Good buddy Mike was in town for a few days, and what better way to spend it than on the range ringing the gongs that good buddy Duane built for me. We had a blast. We’ve known each other since the 7th grade. Mike and I joke about who’s the better shot, and after our session at the West End Gun Club, that’s still an open question. The man can shoot (and so can I).
Mike wanted to stop at a nearby 5-11 outlet to pick up a few clothing items, and while we were there he pointed out the Black Rifle coffee. If you read the blog you know that I’m not a member of the Mattel crowd and I have negative interest in so-called black rifles. In fact, the closest thing I have to a black rifle is my Ruger GSR (it’s what you see Mike ringing gongs with above). It has a green and black laminate stock that Ruger calls black laminate, so I guess maybe it could be called a black rifle. The GSR is a fine weapon, and Mike and I were both making the gongs sing with those big 173 grain full metal jacket .308 bullets.
But I diverge. This blog is about Black Rifle Coffee and the company that makes it.
In a word, Black Rifle Coffee is great. I wish we had it when we rode across China, but like they say, better late than never. You know, they don’t drink coffee in other than the big cities in China, and staying awake on the bike was a challenge for me on that ride. But here at home I start every day with a cup of black coffee (the only way to drink it), and Black Rifle Coffee was rings my gong well.
Black Rifle Coffee is veteran owned and a portion of the profits go to veterans’ groups, police, and other first responders. That’s a good thing. And Black Rifle Coffee is a U.S. company. Reading the labels tells me that the owners have a sense of humor, too. That’s good. Good coffee and a good sense of humor make the world more fun, I think.
It’s good stuff, and it became my coffee of choice as soon as I had my first taste. Give Black Rifle Coffee a try. You can thank me later.
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Last week I wrote a blog about my .300 Weatherby Magnum Vanguard Safari, and I recently spent a bit of time with it on the range. In a word: Wow! This is a most impressive firearm, as is the .300 Weatherby Magnum cartridge.
Before the rifle arrived, I called both Leupold and Weatherby to ask which rings and mounts I should use to mount a 4X Leupold scope. Both told me they didn’t know because there are so many possible combinations of rifles and scopes (which kind of surprised me; you’d think they would know). The Leupold tech rep suggested I try their dual dovetail mounts and low rings and he gave me the part numbers. (so it was off to Amazon for both). The Leupold guy said he didn’t know if what he suggested would work and if it would clear the scope’s bells, but that’s what I ordered and it worked like a champ. The Leupold scope has a lot of eye relief and it just looks right with the low mounts. The matte finish on the rifle, the mounts, the rings, and the scope looks good.
Good buddy John asked about how I sight in a scope, and I thought I would explain that here. I don’t use a boresighting device. The idea of sticking something in the muzzle doesn’t appeal to me, as it is the most sensitive part of the rifle and any nicks or dings in this area will hurt accuracy significantly. My approach is to:
Set the rifle up on the rest, pointing it at a bullseye downrange.
Remove the bolt.
Look through the barrel and center the bullseye at 50 yards in the bore. I use the rear opening of the barrel and the front opening of the barrel (which visually form two concentric rings) like a peep sight, getting the circles formed by both centered on the bullseye.
Bring the scope’s crosshairs onto the bullseye without moving the rifle on the rest.
Fire the first shot.
Make scope adjustments accordingly for subsequent shots.
I can usually get the first shot within 10 inches of the bullseye using the above approach. A couple of times I’ve got it within 2 inches of the bullseye on the first shot, and this was one of them. I took some photos to make my explanation easier to understand.
First, set the rifle in the rest and have a target at either 25 yards or 50 yards:
Next, center the bullseye in the barrel:
Then (without moving the rifle), bring the scope’s crosshairs onto the target:
At this point, my approach is to fire one shot to see where it hits and then make adjustments. My first shot was the one at the lower right in the target below. I cranked in 15 clicks of elevation and 15 of windage, and my next shot was near the middle of the orange bullseye.
