The ExhaustNotes Blog

The Wayback Machine: Riding in High Temps

By Joe Berk

With the temps hitting over 100 degrees out here, I thought it might be a good idea to rerun a blog we ran a few years ago. Let’s stay cool out here, folks!

I visited Chiriaco Summit and the Patton Museum last week (we’ll have a blog on it soon) and it was awesome. But wow, was it ever hot. As in 111 degrees when we left, and that’s not an unusually warm day out there in the Sonoran Desert. The next town over is called Thermal, and a little further north there’s this place called Death Valley. Death Valley recorded a whopping 131 degrees three weeks ago. Sensing a pattern?

Looks like the Mojave, doesn’t it? Nope. That’s Joe Gresh in the Gobi Desert. Gresh and I rode across it after coming down off the Tibetan Plateau. It was a bit warm out there.

Yeah, it gets warm in these parts, and in other parts of the world as well. Hot weather is not ideal riding weather, to say the least, but sometimes we find ourselves riding in shake and bake conditions. I’ve done it. I rode a 150cc scooter all the way down to Cabo and back in Baja’s hottest month of the year (September, when it was well over a hundred degrees every day). It was humid down there, too, once we crossed over to the Sea of Cortez side of the peninsula. We were literally entering the tropics as we crossed the Tropic of Cancer. Whoa, that was rough riding!

Simon Gandolfi, suspenders flying in the breeze, riding my Mustang replica bike south of the Tropic of Cancer in Baja California Sur. It was one of the hottest rides I ever experienced.

When we did the Western America Adventure Ride with CSC and the guys from Zongshen, we rode through the same corridors described earlier above, riding across California and the Mojave Desert, through Joshua Tree, and on into Arizona with temps approaching 110 degrees. That was brutal riding.

King Kong and Mr. Zuo in Joshua Tree National Park. That was another brutally hot day. Higher higher temps were still in front of us when we later rolled through Amboy, California. This picture became the cover photo for 5000 Miles At 8000 RPM. You should buy a copy or three (they make great gifts).

The ride across China that Joe Gresh and I did had similar challenges. It started out hot, then it got cold as we rode into the Tibetan Plateau, and then it became brutally hot and humid as we descended into central China and rode east to Qingdao. That was a 38-day ride, and I’d guess it was well over 100 degrees for at least 30 of those 38 days.

The risk, of course, is heat stroke, and it’s often not the kind of thing you can feel coming on. You’ll think you’re okay one minute, and the next you’re waking up in an emergency room wondering what happened. If you start to feel a headache while riding in hot weather, you are already perilously close to heat stroke. You need to stop, drink copious amounts of water, and get some shade. The better approach, though, is to not let yourself get anywhere near that condition, and that’s what this article is all about.

It almost seems like heresy to say it, but my first bit of advice about riding in hot weather is: Don’t. Given the choice, postpone the ride. But let’s assume that this is not an option, as was the case for each of the rides mentioned above. Okay, then…here’s my guidance on the topic.

12 Hot Weather Riding Tips

One: Don’t ride naked. I’m not trying to be funny here, and I’m not implying you might be the kind of person who would go down the road wearing nothing at all (although there is that story about Gresh riding around with only a bathrobe). Nope, what I’m talking about is not shucking your safety gear. You have to wear it. All of it. ATGATT. All the gear, all the time. You can’t peel it off just because it’s hot. It’s saved my life.

My Viking Cycles mesh jacket and the mighty Enfield.

Two: Wear a good mesh jacket. These are available from several sources. I have a Viking Cycles jacket I’m wearing these days and it works well. I wore a Joe Rocket mesh jacket on the ride across China and it made a big difference. You can get them from Viking Cycles, CSC Motorcycles, British Motorcycle Gear, and other sources. Trust me on this…you need a ventilated jacket for riding in hot weather. EDIT: We’re getting interesting comments advising not wearing a mesh jacket in hot weather. Make sure you read the comments below, and for those of you who responded, thanks very much!

Three: Use a cooling vest. These things actually work, but they’re not as easy to use as it sounds. They don’t work for long, but they work. The idea is you soak them, and then wear them under a jacket. The airflow causes the water in the vest to evaporate and that cools the vest and you. I’ve found that on really hot days these vests need to be remoistened about every thirty minutes, but you should be stopping that often anyway (more on that later). It’s the remoistening part that I don’t like. It seems like they take forever to soak up water when you remoisten them. I’ve found it easer to just get my clothes wet (see the next point below).

Four: Go soak your head (and everything else). Don’t laugh; I’ve done this. On the Baja ride I mentioned above, it was so unbearably hot that we took to pouring water down the inside of our riding jackets and inside our helmets at every stop. We became rolling evaporative coolers. It helped.

Five: Change your riding hours. On the really hot days, I like to hit the road at 0:Dark:30. Get out and get a hundred or so miles in before it gets unbearably hot. You’d need good lighting on your bike to do this (I generally don’t like to ride at night, but I’ll make an exception when I know it’s going to be hot). This is difficult to do when riding in a group because it’s hard to get everybody moving that early. If it was just me and Gresh or Welker, we’d leave way early and get in a couple of hours of riding (or more) before the sun comes up.

We knew it was going to be brutally hot riding through Joshua Tree and the Mojave Desert, so we left just before sunup on the first day of the Western America Adventure Ride.

Six: Drink a lot of water. The problem with riding in high temperatures is you don’t realize how much water you lose through perspiration. My advice is to stop every 30 minutes and drink a bottled water. Like I said above, most of us ain’t spring chickens, and you might be wondering if this means you’re going to be stopping a lot to pee. Hey, it’s a common old guy problem, but it won’t be in hot weather. Drink a lot of water; you’ll lose it through perspiration as you ride.

