First time shooting experiences

[Prof]

O Mr. Sir Battleship Your Majesty Sir:

Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool. Drool.

Prof

[Prof]

At 16 or 17 with 9mm Makarov pistol.Its piece of **** weapon,but it was fun. :)

Hmmph. I've bought 4 of the things. 3 Bulgarians & one East German (got that one first for $139 just before they evaporated from the scene). You must have had a Russian gun. They had a bad rep.

Gave away the 3 Bulgarians because that's what I bought'em for in the first place ($119a pop, & we were loaded back then) but swapped a Mauser HSC back for one without any hesitation when the somewhat Pickwickian lady I had given it to had trouble with the stout action. The guns I retained are terrific in appearance, fit & function. Accurate little bank vaults. Good Maks are good guns.

Prof

[leib10]

I remember shooting one of these at 3 years old, from a whopping 5 feet away from the target:

http://oldrifles.com/coey_70.jpg

My next gun at 4 years old was a S&W Model 29 in .44 Magnum, which nearly ended in disaster as I had found the gun (which was loaded), walked around with it, nearly gutshot my dad, and ended up putting a round through the kitchen window. A very scary and valuable lesson learned that day: treat every weapon as if it is loaded.

I then began to fire all sorts of weapons, from various bolt action rifles, pistols, and shotguns to assault rifles. I honestly don't know how many kinds of weapons I've fired.

[Prof]

The first center-fire rifle I ever shot was also back in the '50s; a highwall Winchester in .220 Swift customized by my Uncle Wells. He was an engineer who did something weird @ Oak Ridge. He rebarreled & restocked many of the things in exotic high velocity small calibers, some wildcats, with perfect, rather short heavy untapered barrels & glass bedded actions. Uncommonly for the time, he free-floated the barrels. The wood evidently came from cured slabs from the Tree of Life or something. Never seen anything like it. Powerful telescopes.

Got $1100 apiece for the things when he sold them, which was 'way up there for the '50s. Had a luxurious cabin parked on the banks of Lake Guntersville where he did most of his shooting. The rifle was heavy as lead but fun to shoot. Deadly accurate & precise. I once saw him (intentionally, I vow) shoot a nut out of a squirrel's mouth at some ungodly distance. Knocked the critter out of the tree & unconscious briefly, after which it scampered back up the tree & beat the shit out of another squirrel it evidently blamed for the incident.

My father was assigned one of them in the will after Wells got cancer but his wife, who was crazy as a bag full of crabs (one symptom: chronic tooth problems no dentist could either identify or explain so she found some quack to pull them all. Didn't help), sold all (6 or 7) of them @ $1000 for the whole lot to a local gun shop. Man, was my old man ever pissed off. I guess the shop owner was pretty happy, though.

Prof

[Chogy]

As a young teenager, I grew up reading Louis L'Amour Westerns, and wanted a six-shooter desperately. My father would have none of it. Then I found out that muzzleloaders, antiques, and specifically cap and ball revolvers were not considered firearms by the feds, which was odd, considering they tended to kill quite efficiently in the Civil War.

So I scraped $100 together and mail-ordered an 1851 Navy, some #11 caps, and moulded my own lead round balls. For powder (I'll make a very long story short) I learned to make my own of respectable strength from the basic black powder ingredients - charcoal, sulfur, and potassium nitrate. Lo and behold, I had a 6-shooter, and it gave me a lot of pleasure for many years, until I was old enough to buy my own "real" firearms. Sadly, the 1851 Navy was lost in a move years ago. I wish I still had it.

I've a collection that runs the gamut from flintlock **** pistols to Sharps metallic cartridge to modern automatic weapons, but I still have a soft spot for the early Colts.

[Chogy]

Wow, the word m-u-f-f is deleted:

****

I refer to this sort of pistol, carried by English ladies in their fur hand-warming tubes while walking near the Thames on a foggy night.

[Prof]

Wow, the word m-u-f-f is deleted:

****

I refer to this sort of pistol, carried by English ladies in their fur hand-warming tubes while walking near the Thames on a foggy night.

"Wow" is right. I once received asterisks for using the syllable N*I*P*S as a component of the word TURN*I*P*S, but it was explained as disapproval of a derogatory reference to the Japanese people. "M*U*F*F?" Some sort of anti-PC program you guys have here.

Pr*f

[Blue]

First time out shooting I was about 10 or 11yoa. I can't recall for sure, but the only stipulation to dad taking me out to shoot was that we never tell my mom.

