Guns

Concealed Carry in Omaha

/ hsoi / 7 Comments

This trip to Omaha was my first road trip with my concealed handgun license.

Short summary: uneventful, but strange.

Resources

First, let me list the resources I used in planning:

opencarry.org – while I had no plans on open carrying, opencarry.org has a lot of useful resources, such as their maps and a Nebraska-specific forum.

handgunlaw.us – which contained a great number of legal resources, such as summary and reference of Nebraska’s laws.

concealedcarry.net – which has more legal resources, such as a reciprocity map and a trip planner.

Travel

We were driving, so I used the resources to see what laws would be like as I traveled to Omaha. In the past my drive took me through Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, then into Omaha. However, I could see Iowa could be sticky so I took a different route that went from Texas to Oklahoma to Kansas, then directly into Nebraska. Google Maps even showed that as the best route from here to there, so all worked well.

You must remember that while there are Federal laws regarding firearms, much of what you’d actually deal with would be state laws, so you needed to know your stuff. Thankfully, most of the laws for the states I was travelling through was similar enough, at least in ways that it mattered. For instance, I was only traveling through Oklahoma and Kansas so I didn’t sweat details like churches or government buildings… but could rest stops be an issue? Apparently in Oklahoma, yes, but only if you went into rest stop buildings. I spent more of my time being concerned with the details of Nebraska and Omaha specifically.

Omaha Details

Unfortunately due to gang violence in Omaha, Omaha has enacted a lot of “feel good” laws that have served to only abridge law-abiding citizens and do nothing to curb criminals. For instance, you apparently can open carry in Omaha, but you must get a permit to do so. Omaha required registration of guns. But yes, past tense.

While you can conceal carry in Omaha, a simple sign is all it takes to deny lawful carry. I’m used to Texas’s “30.06” signs, which means the signs are well-defined and without question. Nebraska has no formal sign (tho they have a suggestion), so it makes things a little less clear. Here’s a sign from the entrance to the Omaha Henry Doorly Zoo:

It’s one of the better and more clearly defined signs that I saw around town. And believe me… I saw a LOT of denial signs. It’s a shame tho because it demonstrates a great misunderstanding. The only people who will be denied and that will obey are people with CHL’s — these people have been vetted by the system, background checked, fingerprinted, educated, tested, and generally deemed by society to be good, law-abiding folks. Meantime, the criminals and gang-bangers are just going to waltz into the zoo without a care in the world. The signage stops the people who shouldn’t be stopped, and doesn’t stop the people who should.

*sigh*

But here’s one odd point.

Back in 2007 there was a shooting rampage at the Westroads Shopping Mall. If I remember correctly, Westroads was VERY anti-gun, signs all over the place denying guns, banning guns on the property, and so on. Obviously those signs did them no good, and one could argue it made for a victim-rich zone and helped to create the tragedy. I went shopping at Westroads with Wife — we even parked outside the Von Maur department store and went into the mall through the Von Maur doors. I saw no signs denying lawful concealed carry anywhere. I still don’t know what Westroad’s policy is, but it seems they aren’t willing to allow the same tragedy twice.

I also find the signs interesting from a legal vs. “normal humans” standpoint. The way the signs read, it denies concealed carry. So… could I switch to open carry and enter that establishment? Of course, in Omaha it may require their open carry permit, but say I had one. How does this all play out legally? It’s evident that if an establishment posts those signs they don’t want guns at all, but the wording is such that it implies open carry would be alright.

It’s all rather odd and I’ll just say I’m happy to live in Texas.

To Nebraska’s credit, the CHL law is still young, but I’ve watched them over the years and they are working to clarify and improve the laws. So, just have to give them time… because the wheels of the law should generally turn slowly.

So….

So to me, I’m glad I was able to continue carrying on my trip. It’d be nicer if things were simpler and more straightforward. For instance, while many driving/road laws are state-based, there is great uniformity across the states. This greatly facilitates interstate travel. Such uniformity would be welcome in laws pertaining to concealed carry and self-defense. In many respects the laws are similar, but the devil lies in the details and that’s where it’d be nice to see improvement.

