Tag Archives: suppressors

Fun at Front Sight

Posted on by Melissa

As some of you know, I will become a parent very soon via domestic adoption. The hubby and I decided that we’d better get the trips done before our baby arrives, and one of the trips included a trip to Front Sight Firearms Training Institute. We decided to take the 4-day practical rifle course. I mainly wanted to take this course to become proficient with my AR-15, because I had very little experience with it. We flew out to Las Vegas on a Thursday. We’ve flown with guns many times, so we knew the drill. When we checked our rifles, we were escorted over to the TSA area where they x-rayed our rifle case. I could have sworn I heard one of the TSA agents mumble, “No way!” Bill (hubby) also heard this. When it came time for them to open the case, Bill told the guy, “Please don’t drool on the rifles.” At this, the TSA agent pretended to wipe the drool off his chin. When he opened the case, the agent actually giggled with delight! He couldn’t get over our awesome Magpuled out guns.
We arrived in Vegas with our 120 pounds of gear total. We stayed at the Marriott for the first few days. Front Sight is a good 45 minute drive from Las Vegas, but it’s worth staying there instead of Pahrump, since Pahrump has nothing to offer. Now granted, after spending the whole day at Front Sight in the sun training hard, when we got back to the hotel, we were not interested in doing anything except taking a shower to wash all the dust, gunpowder, and sweat off, eating something, and going to bed. But at least in Vegas you have a lot of options for food.
We were in a rifle class for returning students, which was great because everyone already knew the drills and the safety rules. We only had one STOP command on the range for the entire 4 days, and it was the instructor’s fault, not a student’s. The other students we had ranged from people like me who shoot mostly as a hobby, to full on special operators. One operator brought out his suppressed rifle. This was so cool because on the first day before we went on break for lunch, the instructor borrowed the rifle and gave a demonstration with it. He told us hearing protection was optional, so I took off my hearing protection since I’d never heard a suppressed weapon without protection before. The instructor fired the rifle at a steel target. I kid you not; the bullet hitting the steel was louder than the actual gunshot!
I’ve talked about the “hot brass boogie” before as being an uncomfortable situation to be in. However, I’ve discovered that I’d much rather take hot 9mm brass all day long before hot .223 brass. .223 brass is larger and much hotter. I took brass twice down the back of my shirt. I’ll tell you, it’s very hard to keep the muzzle of a rifle pointed down range while you are being subjected to 2nd degree burns, fortunately Bill was behind me to grab my rifle and the brass before it did any more damage. I’m writing this a week after the class and the burns are still healing.
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One of the drills we learned was how to go from standing down to the prone position and fire a shot within six and a half seconds at 200 yards. We had knee and elbow pads and we were taught how to do it safely and quickly. I was on the second relay, so while we were waiting for the first relay to walk all the way down range, check their targets, and walk all the way back, I decided to practice getting into prone without my rifle. I did it about a dozen times before the first relay was back and it was our turn to shoot. Well, this was not my shining moment! I’d practiced without the rifle, so the moment I had the rifle in my hand and had to go into prone, the weight distribution was very different. The moment I hit the ground, the butt of my rifle came up and cracked me on the underside of my chin. I still got my shot off when I was supposed to, but it sure did rattle my teeth! I also got a pretty good bruise from it, but I had a lot of bruises by the time I was done.
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The class was incredible. It was physically grueling, but very satisfying. By the fourth day, we were exhausted, but the moment the range master said we were going to have a steel competition, I perked right up. I love shooting steel, and I can get quite competitive. I beat my first opponent, but I lost in the second round. After the competition, we took our skills test for the entire class, and then while they were grading the tests, the range master asked if there were any grudges that needed to be settled. Well, after 4 days, there were quite a few grudges! I went up against my husband who beat me pretty soundly. The grudge match we were all looking forward to was these two men who had been best friends for 38 years. These two had been teasing each other throughout the entire class. While I was watching these two friends go up against each other, I noticed that the instructors were holding a gloved hand over the ejection port of their rifles, intentionally causing a malfunction! They were doing it to everyone to get back at us! That’s one of the things I love about Front Sight; the instructors are not drill sergeants, they have a great sense of humor.
The class was more than worth the trip. The only disappointment I had was that there were only 4 women in the class of over 40 students. In the handgun classes the number of women is much higher; sometimes almost half the class. Rifles can be very intimidating, and just the thought of taking 32 hours of training with one is a pretty daunting task. I was nervous about taking the class for the physical aspect of it, but Front Sight does everything they can to protect their students, but they also do not treat women any differently from the men. That is something I really respect of their program.

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Steel Competition

Steel Competition

Bill getting ready for his turn at the steel.

