Met up with Murph at noon, and we went to a new range near his place in WV. He’s already posted on it HERE; but I want to add one of the reasons I wanted to go today was to work with various sets of gloves in cold temps. It was 28 degrees and occasional snow (see his pics), We had his M-60E and AR, my SCAR 17, and pistols.
As various other folks have noted, shooting in the cold is good training, because you never really know when the bad guys are going to pop out…
The main thing I worked on today was shooting with various sets of gloves, and how that impacted my accuracy and ‘feel’ for the trigger. I have one set of gloves that are going to Goodwill tomorrow… sigh… Too thick, too clumsy, NO trigger control at all (couldn’t even FEEL the trigger). The other two worked well, so those stay in the rotation 🙂
The other thing of note is how quickly your manual dexterity deteriorates with cold when you don’t have ANY gloves on (trying to load mags was a LOT of fun)…
Anyhoo… A good day, good time at the range, good food and good company 🙂
And none of my pics came out… dammit…
And a good time was had by all.
And Murphy–the dog–is really starting to take to you.
I saw the pics of the guns in the snow over at ML’s place, but your description of cold fingers really makes me feel the cold.
Murph- He’s NOT coming home with me… forget it 🙂
Andy- That’s what I wanted to check out and work on, and without gloves about the third mag was actually painful to shoot.
Oh good. More range time. You know, that’s something we don’t think about much in Texas. I think I have to wear gloves maybe a couple of times a year. You know that is when something would happen. Maybe it’s not a bad idea to learn a new skill set. After all, I just put a winter trigger guard on my AR.
As a matter of interest, what models of gloves worked? Interested shooters want to know for future reference!
45er- Yeah, it’s worth looking into…
Peter- Military flight gloves (nomex/leather) worked the best http://www.nomexgloves.com/
second best was a pair of North Face gloves http://www.thenorthface.com/catalog/sc-gear/men-8217-s-windwall-0174-glove.html?parent_category_rn=&cm_vc&variationId=JK3
third were my old pair of leather gloves I’ve had for 5-6 years, don’t even know who made them.
The pair that went away? Isotoner waterproof/windproof gloves (at $42 dammit)…
Jealous. But I think the only gloves I’ve got are ski gloves and leather gardening gloves – probably wouldn’t have worked well.
So what happens if Murphy jumps in you truck and won’t get out?
Truthfully, I’ve not trained much for cold weather shooting. I HATE being cold. It’s a foible of mine.
That said, I used to shoot pins…a lot. The pin range was in the basement and like the range, unheated with exhaust fans constantly running and sucking in cold outside air.
Some of our evening matches had temps in the teens and low twenties. We drew from holsters in our pin matches and it was a struggle keeping the pistols, mags and hands warm enough to shoot. Cold weather malfunctions can be surprising…such as plastic mag baseplates breaking and depositing your rounds all over the floor. And, ducking wooden splinters from the pins. A pin, in sub-freezing temps, has a tendency to shatter.
Glad to hear the SCAR’s back. FN say why it went Fubar? Also, along the Glove lines, I remember that Mas Ayoob wrote up an article a couple of Decades ago about Winter Guns. This was when he was being a Police Chief up in New Hampshire, and he wanted his Dept.’s LEOs to not only have Gloves, but Pistols that would Allow the Officer to shoot them and reload in the First place. If I remember, he recommended Pistols with the Walther-Type Safety on the Slide or Sig Decockers, and K-Frame “Snubbies” for Back Up.
PH- THAT is why you come out and shoot in the cold, to find out those things 🙂
WSF- There WILL be a fight 🙂
Crucis- Excellent points! And I’m pretty sure I blew up one pin from 400 yards with the SCAR 🙂
Les- Yep, there is a post coming on that, and Ayoob was dead on the money if a few years late. Remember the Colt Alaskans?
Range time is good time. Someday I will find gloves that fit me, and then I’ll be able to work on dexterity and such.
Happiness is a belt fed weapon.
Good idea – train like you would fight.
I wear gloves a lot outside, and my choice has always been nomex flight gloves. Now that you mention it, it’s a good idea to get out more and practive with them.
DB- Omar… just sayin… 🙂
Stretch- That it is 😀
CTone- I’d strongly recommend it.