BAG Day purchases and Range Report

My BAG Day purcahse was not a firearm. It is, however, a firearm accessory. So despite what the purists may say, I’m counting The Hun Bastard’s Fero Z24 scope as my BAG Day purcahse. Add that to the 1000rnds of high quality 7.62×51 and .22-250 ammo and I think I’ve done my part.

As for folks I know who don’t have to make excuses (and have posted pics):

The Reasonable Nut’s Old Man picked up this Anniversary Edition S&W Model 629

Sweet. Now he’ll have to get a lever action companion gun next year.

Jim of Smoke on the Water blog fame participated as well. And if I do say so myself, he has exceleent taste.

His BAG Day purchase

The Hun Bastard

Speaking of The Hun Bastard, yes, I made it to the range yesterday, though call it it was a comedy of errors would be putting it lightly. Among the list of forgotten items were: Targets, staplegun, any kind of ear protection. They were in my pistol shooting box from when I went to the range on Friday afternoon.

With bits of napkin stuffed in my ear canals, my junk mail as targets (because I went to the mailbox on the way to the range) and a lucky find of pushpins in the travel tool box, I made do.

Oh yeah, and I forgot the camera too. So the above pic was taken after the cleaning session. Hopefully it is better than the previous crappy one.

I tried out a new range yesterday. The Tacoma Sportsmen’s Club, which is not in Tacoma, but the Puyallup micro-burg of Fredrickson. After hitting their website for a map and hours of operation, I rolled on out. Nice enough folks, even if they shoot a bit too many clays for my appreciation.

The $6 payment for non-members isn’t bad at all and it is on an honor system with an unattended booth and envelopes going into a lockbox. The range does have a master who calls for target change breaks and keeps an eye out for safety violations (there weren’t any while I was there).

While they do a lot of skeet and trap at TSC, I was glad to see that I received no scowls when I revealed The Hun from his case. I did get a couple stares and even a “What exactly is that?”, but no one treated me as less of a shooter, as I have had happen at other ranges.

About the only thing I could complain about is the “Keep this gate closed” policy they have for the gate to the rifle & pistol ranges, but that is understandable with the Honor System thing they have going on. Also, they have a 600yd distance available, but it is only for organized matches held a couple times a year. 200yds max for daily operations (the guys taking money for the skeet range when I asked for directions didn’t even know about it). Looks like I’ll have to try out Nisqually. Also, they could take some of their excess gravel and put it on the walking path for the rifle range to keeps my feets out of the mud.

Lastly, showing up at the opening bell doesn’t help you get a bench on the weekends. I rolled in and there were 16 people waiting for 10 benches. I’m not saying there are too many shooters in the area, I’m just saying that if they would grade some of the hillside to the south side (moderate sized creek on the north side) they could double their capacity and meet the demand and quite possibly expand the profits of their rifle range business.

But that is just a quibble. TSC is, all in all, not a bad place to shoot. I’ll be back.

After about an hour wait, I got my bench and got the zero for the Hun. My German sucks and with the scope having been manufactured for Kraut soldiers, I was left to take educated guesses as to what the markings on the controls meant. After a little trial and error, the gun was sighted in.

Next, I rechecked the zero on both Barak and the .22-250. I’m glad I decided to do so because I forgot to reset my scopes to 100yds last time out and POI was hitting a bit high.

Sorry for no range pics. But Boomershoot is two weeks away and you won’t be able to get away from them then.

Lastly, I didn’t get the reorganization of the Tacoma Blogstation completed due to a need for some shut-eye (this is a weekend after all), so I will try to finish it before next weekend so as to not burn my time-off doing it then.