Which refers not to the hooker-with-the-heart-of-gold film with Melina Mercouri, nor or the bouzouki-and-ouzo driven theme song that became the token Greek staple in Muzak, but to the fact that WeaponsMan.com takes the day off.
(Actually, it looks like snow shoveling is in the near future here).
However, what you can do is ask questions and make suggestions in the comments, because we’ll be rocking again first thing Monday morning.
Kevin was a former Special Forces weapons man (MOS 18B, before the 18 series, 11B with Skill Qualification Indicator of S). His focus was on weapons: their history, effects and employment. He started WeaponsMan.com in 2011 and operated it until he passed away in 2017. His work is being preserved here at the request of his family.
2 thoughts on “Never on Sunday…”
Hey Nose,
Still enjoying ‘da blog, check it every day. Here’s a suggestion… The “controversy” over the differences between the 5.56 and .223, both in the ammo and chamber specs. I don’t know if you even see this as worthy of discussion, but I remember when I first heard about it and I took it seriously. I thought I was fairly knowledgeable on gun stuff and had never heard that there might be differences significant enough to preclude firing 5.56 ammo in a .223 chambered firearm.
After much internet investigation, I decided not to routinely fire my 5.56 ammo in my .223 chambered AR. Although the chances for a catastrophic failure are slim (to none) I read too many opinions that some degrading of the chamber might occur over time. The reverse, firing .223 in a 5.56 chamber does not present any problems, other than some loss of accuracy. I notice that many national ammo retailers advertise their AR15 ammo as 5.56/.223, indicating they apparently see the rounds as interchangeable. What say you?
That’s a great idea for a post, Morgan. You are quite correct that the 5.56mm NATO chamber (which is defined by a NATO standard) and the .223 Remington chamber (which is defined by a SAAMI standard) are different dimensionally. The .223 is tighter which is why it is preferred by the target-shooting gravelbellies, who handload their ammo.
The differences are small, and all across America people are chambering NATO rounds in SAAMI chambers, but they’re real. You’re probably better off just exercising some judgment about the rounds you shoot. English or Metric, if it’s from the Kinshasa Ammo Plant you probably don’t want to jam it into your personal weapon.
I’ll get a post up this week on the details. One very interesting and little known fact is that the .222 Remington Special that became the .223 and later the 5.56 was actually conceived by Stoner and team as an interim, stop-gap round, pending more testing and optimization. The rifle and ammo were rushed into production and service and that optimization never occurred.