That was close enough to get me started. I then moved a target out to 100 yards and fired a few groups. This was the third group, and it measured 0.865 inch.
Not everything ran as smoothly as that target above suggests, though. About a third of my .300 Weatherby Magnum ammunition (all ammunition I reloaded) had difficulty chambering or would not chamber at all, and the rest of the groups were all much larger than that .865 group shown above. I was pretty sure the chambering difficulties were affecting accuracy, but that one good group showed the rifle had potential.
I recognized that the chambering difficulty was the same problem I had encountered with my .257 Weatherby Magnum Ruger No. 1 rifle. A traditional resizing approach didn’t work on the .257 Weatherby Magnum cartridge, and when I called Sierra about it, they told me turn the resizing die into the press an additional quarter turn after the die contacts the shell holder. I think there’s another issue as well due to case distortion due to the neck expander dragging during the resizing operation. If the cases are not well lubed inside the case neck, the dual-radius Weatherby shoulder is more easily distorted upward when withdrawing the case from the resizing die (more easily distorted, that is, than would be a conventional non-dual-radius case shoulder). The trick is to lube the inside of the case neck and to do the extra quarter turn of the die into the press. This addresses the neck expansion longitudinal distortion, takes out all the clearances in the reloading press’s pivot points, and accounts for any springback in case exterior dimensions.
I went home, pulled the bullets on the .300 Weatherby Magnum cartridges that wouldn’t chamber, resized as described above, cleaned the cases thoroughly, and then reloaded them.
On the next range visit a few days later, every round chambered easily, and wow, the results were good. My first group was the one at the top of the target shown below (it measured 1.452 inches). I dialed in five clicks left the Leupold and fired the next two groups in the two lower targets. The group on the left is 1.191 inches, and the one on the right is 0.871 inch.
Note that these 300 Weatherby Magnum groups were fired with a 4X scope at 100 yards. It’s not easy to get great groups with a rifle that smacks you authoritatively each time you squeeze the trigger (the .300 Weatherby Magnum is one potent SOB). My load was the 180-grain Remington jacketed soft point bullet and IMR 7828 SSC powder a grain or two below max, and I’m not done yet. If my shoulder and my wallet hold out (and I can find components) I’ll bet I can get a ½-inch out of this rifle.
Roy Weatherby in his office in the old South Gate facility. I met Roy in that office and had a nice conversation with him. Click on the photo to get the story.
I’m a shooter and a collector. I’m old enough and I have enough toys that each time I buy a gun I’m pretty sure it will be my last. Occasionally a friend will ask if there’s anything I still want and usually the answer is no. But then something comes along and I decide I have to have it. The Weatherby Vanguard Safari is a rifle that fits that description, except it came and went before I even realized Weatherby had offered it.
Okay, let’s back up a bit and do Weatherby 101. Weatherby offers two basic rifles. The high ticket, fancy-schmancy rifle is their renowned Mark V. This is the original Weatherby and it’s a beautiful rifle. I’ve written about them here on the blog before, and I’ll give you the links that will get you to those stories at the end of this one. Then there’s the other Weatherby, and that’s the Vanguard. The Vanguard was originally conceived as a way to offer Weatherby rifles to someone who’s not a movie star, a head of state, or a blog writer. The funny thing is, though, that the Vanguards are usually more accurate than the Mark V. There’s a bunch of technical reasons for that I don’t need to get into here, and like always, I’m sure there’s an army of Internet assholes out there who will take issue with this conclusion. That’s fine. I own both and I will tell you that a Vanguard will usually shoot tighter groups than a Mark V. If you disagree you can leave a comment, or better yet, start your own blog and write an article about it.
A Weatherby Mark V chambered in .300 Weatherby Magnum.
Look, I like Weatherby rifles, and I make no excuse about that. I met Roy Weatherby 40 years ago and I’m still talking about it. I am a Weatherby fan boy.
