PHXSHOOTER
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- Aug 23, 2011
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Hey Gentlemen,
I know you guys that are current regulars on this site won’t recognize my screen name but a couple years ago I was an almost daily contributor here. I learned a lot here and posted if I thought I had something worthwhile to say. I was cleaning my rifle yesterday and had a few thoughts about its evolution I think I will share. This is all cynical humor and all true.
Just under four years ago I bought my S&W 15-22. I am not a novice shooter but it was my first AR style modular long gun. This post is about how it evolved over that time. The first thing I did was act like a kid (unfortunately I am far from being a kid) that had just moved into his first apartment. I started out buying cheap furniture. I justified the cost and the made in China stamp buy telling myself “it is just my fun gun”, I don’t need to pay the big bucks for “real” accessories. So I started bolting cheap cool stuff on to it. The problem with that route is “cheap” refers to the quality of the gear. Some of it was not so cheap in real American Greenbacks.
One of my first buys was a super cool looking tactical scope. It was 3x9 and had reticles illuminated in three colors, red, green or blue. It was super cool, for a while. It even worked, not that well but it worked. I am a photographer, I know a little bit about quality optics, OK I know quite a bit. Soon I was over the coolness of blue reticles. A few sets of wasted batteries because I would forget to turn the damn thing off also helped bring an end to my initial delight with it. Not to mention the brightest thing about it was the seven position brightness of its reticles, not the level of light transmitted through it. I ended up giving it to a friend of mine who generously shares his supply of hard to get ammunition with me. He is that guy who is always over stocked with whichever caliber cannot be found on store shelves. You all know that guy.
I replaced that scope a Nikon P-22. It is a 2x7x 32 tactical looking, bad ***, high quality, brighter than the sun optic, and it is designed for my rifle. It does not take batteries and has an awesome BDC reticle. It is nats *** sharp and works well in low light. It will last as long as the rifle if not longer. And I bought it on sale from a reputable store called Cabelas for a few dollars more than the cheap scope I picked up at a gun show from a guy who may never be there again. The Nikon P-22 rocks big time! First upgrade solved after two attempts.
It is mounted on P-22 rings on a low rise riser so the rear bell clears my Magpul MBUS iron sights. The low rise riser has big thumb screws so I can remove the scope and go to iron. Everything holds zero over and over again. The first high rise riser I bought to make the first scope work was the first thing to go in my junk box.
Lesson learned, right? No, I had to waste more money. After all, I was a new kid shopping for furniture. Wow, I could put a laser on this rifle if I wanted to! How cool would that be? My other guns with lasers are hand guns with Crimson Trace lasers. This one is a long gun and it is just my .22 cal fun gun so I don’t need to buy a Crimson Trace laser for it. At the next gun show I found a super good deal on a laser that would be perfect for it! So I mounted laser, went to the range (my range is open desert) and zeroed it in perfectly one shot at a time. Wow! This is awesome, I have a laser sighted in on a long gun and I can even see it in daylight! Zero accomplished, time for my first mag dump using all that accuracy the laser was going to bring to my favorite plinking rifle. I felt like Obi-Wan Kenobi! No doubt this was going to be close to a spiritual experience. With my laser to guide the lead streaming from my long gun, how could I miss? I knew I was going to burn a hole in the middle of that target I would barely be able to push my finger through. I grabbed a fresh 25 round mag and finally let um rip. Firing as fast as I could be sure that red dot was on the bulls eye I cranked out the first twenty five rounds. Whoa now, what the hell just happened? I did not shoot a group, I shot 25 flyers! How could that be? OK, so I’m not that good. Slow down, this is going to take a little bit of practice, which is fair. Nope, it was the laser, that piece of junk would not hold zero for any two shots in a row! Many hours and about two tons of lead were wasted by that thing before I fatally wounded it taking it apart for the fourth time. It now lives in the junk box.
Then came the flashlights. I am sure somewhere in my posts from way back then I raved about a $50.00 flashlight from UTG. Two pressure switches later it is in my junk box too. It was cool while it lasted but don’t listen to me.
Did I mention vertical foregrips? The first one I bought was so cool it reminded me of childhood feelings of awesomeness. I am talking about the awesome feeling I got the very first time I pushed the button on what was then known as a true switch blade. This foregrip had a push button too. One push of a button and BAM, it became an instant bipod. How cool is that? And it was purchased for almost chump change. That is if you consider twenty five bucks chump change. In the real world it worked for about five hundred rounds. After that the cheap, plastic, wobbly bipod legs would self deploy with a startling boing if you were trying to use it as just a foregrip. That is exactly what I want to happen when trying to carefully squeeze off some freestanding rounds. Spring loaded legs jumping from my grip all by themselves. Into the junk box!
So what has my S&W 15-22 evolved into today? It is now, finally just about everything I want it to be. It is a nice .22 caliber fun gun with that sharp Nikon scope on it. It has the Magpul MBUS iron sights because I am old fashioned and never want to lose my ability to shoot with iron. There is a sling on it with a good mount on the front rail. The factory pistol grip was replaced with a Magpul MIAD grip, a very worthwhile mod. The UTG flashlight has been upgraded to a very nice 200 lumen blaster by Finix Flashlights. Oh yea, there is an upgraded QR folding vertical grip that turns into a bipod on the bottom rail. There is no name brand on it but it does not go boing. It really serves as a place to mount the pressure switch for the upgraded flashlight.
I learned a lot. I learned I don’t want my gun to look cool, I want it to work. I learned if I add anymore plastic parts they are going to say Magpul on them. I learned I don’t really need a laser on a .22 cal plinker. I learned I will never be Obi-Wan Kenobi no matter what I bolt to my 15-22. I learned I do not want to put any more money in the junk box.
