by Jim Taylor

SIGHTS

It seems that most every shooter has some idea of how sights should be on a handgun. Most go for some sort of movable arrangement that allows them to get the point of bullet impact reasonably near wherever the sights seem to be aimed. For myself however I have always preferred a fixed sight over a moveable one on my handguns. And a LOW sight at that. By "low" I mean sights that are as near to the line of the bore as possible. What some shooters never seem to figure out is that the higher the sights, the easier it is cant the gun over one way or the other and toss shots this way and that. For precise shooting I like my sights as near the bore-line as I can have them. I also prefer the fixed sight as it just will not get knocked out of zero as easily as an adjustable sight. I can understand the need for an adjustable sight if one is a target shooter or shoots silhouette matches. However, I have on occasion won silhouette matches using my fixed-sight gun. I just loaded a 260 gr. bullet for chicken and pig and a 300 gr. bullet for the turkey and ram. Hold low on the chicken, center on the pig. Same hold for the 300 gr. load on the turkey and ram.

For myself I learn where the gun hits and how to hold it for longer range shooting. It has not been a problem. On game shots I have never had time to figure, "Well, it's 127 1/2 yards so I have to come up 11 clicks on the rear sight." , then get a screwdriver, run up the sight and shoot the animal. By the time I did something like that the critter would have moved on. No thanks. I will stick with my non-moveable sights thank you.

On sixguns such as the Rugers what I have done is to remove the windage spring in the rear sight and replace it with a small piece of metal. I run the sight over against it, then shoot it and see how it hits. If needed I remove it, file a bit off and then shoot it again until I get the gun hitting center. Then I lock it all down and fill the rear sight body with Super Glue. I have never lost a sight or had one get out of adjustment in over 20 years of hard knocks, dropping the gun, getting tossed off a rank pony or falling down a mountain, as I have done on occasion. I also remove the elevation spring and screw the rear sight all the way down. If needed I will file down the rear blade level with the top of the sight body, the recut the front sight to the proper height. On some of my guns you will see a groove across the rear of the front sight blade. That is my 200 yard mark. Simply perch the target on top of the front sight blade, drop the rear sight down to the mark and let 'er rip. Once you get it set up correctly and get the hang of it, it works OK, at least for me.

And that is the point. What works for me is not necessarily what is best for you. I remember some years back watching a professor from the University of Arizona shoot combat with his 1911 Colt. All he had for a sight was a white line painted down the length of the slide. He was fast and deadly with it. Someone once said, "Every dog has got to scratch his own fleas." If what you prefer works for you, great. More power to you.

Except.....I wouldn't have a scope on a sixgun for anything. They look like AITCH E DOUBLE ELL, make it impossible to carry on your belt like God intended and as Elmer said, "..are an abomination on any pistol.." (SIXGUNS, page 107) That's my feeling too. At least for now. I can still see the sights on my guns. 

SIXGUNS AND BULLET HOLES

I was out in the hills one day and came across a young man firing his pistol into a bag filled with newspapers and water. I asked him what he was doing and he informed me he was testing his gun and loads for expansion. He said he was going deer hunting and was taking his pistol for the first time and wanted to make sure the bullets would expand. We talked for a while and he asked if I had ever killed any deer with a handgun. When I told him I had he began to ask about what bullets I used, powder charges etc. He was flabbergasted when I told him I killed most of my deer with a hardcast bullet. His question was, "How can it kill them if it doesn't expand?"

I don't know where we got the idea that bullet expansion kills. A hole through some vital area is what kills. (people or animals) It does not make much difference whether the hole in the vitals was made by a .30-06, a knife, a spear point, a .22 or a chunk of rebar. While it is true that certain bullets will do more damage and kill more quickly, it is still damage to vital tissue that does the trick. A big heavy blunt pistol bullet at moderate velocity will kill very well. John Linebaugh once compared it to a "long-range remote-controlled punch press". Knock a hole in something in the right place and life leaks out.

For the sixgun game kills I have made I prefer to use a bullet that will go in on one side, punch through, go out the other side and leave a nice hole. While I have never lost but one big-game animal, I have shot a couple that got far enough away that someone else dropped them. What I have found is that generally entrance wounds do not bleed. At least not enough to leave a trail. It is the exit wound that leaves a good trail. For that a nice large flat nose on the bullet works real well.

The velocity does not need to be very fast. A nice flat-nosed slug of 260 to 300 gr. in the .44 or .45 going at 1100 fps to 1300 fps will kill extremely well on game in this country. A 300 gr. .45 bullet running at 950 to 1000 fps will shoot through most any animal, especially on side and quartering shots, and will drop them quickly if you put them in the right place. I have shot nearly full-length through deer with a 300 gr. slug at 1100 fps. The main thing more velocity does (in a sixgun) is to extend your point-blank range. That is the range where you can still hold "on" and not have to compensate for the trajectory. More velocity flattens your trajectory, at least somewhat. In the range of velocity available in a sixgun you generally cannot get enough to make a difference in killing ability. At least not so much as you can tell. I killed deer with the 260 gr. Keith slug in the .454 Casull at velocities near 1600 fps. I also shot them with the same slug at 1100 fps, as well as using 300 gr. bullets at 1000 fps and up to near 1500 fps. I could detect no difference in what the effect of being shot was to the deer. Some of the faster loads when fired into a Mule Deer from 80 yards produced no visible sign the deer was even hit. It jumped a little, looked around, and then walked over and lay down under a Mesquite tree. In a few moments it's head fell over and it was dead. Others, shot with less velocity sometimes fell down and died where they stood, while some busted and ran off as fast as they could only to pile up with in 50 yards or so. I never had a sixgun slug stop in a deer. All penetrated completely, even on angling shots. Most never showed any signs of expanding either. Not that I cared. Punch them through the right place and you do not need expansion. But then .... my .45 started out as large as the kid with the wet newspapers was trying to get his .357 to expand to.

MOLTEN LEAD

Dad started me casting bullets 'way back before I entered my teens. I have been addicted to molten lead ever since. Bullet molds fascinate me. Whenever I get a new one I rush to the shop and turn on the lead pot, anxious to see what these are going to look like coming out of the mold. I have been known to melt a small chunk of lead in a dipper, using a torch to melt it, and pour a bullet just to see what it looks like.

Over the years I have developed my own ideas of what I look for in a cast slug. For hunting bullets I like a large flat nose on the bullet. I like the wide square grease groove like Elmer Keith put on his bullets years ago. And I like a plain-base bullet with a square flat base. While many shoot very well, I do not care for bevel-based bullets. As far as killing ability I have not been able to detect any difference between the Keith-style bullets and truncated-cone type bullets or a bullet with a rounded ogive. If the nose-flat is the same size and the velocity is the same, wound channels appear to be the same on the few head of game I have shot with the various bullets. It is the nose ("meplat") that does the work in flesh.

The care and feeding of bullet molds is an important aspect. A new mold needs to be "broken in" properly in order for one to enjoy a long life of service from it. And they should be treated properly also, or they will not last long. When I receive a new mold I clean it of any oils or preservatives on it, then set it on the warming tray on top of the lead pot and heat it up as the lead melts. Generally I will smoke the cavities with a match or a candle. The carbon helps to get the bullets coming out easier at first. I have found that if I run the mold correctly I do not have to whack the cut-off plate with the sprue cutter. I can gently push the plate to the side and cut the sprue easily. This saves the plates from being banged up and bent or abused. I never hit the mold blocks. I have seen molds - I have one or two that Dad repaired - that are dinged, nicked, and battered. If you have to whack anything, you whack the hinge pin on the mold handles. Usually all it takes is a light tap.