Okay, so on to that collecting thing…in 2018, Weatherby offered a Vanguard model they called the Safari, and it was really something special. They were only available for about a year and only in three chamberings (.30 06, .300 Weatherby, and .375 H&H), and then Weatherby discontinued the model. That made me want one even more, but there were none to be had. Then the pandemic was on us, and they were really gone. As in POOF!, no more. I called Weatherby (they are in Wyoming) and offered to pay up if they would make one for me, but they wouldn’t. Absence. It made my heart grow fonder.
I kept my eye on Gunbroker and the other gun sites, but I had not seen a Vanguard Safari for sale in the last two years. I kept looking, and I kept getting frustrated. Finally, on a whim, I did a Google search a couple of weeks ago (“Weatherby Vanguard Safari for sale”) and what do you know, a small gun store in Oklahoma City had one. I called, and yes, it was new, and yes, they still had it. It was chambered for the mighty .300 Weatherby Magnum and that was what I wanted (I would have been okay with the .30 06 or the .375 H&H, too, but I wanted the .300 Weatherby). The price was $699, which might have been a mistake on the dealer’s part ($699 was the price for the non-Safari walnut Vanguard, another excellent rifle, but as Lloyd Bentsen might say to the regular Vanguard, “You’re no Safari, Senator.”
I asked the dealer they could do anything on the price and they knocked off $30 (which brought it down to $669), so I did what people do with guns and I pulled the trigger. I really scored.
Last Friday, my cooling off period ended and in the eyes of the Peoples Republik of Kalifornia, I had achieved the mandated state of acceptable chill. That’s nanny-state speak for my 10-day waiting period ended and the rifle came home with me. I’d never seen one in person before this.
The Weatherby Vanguard Safari. Ooooh, it’s nice.
With apologies for the disheveled state of my reloading bench and the iPhone photos, this blog includes some first look pics. The rifle looks even better in person than it does in the photos. The trigger is excellent. Weatherby calls it a two-stage competition trigger. It’s light and unlike that other political party, it is creep-free. There’s about 1/8-inch of slack takeup, then it breaks super clean at what I’m guessing is about 2 pounds. It’s exceptional for a factory gun. It would be exceptional for a custom gun, too.
A classic Weatherby stock profile. People said it was too Hollywood when Weatherby first introduced it, but it works.
The checkering is laser cut, but Weatherby did an above average job on it. There’s no fuzz like you would normally see on laser-cut checkering and it’s fairly sharp. I like the fancy pattern (fleur de lis, they call it) and the contrasting rosewood grip and fore end accents. The Weatherby website claims these rifles have an oil finish and that’s a plus for me, too. (In case you were wondering, fleur de lis is French and it means flower of the lily.)
NIcely laser cut fleur de lis checkering. It is well done.Pistol grip checkering on the Vanguard Safari.A closer shot of the laser-cut checkering. Weatherby’s supplier has this process dialed.
The 26-inch barrel is free floated and I believe the action comes from the factory glass bedded, but I can’t see enough to confirm that from the outside. Weatherby appropriately relieved the area behind the stock tang, which is good (it will prevent the stock from cracking).
The free floated barrel. There’s plenty of clearance here. Free floating prevents the barrel from moving as it heats, which prevents successive shots from walking or stringing (or so the theory goes).Relief around the rear tang. You want this so that the tang doesn’t act as a wedge and split the stock under recoil.
Everything is subdued, including the satin oil finish and matte bluing. The walnut figure is not fancy, but I like it anyway. There’s just enough contrast to make it look good.
I called Weatherby to learn more about the Vanguard Safari line, and wow, I was impressed. The nice lady I spoke with told me the .300 Weatherby Magnum Vanguard Safari was only offered for about a year. Weatherby shipped 146 in August 2018, and then another 4 in 2019, so this is a relatively rare puppy. I guess that makes it worth more, but it’s a moot point. This one is not for sale. Still, it makes me feel better knowing I have something other kids on the block don’t.