Seven: Avoid alcoholic beverages. Alcohol will cause you to dehydrate more rapidly, and that’s the opposite of what we’re trying to do here. You shouldn’t be consuming alcohol on a motorcycle ride anyway. Drinking any kind of alcohol while riding in hot weather is just stupid. Where I found you really have to watch this is when riding in a large group (there will be one or two riders who have to have that beer or two at lunch).

Beer is good, especially when it’s a Tecate at the Old Mill in Baja overlooking Bahia San Quintin. But save it for the end of the day, when the bikes are parked for the night.

Eight: Stop regularly to cool off. Find a bit of shade or someplace air conditioned, and get off the bike to cool down. When I ride in hot weather, I usually stop to cool off and rehydrate every 30 minutes or so.

Stopping to cool off at the Tropic of Cancer. Wow, it was hot and humid down there! We were off standing in the shade, drinking bottled water.

Nine: Keep your tires at recommended pressures. Another thing you definitely don’t want on a hot day is underinflated tires. Tires flex with every rotation, and flexing causes the tires to heat. Throw in high road surface temperatures with underinflated tires, and you’re flirting with a blowout. This is especially important to remember if you’re one of those guys or gals who deflate their tires for dirt riding. Don’t forget to pump them back up when you get back on the asphalt.

Ten: Don’t speed. Tar melts on hot days, and melted tar is slick. Factor that into your riding when it gets toasty.

A meal fit for a king, but not for lunch. You wouldn’t want to ride in hot weather immediately after this Baja seafood extravaganza.

Eleven: Eat light. Don’t over indulge. Heavy meals put a strain on your digestive system and your heart, and that can elevate your body temperature. When I was involved in testing munitions out in the Mojave on hot days (where it was sometimes over 120 degrees), we always brought along melons for lunch and nothing else. We didn’t need to keep them cool. They were a great treat, they seemed to make it a little cooler on those horrifically hot days, and they help to keep you hydrated. Good buddy Sergeant Zuo seemed to know all about that in China, too. We were riding through Ledu in central China one ferociously hot day when our favorite Chinese NCO stopped the group, disappeared, and returned with a couple of watermelons. That was a welcome respite and a marvelous treat. We ate a lot of watermelon in China.

Gresh taking a break in Ledu, China. That’s the Yellow River (China’s Mother River) behind Uncle Joe.

Twelve: Lighten up on the low sodium schtick. A lot of us older guys try to watch our sodium intake. When I was in the Army, they actually gave us salt tabs on really hot days when we were in the field, the theory being that we needed the sodium because we were losing so much through perspiration. I later heard the Army reversed that practice, but the fact is you lose a lot of minerals through perspiration. I don’t worry about my sodium intake when riding on hot days.

So there you have it. You know, most folks who ride motorcycles these days…well, how can I say this delicately? We aren’t spring chickens anymore. Motorcycling tends to be a thing mostly enjoyed by full-figured senior citizens, and we have to take care of ourselves, especially when we venture out on hot days.

If you other ideas about hot weather riding, let us know in the Comments section. We love hearing from you.

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

The Sopranos: Paterson Falls

By Joe Berk

Another one of the stops on my New Jersey Sopranos tour was Paterson Falls. Although only about 40 miles or so from where I grew up, I’d never been there.

I knew of the town, though. It’s an old industrial village with waterfalls, which meant that in the early days of our country it was perfect for industrial development. The falls provided hydraulic power, and that could be used to drive machinery. Indeed, it’s where Samuel Colt built his first run of revolvers, which are known (not surprisingly) as Paterson Colts. Paterson was established as the nation’s first planned industrial city in 1792, with its readily-available hydraulic power and close proximity to New York City and the Atlantic Ocean. Paterson manufactured silk cloth, steam locomotives, textiles, paper, firearms, and aircraft engines. It is centered on the Passaic River, which flows into Newark Bay and from there to the Atlantic Ocean.

The Passaic Falls are contained within the Paterson Great Falls National Historic Park, which is (as the name implies) part of the U.S. National Park system. All this was news to me, which is kind of amazing when you consider that I grew up a short 40 miles to the south. I’d never known any of this, and to learn about it at my age was surprising. I’ll give the credit for that to David Chase (the guy who created The Sopranos). Had that show not sparked my interest, I’d still be ignorant.

So, let’s move on to the scene in The Sopranos that caught my attention. It’s the episode in which Mikey Palmici (Uncle Junior’s driver and bodyguard) throws a drug dealer off the bridge over the Passaic Falls:

That episode you see above occurred later in The Sopranos. There was another scene in the very first Sopranos episode on the same bridge shown above in which Hesh Rabkin and Big Pussy Bompensiero (two of The Sopranos characters) threaten to throw a health insurance company executive (a guy named Alex Mahaffey, played by Michael Gaston) off the same bridge if he didn’t cooperate with a Sopranos scam to defraud the insurance company.

When threatened with a swan dive off the bridge, Mahaffey gave in to the Soprano family’s demands, but alas, his Sopranos career was over; Michael Gaston never appeared in another episode. But that didn’t mean Sue and I wouldn’t see him again. In one of our trips to New Jersey, we rode the Air Trans shuttle between the airport and the rental car facility. Just before we boarded the shuttle, Michael Gaston was leaving the car we entered. We didn’t bug him, but we made eye contact and he knew we knew who he was.

Michael Gaston, an actor we bumped into on the Newark Airport Air Trans.

There’s a lot more to Paterson, though, then simply having been a location for a couple of The Sopranos scenes. Here’s another video that describes Paterson’s history:

Today, Paterson is undergoing a renaissance, as the old factory buildings are being converted to loft apartments. Yup, Paterson is being yuppified. It looks like an interesting place to spend more time, but my schedule didn’t permit doing so on this visit. For us it was roll into town, grab a few photos, and bail.

A view of Passaic Falls. This is a beautiful area.

The wood-surfaced foot bridge featured in two different Sopranos episodes.

Another view of the bridge. It’s closed to the public. On the Internet, it says it’s for safety reasons. One of my police buddies told me it’s because there were too many suicides from this bridge.

