How the heck did we survive?

[opos]

I've been doing some cleaning out and arranging my stuff (and we all got stuff)..and found stuff from when I first started to reload back in the '50's...got to looking at my "notes" and some of the things I'd written down and it's kind of funny in a way but also sort of makes my skin crawl.

I started shooting my 22 Winchester model 62A when I was about 10...so in about 1946 or 47...Didn't shoot anything much more than that until I went away for college at Colorado A and M...rented a room with a guy I knew in high school and found out he was quite a hunter and fisherman so we had plenty to talk about. I needed a job and found a place in Fort Collins that sold boats and guns (about 99% used guns)...and also the owner did reloading...so between me, my room mate and the owner of the store we had a "club"...I bought a couple of 1917's for "deer rifles" and a model 97 for duck hunting and pheasant hunting...my room mate had a Springfield 03 and a Winchester model 97 as well..the store owner had his choice from the rack.

We decided we'd do our own loading for the rifles...never did load shotguns.

We had the barest of equipment..hardly any literature....lots of notes from books and magazines and just talk back and forth between us and some other guys that we knew....components were often war surplus and packaged in paper bags with the info hand written on the bag...we had no idea how to store powder and primers and our method for testing a new load was to hear something from somebody or read something and come as close as we could with the stuff we had to use...then to pressure test we tied the rifle to a spare tire and took it out to the "range" and pulled the trigger with a string....if it didn't blow up it was a starting point.

I compare all that old stuff with today and realize we probably had more fun and learned more than many do today...today the number crunching is pretty much done for everyone while "close your eyes and hang on" testing was part of my growing up...was it right? Probably not...was it safe? It was ok for me but did occasionally hear of a problem...did we get game? Oh yeah!! wonderful hunting..not crowded..not restricted...few laws, etc.

Just sort of thinking back...like everything in the 'old days"...it's bitter sweet...I am 90% deaf today..part of the reason is I shot a .30 cal Luger in the basement of the police building in their "range"..it was a long concrete hall with doors that were locked..probably 15 yards long...used Kent cigarette filters in my ears for sound protection..don't have lung cancer but I'm deaf.

Any other old timers remember the spare tire "rest" and pull the cord to see if the thing all holds together?

[JBinMN]

I'm not an old timer yet, still workin on it, but I enjoy reading & hearing folks memories of times like you just shared. I hope others will share some memories also!



Thanks for sharing what ya did!

[Der Gebirgsjager]

I definitely consider the tire rest as still being a good method to test fire long guns. Put the butt inside the tire, tie the fore end down over the side of the tire, and pull the trigger with a string from a safe vantage point. The tire may rock and roll from the recoil, but the gun will survive undamaged. Naturally one needs to be in a rural environment!

As for early reloading experiences, I remember my first .38 Specials loaded with a Lee Loader. I had read several articles on reloading and decided to proceed with great caution. I didn't really understand the graduations on the beam of the Lyman scale I was using, and thought that the advice to back my wadcutters with 2.5 gr. of Bullseye was the 0.2 mark. I loaded up an entire box and gave them to a fellow to try out. He reported that they seemed to fall short of the target, and that he wasn't certain but he thought that some of them might be sticking in the barrel and were pushed out by the next round. I consulted a guy down at the gun store where I had purchased the equipment and was advised to use more powder.

Reloading is a hobby where it pays to have a mentor!

[Tom Myers]

Any other old timers remember the spare tire "rest" and pull the cord to see if the thing all holds together?

Fence post and a throw rope!!!

[Three44s]

Never used a string or another shooter. Had a few case head separations in an old takedown Savage 99 in 250 Savage due to too much head space. But I started in '75 so literature was pretty progressed by then.

I had a spat of trouble with some defective or miss packaged primers from Remington in the early 90's in a 22-250 bolt gun. My local gunsmith figured that large pistol primers were marked as large rifle ones because at low rifle pressures they would pierce at the outside edge of the radius and blow **** out the back of the bolt of my 788 R.E.M.

I had some squibs but luckily caught every one before I fired a damaging round on top of them in a revolver. I put the remaining rounds from that batch in pergetory.

Then at starting load levels I have had problems with a very tight chambered barrel for a Contender in 22 Hornet. I backed off and backed way off to get some semblance of sanity to my pressures with that little cookie and have not revisited it since.

