If John Moses Browning’s Model handgun of 1911 is perhaps now an icon, would it be OK to have more than one? Does Sterling Archer own a turtleneck? Of course!
We give you the reasons why.
Read the rest in my column at Springfield Forum.com
OK, saw this and I assumed at first that it was a modified VSS with a chopped barrel…
….But I cant see a magazine well and the receiver goes too far back in relation to the grip…
What is this thing!?!?
Update, 2/15/14, 0000: Its the SR-2 Veresk (СР-2 Вереск, Russian for “Heather”). A neat little room broom that holds 30-rounds of 9x21mm Gyurza armor piercing in a 14.4-inch long platform with the stock folded and can rip them out at 900 rpms.
In Russia, the Heather rips you….
992 Panavia Tornado twin-engine fighter bombers were produced from 1979-1998. These sexy beasts are in service with the German Air Force (Luftwaffe), German Navy (Marineflieger) until 2005, Italian Air Force (Aeronautica Militare), Royal Air Force, and the Royal Saudi Air Force. They have had the opportunity to drop it like it was hot in the Bosnian War, Kosovo War, the Iraq War, Afghanistan and Libya in the past two decades, becoming the most successful European-designed and built military aircraft since the end of WWII. (Well, besides the Mirage)
Each year gun makers try to introduce something new to keep their customers coming back for more. Many of these new guns are like incoming meteors in the sky, blazing across the horizon and attracting attention but soon disappearing and never heard from again. However, this year’s new SIG .45, the P227 seems to be much more than a piece of bright rock.
SIG, the Swiss based armaments firm that is today famous for its pistols, got into the handgun biz in the 1940s. They made the Swiss Army’s Model SP47/8 pistol just after World War 2. This gun, sold famously overseas as the SIG P210, is one of the most classic 9mm pistols in history. It was only replaced by a more modern double-action pistol, the Model P75 in the 1970s. This gun, sold overseas as the SIG P220, incorporated a locked breech short-recoil action with a fast and effective take down to make a pistol that was both reliable and easy to master. The P220 however was a single-stack magazine design. To garner more military and law enforcement sales with a higher capacity, the design was stretched in the early 1980s to make the P226 series pistol.
Able to carry a 15-shot 9mm magazine (or 13-shot in its later .40S&W half-brother); the P-226 became a fast favorite with operators of all sizes and backgrounds across the world. It was this gun, modified with a push-button mag release over its original heel-release, that would have won the US Army pistol trials in 1985 had its cost have been more on par with the Beretta Model 92. With a more flexible budget, elite units like the US Navy Seals adopted the P226 and have depended on it for years. The only gripe that users have ever complained about is that the gun just didn’t come in .45ACP.
That is, until 2013.
Read the rest in my column at Universtiy of Guns
“WAR GAMES DESTIN: Fighters, bombers, soldiers and noise coming Thursday
EGLIN AFB — Residents may experience noise when the 96th Operations Group conducts boat operations in Choctawhatchee Bay and the Gulf of Mexico Feb. 13 and again Feb. 18-21. The operations are part of the 53rd Wing’s Weapon System Evaluation Program, or WSEP. Fighter aircraft will release munitions in the morning around 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. about 20 nautical miles out in the Gulf.
In the afternoon around 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. approximately 30 boats will be used by A-10s and F-15s as visual targets; no
weapons or ammunition will be involved in the testing.
The boats will transverse between the Mid-Bay Bridge and the Highway 331 Bridge or 5 to 20 miles South of Destin in the Gulf of Mexico.
Please be advised the 30 boat operators will be dressed in various military uniforms and white costumes.
They will carry simulated, rubber rifles, painted in high visible colors which will be kept out of view when transiting to/from the
mission area (i.e. passing under bridges, in/through harbors). Some boats will have mock-up, fake deck guns and rocket launcher tubes.
The test will be conducted within a cordoned range safety corridor, notices to mariners will be issued prior to the missions, and
flyers will be handed out at the local marina.”
Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.
– Christopher Eger
Warship Wednesday Feb 12, the Big Mass
(click to embiggen)
Here we see the war veteran USS Massachusetts fitting out at the New York Navy Yard, 1904, USS Indiana (BB-01), her sister, is in the background. The second official US battleship, the Massachusetts had an interesting life including service against the Spanish, Germans, and a few stops in between before finally taking a beating from the Army.
Note the LOW freeboard…
Built by William Cramp & Sons Ship & Engine Building Co. in Philadelphia at a cost of $3-million, she and her sisters Indiana and Oregon were the young nations first all-steel seagoing battleships. Of course this term was relative as the ships could hardly take to sea due an extremely low free-board that threatened to swap them in heavy sea states.