Another view of the Passaic River and its Falls in Paterson.

While we were visiting the Paterson Great Falls National Historic Park, this rather plump groundhog was doing the same. My Dad used to hunt these in New Jersey with his .243 Model 70 Winchester and the farmers loved having him do so. These woodchucks may look cute, but they destroy a lot of crops.

One thing I know for sure: I’ll return to Paterson. I’d like to explore the city, its museums, and more in greater detail.

Want to see our other visits to The Sopranos locations? Here they are:

The Sopranos Mansion

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

Koh Tao, Thailand

By Mike Huber

Having a new addiction to scuba diving, it didn’t take me long to learn that Koh Tao (an island in southern Thailand) was another mecca for my new hobby. Koh Tao wasn’t a very large island and I was a bit concerned I would succumb to island fever. The big difference is now I would be spending much of my time underwater, thus making the island much larger and more exciting than previous islands I had visited. This new hobby opened up a new world to me just as learning to off-road on the BMW GS1200 had done. They both were previously unexplored frontiers that drew me in and begged for more exploration after each experience.

Koh Tao isn’t exactly easy to travel to from anywhere as you need to fly or bus, and then take a 3-hour ferry out to the island. This to me made it a great destination as I knew those that were there were far off the beaten path and would be well grounded (mentally, not geographically). Although the island was touristy, it was small enough that it was easy to make friends quickly. Another draw to this isolated location was that almost anyone that was here long term had the same line “I came here to visit for two weeks and never left and that was X years ago.” This clearly told me it was a great place to set up a home base for a while and improve on my diving skills.

Outside doing a short blast up to Cambodia and some rest time in Bangkok (yes, it is possible to rest in Bangkok), the past month has been spent in scuba classes (to include advanced diver and rescue diver certifications), fun dives, spending time on the beach, and really just taking a few moments to enjoy chatting with someone at a bar while being fully present in life. The laid back island vibe and hospitality was something that had been missing in my previous travels due to my constant moving. Koh Tao is where I was learning to finally slow down and really embrace the moments without tripping myself up with the racing thoughts I previously had of “what’s next?” This provided an important step into my new lifestyle.

The happiness of being in the moment with my focus on watching my dive log fatten and my circle of friends grow is all I need at this time. As I wrap this article up while sitting at a beach bar with a cold Chang beer sweating next to my laptop, it has me thinking if one day I will tell others “Yeah, I just came here for two weeks but that was X years ago.”

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

A Tale of Two M1922 Springfields

By Joe Berk

Many years ago, I inherited an M1922 Springfield rifle from my Dad. I’ve only ever seen one other M1922 (that’s how rare they are), and it was at the West End Gun Club range earlier this month. Good buddy Kevin owns one, and we both agreed to bring (and shoot) our rifles. Like mine, Kevin’s rifle is beautiful. It has nicer wood than mine. Just seeing any M1922 is a treat (let alone one with figured walnut), so I really enjoyed seeing Kevin’s.

Two ultra-rare M1922 Springfields. The top one is mine, the lower one is Kevin’s. These are the only two I’ve ever seen.

As the name implies, the Springfield Model 1922 was developed in 1922. It was built as a training rifle, intended to offer a lower cost, lower recoil approach to learning how to shoot the Army’s main battle rifle, the 1903 Springfield. The M1922 has the same general dimensions as the 1903, including the large bolt and the long action, but the bolt only retracts just enough to extract and eject a .22 Long Rifle cartridge. It’s really cool.

The M1922 has target grade Lyman adjustable sights, with interchangeable front sight inserts. My rifle is configured as a “peep to peep” sight set; instead of seeing a front post in the rear aperture, the front sight has another aperture ring instead of a post. The idea is that you focus on the target, and the two apertures (in the front sight and the rear sight) appear out of focus. It’s counterintuitive to all the shooting I’ve ever done with iron sights, but it seems to work. My issue is age; these days when looking through those tiny apertures it’s difficult to make sure I’m on the right bullseye on a multi-bullseye target. Ah, to be 70 again…

The adjustable rear Lyman peep sight on my M1922. Note the rifle’s jeweled bolt and long action.

The M1922’s front peep sight. There are different front sight inserts available. Mine had the aperture (or “peep”) insert installed when the rifle came into my possession, and I left it that way.

The M1922 was produced in four different variants from 1922 until the advent of World War II. At that time, material shortages precluded further production, and the US Army had already moved on to the M1 Garand. Springfield Arsenal produced 2,020 M1922 rifles.

Both Kevin’s rifle and mine have jeweled bolts and the jeweling is identical. During all the years I owned my M1922, I always assumed that Dad did the jeweling on my rifle’s bolt (he did that on a lot of his shotguns and rifles). When Kevin showed me his, he told me that the jeweling on his was the only thing on the rifle that wasn’t original. I think we were both wrong. The jeweling on both bolts (Kevin’s and mine) is absolutely identical. I suspect the rifles left the Springfield Arsenal with jeweled bolts, although I did manage to find an internet M1922 photo with a non-jeweled bolt.

Kevin’s rifle had more figure in its walnut stock than mine, and that made me want it immediately (a reaction I have any time I see a rifle with fancy walnut). But I know Kevin is not selling his, and I’m not selling mine, either. These rifles are just too rare (they are irreplaceable, in my opinion), and mine came to me from my Dad (another reason I’ll never sell it). Springfield M1922 rifles don’t come up for sale very often, and when they do, they go for big bucks. I searched Gunbroker.com and found two that were listed at $2,499 and $2,099, and neither of those was in nearly as good a condition as mine or Kevin’s. I’d expect our rifles to be in the $3,000+ range if they were for sale, but like I said above, they most definitely are not. The magazines for these rifles are extremely rare, too. I’ve never seen one for sale; I imagine if one did appear on the market, the ask would be several hundred dollars.

