TSiWRX

I'm not sure I understand....what do you mean by "doesn't give [you] the best viewing?" You mean you like having the FSP inside the objective, for reference? Wonder why they would recommend any sight over another. Train your eyes to "blow through" the objective, and it won't matter. Objectively speaking, the MRO's weight - or lack thereof - versus the XPS2-0 is probably something that you will notice, particularly if you invest in a good mount. You're on a car forum discussing guns. Own it and be proud of it. Since your rifles are for range-fun only, have you thought about a LPVO? Instead of two or three mid-priced optics plus their mounts (and remember, an optic is no good if its mount is crap), invest in one high-end optic and mount, and shift them between the guns. Modern 1-4, 1-6, or even 1-8 offer amazing versatility, and the good ones are incredibly durable and reliable: almost a "one ring to rule them all" kind of deal.... At the Alliance PD Training facility this past year, what I heard most from fellow students as well as the instructional cadre was that for an all-round carbine, the LPVO is currently king - it may give up just a little in terms of absolute speed in CQB (this is with the students pressure-cooking and proving it to themselves, as the facility has a 8000+ sq. ft., 360-degree shoot house in which both live-fire as well as sim/UTM) and demand a compromise in terms of weight/handling, but today, it's very close to being a true one-size-fits-all tool.

^ You did ask for a S/N verification on the unit you bought, right? or did the vendor guaranty it to be higher than ~89,000? The search for the best red-dot never ends. There's always something better just over the horizon....just like anything else gear-related!

^ I love the idea, but I gotta tell ya, if I'm the thief and I see an American flag burning away to the Gadsden, that's the FIRST place I'm gonna have a look for a gun.

^ +1. That sucks!!! How much was it for, out of curiosity?

Ain't that always the truth. I'm actually finally ready to upgrade from the first-gen PST 1-4x that I've been using this past year or so as a trial balloon, to see if a LPVO would work out well for my needs. I think I'll have funds ready two years from now. I don't want price as a limiting factor in the final calculus. I'm going to go purely off of weight, glass quality, and features. Probably end up bankrupting myself, but oh-well! The Strike Eagle is remarkably good for the price. A friend of mine was using it at Fisher's Urban Carbine class, and said that the only time the glass quality became an issue was as darkness encroached.

:spin:

No, not yet, unfortunately. There was a UTM class set up for November at the APD Facility, but I knew early-on that I would not be able to make the date. Not that it mattered - I actually had racked up enough points with the wifey to talk my way into APD's low-light handgun/carbine shoot-house 3-night class, having driven my MIL to D.C. to watch my nephews play soccer, but I ended up breaking my ankle (by not paying attention at all to where I was walking - I was just walking back to the car after a pee break on the Ohio Turnpike, talking to my MIL, and I suddenly ended up face-planting into my car ; I completed the drive, though!), and, well, that's that for the year! I was soooooo mad. I'm OK with a bit of pain as reinforcement. The only thing I've been exposed to that was higher on the pain scale than paintballing in a T-shirt ( ah, the stupidity of youth! ) was the use of RAP4's (now "MCS," IIRC) .68 caliber rubber projectiles. My understanding of UTM is that it's typically 2 to 3 Joules, while Simunition's FXT rounds are between 5 to 6. Those .68 caliber rubber rounds sucked. But I don't know - I think that the specter of pain as feedback may have just made me do even stupider things than taking my hand off fire-control to try to point things out to my partner. I might have ended up running around like a chicken with its head cut off!

^ I took that tape off and bundled it up - it's now in my sanctuary mementos.

^ When. Definitely a when, but it's going to be a few years. My traveling out-of-state (or even farther in-state, like, for example, TDI in southern Ohio) is currently no-go because of work/family schedules. Once Anna is in high-school and can drive for herself, things should free up a bit for me. And I'll definitely look you up then, bruddah. ---- Oh, and I thought I'd share this one as an example of my bad habits getting nipped even before they can be buds. It turns out that it's not only Italians that love to talk with their hands. Picture courtesy of Practically Tactical Yup, that's my fat paw getting taped to fire control. Joe made sure that I could still shoot and finish our run, but yeah..... We debriefed as a class after each evolution, and Joe made me sit for the entire 30+ minute debrief with my hand taped. My hand was pretty numb by then, and my notes for that debrief was a bitch to transcribe, as I had to write with my non-dominant hand. That learned me, good, and honestly, I love Joe for it. My hand has not come off fire-control in a class, since.