I have a new Leupold FXII 4X scope that I essentially got for free from Leupold and I am going to mount it on this rifle. I bought a set of Leupold rings and mounts after I bought the rifle, and I will probably mount the scope in the next day or so. Then it’s out to the range. I have a bunch of .300 Weatherby ammo already loaded. I’ll let you know how it shoots.
Roy Weatherby in his office in the old South Gate facility. I met Roy in that office and had a nice conversation with him. Click on the photo to get the story.
That photo above? My good buddy JBFLA posted it on the Chinariders.net forum a few years ago along with the following comments:
I finally received Moto Baja. Another good read by Joe Berk. At 116 pages of light reading with lots of photos, it can probably be read in one sitting. It took me 3 sittings, with time spent perusing the excellent photos, and my mind wandering…imagining a ride to Baja…..and being chased by wild dogs.
Seeing that comment again got me to thinking about what the next book might be. I have the urge to write. I just have to decide about what.
My two favorite topics? Motorcycles and guns. I’m thinking about a gun book, as I’m about tapped out on riding books. Maybe a photo book featuring fancy walnut gunstocks. The problem with a photo book, though, is that it cries out for color and books printed in color get expensive fast. And expensive books don’t sell.
Fancy walnut on a .257 Weatherby Ruger No. 1.
We’ve done a lot of stories on gun stuff here on the blog; maybe a collection of favorite stories with just a few photos might work as a gun book. It would be easy to put together. Another thought is a Mini 14 book. There are a few Mini 14 books out there, but none of them look interesting to me. When we blog about the Mini 14 blog we get a ton of hits. There might be a market for a Mini 14 book.
My Ruger Mini 14.
I’ve been trying to talk Gresh into writing a book. He’s got a ton of good stuff that would work well as a set of collected works. I mean, the man can make a 50-year-old air compressor story interesting. Joe is that rarest of human beings: A writer who sees things most of us miss. And Gresh can describe these things so they become visible to us (and then make us wonder how we missed what Joe makes seem obvious).
Gobi Gresh, in (of course) the Gobi Desert. The Gobi Desert, man!
I’ve been after Gresh to write a book for years. Help me out here, folks.
I shot on the 50-yard range at a smallbore rifle target. The top center S target caught my first three shots (with my 405-grain cast bullet load) and they were a touch high, so I dropped the rear sight one click and drifted it slightly to the right with my brass punch and a small hammer. Targets 1 and 2 caught the next six rounds (all with the same 35.0 grains of IMR 4198 and the 405-grain Missouri cast bullet). By Target 2, I was dialed in…dead center and hitting right at the point of aim. Then I switched to another favored but lighter accuracy load, and that’s 16.2 grains of Trail Boss with a 300-grain Hornady jacketed hollow point. I shot that load at the bottom two targets.
The Marlin Cowboy rifle kicks hard with the 405-grain bullet when shooting from the bench, but it sure is accurate. Both loads can shoot one-hole groups at 50 yards if I do my part. I didn’t do as well at 100 yards (the above are 50-yard groups), but I think that was because I was feeling the effects of too much recoil already. That front sight change worked for me, and the 1895 is a good shooting lever gun.
Here’s a quick look at some new 185-grain powder-coated semi-wadcutter bullets I received from my good buddy Jim Gardner. I loaded 50 with 5.0 grains of Bullseye in mixed brass to get a feel for how they shot. They did great!
This was a quick look with zero load development; I just used the load that had worked well for me with cast-and-lubed 185-grain semi-wadcutter bullets. The distance was 50 feet.
The two targets on the left were just to get a feel where the load shot, and then I put the remaining 40 rounds through the silhouette target. Interestingly, there was no leading and no blue paint residue in the barrel. I like these Gardner bullets!
More Tales of the Gun, including our favorite loads, are right here!