I’d previously written about my M1922 here on ExNotes and that story is here. There’s more info about these fine rifles online. Rock Island Auction has a good M1922 video. Rock Island does a good job with their videos when they have interesting firearms for sale, and the M1922 Springfield is squarely in that category.

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Folks, if you like what you read here, please consider helping us keep the lights on and the content flowing. We need your help!

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

Product Review: Garmin Chronograph

By Joe Berk

In an earlier blog on my 458 Win Mag No. 1, I mentioned that I used a friend’s Garmin chronograph and decided I needed one. I pulled the trigger and I’ve been using my Garmin constantly since I bought it. I’ve shot rifle with jacketed and cast bullets and I’ve shot several handguns to see how it performed. The bottom line? Garmin hit a home run with their new chrono. Is it perfect? No. But it’s so good I can live with the few minor things I think could be improved.

The Garmin has a bunch of features (and I’ll get into them in a minute), but let my start by saying the most important feature is ease of use. Basically, you turn the thing on, make a few screen inputs, set it on the shooting bench, and you’re good to go. There’s no screwing around with setting up screens in front of the bench, running wires, or any of other stuff you need to do with earlier chronographs. It’s plug and play, but you don’t even have to plug it in.

Operation

Operating the Garmin is straightforward, but it’s not entirely intuitive. The On-Off button is one of four buttons on top of the device. Garmin labels it “Power.” Touch it once and the device is on; hold it down for two seconds and it turns off.

The buttons up top. They are a little confusing at first.

Getting to what you want to shoot involves scrolling through a series of screens and menu options via two of the buttons on top of the Garmin. One points up; the other points down, and that’s how you move from one choice to another on each data screen. Basically, the choices are rifle or handgun (there’s also choices for archery, but I’m not Robin Hood), and their selection is governed by projectile velocity. After navigating up or down on that screen, pressing the OK button gets the next screen up. That asks if you the Garmin to calculate power level (bullet energy). I always tell it no, but getting through that requires pressuring the down button and then the okay button again. Then another screen pops up, advising chronograph placement with regard to gun location. Then it’s necessary to press the OK button once more. That gun placement screen is unnecessary, and it just necessitates pressing more buttons and scrolling through more screens. Finally, the device is ready to use. It’s a lot of button pushing and scrolling. Granted, it is way, way easier than screwing around placing chronograph screens downrange, aligning them with your bullets’ flight path, and making electrical connections, and it’s easier than placing what used to be the most modern chrono (before the Garmin came along) out in front of the firing line. The Garmin is a major step forward in the chrono game.

Once the string has been fired (as many as the shooter wants to include in the string), the scrolling and selecting game starts anew (along with pushing the back, up and down, and OK buttons). I thought it would become intuitive for me, but I’m not the brightest bulb in the box and it seems I have to relearn it every time I go to the range (and I’m on the range at least a couple of times each week).

Charging and Battery Life

Charging is done via a laptop. The chronograph comes with a cord that connects the chrono to your laptop, and that’s how it charges. One charge is good for a couple of range sessions (or more, depending on how much you shoot). Although I didn’t time it, I’m guessing it took maybe an hour to fully recharge.

Downloading Data

I thought the cord connecting the computer to the Garmin would allow me to download the data from each range “session” (a session is a string of shots for which you wish to record data), but if there’s a way to do that, I couldn’t find it. I could the files for each range session, but they were in a format I couldn’t read. What I can do, though, is Bluetooth connect the Garmin to my cellphone. Then, once the data is in my cellphone, I can send the data (in an Excel spreadsheet) to my laptop via email. That’s more bother than I wanted to mess around with, though. I just look at the results on the Garmin screen.

Packaging and the Optional Case

The Garmin chrono doesn’t come with a carrying case. It should. I had to spring for an optional $15, cheaply constructed carrying case that probably cost about 25 cents to make in China. But I’m glad it did. It does a decent job protecting the Garmin and storing the charging cable.

The extra cost case. It ought to be included with the chronograph.

A Few Pistol Examples

I shot three handguns to assess how the Garmin would perform. I thought I could do this at my indoor pistol range (I belong to a couple of gun ranges). The indoor range is usually crowded, and that highlighted one of the Garmin’s weak spots. Even though there are barriers between shooting positions, the Garmin was consistently capturing data from the guy shooting on either side of me. As I had no interest in what they were doing, I picked up my marbles and to the West End Gun Club, an outdoor range.

1911s in .45 ACP, 9mm, and .22. The 1911 is one of the best pistol designs in the world. It’s been around for more than a century.

On the outdoor range there was more room between shooting positions, and the Garmin picking up another shooter’s bullets was not an issue. I shot and captured data for three different handguns. All were 1911s. I’ve written about them before (a .45 ACP Springfield, a 9mm Springfield, and a .22 GSG), but now I can bring you chrono data. My plan was to shoot 50 rounds from each pistol and record the data, shooting at the same silhouette target at 25 yards.

1911 .22 Long Rifle GSG

The GSG .22 Long Rifle 1911. There’s a lot of plastic in this gun, but wowee, does it ever shoot!

The first pistol up was the .22 GSG with Federal Champion ammo. It’s cheap ammo and it’s advertised as having a muzzle velocity of 1260 feet per second, but that’s probably from a much longer rifle barrel. I expected it to be slower from the 1911 and it was.

Federal .22 Long Rifle High Velocity Ammo. The GSG needs the high velocity ammo to function reliably.

I ordered a bunch of ammo when a court found California’s mail order ban unconstitutional. It’s since been overturned, but I brought in a couple thousand rounds when justice prevailed.

The Federal ammo is advertised at 1260 feet per second, but that’s out of a rifle. The chronograph doesn’t lie.

Here’s what the Garmin revealed for the 50 .22 Long Rifle shots fired from the 1911.

1020 versus 1260 feet per second. My lower velocities were due to shooting this ammo in a handgun rather than a rifle.

