 yards. The scope merely makes the target look like it's only 25 yards away. It does not actually warp the space-time continuum.

I don't know how I managed to hang up without laughing out loud.
 
Buddy came over asking for guidance. He wanted to buy his first handgun. I pulled out a variety for him to try before he dropped $. He got the webbing of his thumb behind the slide and took a pretty bloody reminder for it. I should've known when he asked how much accuracy you gain by holding a Glock sideways

Another buddy asking the same bought his 2 small boys over. He'd bought them a pellet rifle to learn basics on. The stock was too big so they'd taken to throwing the stock over the top of their shoulder to look through the scope. It was cute. They wanted to shoot a pistol so I took out a S&W .22 semi auto, loaded it up and handed it to Dad. Looking downrange nothing was happening. Looked back to the young boy who was holding the slide of that pistil about an inch from his mouth so he could see the sights better with his finger on the trigger. I couldn't scream STOOOPP fast or loud enough. Dad has a degree in Physics, but didn't know how a semi auto gun works.

Whenever I get a request to show a beginner how to shoot, I'm always reminded of these 2 instances. Even the stone cold obvious basics are lost on those who've never been shown. Movies are a horrible teacher.
 
natman said:
Years ago I got a phone call at the shop from a customer asking about rifle scopes.

HIM: What does it mean if a rifle scope is a 4x-32?

ME: That means it's a four power scope with a 32 mm front lens.

HIM: What does 4 power mean?

ME: That means if your target is 100 yards away, it appears to be only 25 yards away.

HIM: Does the bullet still have to go the whole 100 yards?

Long pause.

ME: Yes, sir, the bullet still has to go the entire 100 yards. The scope merely makes the target look like it's only 25 yards away. It does not actually warp the space-time continuum.

I don't know how I managed to hang up without laughing out loud.
Click to expand...
That was hilarious.

We have a WINNER!!!
 
Nearly forgot this one. Roughly 15/20 years ago I took my sister into a gun shop. Flint gun shop out of Angola IN. Older gent has run it for decades now. Don't know if its true but I've been told he has an 8th grade education. Nothing fancy, but nice selection, decent prices. Regardless, he's sustained a gun shop on his own for years, so props for that.

Anyhoo, I'm in there with my sister helping her pick out a handgun. I'm recommending a .38 snub, maybe a G23 for her needs. The owner pipes in show should just get a .22 revolver for home defense and CC. I look up completely puzzled and shocked thinking he's been around longer than myself, lets hear him out. Maybe its a 'girl' thing.

Nope, his reasoning was that a .22 long rifle had the same muzzle velocity as a .45 ACP and a slow 9mm. Nothing more was needed that a .22 CCI mini mag for home defense. PERIOD. Same muzzle velocity, thats all that mattered.

I was unable to pick my jaw up to respond. All I could think about was how many other uninformed people had he spewed this to? I'm usually a quick witted person, but this one took the cake. I had to catch my breath. The stupidity was next level.

So, I asked him about muzzle energy, grain weight, bullet design, etc. Nope. Didn't matter. My sister didn't know what was going on, only that I was getting worked up. So, I asked the guy if he'd rather get hit in the face with a ping pong ball at 100'/second or a bowling ball traveling at 100'/second. "well the ping pong ball". And that my friend is stored energy, or bullet weight. He still wouldn't have any of it and doubled down, anything more than .22 long rifle was a waste.

We walked out after I told him the FBI/CIA/LE, and military's around the world would be interested to know how they've wasted all that money on more capable guns and he should write a book.
 
Shortly after I bought my Delta Elite 10mm, circa 1999, I ran 100 rounds through it, cleaned it, and put it away.
The next time I took it to the range, I loaded, aimed, pulled the trigger, and *click*.
Racked that round out, tried again, same result.
Scrutinizing the ejected rounds, I saw no firing pin marks on the primers.
The firing pin had broken on the last shot fired in the previous range session.

My Delta is strictly a fun gun, but if it were a carry gun . . .
 
Every once in a while I run into a yahoo who says a snub nosed revolver is inaccurate. You know, "It's just a belly gun and won't hit anything past ten feet." kind of rhetoric. I found a nice way to shut them up. I keep a $100 bill in my wallet. I don't say aword, just set up one of those po;ice type man shaped targets up and one hundred yards, pull out that $100 bill and set it on the bench with a weight so the wind doesn't blow it away and, sat, "That says I can hit the target out there. Put up or shut up." I've gotten a few takers but I still have that $100 bill. Oh yeah, the gun is an S&W M60, 1 7/8" barrel.
Paul B.
 
Paul B. said:
Every once in a while I run into a yahoo who says a snub nosed revolver is inaccurate. You know, "It's just a belly gun and won't hit anything past ten feet." kind of rhetoric. I found a nice way to shut them up. I keep a $100 bill in my wallet. I don't say aword, just set up one of those po;ice type man shaped targets up and one hundred yards, pull out that $100 bill and set it on the bench with a weight so the wind doesn't blow it away and, sat, "That says I can hit the target out there. Put up or shut up." I've gotten a few takers but I still have that $100 bill. Oh yeah, the gun is an S&W M60, 1 7/8" barrel.
Paul B.
Click to expand...
I thought the same thing the first couple of times I shot a snub nose revolver. Then bought a couple of better snub nose revolvers and learned how to shoot them. I find them about accurate as any other small handgun but regardless of the handgun, someone 100 yards away would be pretty safe from me. I found that 357 Magnum out of a snub nose revolver gets your attention.
 
You have to do a lot of shooting with that Model 60 to be able to consistently hit even a man-sized target out 100 yards. I've done a lot of shooting with a round-butt model 60 and can say that, taking my time shooting single-action I can hit standard round pistol targets in the black up to maybe 30-40 yards or so.
 
Number 11 is GOLD. :)

I was told by a gun counter guy that it didn’t matter what gun you bought because they were ALL made in the same factory. Glocks, AKs, Savages, SIGs, Berettas etc. didn’t matter because what they don’t tell you is they were ALL produced in the same factory. :rolleyes::cool:

Since I know better then to have these conversations I just sighed and said “No Sh@&, really?” Did my business and got the heck out of crazy town.

To this day I imagine this mythical place where all guns are made called Webemakindemalldorf. I also imagine a magical place where every round of ammo is produced called Ammostan. :)
 
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