Hello everyone. It’s Laredo, and I have been moving into a new house. I apologize for vanishing without a word. Just as well, I have been thinking a lot about what to write about. I don’t want to write a bunch of blogs just to be active. I want to write material that is thought out and provides what I see as usefulness. So today I want to go over a little bit of the most common problems with gun debates that I see: misinformation.

First and foremost, assault rifles are actually rifles that have the capability of fully automatic fire, or at least just burst fire. These assault rifles have a switch that will have a few options for firing. Safety, single shot, burst shot, and full auto. This ability is called “select fire”. (Thanks to the comment below for the clarification)

Gun violence. This phrase gives the notion that guns cause violence, which is misleading and false. When a person is beat to death by someone’s hands and feet, we do not hear about physical violence. Aside from that, I am not likely to use my guns for harm. I would only use my guns to shoot a human being if he or she is an immediate threat to me or my own. Owning a firearm does not make me want to rob a store.

Gun free zones. These zones follow the notion that anyone who carries a gun is a danger to society. Look to the Texas Department of Public Safety HCL conviction rates to see that most people who carry are not a danger to society. These zones will make law-abiding citizens be disarmed. At the same time, someone looking to break the law is usually not physically restrained from carrying a gun into the zone. A courthouse would be extremely difficult to get into with a gun not being noticed. A college campus, which is usually made up of multiple buildings and allows entry from any direction, would be easy to get into with a gun unnoticed.

Mandatory classes for permits. If you do not want to go to a class, then you might not learn much when you go. You can’t learn much in one session anyway, especially when it won’t be a one-on-one experience. People should practice with their firearms often, and I would suggest learning about the laws of their states and what to do after using a firearm for self-defense. Someone might argue that what I said means that mandatory classes should be taken often. However, that would be further intrusion upon the right to bear arms. Such an action would see strong opposition. It would also

This will be all for today as I have a busy day ahead. I hope you all are doing fine, and I will be back tomorrow.

I have edited my first post on plating steel. Added pictures and a better discription. check it out please. I will be adding more on the Winchester receiver plating project this Sunday and Monday. See y all soon.

An Opinion on Gun Control by someone experienced in the firearms industry.

Larry Correia is a man who has been around firearms for a long time. He used to be a gun store owner, firearms instructor, a competition shooter, and has done quite a few other things related to firearms. In this article he goes over gun control laws such as armed teachers, gun free zones, media coverage, bans, and regulations. He provides references, facts, and draws on his own experience to give his reasoning for pro-gun arguments. It’s a well-written article and you should go visit. You might need to mark where you are and finish it later as it is a very long article.

I am here again to talk about smart guns. This time I will be a bit more in depth over the topic.

I want to take a look at the reasons for them to exist:

1. It is an interesting engineering feat. It might be sort of cool to be at the range and hand your gun over to a buddy without the “key-piece”, such as the watch or ring, and watch them attempt to fire. It would be a sort of a plinker and also sort of a display piece for interest.
2. If your gun is stolen from you or your vehicle while out and about. Then, the gun would be inoperable unless it is hacked.
3. For safety in the house (children, theft).
4. It would help lower suicide rates and accident rates.

Undoubtedly, there are other reasons you might think of, but I feel as if those are the most common reasons, except number one- that is my idea.

Now, take a look at a PBS article titled “Is America Finally Ready for Smart Guns?”.

Stephen Teret, founder of Center for Gun Policy and Research at John Hopkins University in Baltimore, supports smart guns and feels that we are closer to having them be available. Teret is quoted saying “We make aspirin bottles that 4-year-olds can’t use. Why are we making guns 4-year-olds can use?” when speaking about how children at home will be safer when smart-guns are owned. PBS then cites statistics from the CDC about 527 children dying from unintentional firearm discharges between 2010 and 2014. Also cited was the 33,599 people in total died from firearm injuries and stated that most of those were suicides. The follow up paragraph states that “smart guns won’t be a quick life saver because traditional guns are so prevalent, said James Pasco Jr.”

Let me now go over reasons for them not to exist:

1. Mandate laws, such as the one in New Jersey. This law states that after 30 months of smart guns being sold in the U.S.A. that all new guns sold in New Jersey would have to be smart guns.
2. Currently Armatix’s price for the iP1 is about $1,800 according to VentureBeat.com. However, if they became more common the price would become more competitive most likely.
3. Concern over whether the system could be corrupted through other radio waves.
4. Concerns over battery life.
5. Concerns about the time to unlock the system in case of emergency.
6. Concerns over how other people could become authorized to also use the gun (ie. An officer needing to borrow a colleague’s gun).

Now, I added a few extra points compared to the pro-smart gun side because these are concerns that are consistently brought up in this discussion.

Here’s my two cents on the matter of smart guns and safety.

If smart guns are not able to be hacked, then they would be a bit useful for a carry/truck gun in case it is stolen. However, it is likely that there will be people who hack the systems whether it is a few tech-smart nerds or a few criminals. Miguel or J. KB noted the hacking bit before, but I could not find the article. This begins to render the smart gun safeties useless other than the person not being able to immediately shoot you, provided that the radio waves from the watch or ring are not close enough to the gun.

I do feel it would be a niche market where some people would honestly enjoy it. It would be an item of interest to some people even if they would still use a traditional firearm for protection.