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The 1911 is an all time favorite handgun for me (and a lot of other people, too). I’ve owned several 1911s over the last few decades, I carried one in the Army, and I enjoy shooting them. One of the best I’ve ever owned is a bright stainless steel Series 80 Government Model I bought new back in the mid-1980s. Mine has been customized by good buddy TJ (of TJ’s Custom Gunworks) and it’s the one you see here. I have no idea how many rounds I’ve sent downrange with this gun, but it’s been zillions. Maybe even gazillions.
TJ’s Custom 1911 Touches
My bright stainless 1911 has had a number of TJ’s custom touches. The fixed Millet sights are probably the most obvious.
Front and rear Millet sights on my 1911. You’re actually supposed to focus on the front sight and the rear should be blurred when shooting (just the opposite of what you see here). I’ll post more on that in a later blog.The Millet red ramp front sight.
TJ polished and ramped the gun’s internals so it will feed anything, he added a Les Baer match grade barrel, and I had him engine turn the chamber (I love the look).
A Les Baer match barrel.I like it so much I photographed it twice!
The original Colt front sight wouldn’t stay put on my 1911 (probably because of the number of rounds I was cycling through it), and after having the front sight restaked twice, I knew something more permanent was required. The Millet red ramp from sight has two stakes, they are each larger than the single Colt front sight stake, and TJ JB-welded them from underneath after staking. They are on there for the duration. A lot of folks prefer a dovetailed front sight and that would have worked, too, but I’m partial to these no-longer-made Millets. I just like the look.
The rear sight is a fixed Millet dovetail and it has a bright white outline that works well with the red ramp front. I’m not normally a fan of gimmicky sight doodads like red ramps and white outlines, but these just flat work. They’re quick to acquire and they put the bullets where I want them to go. Millet sights are no longer in production, but they are some of the best ever made and TJ keeps a stash in stock for his customers. I imagine he spends a lot of time on Ebay hunting for these things.
One other thing TJ did on my 1911: He fitted the extractor. It was very rough as delivered from Colt and difficult to remove for cleaning. Now (after TJ’s magic touches) it inserts and removes easily, and extraction is flawless.
1911 Accuracy
Close enough for government work, most folks would say, and maybe that’s so. When I slow down and do my part, I can tear one ragged hole at 50 feet with my 1911, and that’s good enough. If I’m shooting for fun with a bit of speed, it’s not problem to put an entire box of ammo through one big ragged hole with the odd flyer or five like you see up top.
The Millet sights print where I want them to, and I like the simplicity of fixed handgun sights. It’s a good setup.
Getting a Grip
My 1911 didn’t need a trigger job, and TJ recommended not trying to improve the trigger after he felt it. The gun came with the rubber Pachmayr-type wraparound grips from the Colt factory, and I added a Pachmayr rubberized rear grip housing. Those two items (the rubber grips and rear grip housing) are, in my opinion, as good as it gets in the 1911 game. I don’t think that rear grip housing is available any more. I wish I had bought a few extra when Pachmayr was still making them.
Appearance Is Everything
I’m not normally a shiny objects kind of guy, but when I first saw my bright stainless 1911 in that gun store 35 years ago, I knew I had to have it. The gun just looked cool and it’s a conversation starter. It’s easy to pick up minor scratches that I can see before other folks do, but they come right out with a bit of Flitz (a superb stainless steel polish) and a little elbow grease.
My Three Favorite .45 ACP Loads
The target you see at the top of this blog? That’s 50 rounds at 50 feet with one of my favorite loads for this and any other 1911 I’ve ever shot: 5.0 grains of Bullseye under a 185-grain cast semi-wadcutter bullet. I’ve got a couple of other favorite loads, too. One is the 230-grain cast roundnose over 5.6 grains of Unique (that load is 100% reliable in any 1911). Another for target work is 4.2 grains of Bullseye and a 200-grain cast semi-wadcutter. All three loads are as reliable as taxes going up under a Democrat, and they all work with the same recoil spring. In my case, that’s the spring that came with my Colt 1911.
230 grains (in this case, bullets from Xtreme), 5.6 grains of Unique, and good times.
