NRA Annual Meeting - Post your impressions, pics, etc.
- Thread starter benenglish
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A leather version of the Vibram FiveFingers footwear? Interesting but I don't see how they could be as comfortable as the original.
I'm sure there were a number of examples of honorable behavior. That's the way shooters are. I'll bet the number of examples of honorable behavior totally dwarfed the instances of petty theft.
Still, I was filling out raffle tickets at the Whittington Center booth yesterday and I'm sorry to say I was too engrossed in writing my name and phone numbers for the 25th time to mentally change gears and intervene when a passerby furtively glanced around, snaked out a hand, scooped up a huge pile of pens from the desk, and then melted into the crowd. This wasn't someone who forgot to hand back a pen after doing business; it was deliberate "I can get away with it so I will", shoplifting-style theft.
I told the folks at the booth what happened and they said they'd been losing pens at a problematic rate to people who forgot to hand them back after filling out tickets but that this was new.
Not getting to see something I wanted to was a minor disappointment here and there throughout the show but I have weird tastes and not everyone brings every weird gun in their catalog. This, however, was the only truly disheartening thing I witnessed during the entire three days I was there.
While I could have let it depress me, I prefer to look on the bright side. By rarity and contrast that incident just proves what I deeply believe. Shooters have flaws like all humans but, by and large, they're a better brand of humanity.
5 Screw Smith
Member
Two friends of mine and I traveled to Houson for the event yesterday from Pleasanton. This was a first time NRA event for all of us. What stood out was the civility of the attendees in the convention hall. People were polite, courteous, and friendly.
The media was also there giving all their attention to the handful of protestors across the street.
The media was also there giving all their attention to the handful of protestors across the street.
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Saw an interesting drum setup for Remingtons (and Mossbergs?). It was ambi, drum could be loaded "forward or backward" meaning insert the rounds in one direction and it was righthand friendly...insert the rounds in the other direction and it could be used by a southpaw.
Price point was $275.
Price point was $275.
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Some guys from Kali were selling knockoff bipods and copies of UTG scope mounts for AK's. They were near the door in Hall B, next to the pizza area. Had VFG's (w/batt compartment etc) for $5...yep, $5.00 eack. Bipods were $15, scope mounts at $20 each. Various types of scope rings were $10 a set.
eta - appears this was the bunch from C&C Outdoor Products
http://ccop-usa.com/
t
eta - appears this was the bunch from C&C Outdoor Products
http://ccop-usa.com/
t
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Some pretty neat pics and commentary from inside the show.
NRA expo features nine acres of guns, bras and zombies
Protesters across the street. Apparently one of Bloomberg's trolls made the trip from NY.
Protesters confront NRA board member at gun meeting
NRA expo features nine acres of guns, bras and zombies
Protesters across the street. Apparently one of Bloomberg's trolls made the trip from NY.
Protesters confront NRA board member at gun meeting
- Jul 1, 2011
- 27,734
- 21
Taya Kyle ('American Sniper' Chris Kyle's Widow) - 2013 NRA Annual Meetings - 2013.05.03
If you do not shed tears please, turn off the world and do some soul searching.
If you do not shed tears please, turn off the world and do some soul searching.
Saturday, Day 3
I put in a marathon push to get to every booth in the place and managed to get it done. How hard did I push? I actually didn't notice *any* of the "booth babes" until I had nearly finished. I was too busy looking at product. When I was completely done and just walking back to the hotel, I saw them everywhere.
Clearly, there's something wrong with me.
I sometimes forget it's a trade show.
There were a bunch of "services to the industry" exhibitors, the folks who see things that us plain old shooters would never think about. Range builders, financial services, some insurance products, etc. For example, these folks from Payment Alliance were offering credit card services and wireless readers to retailers. People have to sell stuff like that so that our favorite ranges can conduct business. I shouldn't have been surprised to see them and similar other booths at the GRB.
When it comes to "services to the industry", what is more hardcore than ballistics testing fixtures? My bad for not getting the name of the company; I thought I'd be able to read the card in the picture. I seem to remember them as being somewhat local to Houston. Did anybody catch their name?