The velocity was lower than advertised, but as mentioned above, I fired from a 5-inch-barreled handgun and not a rifle.

1911 9mm Springfield

I then turned to my Springfield 9mm 1911, which is one of my all time favorite pistols.

My 9mm Springfield Armory 1911. This is a great handgun.

I fired another 50 rounds through it with my handloaded ammo (the load I used is the 124-grain roundnose plated Xtreme bullet and 5.5 grains of Accurate No. 5 powder. That ammo had about the same average velocity as the .22, but the extreme spread and the standard deviation were lower (a good thing). Accuracy at 25 yards was about the same as the .22 1911.

1035 feet per second ain’t too shabby. I could go higher by running a hotter load, but this one is hot enough and it’s accurate.

You may have noticed that the Garmin only picked up 49 of the 50 shots I fired. I don’t know why it did that.

1911 .45 ACP Springfield

For my final quick look handgun trials I used another Springfield 1911, this time chambered in .45 ACP.

One of the great ones: A .45 ACP 1911. This is also a Springfield Armory handgun.

The load was 4.6 grains of Bullseye under Gardner 185-grain cast semi-wadcutter bullets. This has always been a great target load in any of my 1911s, and it proved that to be the case again. I was not shooting for accuracy; I was simply showing 50 rounds through each of the three 1911s to wring out the Garmin. On the target, the GSG .22 and the Springfield 9mm were grouping at about 10 inches (again, I wasn’t try to put them through the same hole during this test). But that .45? Wow. It put 50 rounds through one ragged hold about 4 inches in diameter. If I had put any effort into it, that hole would have been smaller.

A .45-caliber bullet at 850 feet per second will settle most arguments. It’s accurate, too.

You can see the inherent accuracy in the .45 load I used in this portion of the test. Check out the very small standard deviation and extreme spread. Both are much smaller than the corresponding values for the 9mm and .22 handguns.

Mosin-Nagant Cast Bullets

I next wanted to try cast bullets in the Mosin-Nagant 91/30 rifle. I knew the load I was using (a 173-grain cast bullet and SR 4759 powder) to be an accurate load from previous forays.

I love the Mosin-Nagant. There are certainly more elegant milsurp rifles out there. I haven’t found any that shoot better than a Mosin-Nagant.

Cast bullets loaded in 7.62x54R cases. This is a fun load.

Fast enough, and no leading. This is a great load.

As I said above, I knew this to be an accurate load, and the Garmin showed why: It had a l0w standard deviation.

Mini 14 Jacketed Bullets

Finally, I wanted to see how the Garmin would do with a small bullet moving at higher speeds, so I ran a few shots through my faithful Mini 14.

You don’t see many Mini 14 rifles with wood like this one. It’s stunning, and it can be surprisingly accurate with the right load.

My accuracy loads for the Mini 14 have been a Hornady 55-grain full metal jacket boattail bullet and a max load of either IMR 4320 or ARComp. The results you see below are for the IMR load. You might be wondering why the velocity is a bit less than the expected 3000 feet per second speeds attained with a .223 cartridge. My Mini 14 has a 16-inch barrel.

The Garmin had no difficulty picking up those little 55-grain bullets flying away at 2800+ feet per second.

The results looked good to me. Those five shots went into less than 2 inches at 100 yards. Four of the five went into less than an inch.

A Mini 14? Are you kidding me? I never joke about my work, folks.

The Bottom Line

There’s the good, the bad, and the ugly. The good is the Garmin chronograph has upped the ante by bringing an easily-used chronograph to the masses. There’s no screwing around wires or screens, and you don’t have to get in front of the firing line to set it up. This is a major breakthrough, and it’s what prompted me to finally pull the trigger on a chrono (well, that and my good buddy Walt telling me that any serious shooter and reloader needed a chrono).

The bad? There’s not much. I mentioned the tendency to pick up rounds fired from an adjacent lane on an indoor handgun range. I think the screen scrolling drill could be simplified a bit. The chrono occasionally failed to pick up a round (but that could be me not positioning it correctly). I think the chrono should allow downloading data sessions directly to a computer (without having to Bluetooth the thing to a cell phone and then email it to myself). These nits wouldn’t stop me from buying one, and they shouldn’t stop you, either. I love my Garmin chronograph. The Garmin engineers did a good job.

What surprised me (but maybe didn’t surprise me too much) was that the lowest standard deviation did not necessarily result in the tightest group. Barrel harmonics, bullet issues, and the guy behind the trigger also have a huge influence. I suspect the so-called accuracy loads in the Lyman reloading manual are based mostly (perhaps exclusively) on standard deviation. There are a lot of things that go into rifle and handgun accuracy. With a Garmin chronograph, you can get a better understand them.

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

The Bisley Revisited

By Joe Berk

One thing about Ruger: Nobody can top their customer service. Ruger may not explicitly state their firearms come with a lifetime warranty, but in effect, they do.

You may remember my story on the Ruger Bisley I won in a Rock Island Auction (I wrote about it several months ago). I had wanted a .357 Magnum Bisley for its heavy construction and longer barrel and, truth be told, I was surprised that my bid prevailed. When I won the Rock Island Auction, I ponied up all the nutty fees that come with such an undertaking (they are significant), and then when I received the Bisley I was disappointed. It wasn’t particularly accurate (the group sizes were mediocre), and it shot so far to the left the rear sight had to be adjusted all the way to the right to get the shots on paper.

I figured I was kind of stuck with the Bisley and my initial thought was I’d look at the gun for a while, stick it in the safe, and then maybe sell it somewhere down the line. But it bothered me. Owning a firearm that doesn’t meet my expectations doesn’t set easy. If there’s such a thing as having an obsessive-compulsive disorder with firearms that are less than perfect, I’d make for a good clinical study.

