Went shooting at my son's place yesterday.
I had several guns that I had never had a chance to fire before yesterday. As it stands today I don't have any firearms that I have not shot at least once. Spent about 4 hours on the range at the ranch. It is a private range and there is never anyone else around. Very peaceful in the middle of 22,000 acres of cattle range. There is also a separate 1000yd rifle range with steel targets at various range increments. We did not utilize the rifle range yesterday since we figured 75 yards on the pistol range was adequate with the rifles for now.
I get bored quick shooting paper so we shot the steel gong target mostly but I brought along a new synthetic "self healing" orange gong target to see if they were any good, so no paper target photos.
I didn't take any photos while we were shooting but took a pic of all the guns I fired yesterday and a shot of the new orange gong.
Here a pic of the guns fired yesterday. Except for a wipe down after shooting they are all still dirty. Took a while to clean them all.
Here's the revolvers, (clockwise from top left) Uberti Patterson, Pietta 1860 Army, Uberti 1873 SAA Bisley BP, and a Heritage Rough Rider 22/22mag revolver.
The rifles (from the top) Marlin 1895 in 45-70, 1892 Winchester in 44-40, and a Henry 22.
The Patterson and 1860 were both loaded with Goex 3F. The Marlin with a full case of Goex and the 44-40 was fired with both Goex 3F rounds and cartridges loaded with 7.5 grains Trail Boss. Although it is harder to clean up I like the BP loads better than any BP subs or smokeless such as Trail Boss. There was no discernable difference in the Trail Boss loads and the BP loads in the 44-40 cases. I just like the sound and smell of the BP. Next I'll have try some Swiss.
The orange gong. I kinda liked shooting at this target. It's easy to see at 75 yards and flips around about 10 times when hit with the 45-70 rounds. It looks like it might last awhile too. I always take my 1911 along too no matter what, just to shoot it more and try to get used to it.
As much as I enjoy the guns I also got to visit with my 7 week old grandson for a couple hours. That is better than a shooting a truck full of guns.