I’d also like to see Omaha improve. Yes I know gang violence is a problem, but denying and abridging the law-abiding is not going to help anything. The laws are well-intended, but good intentions pave the road to Hell. Just remember that.

All in all, an uneventful trip (in this regard), and that’s a good thing.

Comp-Tac XDm 3.8 stuff

/ hsoi

I’ve been seeing more and more Springfield XD(m)‘s showing up at KR Training classes, especially that 3.8 model.

One thing people have lamented is the lack of available gear for it. Well, Comp-Tac has just released holsters and mag pouches for that gun. So, there you go folks. No more excuses to not have good gear. 🙂

Reality check – just because you legally can doesn’t necessarily mean you should

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

The following comes from Karl Rehn of KR Training.

I’ve talked with dozens of people who have firsthand experience in lethal force incidents: armed citizens, cops and military personnel, including several who were in multiple incidents.

One of the best comments on the subject came from one of them, who said that it was “like being in a car wreck.  Fast, loud, scary. When it’s over you are glad to survive it, but it’s not something you are in a hurry to experience again.”

Several of the people I’ve spoken with were involved in publicly debated incidents, and they suffered the additional stress and loss associated with getting fired and/or becoming publicly known/vilified as a result of the incident.

No one that is armed wants to imagine any outcome other than victory and exoneration, and sometimes that lack of concern over the consequences of a bad outcome leads to bad decisions….

The decision should be made based on what the worst case outcome is, not the best case.  For example, “if I do nothing, I will die.  If I do something, I still might die but my odds of dying are less than if I do nothing.”

Not “if I do nothing, I lose a TV, but if I act, I’ll have to use up all my vacation time from work going to meetings with lawyers and the grand jury, and spend my vacation money paying a lawyer, and have people on local talk radio Monday-morning quarterback my actions, and have everyone I know (neighbors, co-workers, family) forever treat me differently, and spend the rest of my life getting awkward questions about it.”  Every single person I’ve talked to that’s been in a shooting has had one or more of those post-shooting issues, even if they had no (or will admit to having no) PTSD after the incident.  You can’t wave your hand and say those things don’t matter and all that matters is what the Penal Code says.

Wilson Combat Ammo

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

So big news… Wilson Combat is making ammo.

That is awesome.

I know Bill Wilson knows his stuff when it comes to guns and ammo. I want to get my hands on some of that .308 168 grain TTSX. If it shoots good out of my .308 bolt action and/or my M1A, it’ll be my hunting ammo for sure.

But the one thing that puzzles me is why no 6.8 SPC load? I know Bill Wilson likes the 6.8 and uses it a lot for his own hog hunting. So why no 95 grain TTSX here? Probably a matter of it being a niche caliber and not worth offering in the first go-round for a new venture (i.e. nothing personal, just business decisions). Still, I’d love to see that. 🙂

Improve your snub sights

/ hsoi

A great article from Claude Werner about ways to improve the sights on your snub revolver.

The sights on snubs are pretty bad, and Claude’s article offers a wealth of suggestions on how you can improve them.

Rifle Reloading… just thinking aloud

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

I’ve been keeping up my daily ritual of reloading every morning. I did bump it up to 200 rounds a day, and that’s made a big difference. Doesn’t take much more time out of my day, but is making everything go well… twice as fast as before. I’m out there almost every morning, and at this rate I reckon I’ll be done reloading all my 9mm components by end of August or so. Then a brief stint to get all the .38 Special I have loaded up. And then… rifle loading.

Let’s go back to February 2010 and look at my long term reloading plans. I am sticking with the goal to get a lot of 9 loaded up.

The thing that’s different? Back then 6.8 SPC wasn’t in the picture, but it is now. Now that I have it, I’m not sure I’ll bother with .223 because I was wanting .223 for hunting and well… 6.8 is filling that role. However, loading for 6.8 is a LOT more expensive. And I must admit, after all the failure and problems I had before with rifle reloading, I’m a little gunshy and unsure where to go. I think the biggest thing that got me not just the frustration factor but the cost involved — those Barnes Bullets aren’t cheap.