I wrote to Ruger and told them what I wanted, which was an accurate Bisley that didn’t shoot to the left. I told them the revolver left their plant in 1986, so I was more than willing to pay whatever it took to make me happy. I also mentioned that I wanted to buy new grip frame screws and a new ejector rod shroud (cosmetically, they looked beat up). And finally, I mentioned that extraction was difficult with hotter loads. I asked the Ruger folks to hone the chamber walls so the fired cases would extract easily.

Ruger charged me $45 for a Fedex mailer (which they emailed to me), told me how to package my revolver (a plain brown box, with nothing on the outside to indicate its contents), and advised it could be 4 to 6 weeks before I saw the gun again. Four days later, it was on its way back to me, with no additional charges other than the initial $45 I paid for the Fedex mailer.

The rear sight, approximately centered. This is way better than what it was when I returned the Ruger.

Ruger honed the chamber walls to prevent sticky extraction. The gun extracts flawlessly.

Ruger mentioned in the paperwork returned with the gun that they retorqued the barrel, installed a new ejector shroud, honed the chambers, replaced all the grip screws, test fired it, and sent it home. The first thing I looked at was the rear sight. Comfortingly, it was a lot closer to being centered than it was when I sent the gun to them.

So how did it do?

Yessiree, that’s what I’m talking about!

Just fine, thanks. The day I received it, I hopped in the Subie, motored over to my indoor range, and fired three different .357 loads at 10 meters. Now, I know 10 meters is only 30 feet, but I wanted to get an idea how the revolver was working. One load was a relatively mild Bullseye-powered concoction with cast 158-grain bullets, another was a gonzo 158-grain Hornady jacketed bullet load with a max charge of Unique, and the third was an even more energetic load with the same 158-grain jacketed hollow point Hornady bullet and a max load of Winchester 296 propellant. On that indoor range, even with my Walker electronic earmuffs, the concussion of the big Bisley and its full throated .357 loads was starting to give me a headache. But the targets? Oh, boy…the Bisley and I were back in business. I ran another target out to 50 feet (the longest range available at the indoor range), and that group was just as good as the ones at 30 feet.

Winchester’s 296, Unique, a finished .357 Magnum cartridge, the 158-grain Hornady XTP bullet, and the 180-grain Hornady XTP bullet.

A macro shot of the Hornady 159-grain and 180-grain XTP bullets. Viewed from outside the cartridge case, the bullets appear identical. The difference is in their length below the cannelure.

A couple of loaded .357 Magnum cartridges. I’ve always liked the .357 Magnum cartridge.

The day after that, I took the Bisley to our Wednesday morning Geezer get-together at the West End Gun Club. I had three things in mind: I wanted to show off a bit to my friends, I wanted to chronograph the two balls-out .357 loads I mentioned above, and I wanted to see how the revolver would do at 100 yards. Yes, you read that right: 100 yards.

100 yards with the Bisley. The first 30 shots or so were with the Unique load. When i switched over to the 296 load, the group tightened. Next time I’m out I’ll try the 180-grain bullets with 296 and dial in a little windage.

My buddy Kevin spotted for me with his spotting scope, and he was amazed with the first load (8.0 grains of Unique and the 158-grain Hornady jacketed hollow points). Kevin gave a hearty “whoa!” and I suspected things were looking good.

Kevin said several of the shots (after I had warmed up a bit and got into my long-range groove) grouped like I was shooting a rifle. I sure didn’t mind hearing that. I checked the chronograph and the velocities were respectable, too. The bullets were hitting to the left a bit, but I had room to adjust the rear sight to bring that in. And where a gun prints on target is a function of how it is held. I wasn’t consistent with the Bisley yet (I actually haven’t shot it that much).

The 158-grain Hornady bullet with 8.0 grains of Unique. It’s a max load and velocities were respectable, but not like what I attained with Winchester 295.

Then I switched to the heavier-duty 296 load (with the same Hornady XTP bullet), and wowee, I was keeping them in the black on that same 100-yard rifle target. And those loads were smoking hot. Winchester;s 296 propellant is good stuff. Check this out.

Whoa, baby! 1500 fps plus! 296 is a dynamite powder in the .357 Magnum.

All the cartridge cases extracted easily and even with the 1500 feet per second 296 load above, there were no pressure signs (other than a hellacious muzzle blast). As mentioned above, Ruger honed the chambers for me and the prior extraction issues had evaporated.

With replacement of the grip frame screws and the ejector shroud, the Bisley looks like a new revolver. And other than me paying for the initial shipping to Ruger, it was all on the house (Ruger’s house, that is). Bear in mind what I said earlier in this blog: The Bisley, purchased used, is a 38-year-old revolver.

The Bisley went from being a regret to a gun I’m excited about owning. You probably know that Ruger also made these guns in other chamberings, to include .44 Magnum and .45 Colt, and you might be wondering why I wanted the .357 Magnum. Back in the 1970s when I was a handgun metallic silhouette shooter, I competed with a .357 Magnum and I was a rarity. While everyone else was shooting a .44 Magnum or a .45 Colt, or custom-built bolt-action handguns shooting what were essentially rifle cartridges, I was one of the very few people (in fact, the only one I knew of) who shot a .357 Magnum in that game. With the right loads, the .357 would topple the 200-meter rams (the toughest target to knock over) more reliably than either the .44 Magnum or the .45 Colt, so there was a certain coolness (and a bit of smugness) on my part associated with that. The other reason is weight. When Ruger chambers different cartridges in the same firearm, the gun’s external dimensions remain the same, so the .357 Magnum Bisley weighs more than the .44 Magnum or the .45 Colt versions. More weight means the gun holds steadier and that means greater accuracy.

What’s next for this revolver is working up a load with Hornady’s 180-grain jacketed hollow point bullet and 296 powder and getting the sights dialed in at 50, 100, 150, and 200 yards (the four stages of a handgun metallic silhouette competition). When I used to compete in metallic silhouette competition, I used a cast 200-grain bullet, but nobody makes that bullet commercially. Well, almost nobody. I previously found a guy who sold a 200-grain bullet for the .357, but his bullets leaded terribly and accuracy fell off after the first three or four rounds (and cleaning the bore was a pain). If I can get the 180-grain jacketed bullets to group well, I think the metallic silhouette rams at 200 yards won’t know the difference between a 200-grain cast bullet and a 180-grain jacketed bullet, and I may get back in the game. We’ll see.