Anyway, this is the small fixture they brought for display. The large one looked like something from a railroad fabrication yard.
Carry Options
There were still more carry options for women.
My Handgun Purse was the definition of ranch bling.
Of course, Flash Bang was there.
CCW Breakaways is now offering purses and belts
in addition to the first product they broke with, their breakaway-pocket pants with integral holster for front-pocket carry.
A while back, I remember someone here on the forum suggesting Kangaroo Carry so I took a picture. I doubt they make these things big enough to encircle my considerable girth but the concept looks more than workable.
EAA
One of my favorite booths was EAA. No, not for this reason.
I'm not sure if that particular customer aspired to being a great shooter and wanted the poster for inspiration or if she wanted to be a model. The politically correct take is "In this modern world, you can be anything you want to be." I think I'll leave it at that.
EAA interests me simply because I really like their Italian-made iterations of the basic CZ75 design. They had the full range on display.
This one, however, jumped out at me. It's an uncatalogued Witness Gold variation featuring a long-slide configuration with cuts to remove slide weight. Interestingly, it's not ported. For some shooting games, the rules forbid porting. I wonder if I would have bought my Witness Elite Limited if I had seen this first? I kinda doubt it; this is a seriously cool piece.
I put in a marathon push to get to every booth in the place and managed to get it done. How hard did I push? I actually didn't notice *any* of the "booth babes" until I had nearly finished. I was too busy looking at product. When I was completely done and just walking back to the hotel, I saw them everywhere.
Clearly, there's something wrong with me.
I sometimes forget it's a trade show.
There were a bunch of "services to the industry" exhibitors, the folks who see things that us plain old shooters would never think about. Range builders, financial services, some insurance products, etc. For example, these folks from Payment Alliance were offering credit card services and wireless readers to retailers. People have to sell stuff like that so that our favorite ranges can conduct business. I shouldn't have been surprised to see them and similar other booths at the GRB.
When it comes to "services to the industry", what is more hardcore than ballistics testing fixtures? My bad for not getting the name of the company; I thought I'd be able to read the card in the picture. I seem to remember them as being somewhat local to Houston. Did anybody catch their name?
Anyway, this is the small fixture they brought for display. The large one looked like something from a railroad fabrication yard.
Carry Options
There were still more carry options for women.
My Handgun Purse was the definition of ranch bling.
Of course, Flash Bang was there.
CCW Breakaways is now offering purses and belts
in addition to the first product they broke with, their breakaway-pocket pants with integral holster for front-pocket carry.
A while back, I remember someone here on the forum suggesting Kangaroo Carry so I took a picture. I doubt they make these things big enough to encircle my considerable girth but the concept looks more than workable.
EAA
One of my favorite booths was EAA. No, not for this reason.
I'm not sure if that particular customer aspired to being a great shooter and wanted the poster for inspiration or if she wanted to be a model. The politically correct take is "In this modern world, you can be anything you want to be." I think I'll leave it at that.
EAA interests me simply because I really like their Italian-made iterations of the basic CZ75 design. They had the full range on display.
This one, however, jumped out at me. It's an uncatalogued Witness Gold variation featuring a long-slide configuration with cuts to remove slide weight. Interestingly, it's not ported. For some shooting games, the rules forbid porting. I wonder if I would have bought my Witness Elite Limited if I had seen this first? I kinda doubt it; this is a seriously cool piece.
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Saturday, cont.
Big Iron
Everybody loves the big stuff. Ohio Ordnance Works was there with semi-auto versions of various machine guns...
including, yes, an M2.
What I liked best (maybe because it's closest to affordable) were the BARs. They're offering 30-round magazines for them, too. Cool.
Maybe this is the spot to slip in a note that besides the BAR above, other WWII-era weapons are available in new production versions, such as this Stg-44 from...somebody whose name I neglected to get.
I did remember to get the name of DSA...
who had semi-auto RPDs and variations on offer.