Was it the single-stage press and inconsistency there? Was it the recipe? Was it the way the bullets were being seated or crimped? Was it just me? I don’t know. Too many factors to consider. And now, I’m going to load on the progressive press. foo.c’s zombie loads were done on his Lock-n-Load progressive press and they came out excellent, so I’m hoping for greater consistency due to that factor.

Still…. I’m not sure what I should do. Should I start loading some .223 plinking loads? I’ve got a bunch of brass and bullets (.223 55grain FMJ’s) and usable powder (e.g. Ramshot TAC). Loading them could help me shake out any process issues (resize, deprime… might even set up the single-stage to do that; brass prep (trim, clean/ream primer pockets, etc.); prime, powder, bullet; skip the crimp for now). Plus help me gain confidence in loading, after the prior fiasco. I’d have to shoot these with irons, but if I could get a group doing 0.5″ at 50 yards, that’d be bueno.

I may do that. Then after that, do some 6.8 plinking loads, because it’ll be a little cheaper and I want plinking loads anyways. Then finally move to those Barnes 95 grain TTSX bullets and make a hunting load.

Probably what I’ll do. I’m really excited about it and kinda want to get done with the handgun loads so I can get to experimenting. 🙂

On Shotguns

/ hsoi / 8 Comments

Like many (most? all?) people, I started out in the “shotgun for home defense” camp. For whatever reason, it’s the mantra firearm to utilize in that situation.

However, if you think beyond that towards the actual realm of application, plus if you do any actual work in that realm of application (e.g. a class like Defensive Long Gun), you start to see it’s not the best tool for the situation. For example, consider the longest shot you may have to take in a home defense situation. What if it’s something like 25 yards? Take a look at The Box O’ Truth #20 and notice the size of the spread at 20 yards: from 9″ to 17″. That’s a huge variance. Even at best, can you be sure to get all 8-9 pellets on target and not in an innocent person? Maybe, but maybe is of little comfort when the flag is flying. It’s due to that and many other factors that I’ve settled on an AR for home-defense. It’s the entirety of the platform that makes it a better fit for the context.

But for some reason I still had a desire for a shotgun.

Now, I still keep shotguns for home defense. Why? Easier manual of arms. It’s very simple for Wife or my kids to operate a shotgun, especially if something goes wrong (just keep pumping and shooting, and if all else fails it’s a club). Heck, it’s difficult for my young kids to operate that charging handle on an AR, but they can easily work the pump action on a youth 20 gauge shotgun. Some gun is better than no gun.

A few months ago it was maybe 10:00 PM. We heard a helicopter overhead, which isn’t usual because of medical helicopters. What became unusual was that the helicopter didn’t pass over but stayed in the area. We found a police scanner feed and listened in. Apparently the police were chasing someone and he hunkered down in a patch of woods close to my house. I went Code Orange. The reality was, he certainly could have run and wound up near or in my house. Slim chance? Yes. But better to be prepared and on guard.

What surprised me about my reaction to the situation? My gut response was to grab the 12 gauge, not my AR.

I’m not sure why.

On the one hand, I’ve been very handgun oriented lately and haven’t been practicing with my AR as much as I should. If I have been doing anything with a rifle, it’s been more along hunting or target shooting, not fighting. Monkey brain mode kicked in and brain reverted to “simple point and click interface” of the shotgun, not “OK, gotta figure out the holdover, blah blah”. While the logical part of my brain still buys into the AR for home defense, that night the shotgun just sung to me. In the end I didn’t have to pick anything up, eventually the police scanner provided no more information on the matter and the sounds of the helicopter faded. No idea what happened, doesn’t really matter.

Recently on the InSights Training Center mailing list, someone was asking about the SAIGA 12 for home defense. Now, these guys are big on the AR, but lead instructor Greg Hamilton gave the shotgun its due:

For general civil situations, the 7-8 shot, tube feed, pump shotgun is already more gun than is required to solve the situation. I’ve shot 1000s if not 10,000s of rounds though every type of shotgun over 25 years.  Just shoot pumps now. I have a nice 11-87 that I don’t use and I would like a saiga with a really short barrel but it would just be for fun, as I don’t know what else I would do with it.