First gun up was dads Winchester 1200 12ga that he had gotten as a young man. Second was his Colt Trooper Mk III .357. Started with 38s loaded in it but was blamming away with .357s before we left. Couldn't get the smile off my face for days!:)

Don't know how but mom found out. She was p'oed alright, but since my brother and I had taken our hunter safety courses, she was so assured of our safe handling and responsibility with a gun, that when I was 15, SHE actually bought me my first gun, a 12 ga Mossberg 500.

My first pistol was an H&R .32 revolver when I turned 18 and then a Ruger GP100 when I turned 21.

From 18 to 21 I just shot all of my Uncle Sams guns. Probably couldn't name all those if I tried. :));)

[Prof]

Chogy:

I had a repro Colt Navy .36 for awhile. Loved its looks but never could hit anything with it, but then I was a really lousy handgun shot. 'Course, back then I was using commercial black powder & pre-cast balls. I keep seeing some really nice stuff in the Cabela catalogue. Got any advice? I have a C&R so I can just order most of the stuff I like, but these old critters don't even have the C&R restrictions, & ought to be perfectly satisfactory firearms. Eh?

Prof

[Prof]

First time out shooting I was about 10 or 11yoa. I can't recall for sure, but the only stipulation to dad taking me out to shoot was that we never tell my mom.

First gun up was dads Winchester 1200 12ga that he had gotten as a young man. Second was his Colt Trooper Mk III .357. Started with 38s loaded in it but was blamming away with .357s before we left. Couldn't get the smile off my face for days!:)

Don't know how but mom found out. She was p'oed alright, but since my brother and I had taken our hunter safety courses, she was so assured of our safe handling and responsibility with a gun, that when I was 15, SHE actually bought me my first gun, a 12 ga Mossberg 500.

My first pistol was an H&R .32 revolver when I turned 18 and then a Ruger GP100 when I turned 21.

From 18 to 21 I just shot all of my Uncle Sams guns. Probably couldn't name all those if I tried. :));)

Sniper:

My old man bought a Smith .357 (again, back in the '50s). He's the guy from whom my rich & privileged little monkeyass neighbor Timmy & I got the word that the .357 would shoot through an engine block. O, the innocence soon to be lost.

It went away, & I never found out where & why, or what it actually was. The gun, not my innocence. I suppose the gun was an M19, since it didn't seem imposingly huge at the time, something an M27 probably would have. I only saw it fired once (not by me unfortunately), & that might have been during the weekend of my attempt at hurling my first gun at my first rabbit. Sounds about right. Dad shot a fence post & then two squirrels with it. Must have been using light, high-velocity non-squirrel-appropriate bullets.

Hit the first critter low ribcage, effectively blowing it in half. Well, into pieces, but mostly in half. The other he grazed from right lower leg to shoulder. Powdered the right hind leg, unzipped the ribcage all the way up, emptying the little feller & powdered the right foreleg. Limited eating meat. Ate it. Good old Aunt Winnie. Fried fragments. Famous Southern tradition; Saturday FragFry.

I used those "autopsy" results for a couple of years to substantiate the .357's reputation for inconceivable power until I figured out that just about anything besides a .22 or a shotgun would do about the same under similar circumstances.

I still haven't figured out why I don't prefer my M19 to my M15 for outdoors use. I mean, come on. They balance close to the same. They carry the same. The M19 will shoot all the .38Spl loads I normally use just fine, & adds .357 to the mix as well. You got me.

Prof

[highsea]

Can't remember the first time I ever shot a gun, but my first gun was a Remington 740 that my dad cut the stock down to fit me. I was 11 or 12.

I was never allowed a BB gun, and didn't get a .22 until I had mastered the .30-06. Dad was smart, that -06 had a good kick and taught me to respect guns.

My first .22 was a Remington 514 ayear or so later. Still have them both, sitting in the safe at my brother's house.

[gunnut]

The first firearm I've ever fired was my brother's Ruger 10/22. It was fun and got me started to collect guns. I think I was 16 or 17 at the time.

The first gun I bought was a Mini-14 (no laughing please).

[highsea]

^^^ I like Mini-14. Not sure why they have a bad rap here, they're whopping good fun to shoot. :)

[gunnut]

^^^ I like Mini-14. Not sure why they have a bad rap here, they're whopping good fun to shoot. :)

They're fun and reliable. Just not accurate. I don't like the stock aperture sight either.

[highsea]

Mine was scoped, so I didn't use the factory sights.

It was a good shooter, I never had any accuracy problems, 1-1/2" or so at 100 yards from a benchrest seems acceptable to me for that type of gun.