How does this post elevate discourse here? How is it even relevant?
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I would have to argue that these âscaryâ features that were banned in the original ARB were banned primarily for their looks and how they differed from other rifles. While grips, stocks, barrel shrouds etc may assist some in ergonomics - the actual performance increases are negligible to non-existent.
Telescoping butt stocks are about as old as the AR-15 itself. You can see they were used by some Special Forces during Vietnam on a carbine (shorter) version of the M-16 called the CAR-15 and Colt Commando. Eventually it was adopted for regular use in the M-4 carbine. The main purpose of a telescoping stock is to make it easier to stow and transport when used with a shorter barrel. It made it much easier getting out of Humvees and helicopters. There is also the added benefit that when wearing full armor, the shorter stock is easier to put on the shoulder than the full sized stock. In the civilian world the stock might make the gun fit better for both you and your wife or kid by adjusting the length. Doing away with a telescoping stock isnât going reduce itâs effectiveness in any real way. Most civilian shooters collapse their stocks to make the guns fit in their case better, expand it when they shoot, and collapse it to put it away. They arenât constantly tweaking it to eek out performance. (Accuracy shooters tend to use fixed stocks or target stocks with minute adjustments.)
Same with the âpistolâ grip. While for some there is an ergonomic benefit, it is negligible. The pistol grip came into fashion because the design of guns changed. It started, obviously, with pistols, moved to sub-machine guns, and later rifles. Guns were no longer being made with solid wood stocks, they were being replaced with metal and plastic. The old designs that you would see on the German Mauser and the M1 Garand the wood stocks, handles, and forearms were one piece. The metal parts were the trigger group, the breech, and the barrel which all attached to the wood acting as the receiver. But the newer guns had metal receivers. Itâs cheaper and easier to bolt a handle onto a block of steel, than it is to carve out a full sized wood stock. Guns like the Browning BAR and the Russian PSSH-41 both had straight stocks and didnât have their performance hampered. (Note, early pistols had the grip and receiver as one piece of wood as well. It was when the revolvers and other guns were invented that the pistol grip was born.) Here is an ugly California compliant straight stock for the AR. It might not be your preference, but it isnât going to effect performance. http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/frs_15_1-tfb.jpg
On to barrel shrouds - AKA fore grips, front end tubes. Earlier rifles, like the muskets and bolt actions, used to have wood just on the bottom of the rifle to hold. Later they added wood to the top as well to let you carry your rifle by the barrel while it was hot. The AK and AR today use something similar, using wood, plastic or aluminum. This really has little effect on shooting the gun, as generally you only grip the bottom of the rifle when firing anyway. They started to add wood to the top of bolt actions used in battle so you could grab it by the barrel when it is hot and run, or grab it by the barrel and use it as a club. The MODERN reason these are used today on ARs and the like and not on your average hunting bolt action is because there is a gas tube or piston above the barrel that is used to re-cock the gun. These shrouds protect these thin tubes from getting damaged.
Recently, like in the last 2 years or so, there are people who have developed a grip on a rifle where you hold on to the whole side as far out front as you can reach, making a barrel shroud required. But before that, and even now, most people just grab the lower end of the fore stock.
A vertical fore grip attaches to the bottom of a barrel shroud or fore grip. Again this is a personal preference thing and relatively recently developed (it wasnât even listed in the 1994 AWB). Some ergonomics advantages? I suppose - but again its not going to make a noticeable difference between that and just gripping the fore stock.
So my point to all of this is all of these features are largely cosmetic or are part of the engineering of the design.
Iâll let you all in on two big bad secrets:
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Nothing makes an American want something more than to tell them you canât have. ARs had a cult following in 1994. There was even a stigma attached to them (what do you need that gun for). When the AWB sunset interest in the AR exploded. Since then there have been dozens of companies crop up making their own version, and even more who donât make the guns themselves, but just makes the accessories.
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A lot - I would even dare say most - of the accessories for the AR platform have zero to no effect on its performance. So why do people spend more money on accessories than they did on the stock gun? There are several reason. You will see the same thing happen in other tech oriented hobbies, like car tinkerers.
- They buy the hype and the think an aftermarket part is better and thus will make them shoot better.
- Because it looks cool. You donât NEED it - but damn if that isnât sexy.
- It allows you to enjoy your hobby more often. Most shooters have to go to a public or private range to shoot. These are usually out of town and you have to travel at least 30-60min (assuming itâs not raining, too cold, etc). Many people get home from work and itâs already getting dark. While a bench rest shooter with a bolt action might fire 10-20 rounds and call it a day, that isnât even a whole magazine for an AR owner. Bullets are expensive. So instead of spending money and time going shooting, they spend hours researching a new gadget, and once it comes in they get to play with there gun and install the new part. Itâs like grown up Legos.