The shotgun is still a great weapon especially if you are poor. For $250 you’ve got something that you can take on multiple opponents with, with confidence in the reliability of the gun and in the cartridge. A screw on rail to the forend, weaver ring, and $50 flashlight and your looking good. Throw some extra ammo on the gun someway cheap and for <$400 you are ready to rock. It won’t win any picture competitions on AR15.com but it will smoke a couple scumbags with extreme prejudice.

and that’s what it’s all about.

Granted, this doesn’t take away some inherent limitations of the platform (e.g. those 25 yard shots). But with a little investment of time, money, and ammo, you can do you best to figure it out. For instance, back in that BOT #20 you saw that different ammo provided different patterns. You must take the time to seek which ammo will work best in your gun. Furthermore, if your shotgun has different chokes, try them out and see what difference they make. I’ve tended to lean towards whatever gives you the tightest possible pattern, minimize spread. Furthermore, with some additional way to carry ammo on the shotgun (e.g. side-saddle), throw a few slugs in there.

And practice. Pick up some dummy rounds and practice loading, reloading, getting that one slug in there, and so on. Take classes if you can.

So on that front, I opted to run the Team Tactics course a couple of weeks ago with a shotgun. I just wanted to see.

On the one hand, it was just plain fun to do. 🙂  There’s something viscerally satisfying about BOOM rack BOOM rack BOOM. 🙂  Of course, reloads were slow, but you manage the best you can. Even with a shorter 18.5″ barrel, it’s still cumbersome to move and navigate with the shotgun: an AR with a 16″ barrel and collapsible stock is overall much shorter and easier to move around with. Shooting weak-side (e.g. around the left-side of a barrier) was difficult with the pump, but do-able… just a matter of training those motor skills.

In the end, I’ve softened my “anti-shotgun for defensive purposes” stance. In the end, it all comes down to you and your particular situation — there is no blanket answer. I do look forward to doing more work with the shotgun, classes if I can. Curious to study it more in this context.

Barnes VOR-TX

/ hsoi

A couple of weeks ago, Barnes Bullets announced a new line of loaded ammunition called the Barnes VOR-TX. I obviously missed the announcement, and I’m quite the fan of Barnes Bullets (even a member of their Club-X). Another page on the VOR-TX here. Apparently it will be available on August 1, 2010.

While I’m starting to lean towards 6.8 SPC for hunting, I still can’t get away from .308 Win as my go-to caliber. Barnes will be offering this VOR-TX in both 150 and 168 grain TTSX (for .308 Win). That’s what intrigues me about this round: factory ammo with a 168 grain TTSX. No one offers factory ammo with a 168 TTSX; International Cartridge Co offers 150 grain TSX and TTSX, and DoubleTap Ammunition offers a 150 grain TTSX. But again, no one does 168 grain TTSX.

I’m still not doing a lot of rifle ammo reloading, so for now I still have to look to factory ammo for my hunting rounds. I’ve been using Federal’s P308H, which is a 165 grain TSX bullet and an overall fine round. Everything I’ve taken from hogs to deer to that water buffalo was taken with that round. But again, it’s a TSX bullet.

The Tipped TSX bullet (TTSX) is the evolution of the TSX. That polymer tip improves the ballistic coefficient. A .30 caliber 168 grain TSX BT (cat# 30844) is listed as having a B.C of .404  & S.D. .253 (the 165 grain TSX is B.C. .398 & S.D. .248) (source). A .30 caliber 168 grain TTSX BT (cat# 30878) is listed with a B.C. of .470 & S.D. .253 (source). That’s a nice improvement. Of course, the reality is the distances that I’ll be hunting with this? an improved B.C. won’t have a huge impact (but every bit is welcome). So what then? Well, that polymer tip greatly aids in getting the bullet to expand. Useful that.

Granted, to use the TSX vs. the TTSX isn’t a no-brainer as there are still advantages and application situations to one over the other. Nevertheless, to see the 168 grain TTSX offered in a factory load is welcome. Who knows… I may buy a box and see how it fares. Or, if I know what’s good for me, I’ll ignore all of this and get my butt to working on 6.8 SPC hunting loads instead. That .277″ 95 grain TTSX is panning out to be “the” bullet for 6.8 SPC.