If you’re interested in learning how to reload .45 ammo, here you go:
Some folks won’t shoot a commemorative or high end custom gun, and instead relegate the firearm to a life of being on display or taking up residence as a safe queen. Other folks espouse a manly “I won’t have a gun I don’t shoot” attitude. I’m a few days away from having to make that decision with the Lyman Ruger No. 1 you see in the photo above. What’s your feeling, and why?
Let us know here in the comments section and don’t waste any energy posting on Facebook. This is where the cool kids hang out and we want to know what you think.
Good buddy Guy Miner, former US Marine and retired law enforcement officer, enjoys following the ExhaustNotes blog and in particular, our gun stories. Guy has a very cool 1909 Colt and he wrote a guest piece on it for us.
Pressed into service by the Army, Navy and Marines early in the twentieth century, the Colt New Service revolver also served in various police departments and of course as a sturdy handgun for many outdoorsmen. This particular revolver was my grandfather’s and I’ve been caring for it the past 35+ years. The old Colt is a big revolver, with a 5 ½” barrel and those gaping 45 caliber holes in the cylinder. Grandpa, a WWI veteran, got this Colt after it was sold as surplus by New York. The backstrap is marked NYST for New York State Troopers. He carried it as part of his WWII era security duties with the Home Guard.
When it became mine, I replaced the bulky custom grips that fit the frame poorly and my hand worse. A pair of recent manufacture, original looking grips better suit both the revolver and my hands. I wasn’t expecting much in the way of accuracy and was pleasantly surprised on my first trip to the range with it. The first ammo I used was Federal’s 225 grain LSWC hollow point which produced modest recoil and good accuracy.
All of the major ammunition makers support this wonderful old cartridge. It was originally a low pressure, big bore tossing a heavy lead bullet at modest velocity. For this revolver, that’s exactly how I load it. Typically I’ll use the soft swaged 250 grain Speer LSWC loaded with 8 grains of Unique and a CCI 300 primer for about 830 fps.
One caution when loading for these fine old revolvers – they’re not meant to handle the very stout 45 Colt loads intended for use in Ruger’s much newer and stronger revolvers. Stick with loads for the old 45 Colt, which approximate the power level of a 45 ACP.
I treat the old gun gently, shooting only a few boxes of ammo through it every year. Now and again I’ll shove it into a holster and haul it along with me on a camping or fishing trip, though I prefer a smaller revolver for those duties. Mostly it gets hauled along out of a sense of nostalgia. Handling it, I can’t help but think of my grandfather, of the trooper who carried it long ago, and of the history wrought by these grand big bore revolvers.
Guy, thanks very much for your guest blog. I always enjoy reading about vintage revolvers. Your Colt has an interesting provenance and a great family history, and the grips you put on it look great. I always wanted a 1909, and your story makes me want one even more. You write well, my friend.
My good buddy Bob, who enjoys playing with things that go bang as much as I do, followed the stories I’ve done on my TJ-modified revolvers and pistols. Bob wrote to ask if the guy really is that good. He is, I said. In fact, he’s better.
Bob took the plunge and had TJ refine several of his guns. Bob sent this note to me after he took his TJ-modified automatics to the range.
Joe,
I got my Berettas back from TJ. I initially took him a M-1951 and a 92 and when he was done with those I picked them up and dropped off another 92 for a Level 1 package and a Radom P-64 that I was having trouble with. Picked those up a few weeks ago and finally got to the range yesterday. Took the M-1951 and both 92s and what a difference. Just wonderful.
You were totally right about TJ. And I would like to do a guest blog at some point. Any tips?
Bob
Bob, thanks for the note and the photos, and the offer to write a guest blog. We always love receiving them. As for tips, if the question refers to writing, my advice is to just be yourself. If it refers to shooting, that’s easy: Focus on the front sight. And thanks again!
Hey, all of our gun stories are here on our Tales of the Gun page! Revolvers, autos, milsurps, lever guns, single shot rifles, reloading, and much, much more!