Bill getting ready for his turn at the steel.

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Why I love Colorado

Posted on by Melissa
I recently came back from a trip to the east coast. I was there to see my cousin graduate from high school. My aunt, uncle and cousin live in Washington DC, so we spend a few days there and then went down to Atlantic City for a couple days. We had a wonderful time, but spending some time out east made me appreciate home. Don’t get me wrong, the east coast is beautiful, and Washington DC is amazing and full of history, but it’s a different world out there.
I haven’t been to DC in about 15 years. When you’ve been somewhere as a kid, then you go back as an adult, it’s like the first time, because you have a completely different perspective. The first thing that struck me was how claustrophobic that city is. There are a lot of people, in a very small area, compared to where I live, in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where we’re very spread out. It was a little uncomfortable, but it wasn’t the biggest culture shock…
The biggest culture shock about Washington DC was their gun laws. Pretty much take all of Colorado gun laws, and turn them up-side down. It’s basically full of CAN’T's. You can’t apply for any type of permit or license to carry a gun. You can’t have a “high capacity” magazine (more than 10 cartridges). You can’t have a fully automatic firearm or suppressors (aka, any fun). You can’t have a taser or stun-gun. And finally, the only way you can transport a gun through Washington DC is unloaded, and neither the gun nor the ammo can be accessible to the passenger compartment.
When people live in an environment with their gun freedoms suppressed like this, they become ignorant about guns, because people assume if the government restricts guns, guns must be evil. They have no idea of the rich gun community in other parts of the country. They don’t understand how the sport enriches people’s lives, young and old. I was at the range with A Girl and A Gun the other day, and I watched a 7 year old girl fall in love with shooting, and see her confidence grow with every shot. I feel sorry for those who cannot see past the anti-gun rhetoric, but I have to admit, it does make me proud to live in a state like Colorado.

Next item on my wish list: A Suppressor for my Glock

Posted on by Melissa

I was at an outdoor public range a couple weeks ago with a friend. It was a combination pistol and rifle range, and my friend and I were shooting a couple of my pistols. There was a lot of noise on the range, obviously, with about twenty people shooting their guns. But through all the normal gun shots, I heard something like you hear in an assassin movie. I looked to my left and saw a rifle with a suppressor, and I was so jealous! I would love to have a suppressor, but they are a little difficult to buy.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) categorizes silencers as a National Firearms Act (NFA) firearm. (Silencer is a common term for suppressors, and that is how the ATF refers to them, but I will always call them suppressors, because nothing can really “silence” a gun.) Other weapons categorized as NFA firearms include full-auto guns, short-barreled rifles and shotguns, “destructive devices” including Molotov cocktails and bazookas, and “any other weapon” which includes cane guns and gadget guns.

The process for buying a NFA firearm is pretty lengthy. When you’ve picked out your suppressor, you must fill out an application with the specific serial number for your suppressor. Before you send the application and $200 in taxes to the ATF, you must first have the “Law Enforcement Certification” completed by the chief law enforcement officer. Your gun dealer then holds on to the suppressor while your application is being processed, which could be up to six months! If your application is approved and when it’s sent back to you, then comes the happy day you get to go back to your gun shop and pick up your suppressor. You must do this with each NFA firearm you purchase. From then on out, any time you have the suppressor, you must have a copy of the ATF approval on your person. By the way, if you didn’t know already, I happen to live in Colorado, where suppressors are legal. If you live in state where they are illegal, then you are out of luck.

I don’t understand why suppressors are so restricted. I feel they should be as easy to purchase as any other gun. Suppressors actually make your gun safer. The most obvious way is that suppressors reduce the gun’s report (gunshot noise), which is safer for your hearing, with or without hearing protection. On the range this isn’t such a big deal, but if you’re protecting yourself in the middle of the night, are you really going to have time to put on your hearing protection? Probably not.

When you screw on a suppressor to the end of your barrel, you are adding weight on your gun. Extra weight is always a plus on a gun, and when it’s on the end of your barrel, it will reduce both recoil and muzzle climb, which will make you more accurate. In a home invasion scenario, you need to stop your target as soon as you can so you have less of a chance of you or others in your home getting hurt.

So yes, I really want a suppressor, but I am certainly not looking forward to the process to purchase one. The great part about being a gun-lover in Colorado is that if I want a gun, I go to my local gun shop (usually the Shootin’ Den in Colorado Springs), fill out the application, wait an hour or so, and then go home happy with my new gun. We don’t have a waiting period of several days or weeks. I don’t usually buy things online because I’m very much an instant-gratification kind of girl. So whenever I do go through the process of buying a suppressor, it will be so hard to wait!