"Big Iron" is not a new concept. Look at the "chunk gun" (I think that's what they're colloquially called; someone correct me if I'm wrong.) on display at the National Muzzleloading Rifle Association booth. It's nearly the length of a table and that barrel is thicker than your wrist. There's a small but enthusiastic group of target shooters in this country that use those rifles in competition resembling F-class (i.e., prone with a front rest for the barrel) and do some amazing shooting with rifles sometimes so heavy they can't be easily lifted. This rifle is actually a small version; I've seen them with barrels 4 inches or more in cross-section diameter.
Here's a Bushmaster in .50 Browning. The kid isn't full-grown, obviously, but when the rifle you're totin' is half-again taller and weighs more than a small boy, isn't that enough?
Perhaps not. I'll close out this section with the Barrett 107A1. 'Nuff said.
Big Iron
Everybody loves the big stuff. Ohio Ordnance Works was there with semi-auto versions of various machine guns...
including, yes, an M2.
What I liked best (maybe because it's closest to affordable) were the BARs. They're offering 30-round magazines for them, too. Cool.
Maybe this is the spot to slip in a note that besides the BAR above, other WWII-era weapons are available in new production versions, such as this Stg-44 from...somebody whose name I neglected to get.
I did remember to get the name of DSA...
who had semi-auto RPDs and variations on offer.
"Big Iron" is not a new concept. Look at the "chunk gun" (I think that's what they're colloquially called; someone correct me if I'm wrong.) on display at the National Muzzleloading Rifle Association booth. It's nearly the length of a table and that barrel is thicker than your wrist. There's a small but enthusiastic group of target shooters in this country that use those rifles in competition resembling F-class (i.e., prone with a front rest for the barrel) and do some amazing shooting with rifles sometimes so heavy they can't be easily lifted. This rifle is actually a small version; I've seen them with barrels 4 inches or more in cross-section diameter.
Here's a Bushmaster in .50 Browning. The kid isn't full-grown, obviously, but when the rifle you're totin' is half-again taller and weighs more than a small boy, isn't that enough?
Perhaps not. I'll close out this section with the Barrett 107A1. 'Nuff said.
- Jul 1, 2011
- 27,734
- 21
Trust me, I debated on posting here but it does fit the "impressions, etc." extension of the thread title. It is part of the 2A/NRA big picture and I hope it doesn't stop others from posting here too.
country_boy
TGT Addict
Post impressions? Im wore out, my buddys dad pulled something in his hip so we took it slow. The whole time. Side note: MAGPUL AK MAGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Got a free hornady hat pre bent too. Well time to take a nap and mow the lawn. And yes my allergies(sinus infection) were killing me once I was in the building, whats up with that?
Saturday, cont.
Defense Firearms
Personal protection firearms, both familiar and new, were legion. There's no way to take account of all of them, so I chose just a few that caught my eye.
I have a Beretta Nano. I like it since it's just big enough to hang on to and, being mostly steel, heavy enough that it doesn't kick too hard. Beretta apparently felt that too much isn't enough and decided to push the concept further with the Pico. It didn't look bad in the ad copy.
However, when I picked one up it was nearly small enough to swallow. For me, it's unshootably tiny. These days it seems that anyone who makes a pistol so small and light that it hurts to shoot can sell them by the boatload, so look for the Pico to be super-popular.
I was glad to see Boberg show up...
with their SR9. Note that the chamber is directly over the magazine; it's impossible for a round to be pushed from the magazine into the chamber. Instead, in recoil when the slide moves rearward a sort of claw-type mechanism pulls each round from the magazine to the rear, positioning it behind the barrel. When the slide runs home, the next round is chambered. With this design, it's possible to make the overall length more than an inch shorter without changing the barrel length.
AFAIK, these have thus far been turned out only in short production runs. I wish them success since I really like short, muzzle-light pistols.
From compact and light to big and bulky, it turns out that Kel-Tec isn't the only company that makes a dual magazine tube, hi-cap defensive bullpup shotgun. These guys do, too. I don't know where I've been but a little research shows these have been out long enough for comparison tests (vs. Kel-Tec) to be posted to Youtube.
And on to the "I just don't understand" department - the Kriss. I've started seeing these things fairly regularly. The recoil-mitigating operating system is interesting but it's still an insanely expensive .45ACP carbine. As an SMG, perhaps the tech and expense are justified but I just don't get why anyone actually buys them. Kriss owners, please enlighten me; I'd really like to know.