That term: Balls out. You might think it’s a crude anatomical and testicular reference, but it’s not. Engine governors used to use lever-suspended rotating metal balls that moved further away from their axis of rotation as rpm increased. When the engine speed reached a preset maximum value allowed by the governor, the centrifugal outward movement of the balls operated a lever that prohibit engine speed from going any higher. At that point, the engine was running “balls out.”

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

ExNotes Review: Doremi Kawasaki Z1 Body Set

By Joe Gresh

Zed has been dormant for a few years. The bike has a running issue that has eluded my best efforts to remedy. But this story isn’t about my mechanical incompetence. This story is about Zed’s gas tank.

Back in the Zed’s Not Dead series I cleaned the tank fairly well using the apple cider vinegar method. The cider/baking soda trick works well but Zed’s tank was looking a little crusty after sitting two years with alcohol laced fuel inside.

I decided to give the tank a second cider session. All went well and the tank was spotless inside. I installed the tank and filled it with fresh gas. Checking the tank for leaks revealed none so I closed up the shed and retired to dream big dreams of fun motorcycle rides to come.

The next morning when I opened the shed a strong odor of gasoline hit my nose. Fuel was everywhere under Zed. The right side tank bottom was soaking wet. Apparently only the paint was covering pinhole rust-through spots. After draining the remaining fuel I ran a wire brush over the bottom of the tank, which revealed a ton of tiny holes.

My initial plan, because I can’t let it go, was to cut out the bottom of the tank, fabricate a new sheet metal piece to fit and then braze the new bottom into the tank. It’s a good plan and it might have worked.

Instead, I went with Plan B: a new set of painted bodywork from Doremi (a Zed parts supplier out of Japan). Doremi is resold by several different companies in the US. I chose Cycles R Us, an eBay seller because they had the correct year and color in stock and their shipping was only $39. Prices for the body set are mostly the same (around $1500 with some outliers at $1700).

I know what you’re thinking: that’s a lot of money for a cheap bastard like me. It killed me to spend the money but used tanks are going for $500 and new, unpainted reproduction tanks are $400. Not to mention a professional paint job on my repaired stuff would probably exceed $1200.

One of the good things about the soaring value of Z1 Kawasaki’s is that you can spend money restoring them with a good chance of getting your investment back (minus your labor)

Enough of the rationalizations: let’s get into the product. Opening the well packaged box from Doremi was breathtaking. The paint is stunning. I cannot find a flaw anywhere and I don’t think the factory Kawasaki paint looked this good back when the bike was new on the showroom floor.

For 1975 Kawasaki’s Z1 had two color choices, a metallic aqua-blue that was pretty and my bike’s color, a dark burgundy that looks almost brown in low light. The color pops deep red metallic when a single photon from the sun strikes the paint surface. The stripes are perfectly applied and I cannot fault the quality of Doremi’s product.

My kit came with new tank badges and a new gas cap, some resellers break these parts out of the kit and sell them separately.

The tank badges are flat when you get them and require gentle bending by hand to fit the curvature of the gas tank. This is kind of a trial and error thing. I got the badges pretty close but they still need a little tweaking near the front. I stopped bending them mostly because I was worried about messing them up.

The gas cap comes loose in another bag. Putting the cap on was pretty easy once the roll pin was test fit into the tank.

The gas cap latch was a little harder to install. The instructions were oddly worded and there are some notches you are supposed to file into the underside of the latch. The photos aren’t super clear and I could find no reason to file notches so I ignored the instructions and did it the way I wanted.

The main issue with the gas cap latch is getting the little torsion spring inside the latch then holding it concentric while the pivot shaft is slid into place. The instructions recommended using a small, flat blade screwdriver, I tried that but it was fumbly and the spring never ended up in the correct location.

The method I settled on was to compress the torsion spring and capture the two ends with a small tube (the interior metal barrel of a wire crimp connector) once you have both ends of the spring under control it’s easy to insert the spring and line it up with the pivot shaft.

The latch’s pivot shaft is sort of a rivet. After it’s in place you have to peen over the end. This is a two-man job as you’ll need to hold a weight against the pivot head on one side while rolling the other end. I’ll get CT to help me with this step.

The new side covers arrived without badges so I used the original badges. The old badges were in fair condition but I suspect the reseller removed the new badges from the Doremi kit.

The new tail section was a bit fiddley in that the bolt holes didn’t quite line up perfectly like the original tail. You reuse the original Kawasaki grommets and spacers with the new tail. Maybe new grommets would be softer and have more give. It took a little aggressive tugging to get all four bolts lined up and in place. I imagine the plastic will take a set in its new position and future fitting will be easier.

Zed’s original paint was in horrible condition, the bike had sat outside for an indeterminate length of time. Talk about patina. I cleaned up the old paint as much as I could but it was tatty and dead. The Doremi body kit transformed the bike: it looks like a new, 1975 Kawasaki Z1-B. The bike is beautiful in the sunlight with the perfectly smooth surfaces changing color as you move about. Damn, this bike looks good.

Is the Doremi body set worth $1500? If your old stuff is rusted, yes. Even if your old stuff is in good shape you’d be hard pressed to find a painter who could lay down a beautiful job like Doremi for $1500. It’s like you’re paying for a paint job and the bodywork is free!

I recommend the Doremi highly. If we had a rating system at exhaustnotes it would get top marks. If you want your Z1 to look like a new bike get the Doremi.