No blown guns or even any repairs done by me needed due to all these fracases .... so far!

Three44s

[Three44s]

opos,

If I was to pick a rifle to load for under such circumstances ... no solid data, it would be the 1917. Built like a tank!

Best regards

Three44s

[Kraschenbirn]

Any other old timers remember the spare tire "rest" and pull the cord to see if the thing all holds together?

Yup!! It was (IIRC) my freshman year in high school when a friend was given a pair of "Civil War muskets" by a relative who'd found them in the attic of an old house he'd purchased. Jeff brought them to me thinking I'd "know something about guns" because, at the time, I was shooting on a Boy Scout small-bore rifle team and my uncle was a partner in a tack & gun shop in Southern Illinois. The guns had been coated what appeared to be axle grease before they were stored and were caked with years' accumulation of dust and grunge so we got ourselves a gallon of 'white gas' from the hardware store and commenced to degunking them. As the exterior crud came off, I recognized both the old guns were some kind of breech-loader and, when I saw the "U.S" markings on the breechblock and sideplate, I had what might've been my epiphany for that year, deciding then and there that we needed some higher expertise.

Fortunately, my shooting team coach - a WWII Army armorer - was a genuine "gun buff" who lit up like a carbide lamp when we laid those two Springfield Trapdoors on his workbench. While Jeff and I watched, he completely dismantled both guns, cleaned and oiled the lockwork, and finished cleaning the bores...I'd run some wet patches through them with a shotgun cleaning rod but didn't own a .45 cal. brush or jag at the time. After the guns were back together and Harvey (my coach) said he felt they were mechanically sound , we (naturally!) wanted to shoot them but Harvey didn't shoot .45-70, himself, and didn't know any else who shot it, either; phone calls to both of our local sporting goods shops came up dry, also. Disappointed, we wrapped up the guns and Jeff took them home.

A week or so later, Harvey called and said he'd found some "cheap" .45-70 for sale in 'Shotgun News' and would order for us (both Jeff and myself were only 15 at the time) if we paid up-front. I don't remember the price but I do recall that the shipping was roughly the same as cost of the ammo. What we received was a carton (100 rounds?) of gov't ball ammo packed in badly deteriorated 20-round boxes. Brass was tarnished and somewhat corroded (some actually more green than bronze in color).

The following Saturday morning, Harvey picked us up and took us out to the municipal police range where he put the spare tire from his pick-up on a shooting bench and strapped down one of the Trapdoors; tying a string to the trigger and backing off 25-30 feet before yanking it. Despite having about 1 out of five misfires, we put a few rounds through each of the guns before Harvey would let us fire them ourselves. Naturally, the boom and smoke of those old Springfields had drawn a small crowd...like about a third of the local police force with a couple county deputies thrown in...and, of course, they all wanted to try a shot. At this point, Harvey jumped in and told the LEOs if they wanted to shoot they had to pay for the ammo at $.25 a round. By the time we ran out, we'd collected almost enough to cover what we'd paid for the whole 100 rounds.

Always wondered what became of those old Trapdoor Springfields; a few months later...at the end of our school year...Jeff and his Mom moved out of state and I never saw him, or the guns, again. Harvey, on the other hand, sort of moved from being my coach to being my shooting mentor...my father was a waterfowler who I don't believe ever owned a rifle or handgun in his entire life and my uncle's tack & gunshop was 200 miles away...teaching me to reload ammo, a bit of gunsmithing, and a whole lot about the real world. But that's another story.....

Bill

[snuffy]

A fella at work said he had a rifle loader he would sell. It turned out to be a rock chucker. It came with a set of 30-06 dies. My dad's 03-A3 needed feeding. Powder provided by a former shop teacher located in the basement of his wife's liquor store. A paper bag of surplus IMR 4831. Load data was,"scoop the case into the powder to over full, then strike off the excess." He said don't worry about the crunching sound when you seat the bullet! They shot just fine, no excess pressure.

My rifle was a '98 Mauser 8X57, so I bought a set of dies for it. Again with the Mauser, I went with the surplus 4831, same technique for fun loads with Hornady 170 RN. During the next summer I bought a RCBS scale and some IMR 4350. Max loads according to a new Pacific load book seemed tame compared to the full case 4831 loads. The basement guru said the loads for Mauser's were kept tame because of weak actions, so I could safely get near 30-06 loads with like bullet weights. Plenty of room in the case for the extra powder, and good snappy loads.