Heizer
Speaking of "Why?" guns, there's the Heizer DoubleTap. They were all over the place, being displayed in two different booths and on the second floor as a part of a short-lived table display.
Here's the main booth.
Here's a display in another booth where they were asking passers-by to compare trigger pulls.
So DoubleTaps are all over this big show. I'm glad they have investor money to do all this promotion. Now, if they'll just put some of that money into shipping product we might be able to figure out if the hype has anything to back it up.
IWI
The best thing about the IWI booth, where they were showing off the Tavor bullpup, was the salesman. The guy knew the rifle and knew how to put on a demo. He made it sound like the ultimate evolution of the semi-auto rifle and I would have pulled out cash if they were on sale. He was that good. Of course, many of the reports from the field have been a bit less stellar. Still, it looks like a functional, practical design. Anybody here had any experience with them?
Then IWI managed to screw it up by showcasing this thing, leading me back to "Why? Just...why?"
Defense Firearms
Personal protection firearms, both familiar and new, were legion. There's no way to take account of all of them, so I chose just a few that caught my eye.
I have a Beretta Nano. I like it since it's just big enough to hang on to and, being mostly steel, heavy enough that it doesn't kick too hard. Beretta apparently felt that too much isn't enough and decided to push the concept further with the Pico. It didn't look bad in the ad copy.
However, when I picked one up it was nearly small enough to swallow. For me, it's unshootably tiny. These days it seems that anyone who makes a pistol so small and light that it hurts to shoot can sell them by the boatload, so look for the Pico to be super-popular.
I was glad to see Boberg show up...
with their SR9. Note that the chamber is directly over the magazine; it's impossible for a round to be pushed from the magazine into the chamber. Instead, in recoil when the slide moves rearward a sort of claw-type mechanism pulls each round from the magazine to the rear, positioning it behind the barrel. When the slide runs home, the next round is chambered. With this design, it's possible to make the overall length more than an inch shorter without changing the barrel length.
AFAIK, these have thus far been turned out only in short production runs. I wish them success since I really like short, muzzle-light pistols.
From compact and light to big and bulky, it turns out that Kel-Tec isn't the only company that makes a dual magazine tube, hi-cap defensive bullpup shotgun. These guys do, too. I don't know where I've been but a little research shows these have been out long enough for comparison tests (vs. Kel-Tec) to be posted to Youtube.
And on to the "I just don't understand" department - the Kriss. I've started seeing these things fairly regularly. The recoil-mitigating operating system is interesting but it's still an insanely expensive .45ACP carbine. As an SMG, perhaps the tech and expense are justified but I just don't get why anyone actually buys them. Kriss owners, please enlighten me; I'd really like to know.
Heizer
Speaking of "Why?" guns, there's the Heizer DoubleTap. They were all over the place, being displayed in two different booths and on the second floor as a part of a short-lived table display.
Here's the main booth.
Here's a display in another booth where they were asking passers-by to compare trigger pulls.
So DoubleTaps are all over this big show. I'm glad they have investor money to do all this promotion. Now, if they'll just put some of that money into shipping product we might be able to figure out if the hype has anything to back it up.
IWI
The best thing about the IWI booth, where they were showing off the Tavor bullpup, was the salesman. The guy knew the rifle and knew how to put on a demo. He made it sound like the ultimate evolution of the semi-auto rifle and I would have pulled out cash if they were on sale. He was that good. Of course, many of the reports from the field have been a bit less stellar. Still, it looks like a functional, practical design. Anybody here had any experience with them?
Then IWI managed to screw it up by showcasing this thing, leading me back to "Why? Just...why?"
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- Jul 1, 2011
- 27,734
- 21
What did you win? I tried 3 times
If I tell you, then you tell ten friends, etc., suddenly me joking about being at the meeting with 100,000 of my closest friend won't seem like a joke anymore. 
Picked out the Remington 1911 R1 and the Auto Ordinance 1911A1.
Picked out the Remington 1911 R1 and the Auto Ordinance 1911A1.
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