Well, I picked up the Krinkov today (well, technically yesterday).  It’s beautiful.  Firing Line did a great job on the build.  I broke it down for inspection and didn’t find anything wrong with it.  My only complaint might be the missing scope rail, but the e-mail I sent in requesting it could have gotten lost in their move to a new domain.  It’s not too big a deal.  It can always be added later, and I might just wait until I have it SBR’d to have it done.  After checking it out, I braved the stiff cold wind to run 40 rounds through it.  It ran like a top.  Even with the barrel extention to get the barrel length out to 16 inches, it’s a fire breather.  I could quite clearly see a big muzzle flash.  That’ll be fun to try and get a pic of.  I took some photos with my camera phone, but only 2 really turned out any good (mostly due to low lighting for the others).  Here’s one:

I got the e-mail from David this morning. My Krinkov has arrived. It’s gonna be tough waiting until Saturday to go see it, especially when it’s only 8 miles away. Too bad the work schedule interferes, but I wouldn’t be able to do anything with it until Saturday anyway. Gonna be a long Friday sitting at work thinking about it.

Anybody who’s not seen the Box O’ Truth website really ought to take some time and read what they have. In some sorts, it’s a Mythbusters of the gun world with particular interest in ammo and it’s effects. I found a link to their website some time back and occassionally check it for new articles. Some of their results are interesting, most are just fun factoids to keep in mind. Anyway, I found a link to something new they’d put up in their educational section about the Makarov. It’s pretty neat, especially for those not aquainted with the Makarov. I particularly like the quote:

We have determined that this pistol may shoot as accurately as my Colt Gold Cup .45 ACP. That is no joke, the accuracy is simply amazing.

So, here it is: http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/edu16.htm

I think I’ll declare that the SP-10 is marginally fixed. Why do I say this? Well, I ran another 600 rounds through it today (well, technically yesterday, but I’m still awake). I had 10 or 15 FTE’s. I don’t remember exactly, because I started to get really pissed off about them. Sometimes it was a failure to eject. Sometimes it was a failure to extract. A few times it was a failure to load. So, by the standards that Special Weapons gave me (ie 99% reliable on Wolf ammo), it is still broke, because we’re down to somewhere like 97.5% reliability or slightly better. Now, about that “marginal” part. I didn’t clean the thing after the previous 600 rounds. So, in total, it did something like 13 to 18 FTE’s in 1200 rounds (98.5% reliability or slightly better). That’s still not in specs. Considering I’ve put over 1600 rounds through one of my AK’s without a hiccup in a single session and 1450 rounds through one of my Makarovs without a hiccup in a single session, I consider this an abysmal result.

I found some interesting notes, though. It seems that I might have higher reliability in rapid fire than doing slow fire. I found FTE’s less likely to occur when I would do runs with higher rates of fire (like 30 rounds in 25 seconds), than a normal slow rate like 1 round every 2 seconds.

Now, I think I’ll probably just sell it. It’s just not worth the frustration anymore.

Before I crash for the night I just wanted to post about some excitement today.  I got a call from Firing Line and my Krinkov is done.  It’s been a long wait (and somewhat less than optimal financial timing for it to get done), but considering how many months it’s been in the works it’ll be nice to see it come to a completion like this.  Looks like I have another month of wait before I actually get to see it, though.  Mike has a couple trips out of state that have to be worked around and I’m still waiting on my tax refund to get here.

Well, we took the SP-10 to the range on Saturday and ran 600 rounds through it.  There were only 3 failures.  So, it ran 99.5%.  That is definitely not a declaration of being fixed, but it’s not necessarily still broke either.  I’ve got another 600 rounds I’m going to run through it before I even remotely make any decisions about it being fixed or not.  I can only hope.

Welcome to Memphis, my soon to be adopted home. It kind of gets me thinking when on the evening news they announced that Memphis now has 4 murders in the first 5 days of 2006. This last case being a man mugged and shot to death in front of his apartment. My understanding is that the rest of Tennessee jokes about the crime rate in Memphis, but this is ridiculous. I’m used to Stillwater, where we can go a year or more without a murder. One thing is for sure. After I officially get moved out here, I’m getting a carry license as soon as I can. The precedent has been well documented in court that the police can not be held responsible for our safety, so I sure as hell will be responsible for my own.

I came across a link to this anti gun control “article” today. Pretty funny. It has more one liners than I’ve ever seen in one place before. Most of them make pretty good points.

http://www.michaelzwilliamson.com/rants/guncontrol.php

I was starting to get a little curious when my SP-10 would be done. Considering how quickly it has returned the last two times it was in I was odd that I hadn’t at least heard something. Well, it was came back today. Total turn around time was 17 days, including Thanksgiving week. That’s very good time yet again. The invoice says they replaced the bolt head, extractor, and extractor spring. So, this is the fourth extractor and extractor spring set in the gun. I planned on hitting the range with the AK-74M tommorrow anyway, so I’ll take the SP-10 with me. I only have 200 rounds of ammo left to try with it, though. David said he’s going to a Tulsa gunshow tommorrow and would try to bring me back a case of Wolf 9mm and a couple cases of 5.45x39mm. So, depending on how prepared I feel for finals (if I even care at that point), I might burn through another case of 9mm next weekend. Boy do I hope it works this time.

Update 1: David managed to get 1000 rounds of 9mm for me, but there was no 5.45×39 at the show at all.
Update 2: Apparently, my SP-10 didn’t return with its mag.

I’ve updated some of my firearms content with better or more pictures. I also added a couple more pieces. That new digital camera really produces large images to work with. I can’t wait to get these new pieces to the range to try out.