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

Product Review: Razor Electronic Muffs

By Joe Berk

I’ve never been one to fall for fancy newfangled gear (unless it involved fancy walnut), so for most of my life I’ve used cheap Harbor Freight earmuffs when shooting. That’s okay for most shooting, I thought, but I recently noticed that my earmuffs were interfering with getting a good cheek weld on a rifle stock when shooting from the bench. And there was another issue: Good buddy Daniel (one of the rangemasters) always has a good joke or two, and I couldn’t hear him through my earmuffs.

I noticed other guys using electronic earmuffs. You know, the kind that lets you hear normal conversation, but chops out the loud report from a handgun or rifle. They appeared in a recent ad to be slightly narrower than my el cheapo Harbor Freight muffs, too, so I thought maybe they wouldn’t interfere with the rifle’s stock. So I pulled the trigger, figuratively speaking, and ordered a pair of Razor Slim Electronic Earmuffs from Amazon.

They take two AA batteries (which are provided), and they turn on or off via a dial on back of the left earmuff. That dial also controls the volume. Turn them off, and they are like a regular set of earmuffs. Turn them on, and you can hear conversation but rifle and handgun shots are attenuated. You can control the volume, so I imagine they are pretty much like wearing hearing aids. In fact, they work almost too well in that regard. I could hear conversations a dozen benches down on the firing line, and I had to reduce the volume because I found it distracting.

I like these Razor earmuffs. I can carry on a conversation when wearing them, and that makes it nice because those with whom I’ve conversing don’t need to shout (nor do it).

The knob on the left eafmuff controls the volume and is also the on-off switch. If you forget to turn that knob off, it will run down the batteries.

There are three things I don’t like about the Razor earmuffs, but none are showstoppers and they wouldn’t prevent me from buying them. The first is that the original reason I bought them (to eliminate interference with the rifle stock), well, that isn’t what I found. The name notwithstanding (“Razors”), they interfere as much or more than a plain old set of the Harbor Freight earmuffs. The second is that it’s easy to forget to turn down the volume all the way and switch the earmuffs off, with the result being that on the next trip to the range, the batteries are dead. That one’s on me, I guess. The third reason is they are warm. The Razor earmuffs form a better seal around your ears, and on a hot day, that can be a bit of a drag. But like I said above, none of these are showstoppers for me, and they shouldn’t be for you, either.

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

Indonesia: Part 4

By Mike Huber

It was a relief to be back on the boat and done diving for the day. My anxiety level was still pretty high having run out of air 10 meters below the ocean’s surface on my second dive. Nonetheless, I registered to dive the following day. There was a sense of relief knowing that I would have the same diving partner. He understood the emotions going through my head and he would be right at my side to help me through the next dive.

The remainder of the boat ride back to the dock consisted of me pulling sea urchin spines out from everywhere on my body with needle-nosed pliers. That’s one way to pass the time. The spines under my fingernail would need to be pulled out by a doctor at a medical clinic somewhere in Flores. My biggest concern was that it might become infected. The closest clinic was a few kilometers outside of town so I would have to taxi to get there.

Then, upon disembarking from the boat I looked up and saw an Indonesian Naval Base. Right behind the gate was a giant red cross. I decided to give it a try, not expecting any success. The Military Police stopped me instantly ,asking what I was doing. I showed them my finger and pointed to the red cross behind them. They invited me in and within 5 minutes I had an Indonesian Naval Officer using a razor blade to pull the pines out from under my fingernail. After about 45 minutes of him carefully removing all the spines, he gave me some antibiotics, he only charged me about $12 (US), and he sent me on my way. During the whole ordeal he and I were chatting quite a bit over our past military experience and we even exchanged phone numbers. We trade texts every few weeks.

With the sea urchin spines removed, the next day came and it was time to get over my anxiety from the previous dive. The first dive of the day proved to be challenging and my only motivation was to just survive it. I wasn’t too concerned with the enjoyment or the wildlife. Fortunately, by the second dive I had regained my confidence and was back to enjoying this hobby again. Swimming by seven manta rays changed my mind and helped me reprioritize my goals.

My 30-day Indonesian visa was nearing expiration. Indonesia has around 7,000 islands and was much too large to cover in 30 days. Even having experienced 10 of the islands felt rushed. I knew I would need to slow my travel to more deeply absorb these countries. Having done SCUBA dives in two countries, racking up 19 dives, and overcoming adversity provided renewed confidence. I was ready for the next country: Thailand.

Inbound!

By Joe Berk

We’ve got a bunch of good stuff coming your way, my friends. I just finished a whirlwind week in New Jersey, we hit some of the Sopranos film locations, I grabbed a bunch of very cool Norton P11 photos, we saw where Bruce Springsteen was setting up for a concert in Asbury Park, I have a review on the new Garmin chronograph about to go live, Mike Huber (aka Mike Nelson) is down there in Indonesia and Thailand becoming one with the sea turtles, I’ve got a review on Ruger Customer Service and my revamped .357 Bisley, Joe Gresh has his Z1 Kawi all dressed up with lots of new places to go, and lots, lots more.

Andrew Capone, Isle of Man impresario and British Motocycle Gear CEO, with an unknown paparazzi reflected in a Norton Scrambler fender at an undisclosed location in New Jersey.

All dressed up with lots of places to go…Joe Gresh and the Z1…the gift that keeps on giving!

How fast is fast? Stay tuned, and we’ll tell you!

Bisley mania! Plinking at 100 yards with a handgun? You bet!

Andrew, Harry (aka “the Norton Whisperer”), and what is unquestionably one of the most beautiful motorcycles ever made!

There’s ink, and then there’s Sopranos ink. Oh, do we have a story for you!

You know, we blew right by 1500 blogs some time ago, and I started to wonder if we were going to run out of things to write about. Nope. Not gonna happen. It’s like when one of my geezer buddies told me he didn’t know what to say at a lunch gathering, and another of my geezer friends told him, “Don’t worry…you’ll keep talking until you think of something.”

Stay tuned, my Amigos…

Never miss an ExNotes blog: