There are lots of magic formulas and snake oil in the world of firearms. While these marketing departments try their best to make a product stand out from the crowd, most are repurposed industrial chemicals. If applied correctly, all these years of experience from industry can benefit the gun community. Most of the things that I’ve had the chance to use over the years, from Hoppes to CLP to cherry-scented grease worked from well enough...
If you have ever watched a shooter drop a field of plates like a well-oiled machine and thought, “Man I wish I could do that” then Mantis’ BlackbeardX is a tool worth considering. But, if your plan is to be the person who only takes their AR-15 out of the safe every few years to wipe away the dust, then this is not the training tool for you. Putting in just a little time...
A few weeks ago I wandered past the sporting goods section of the local big-box store and saw that they had 350 Legend ammo in stock. Actually, the only ammo that they had in stock was 350 Legend and these same boxes have been sitting there for quite a while now. So, I started to wonder if a case could be made for the 350 Legend as a survival rifle. Right off...
The AR15 has grown into the most customizable and most popular rifle in the country. While some upgrade are mostly cosmetic, one of the easiest ways to make a rifle easier to shoot well is to upgrade the budget minded, often lawyer approved factory trigger. Midwest Industries has added another contender to the list of trigger options with their Enhanced AR15 Flat Trigger. This is a cartridge style trigger with an anodized aluminum frame that...
There are more modern survival food options to stock your preparedness pantry than ever before. This gives us lots of different ways to keep food on the table, even when the lights go out or the delivery trucks stop running. To make planning easier, we are going to break all the options down into different categories, sorted by ease of preparation, and cover the use case for each one. This will let you decide what...
With the rising cost and limited availability of ammo, getting in some range time has become more difficult over the last year. One fun solution to this problem is laser based training using the Mantis Laser Academy Training System and the Mantis Blackbeard AR-15 Trigger Auto Reset System. We had a few weeks to get these into the hands of about a half dozen different shooters of both genders and various skill levels in order...
One of the basic rules of firearms safety is to identify your target and what lies beyond it. This gets more challenging after dark. Using tactical flashlights mounted to a firearm is one of the simplest ways to improve the nighttime target identification of possible threats and potentially avoid problems. Modern weapon lights have a high enough output to not only light up but temporarily disorient a potential threat. One of the main reasons that...
Picking out the right pocket knife is all about finding the right balance of features for a given price point. These days there are literally hundreds of choices just a website order away. LAPG has been marketing in-house designs for the last few years with the goal of cutting out the middle man to provide a really competitive value to the end-user, as seen with the TBFK S35VN EDC Folding Knife. It is clear from...
The Ruger 10/22 has become the standard for 22LR semiautos over the last fifty years. However, Ruger definitely makes this rifle to a specific price point, with some rough edges and room for improvements. Building a 10/22 into a custom 22LR survival rifle takes some picking and choosing, with aftermarket parts available for basically every piece of the gun. But, this is also what makes building a 10/22 the perfect rifle to try your hand...
FAB Defense, an Israeli company that supplies the military, recently released the Rapid Adjustable Precision Stock for AR-15 platforms. The RAPS stock uses the “1Latch” pull-down/fold-out style locking mechanism for both the cheek rest and length of pull adjustments. It is designed to be both lightweight, simple to use and comes with adapters for both rifle and carbine length buffer tubes. The length of pull adjustment range is from 14.8 to 16.14 inches, which was...