PHXSHOOTER
I know you guys that are current regulars on this site won’t recognize my screen name but a couple years ago I was an almost daily contributor here. I learned a lot here and posted if I thought I had something worthwhile to say. I was cleaning my rifle yesterday and had a few thoughts about its evolution I think I will share. This is all cynical humor and all true.
Just under four years ago I bought my S&W 15-22. I am not a novice shooter but it was my first AR style modular long gun. This post is about how it evolved over that time. The first thing I did was act like a kid (unfortunately I am far from being a kid) that had just moved into his first apartment. I started out buying cheap furniture. I justified the cost and the made in China stamp buy telling myself “it is just my fun gun”, I don’t need to pay the big bucks for “real” accessories. So I started bolting cheap cool stuff on to it. The problem with that route is “cheap” refers to the quality of the gear. Some of it was not so cheap in real American Greenbacks.
One of my first buys was a super cool looking tactical scope. It was 3x9 and had reticles illuminated in three colors, red, green or blue. It was super cool, for a while. It even worked, not that well but it worked. I am a photographer, I know a little bit about quality optics, OK I know quite a bit. Soon I was over the coolness of blue reticles. A few sets of wasted batteries because I would forget to turn the damn thing off also helped bring an end to my initial delight with it. Not to mention the brightest thing about it was the seven position brightness of its reticles, not the level of light transmitted through it. I ended up giving it to a friend of mine who generously shares his supply of hard to get ammunition with me. He is that guy who is always over stocked with whichever caliber cannot be found on store shelves. You all know that guy.
I replaced that scope a Nikon P-22. It is a 2x7x 32 tactical looking, bad ***, high quality, brighter than the sun optic, and it is designed for my rifle. It does not take batteries and has an awesome BDC reticle. It is nats *** sharp and works well in low light. It will last as long as the rifle if not longer. And I bought it on sale from a reputable store called Cabelas for a few dollars more than the cheap scope I picked up at a gun show from a guy who may never be there again. The Nikon P-22 rocks big time! First upgrade solved after two attempts.
It is mounted on P-22 rings on a low rise riser so the rear bell clears my Magpul MBUS iron sights. The low rise riser has big thumb screws so I can remove the scope and go to iron. Everything holds zero over and over again. The first high rise riser I bought to make the first scope work was the first thing to go in my junk box.
Lesson learned, right? No, I had to waste more money. After all, I was a new kid shopping for furniture. Wow, I could put a laser on this rifle if I wanted to! How cool would that be? My other guns with lasers are hand guns with Crimson Trace lasers. This one is a long gun and it is just my .22 cal fun gun so I don’t need to buy a Crimson Trace laser for it. At the next gun show I found a super good deal on a laser that would be perfect for it! So I mounted laser, went to the range (my range is open desert) and zeroed it in perfectly one shot at a time. Wow! This is awesome, I have a laser sighted in on a long gun and I can even see it in daylight! Zero accomplished, time for my first mag dump using all that accuracy the laser was going to bring to my favorite plinking rifle. I felt like Obi-Wan Kenobi! No doubt this was going to be close to a spiritual experience. With my laser to guide the lead streaming from my long gun, how could I miss? I knew I was going to burn a hole in the middle of that target I would barely be able to push my finger through. I grabbed a fresh 25 round mag and finally let um rip. Firing as fast as I could be sure that red dot was on the bulls eye I cranked out the first twenty five rounds. Whoa now, what the hell just happened? I did not shoot a group, I shot 25 flyers! How could that be? OK, so I’m not that good. Slow down, this is going to take a little bit of practice, which is fair. Nope, it was the laser, that piece of junk would not hold zero for any two shots in a row! Many hours and about two tons of lead were wasted by that thing before I fatally wounded it taking it apart for the fourth time. It now lives in the junk box.
Then came the flashlights. I am sure somewhere in my posts from way back then I raved about a $50.00 flashlight from UTG. Two pressure switches later it is in my junk box too. It was cool while it lasted but don’t listen to me.
Did I mention vertical foregrips? The first one I bought was so cool it reminded me of childhood feelings of awesomeness. I am talking about the awesome feeling I got the very first time I pushed the button on what was then known as a true switch blade. This foregrip had a push button too. One push of a button and BAM, it became an instant bipod. How cool is that? And it was purchased for almost chump change. That is if you consider twenty five bucks chump change. In the real world it worked for about five hundred rounds. After that the cheap, plastic, wobbly bipod legs would self deploy with a startling boing if you were trying to use it as just a foregrip. That is exactly what I want to happen when trying to carefully squeeze off some freestanding rounds. Spring loaded legs jumping from my grip all by themselves. Into the junk box!
So what has my S&W 15-22 evolved into today? It is now, finally just about everything I want it to be. It is a nice .22 caliber fun gun with that sharp Nikon scope on it. It has the Magpul MBUS iron sights because I am old fashioned and never want to lose my ability to shoot with iron. There is a sling on it with a good mount on the front rail. The factory pistol grip was replaced with a Magpul MIAD grip, a very worthwhile mod. The UTG flashlight has been upgraded to a very nice 200 lumen blaster by Finix Flashlights. Oh yea, there is an upgraded QR folding vertical grip that turns into a bipod on the bottom rail. There is no name brand on it but it does not go boing. It really serves as a place to mount the pressure switch for the upgraded flashlight.
I learned a lot. I learned I don’t want my gun to look cool, I want it to work. I learned if I add anymore plastic parts they are going to say Magpul on them. I learned I don’t really need a laser on a .22 cal plinker. I learned I will never be Obi-Wan Kenobi no matter what I bolt to my 15-22. I learned I do not want to put any more money in the junk box.
PHXSHOOTER