[quote=âThecorrectline, post:119, topic:13277, full:trueâ]
These are hunting rifles for hunting humansâŚ
One is engineered with hunting an animal for meat in mind. One is designed for a shooting scenario that only occurs when the shooter is engaging humans. Own up to that. Embrace it.[/quote]
Well - pretty much every gun has itâs roots from guns made for war. All those fancy walnut stocked hunting rifles are based on the Mauser action. But this is completely irrelevant. A lot of technology is invented for or modified by the military in one way or another. Inventers and engineers are constantly finding things they can sell to the gov. for a military application - those contracts are big bucks. What is important is what the objects are actually being used for - not their potential or even their original purpose.
Ironically I know of one rifle that was made for strictly for sport and later adopted by the military. Long distance shooting (like a mile or more) enthusiasts pioneered the shoulder fired .50cal rifle. It took their years of tinkering before the Army gained interest in it and now they have the Barrett anti-materials weapon.
See statements like this bug me and come off as ignorant stereotyping. For sure some guns are purchased for defense (with most all of them hoping they never have to use them in that capacity). Iâm sure a few even buy them in case of a 2nd Revolution.
But an over whelming majority of people who own guns have zero desire to use them on people. They are not buying this rile or adding that part with the fantasy of actually using it to help them kill someone. Nearly every gun owner uses their gun to shoot paper, steel plates, clay pigeons and maybe a deer. People buying for defense will think of the practicalities, say to load buck shot vs bird shot. But they take these preparations as precautions, hoping they never have to us them for that purpose. Iâve never met anyone, eager to end a life, and I know people who have shot others in defense. Sure there are some crazy blood thirsty nuts out there - but they are a tiny sliver of gun owners.
Iâve been a concealed carrier for many years. Iâve used my weapon in civilian life twice - I fit right into the quoted category, The rest of what you argued, I disagree with.
Some good points raised. Obviously I donât agree, but sort of well argued. From my point of these guns are for killing people, to âwell all guns are!â. From an informed analysis of firearm handling characteristics to âignorant stereotype!â. From the ergonomics and reasons for a pistol grip to âWell it doesnât affect performanceâ.
This quoted point I will comment on - bespoke desire (too lazy to get the does not equal symbol) purchased capability. These guns are designed not to make it easier to kill deer, not to make it easier to 10 a paper target, not to make it easier to hit rabbits or rats - no sir, with all due respect to your stance, these modifications are designed to better enable combat with and increase the efficiency of killing of human beings. If that is the âSexyâ you refer to, then thank you for reinforcing my point.
While you may claim zero desire, the application of these weapon mods is human combat, That doesnât presuppose blood thirst, or malintent - but it certainly isnât ignorant or negligible. A forestock? A weapon operator needs that why? Looks? Negligible? No sir. Hell no, sir. A forestock grip serves two purposes (and synergises with a pistol grip) - recoil amendment, and rapid target acquisition. You can call it cosmetic all you want, you can point to the peace loving nature of the users all you want, but the fact is a pistol grip + forestock rifle is in no way useful or needed in any situation other than human combat. You donât need it to hunt, target plink, or look sexy; unless you think sexy = designed to kill humans.
All in all, I find your comment to be a very long winded version of exactly the argument I decried previously.
Source - armed, educated, educator of armed.
Edit - Disclosure: I own (without shame) âassault riflesâ (and way scarier, battle rifles). They arenât for hunting, and their design isnât entirely âcosmeticâ.
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Ha - that is indeed a trickier social problem to address!
Simply: the Assault Weapons Ban was based on purely cosmetic features that did not affect actual function.
Since it is apparently OK to put laws in place for aesthetic reasons, I merely did a reductio ad absurdium on the concept of banning things because of aesthetics. . .
Thecorrectline, a couple of posts above, begs to differ on the purely cosmetic nature of the features. Thanks for injecting some sexism and mindless politics in the process of making your apparently incorrect point.
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Thecorrectline is incorrect. Ergonomics does NOT change function, it merely allows personalization for a better âfitâ.
And hunting deer is utterly irrelevant, although you COULD hunt them with an AR. (the .223 cal/ 5.56mm caliber and cartridge are not well-suited to game hunting, something on the order of ,308 Winchester is far more suited to that task), although with the proper upper, I suppose you COULD use it for that.