The concerns over how reliable the smart gun systems will be is a genuine safety concern. If I am in the position where I need to use the gun and it does not fire, then I am likely to become seriously hurt or die. After a lot of testing and models of smart guns, I do think engineers would have better, more reliable smart guns. However, even traditional firearms can still be defective- so perfection is impossible, and the technology provides one more way for the gun to fail to fire (FTF).

In home use and theft is in its own category for a reason. There are already ways to make a gun inoperable for your children if you so desire. First, use a gun safe that they do not know the combination to. This is the near-equivalent of the Aspirin bottle comparison that Teret made. It is only nearly the same because it is easier to cut open a pill bottle than to shred a gun safe open.

Second, take the firing pin out and hide it separate from the gun. This makes it so the gun cannot be used even if you leave it on the kitchen counter. Parents who want their children to not be able to use any of the guns in their home can do this easily, and then return the firing pin when they come home or otherwise wish the gun to be operable. Child accidents are tragic, and smart gun advocates and articles often cite them as a reason for smart guns to be owned. However, this option can be done with any traditional gun. This beats out the Aspirin comparison. Instead, this is comparable to the smart gun “key-piece” being taken away.

A third note for parents would be to teach kids from a young age to respect firearms and know the four rules of safety. This creates a built in safety for your children’s brains. Make sure they know the dangers, and how to handle being around firearms.

I do not believe that suicides of adults would see any change, especially with traditional firearms being the same. Even if we were in a world where only smart guns exist, you cannot stop someone from shooting themselves.

As far as the New Jersey law, I do believe it will be undone in short time. There have been a lot of gun rights legal victories, and it is noted by many that the NJ law is holding smart guns back. Therefore, people on both sides of the issue want the law undone.

I’ve gone on for a long time now, but I hope what I said was clear for y’all. I am okay with smart guns being around, but I will never want one. I would rather spend money on something that I would find more useful and appealing to me. I just don’t see how smart guns would turn around homicide, suicide, and accident rates when measures that can be taken now would have the same effect. To me, most of these issues are issues of taking better care of you, your family, and your belongings. So, take care of your guns. Make sure you know where they are, and who can get to them. Make sure that if you carry them, it won’t be easy for someone to take it from you. Take care of your children, make sure they know how to handle guns. These are safety precautions we can all take without mandates or technology. And in the end, they benefit everyone around you.

Now, y’all take care. 🙂

hello all. Here is part one on plating guns. In most cases guns will be blued or nickel originally. So the original finish has to come off first. Lesson learned-bead blasting or sand blasting create way more work. unless you want a matt finish,all it does is rough up the surface that now needs extra steps to smooth. Gun blue can be taken off with muriatic acid bath.Pic 1 shows the receiver after bluing is gone The smoother the finish,the more reflective the finish. I usually will matt finish the top of the firearm in the sight radius,but sometimes its nice to do 100 percent for the WOW factor. Once we have bare steel (aluminum will be later) some times I will buff it with black emory to see what Im dealing with, as it shows surface damage better. If there are no deep rust pits I start sanding with 400 wet,using sanding blocks on any flat surface. Pic 2 is my hi tech sanding block. Better known as a paint stick. On flat surfaces sand in one direction,say long way on this receiver to start out. then when you are happy with the way it looks,take the next grit in this case 600 and sand 90 degrees to the 400 as in pic 3.What this does is eliminate the previous  grits scratches. If you sand in one direction you will not remove all the scratches and the piece will never be like a mirror. Do the same on round areas too. This is as far as I have gone with this piece so far. I will be finishing it up on Sunday and will finish this post on Monday. Any questions on this,shoot me an email or comment below, Thank you. Out here till Monday.

I have not watched the full documentary. I may or may not do so. For those of you who don’t know, it is a documentary over gun violence in the U.S.A. It is supposed to represent both sides, and it is done by Katie Couric and Stephanie Soechtig.

I want to watch it to see how balanced the documentary is, but from the trailer and reviews it appears to be one-sided. For instance, the trailer opens with an interviewer asking “How do you feel about the fact that a person on the government’s terror watch list can’t board a plane but can buy a gun?”. Right away there is propaganda- or just misleading information- given. First, the terror watch list is known to be faulty. Second, boarding planes is not a right. Bearing arms is a right, and requires due process.

The show then points out that there are more FFL dealers/people than total of Starbucks and McDonalds in the U.S.A. I can’t figure out why this is such a terrifying number? I mean, let’s compare entire markets at least. About 247,000 fast food restaurants are in the U.S.A., while there are only 51,438 retail gun stores. However, the number of these stores do not matter. I just figured I would also quickly find larger numbers for the fun of it since the filmmaker did so.

The trailer doesn’t contain much else, other than a few quotes on how the film is fair on the topic.

According to Katie, the NRA only represents 5% of gun owners.  There are about 5 to 6 million NRA members. Let’s go on and say that by their math, 120 million gun owners exist in the U.S.A. You don’t think that it is possible that many of those gun owners support the NRA? I am not a member, but I approve of a lot of what they do. While I am sure there are gun owners that think all gun sales should go through background checks, it is terribly misleading to think that only 5 percent of gun owners approve of the NRA.

This is all for today, and I will consider watching the full documentary. However, I will likely just go on about one or two topics from the film if I do. That way the blog does not become burdened or repetitious. Have a nice day.

Update: I missed J. Kb’s article in February that spoke of this film.

https://gunfreezone.net/index.php/2016/02/07/triumph-of-the-anti-gun-will/

There you will find where he showed a list of official partners of the film. Everytown and quite a few others made the list. Thanks to the comment below for pointing this out.