I had loaded 12 shotshell loads for a couple of years before the rifle adventures. When I got the scale, I discovered I had been under-loading the shotshells for a long time. Relying on the destructions given out by MEC, as far as what bar number would throw how much powder, they always were light. No wonder we had to lead ducks farther, and we weren't penetrating like we should!

It IS a science. A lot of early reloaders were stumbling around in the dark, some getting hurt or damaging guns. For me this was circa 1960---s

[MaryB]

Not quite to old timer status but every Mosin Nagant I have purchased was "tire" (actually I used my rest and some lead blocks to hold things down, plus 2 ratchet straps around the bench) tested for a few rounds to make sure the barrel and action were good and wouldn't embed parts in my face!

I've been doing some cleaning out and arranging my stuff (and we all got stuff)..and found stuff from when I first started to reload back in the '50's...got to looking at my "notes" and some of the things I'd written down and it's kind of funny in a way but also sort of makes my skin crawl.

I started shooting my 22 Winchester model 62A when I was about 10...so in about 1946 or 47...Didn't shoot anything much more than that until I went away for college at Colorado A and M...rented a room with a guy I knew in high school and found out he was quite a hunter and fisherman so we had plenty to talk about. I needed a job and found a place in Fort Collins that sold boats and guns (about 99% used guns)...and also the owner did reloading...so between me, my room mate and the owner of the store we had a "club"...I bought a couple of 1917's for "deer rifles" and a model 97 for duck hunting and pheasant hunting...my room mate had a Springfield 03 and a Winchester model 97 as well..the store owner had his choice from the rack.

We decided we'd do our own loading for the rifles...never did load shotguns.

We had the barest of equipment..hardly any literature....lots of notes from books and magazines and just talk back and forth between us and some other guys that we knew....components were often war surplus and packaged in paper bags with the info hand written on the bag...we had no idea how to store powder and primers and our method for testing a new load was to hear something from somebody or read something and come as close as we could with the stuff we had to use...then to pressure test we tied the rifle to a spare tire and took it out to the "range" and pulled the trigger with a string....if it didn't blow up it was a starting point.

I compare all that old stuff with today and realize we probably had more fun and learned more than many do today...today the number crunching is pretty much done for everyone while "close your eyes and hang on" testing was part of my growing up...was it right? Probably not...was it safe? It was ok for me but did occasionally hear of a problem...did we get game? Oh yeah!! wonderful hunting..not crowded..not restricted...few laws, etc.

Just sort of thinking back...like everything in the 'old days"...it's bitter sweet...I am 90% deaf today..part of the reason is I shot a .30 cal Luger in the basement of the police building in their "range"..it was a long concrete hall with doors that were locked..probably 15 yards long...used Kent cigarette filters in my ears for sound protection..don't have lung cancer but I'm deaf.

Any other old timers remember the spare tire "rest" and pull the cord to see if the thing all holds together?

[bedbugbilly]

I was never in to cartridge guns much when I was a kid other than a 22 for tree rats and a double 16 for pheasants and rabbits. I was always interested in muzzleloaders and I probably took my first shot with one when I was about ten. I built my first file when I was around 12 and back then, most of what was averrable was originals. I moved on from there to repairing them and fixing many of them up to get them shooting again and the "tire rest" was a permanent fixture out in the pasture by the barn. If I was really confident, I'd leave the rifle assembled but usually I just strapped the barrel down and use a piece of cannon fuze to touch it off to "proof" the barrel and make sure it was not going to blow. I never had one blow either.

Funny thing is, cartridge guns never really did much for me until a few years ago. I owned quite a few but as "collector" pieces and I eventually liquidated them - THEN I got interested in shooting cartridge! Now I wish I had some of them back as I had some nice milsurp rifles but life goes on. I have cast for probably 55 years .