The AR platform IS optimized for âplinkingâ, small game, and personal defense. But the bottom line remains the same: the AWB was based on cosmetics, not function. And youâre welcome. . . even if youâre utterly mistaken.
I would say youâre slicing the issue too thin, and also that perhaps you have little experience operating weapons. I guess you can make the spurious claim that they are functionally the same - except that the manner in which the weapon is operated is different. This is due to the ergonomic changes in the weapon - while it is true that the weapons base function of firing one bullet when the trigger is pulled is the same in both cases, the typical pistol grip AR is able to be operated in a fashion not needed outside of combat. This is the reason military and law enforcement weapons are designed the way that they are - with pistol grip.
Iâm going to guess you have no skill base in weapons operation, given the two pics you have provided and your claims that âErgonomics does NOT change functionâ. It isnât the function that is at issue - both of those pictures are of a machine designed to kill animals. That is their function. They both get that job done remarkably well.
In operation those weapons are markedly different - the âhunting rifleâ must be shouldered and sighted to yield accurate results, âhipâ fire is both wildly inaccurate and uncomfortable. The âassault rifleâ however may be used in a wider variety of stances, fired from the hip, elbow, shoulder, or anywhere in between. This lends the AR remarkable advantage in accuracy and fire rate in a multiple target environment, more so at close range.
By your definition a hammer and a nail gun are functionally the same, one is just "personalized for a better fit. "
I guess nothing is left to stop you from censoring him then, except your inability to do so.
Reading your posts has been quite educational for me. Thanks for joining the discussion.
I think your arguments about those things banned being for ergonomics that lend themselves to shooting humans (several of them, seemingly) are solid, so Iâm happy to change my mind about that.
So now a question⌠are these weapons covered in the assault weapon ban more effective for shooting and killing humans than a handgun would be, at handgun ranges⌠say out to 50 yards?
The reason I ask is Iâd like to understand why the laws focus on assault weapon like long guns, while not mentioning handguns.
Yeah weâd have to look into root causes violent crime in the US.
But that would mean complex solutions to a complex problem, which is way harder to accept then a simple and easy to understand wrong answer.
Well that would certainly reduce the amount of violent crime (although it would involve that elusive social-work component of policing that no one seems to get right) - but the arsenal the criminals have access to canât be ignored. A drive-by just isnât the same with a hunting rifle.
You would be guessing wrong. Iâve been using rifles, shotguns, and pistols for over 40 years. And youâre guilty of the exact same thing you claim I am doing: both of the examples I showed were of a light sporting rifle, chambered in .22LR. One with an out-of-the-box stock, the other has been taken to the extreme of âtacti-coolâ, a phenomenon I find distasteful. But it still does not change rate of fire, ballistics, or any essential function of the weapon, which is to fire, in this case, a .22LR bullet per cycling of the trigger,
To your next point, ergonomics is NOT function. As an example, all 4 of my ARs have Adjustable Stocks, one of the âfeaturesâ of the Assault Weapons Ban. What they allow, is that we only need to take ONE rifle to the range, instead of four, because my 5â 2 Wife and 5â4" daughters can all share the rifle with me, merely adjusting the stock to fit their size. (In reality, we take two: I have a special âreverseâ Left-handed AR with the Charging handle, ejection port, safety, and mag release on the LEFT rather than the standard right)
On your next point, âoperationâ, youâre so far off target it isnât funny. If you want ANY accuracy, you need to bring the weapon to shoulder, acquire a sight picture, aim, and fire. Firing from the hip, elbow, or even out your butt gives ZERO accuracy, itâs referred to as âspray and prayâ. and gives absolutely ZERO advantage to mechanically-determined fire rate. Youâve seen too many movies, and if youâ'd done any tours in the Sandbox or the Rockpile, youâd KNOW how ineffective it is at ANY range. Haji seems to like it, but aimed fire dropped him every time.
Now, to your final point. Hammer vs Nailgun. So, to you, a single use, hand fed tool is equivalent to a magazine-fed full-auto tool. The firearms equivalent argument is a musket to a machine gun. In both cases, there is a wide and significant difference in capability, although both cases have similar missions. . .
Short answer - Yes, rifles are more effective at killing at all ranges, provided you have enough room and time to bring the rifle to bear on target. That proviso is why the now very common M4 rifle is so much shorter than itâs predecessors.