Ordered in 1890, she was laid down on 25 June 1891 and commissioned 10 June 1896, her construction drawn out almost six years which is evident to the new type of ship that she was. Just 350-feet long, she would be considered a small frigate today except for the fact that she was a massive 11,500-tons when fully loaded. This was because the ship was crammed with 4 double ended Scotch boilers, two vertical inverted triple expansion reciprocating steam engines, a dozen 13-inch and 8-inch guns, forty smaller cannon and five torpedo tubes.
This was all clad in a total of up-to 18-inches of Harveyized steel and conventional nickel-steel armor, she was crewed by some 400+ officers and men.
The men in the late 1890s, were darlings of the media and some of their pictures remain in the Library of Congress, showing an interesting aspect of the ordinary lives of bluejackets more than a century ago.
bluejackets on BB-2 getting some officially sanctioned boxing in
According to the history of the ship, “To the men who served on her she was more than just a battleship. The men polished her brass fittings and cleaned her wooden deck because she was their home and their protector. They proudly sailed the seas knowing that they were aboard one of the most powerful and beautiful ships on Earth. But these men did not always have it easy, they had to constantly feed the coal burners to keep the ship powered, clean the guns and ammunition and then check and recheck them to maintain battle-readiness.
U.S.S. Massachusetts, fire room 1897 note the chalk on the boiler hatches
“They lived in small quarters, sailed through rough seas and were away from daily comforts. Yet throughout these difficult tasks and times, recreation was encouraged. The Navy learned long ago that it was important to keep up the men’s spirits in the face of such demanding times. Before retiring to their hammocks for the evening, the men were sometimes allowed to purchase small amounts of beer. They also formed a football team and held boxing matches to help relieve tensions aboard, and on holidays special dinners were cooked for those not lucky enough to be at home with family. Overall, those who lived, worked and died in her service know that Massachusetts was a fine ship”
Marine guards c1897. White gloves and spiked Prussian style helmets were standard for the Army too in many units at this time.
BB-2 sailors in summer whites
Inside one of her turrets. Note the old school Donald Ducks
Capable of steaming at up-to 16-knots, she was fast for her time.
When war broke out in 1898 with Spain, her beautiful white and buff paint scheme switched to haze grey and she went off to the beat of the drums, joining the Flying Squadron under Commodore Winfield Scott Schley for the blockade of Cuba. Missing the main fleet battles due to having to be coaled, she did cause the old Spanish cruiser Reina Mercedes to scuttle and assisted with the occupation of both Puerto Rico and Cuba.
The 3000-ton largely disarmed Spanish cruiser Reina Mercedes, sunk in Santiago, Cuba 1898 after scuttling following an engagement with the USS Massachusetts. She cruiser suffered no less than three direct hits from her 13-inch shells.
Over the next several years she was something of a cursed ship, grounding herself on no less than three occasions as well as suffering explosions in her turret and boiler rooms.
By 1910 she was used only for gunnery training and annual summer midshipmen s cruises around the Eastern seaboard and Caribbean. In 1917 when WWI became very real for the US, she was pressed into service to train naval gun-crews which she did admirably. With the end of the war came the end of her usefulness and in 1919 she was simply renamed the very awe-inspiring and creative ‘Coastal Battleship No.2′ before being struck on 22 November 1920. The next year she was turned over to the Army, who desperately wanted a battleship to poke holes in
Her guns and coal stores were removed as was anything that was useful. But that’s OK, as the Army just wanted her armor intact anyway.
Scuttled in shallow water near Pensacola, she was within range of the US Army Coastal Artillery positions at Forts Pickens and Fort Barrancas as well as by mobile railway artillery and tons of ordnance were fired at the old ship through 1925 when the Army offered her back to the Navy. The Navy said thanks but no thanks and instead used her for occasional bombing runs by pilots flying out of NAS Pensacola as late as the 1950s when she finally slipped under the waves for good.
She is now owned by the state of Florida who maintains her as an artificial reef.
As such she is a very popular dive.
Specs:
Displacement: 10,288 long tons (10,453 t; 11,523 short tons)
Length: 350 ft 11 in (106.96 m)
Beam: 69 ft 3 in (21.11 m)
Draft: 27 ft (8.2 m)
Propulsion:
Two vertical inverted triple expansion reciprocating steam engines
4 double ended Scotch boilers later replaced by 8 Babcock & Wilcox boilers
9,000 ihp (6.7 MW) (design)
10,400 ihp (7.8 MW) (trial)
Speed:
15 kn (28 km/h; 17 mph) (design)
16.2 kn (30.0 km/h; 18.6 mph) (trial)
Range: 4,900 nmi (9,100 km; 5,600 mi)
Complement: 473 officers and men
Armament:
4 × 13″/35 gun (2×2)
8 × 8″/35 gun (4×2)
4 × 6″/40 gun removed 1908
12 × 3″/50 gun added 1910
20 × 6-pounders
6 × 1 pounder guns
5 × Whitehead torpedo tubes
Armor: Harveyized steel
Belt: 18–8.5 in (460–220 mm)
13″ turrets: 15 in (380 mm)
Hull: 5 in (130 mm)
Conventional nickel-steel
Tower: 10 in (250 mm)
8″ turrets: 6 in (150 mm)
Deck: 3 in (76 mm)
If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO), Publishers of Warship International
They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find http://www.warship.org/
The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.
Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.
I’m a member, so should you be!
A petition started by Todd Ryan of Lafayette, Tennessee would ask the Honorable Ray Mabus, current SECNAV, to name a future carrier ‘Forrestal‘ is circulating. It reads:
“The name “Forrestal” is distinctly recognized by any sailor in the US Navy. After attempts to have her preserved as a museum failed, the Navy decided to sell her to the ship recyclers. For the 134 sailors that lost their lives on 29 July, 1967, and countless other reasons, we ask that a new aircraft carrier be designated “Forrestal” to pay homage to the first Secretary of Defense and the worlds first super carrier and first purpose built angle deck carrier.”
Maybus, the former Mississippi governor and current appointment to the post of the 75th SECNAV is an avoid democrat, has passed on a series of what are considered ‘left leaning’ ship names including that of gun violence victim Gabby Gifford, civil rights icon Medgar Evers, and labor activist Cesar Chavez to the Naval List, Forrestal himself was a life-long democrat, which may prove key to the nomination. A former naval aviator in WWI, he was later the publicist for the Democratic Party committee in Dutchess County, New York– with FDR as a neighbor.
I cant find a picture of him smiling anywhere….
He served Undersecretary of the Navy from 1940-44 then as the 47th United States Secretary of the Navy under Roosevelt and Truman from 1944-1947 then became the 1st Secretary of Defense. In all three of those roles he was a force in the background for naval aviation and during his tenure created the largest carrier force ever seen before or since. His headstone in Arlington reads first, “Lieutenant, USNRF, WWI” on its preamble.
The world’s first super-carrier was named after Forrestal only a few years after his untimely death.
Commissioned 1 October 1955, at 81,101 tons full load the USS Forrestal (CVA-59) was the largest warship in the world and would remain so until later super-carriers grew ever larger. Over the next forty years of service she would serve as a lynchpin of the US Navy in the Cold War, proved it was possible to land a C-130 on a carrier (and take off again), survived a horrible fire off the coast of Vietnam in 1967, held the line in the Med in the 1970s and 80s, was the largest shop to sail up the Mississippi river, and trained legions of sailors over the course of an amazing 21 deployments.
Decommissioned Sept 11th, 1993 in a fit of military drawdown she was sold for scrap last year after sitting in mothballs for the past twenty years.
In respect for both the man, and the ship, the name Forrestal should be restored to the US Naval List.
Todd is a former crew member of the USS Forrestal (1988-1991), and told me “We feel that it is only right to name a new carrier Forrestal being as she has played a major role in the designs of carriers since her launch. We might not get her a new carrier, but her name will live on forever in our hearts..”
Sign the petition here. I did.
Primary Weapons Systems, Inc. (PWS) of Boise Idaho has been in the high-performance AR biz for long enough to have some serious street cred. They are best known for their top shelf MK1 and MK2 series rifles and uppers in addition to their Triad series of flash suppressing compensators. Well PWS has now taken to making an AR-style pistol.
And its piston driven.
Wait, what?
Read the rest in my column at University of Guns
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico essentially legalized the country’s growing “self-defense” groups Monday, while also announcing that security forces had captured one of the four top leaders of the Knights Templar drug cartel, which the vigilante groups have been fighting for the last year.
The government said it had reached an agreement with vigilante leaders to incorporate the armed civilian groups into old and largely forgotten quasi-military units called the Rural Defense Corps. Vigilante groups estimate their numbers at 20,000 men
under arms.
The twin announcements may help the administration of President Enrique Pena Nieto find a way out of an embarrassing situation in the western state of Michoacan, where vigilantes began rising up last February against the Knights Templar reign of terror and extortion after police and troops failed to stop the abuses.
“The self-defense forces will become institutionalized, when they are integrated into the Rural Defense Corps,” the Interior Department said in a statement. Police and soldiers already largely tolerate, and in some cases even work with, the vigilantes, many of whom are armed with assault rifles that civilians are not allowed to carry… (More in the AP story here)
I’m a KC fan myself, but Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill’s deserves some press. You see his old lady Lauren recently rented a Nissan Rogue from Rent A Car then returned it two hours later as she apparently wasn’t feeling it.
The next driver called attention to it and the gun was handed over to the local LEO and later retrieved by the Tannerhills. Tannerhills AR is nicely tricked out with an EOTech reactive sight, Magpul furniture including a sweet AFG2 Angled Forend Grip, and a modular swift flip magnifier of unknown make.
He has good tastes.