Things HAVE changed over the years though - when I was a kid, a pound of Dupont 2F or 3F would set you back seventy five cents and a tin of Remington caps would cost me a quarter - all from an old gunsmith in his late eighties who taught me how to shoot muzzleloaders. I had a couple of muzzle stuffing shotguns that were originals. I remember that a lot of my folk's friends knew that I was interested in guns and they'd often give me old ammo - usually shotgun shells - that they wanted to dispose of. If the cartridges were good, I would trade them for caps or powder but the shotgun shells I would cut down - save he wads if they would fit my shotgun barrel and save the shot. The hulls, powder and what was left I would throw away. I usually had a good supply of shot by getting it that way but not such a good supply of wads - but that was what they made wadded newspaper for! And, the rabbits and squirrels didn't know he difference.

It seemed like there was always an "old timer" that if I looked long enough, I could find that could help me out with a question or show me how to do something. While I used to drool over the Herters catalog for some things, I never hd enough money as a kid to afford the things I was drooling over. I remember I wanted to learn how to cast minie balls for a rifled musket I had. I bought a brand new Lyman 575-213 mold and handles - IIRC the price was about $35. I bought a Lyman bottom pour ladle and that was $3.50. My Dad had an old cast iron 10# pot and some soft lead from some plumbing stuff that he had bought from a guy.My first source of heat for casting was a wood fire. It makes you appreciate what is available today for eating lead for casting for sure!

One time, a friend of my Dad's stopped at our house to see my Dad and when he came in, he handed me a grocery bag. He said that he wanted to give me what was inside as he knew how interested I was in guns and history. When I opened the bag, there was a 1911A1 in a govt. holster on a pistol belt with a double mag pouch with mags. He said that a Navy Pilot he knew had brought it home when the war ended - he had worn it on all of his flights in the Pacific. When he passed away, his widow had given it to him and he thought I ought to have it. I studied up on the 1911s and I told another friend of my Dad about it who had been a Marine in the Pacific. He was like a second Dad to me and he owned the locale hardware in our small town. He told me to bring it in and he would teach me how to field strip it and break it down. I took it on one day and we went back to the back of the store where he had a workbench for repairing things for customers. He went over the 45, instructed me how to break it down and then showed me how to disassemble and put it back together. He had me do it a couple of times and I thought that was the end of the "lesson". Nope! He then proceeded to blindfold me with a bandana he always carried (fortunately it had been freshly laundered!) and then he walked me through the field stripping and reassembly until I could do it blindfolded. I never have forgotten that lesson! As I said, he was like a second Dad to me and in later years, I would take him to Dr. appts. and help him out in any way I could, stop at his house every morning to check on him, etc. He's gone now but I still remember the lessons he gave me on shooting, etc. and one of my prized possessions are his "dress blues" - he was a prime example of "once a Marine, always a Marine!!".

I miss those times and it just seems like things were a lot simpler in those times, even though we often flew by the seat of our pants! Somehow the years passed and now we're the "old timers"! LOL

[Tom W.]

My son has a Savage model 340 in 30/30 that his maternal grandmother gave him. He wanted me to load some light jacketed bullets as fast as I could get them. I told him that he was going to waste time and money as the light bullets would shoot higher than he could adjust his scope. Found out Dad was right.

Fast forward fifteen years....... A friend of a friend found out that I could handload. He was a member of our loose knit hunting lease, so he asked me for the same favor. He had that same model rifle ( that I tried to buy from him ), a box of Speer 95 gr jhp bullets, and wanted to know what powder to buy. I told him it wasn't going to work for the same reason it didn't work in my son's rifle. Well, he wanted to try. He gave me a huge bag of 30/30 brass, most of which I still have in the shed, the box of bullets, and a pound of powder that he thought would be the best along with a few containers of primers. Told me to keep anything left over. I shook my head and told him that he wasn't going to be happy. I delivered five boxes of ammo loaded to his specs, but still within the loading manual recommendations. Aboutna month later I saw him and he said that the loads were terrible, hitting way high at 100 yards, and he couldn't adjust his scope enough to hit the paper. I just looked at him with an astounded look and said I told you so........

Some people don't know, some won't listen.....

[MaryB]

I had one mosin split the receiver... from the look of the metal it had a micro crack from the factory and age weakened it to the point it let go... gun dealer got that one back and I picked the next nicest one on the rack with matching numbers. Back when they were $89 each!

it takes a good deal of effort to destroy a mosin rifle, especially a hex receiver.


But I think it helped that by not having lawyers around telling you it wasn't safe, that somehow THAT helped you survive.