In my mind, assault weapons are a target of convenience, a wedge topic utilized to further political careers and gun control legislation in general. While rifles are more dangerous in any given shooting scenario, it is handguns that are responsible for most of the gun violence in America. The thing is âAssault Rifleâ sounds so threatening, it is a lovely political buzz phrase. Add to those wonderful buzz words a picture of a paramilitary styled weapon and you have a pretty much perfect political tool. Overall, the most lethal weapon is the one in hand. Itâs relatively hard to walk around with a rifle and not attract attention, although obviously it is possible. 30 people killed by one guy with a rifle gets all kinds of attention, but 60 people killed by various guys with handguns gets relatively little. The american political process and public consciousness mystifies me.
Sorry to write a book at you here, just some possibly relevant background Iâll throw out below -
As far as lethality - Size matters. At root, a gun is a machine which makes use of the chemical properties of gunpowder to utilize the mechanical properties of an enclosed explosion. A bullet after leaving the barrel of a gun is a ballistic object, that is to say it is no longer under acceleration - the instant a bullet leaves the barrel it has begun to decelerate and descend. A longer barrel allows the bullet to be accelerated for a greater amount of time. Add to this the amount of powder used to achieve the acceleration - a 9mm cartridge is a tiny little thing, a .223 cartridge (in metric thats 5.56mm, these are the common âassault rifleâ calibers) is much larger, More boom behind the bullet + longer barrel = much greater velocity.
The difference between a handgun wound and a rifle wound is in the energy delivered to the target. A handgun wound will certainly kill, provided the pulmonary or circulatory system is hit. While hydrostatic shock is an issue in treatment, itâs not nearly as problematic as higher energy wounds. A rifle wound with the much higher velocities involved produces a much larger amount of hydrostatic shock, yielding not only a primary entry/exit wound, but a secondary âdamage channelâ far in excess of handguns. Think hamburger here. Ruptured blood vessels and cells. A rifle wound is orders of magnitude harder to treat. Stitching up a wound is much harder when the wound is 2 inches diameter of meat jelly soup (forgive the hyperbole).
For the purposes of visualization, youtube has a ton of videos showing various calibers being fired into gallon containers of water, melons, and ballistic gelatin. A 9mm fired into a plastic gallon of water, or a concrete cinderblock? Yeah, it kind of pops / breaks apart. Now break out your rifle, repeat the shot and watch the same target basically explode.
edit - deleted extra decimal
If you say so. I stand by my assertion that the tactical design is based upon a different scenario than the traditional design of rifle. One is designed to be used at long range vs. animals. The other is designed to be used at long, intermediate, or close range vs. people. That one is also designed to be brought to bear on targets at any range extremely rapidly. How exactly is that useful again? Right. As Iâve said, Iâm neither pro nor anti. I just value honesty. My hunting rifles are for hunting. My AR/BRâs are not designed for that. They are designed for combat. Iâm not sure why you seem to have a problem accepting that. Thereâs nothing wrong with it.
Well itâs nice to know where you are coming from. I think most people here have a limited knowledge of firearms, with most of their experience coming from Call of Duty. I do tend to get verbose because I try to be thorough and explain things the best I can. Some times I start to ramble and fail to edit myself. This isnât always just for the benefit of who I reply to directly, but others reading it.
[quote=âThecorrectline, post:123, topic:13277â]
These guns are designed not to make it easier to kill deer, not to make it easier to 10 a paper target, not to make it easier to hit rabbits or rats - no sir, with all due respect to your stance, these modifications are designed to better enable combat with and increase the efficiency of killing of human beings.[/quote]
I think I understand your point. Something like comparing an M1903 Springfield to a Winchester 70 in .30-06. Both shoot the same round, have the same Mauser action, have the same 5-round box magazine, have a solid wood stock, and have very similar performance. But the Win 70 has features that appeal to hunting and aesthetics, such as a lighter, tapered barrel, different sights, and higher grade walnut stock - generally they make them lighter and more accurate. Whereas the M1903, which was made to be used as a battle rifle, has features that are more or less only to increase its ability to be effective on the battle field. Examples of features would include a bayonet lug, ability to load the magazine with stripper clips, combat oriented sights, wood on the top and bottom of the forestock to increase its ruggedness and allowed it to be handled while hot, engineered to be able to be used as a club if necessary, thicker barrel - generally tougher, and quicker loading.
[quote=âThecorrectline, post:123, topic:13277â]
While you may claim zero desire, the application of these weapon mods is human combat, [/quote]
I can agree with you in some cases here. Certainly the detachable box magazine was made to allow soldiers to carry more ammo, reload faster, and shoot more rounds before having to reload.
I still contend that some features - many of which are used to ID a rifle as an assault weapon or not - are products from the evolution of firearm design. I donât think a pistol grip makes a lot of difference in controlling recoil (though I suppose that is subjective). I donât see any difference between the straight stocked Ruger Mini-14 and the pistol gripped AR-15. As the designers did away with the one piece straight stock, bolting a grip onto a metal receiver is much cheaper, lighter, and easier than trying to mimic the straight stock out of metal, like they did with the Browning BAR.
And again, just about all rifles have forestocks. I suppose in the cases like the M1903 the wrap around stock on top was made to make it a better combat weapon. But I believe the main reason for the wrap around stock on ARs (which I guess some call a barrel shroud) is to protect the gas system - part of the design. (Then again the whole AR design was made for combat, so I guess one could connect the dots and claim these types of forstocks are only built for combat.)
First I assume you mean a wrap around forestock like the AR or AK, as just about all rifles have a forestock. I suppose on one hand you are right, as one could use a California compliant straight stock, and then some how cut off the top half of your foregrip, exposing the gas system instead of a wrap around forestock and pistol grip. But I still contend doing so isnât going to change the performance much.
Assuming a pistol grip and wrap around forestock does increase performance, there are many types of competitions where such things would be useful, but doesnât involve shooting people.
Again, I think I get your point. The M1903 wasnât made to hunt deer, it is a battle rifle. The AR wasnât made to hunt, it is a battle rifle. (Though something like a varminter variant with a heavy, long barrel would make it made for hunting and less practical as a combat weapon.) I can agree some of the mods primarily enhance its ability as a battle rifle.
So I think I get your point, we just disagree on whether that matters or not. People take these battle rifles and find uses for them other than war or for defense. Peaceful applications of instruments of war are done all the time to many things besides just firearms.
I own a couple swords, which were made to kill people, but I donât think anyone fears me using them for that purpose (except maybe that weird guy in a trench coat down the road who keeps mumbling something about âThere can be only one.â)
Eh - what? Hip fire? No one uses hip fire and expects any sort of results besides wasting bullets. The AR âmust be shouldered and sighted to yield accurate resultsâ. And in semi-auto mode. Soldiers very rarely if ever use full auto on their rifles, and when they do they are providing covering fire, not looking to actively shoot someone.
For sure a semi-auto like the AR allows for a âremarkable advantage in accuracy and fire rate in a multiple target environmentâ, but only if the rifle is aimed. We would have a lot more dead US soldiers if firing from the hip or any other off position was effective, as many of the ill-trained combatants in the middle east utilize this method.
All good points. The easiest way I know of to illustrate the modern âAssault rifleâ (I try to stay away from the term AR as it means different things to different people) is to examine the evolution of the US military service rifle(s), from the M1 garand forward.
More possibly relevant background for folks - AR depending on context and person you are talking to can mean either assault rifle (a non-technical, catch all term) or it can mean a rifle based upon the AR15 (m16, m4, etc) design. Not all assault rifles are ARâs in the latter case.
This is of course true, I should have validated that to indicate the relative problems a classic rifle has in close quarters, which has led to the modern shorter / lighter M4 design. There is no substitute for proper technique, whether in a narrow hallway, or on a flat field. I wrote that badly, and I should feel bad.
I have many rifles. Some ARE optimized for long range big game shooting. But take it out for squirrel hunting, and youâre not going to be bringing much home to make stew with. Others are optimized for plinking ,or for small game, or even for varmint shooting.
As for brought to bear on target, at any range ?? I donât think so. Beyond a certain range, youâre simply not going to use an AR platform in the standard .223 caliber: the round loses accuracy over 400-450 yards, depending on the bullet, load, and barrel combination, much less the standard sights. Thatâs when scope-sighted bolt actions come into play, their range is much longer, 2 miles, and sometimes beyond, on the high-end scoped .50s.
The REAL reasons for the popularity of the AR platform are two-fold: modularity and familiarity. Modularity, because by switching uppers, you can customise to a broader range of capabilities, from dropping to .22LR for plinking and marksmanship practice, all the way up to an UltraMag, and turning it into a low-end .50 cal bolt-action. Thereâs even a CROSSBOW upper available for the standard AR Lower.
Familarity, because, other than selective fire, it DOES handle like itsâ military counterparts, the M-16 and M-4, a rifle that almost everyone who has served in the military knows how to use, and many have vast experience with the platform. The bugs were worked out of it long ago, and thus not just operations, but maintenance is simple and standardized.
The fact that it scares gun-grabbers by being an âevil black gunâ is, in my opinion, a bonus. . .
I had to google that, Iâm laughing it up atm. Really guys? A crossbow upper⌠giggle⌠And with an AR lower itâs still technically a firearm! lol! Not quite up there with the chainsaw bayonet for sheer sillyness, but a good one.