^ I'll pass on the flashbanging. I am using the house for one specific reason only: to break me of my square-range mindset, and to allow for a higher level of problem-solving and practical application. Sure, I'll admit to being a gear-queer and loving to play dress-up ninja in cool-guy gear. But truthfully, I know that's just for play (and also for the facility's liability requirements) - it's the "work" I'm learning in the house that's really what I'm after. I've done some of it in makeshift structures, and it's just not the same. I was really lucky to have my virgin runs be through the Alliance PD Training Facility. The Practically Tactical guys lured in a great bunch of folks, and we were under the careful eye of Joe Weyer - who broke me of bad habits before I could even form them. My partner - a good buddy of mine who was also a shoothouse virgin - and I also lucked-in to the fact that the two AIs for the class were our personal friends. One is a Marine combat vet, and the other a civilian who has been through the house countless times. They gave us several more hours of private tutelage, without which we would have been completely and totally lost beyond hope. Well, more me than him, anyway. The first run was just to enter a blank room and process it. Takes just over a minute to do it right, as a partners duo. I apparently was so nervous that I held my breath the entire time. Folks on the catwalk said I was turning purple. And uproarious laughter erupted from above me when Joe patted me on the back after he called ENDEX, and I let out a huge breath. Instruction emphasized processing and problem-solving. Shooting was held to a minimum, with the SOP being 2 shots per threat/shoot target, and the evolutions were *_not_* timed. Through a dozen runs through the house (4 of which were low-light), total ammo expenditure was no more than 50 rounds. Shot accountability was extremely high: we were expected to engage 2D-paper "Scenario Targets" with appreciation for 3D anatomy, and high-center-mass shots were held to a fist-size where the heart would be, with head-shots only counting as neutralizing the threat if it entered the eyebox area (again, with 3D consideration). Part of the genius of Joe was that on TD1, he baselined all of us by giving us extremely demanding standards to shoot to, both from our handgun as well as carbine, with close to 500 rounds of each being shot in a little over 6 hours. In-retrospect, we realized that this was on-purpose, as he would then prove to us later that any of us - myself included - failing to neutralize via the set accountability standards would be due to our brains just being overloaded: thus pointing a finger directly at our underlying inadequacies in executing the fundamentals. I was awkward on the carbine through most of last year, and this class really kicked my ass in that respect. I had so many shots fall outside the eyebox simply because when I got nervous, I would forget mechanical offset - a skill which, at that time, I'd yet to fully internalize. It was a great time, and I'm looking forward to doing it again a few times this coming year.

^ It's really not the same, bruddah. http://www.recoilweb.com/ Their website has a section that houses select articles from their last few issues that you can view for free. It's worth looking at those to get an idea of what Recoil is about. One of my favorite of the last few happens to be the "An Assaulter's Guide" series, authored by John "Chappy" Chapman ( https://forgetactical.com/legacy/ ) - http://www.recoilweb.com/an-assaulters-guide-to-doors-128037.html http://www.recoilweb.com/an-assaulters-guide-to-hallways-128691.html http://www.recoilweb.com/assaulters-guide-to-stairways-129416.html http://www.recoilweb.com/assaulters-guide-to-room-processing-131614.html Those of you who know me know that I finally got up my courage to get into the house this past spring - and man, let me tell ya, I really could have used those articles a few months before those virgin runs, to get my head in a better place. Looking back at these articles from the point of view of someone who went through that very same facility just months prior, I really think that Chappy did an amazing job writing those pieces. In any case, this particular rag has the usual marketing of guns, babes with guns, tacticool toys and even metrotactical clothing, but it's also got excellent articles like these above - articles authored by some of today's top shooters and instructors, which cover everything from tactical to defensive to competition, with words that can benefit everyone from beginners to more advanced shooters. All with nice, glossy photos. It's really a lot of fun.

Recoil "feels" good. The cover is that matte-lux stuff. I've also been given promo copies of their sister publication, Ballistic, and it's also had some interesting articles, and the same photography. I prefer Recoil, though. I still like the feel of paper-in-hand, too. Reading on the screen, tablet, or phone just isn't the same. Besides, it feels funny bringing electronics into the bathroom, still.

Recoil is good eye-candy. Good articles every once in a while. I usually pick one up before going on trips for mindless airplane and hotel reading. Overall, I side with Penguin. It's much better to get good information online nowadays, like through Primary & Secondary.

I have no idea, unfortunately. It was lost to someone out in the community shortly after the LERSOC days.

:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol: I just spewed my drink! :lol::lol::lol::lol::lol:

Where's my picture!!!!!!!!!!

^ No problem. Just an objective look, that's all. I actually own four ( \ducks for cover ) Springfield XDms - two pairs of carbon-copies that I mirror for range/training use versus defensive/EDC. I really truly think that the SA's entries into the AR world are well priced and competitive in where they landed in the market. Go out and enjoy the new gun. I think that you'll enjoy it. Again, just be sure you take a peek down the barrel, OK? This is good practice for any new firearm, anyway. ----- I didn't want the thread to get bogged-down by the nitty-gritty, and just wanted to use a quick illustration to use as a benchmark for Code and other newcomers of the genre, that's all. The recent Black Friday offers from Sionics and SOLGW really had me chompin' at the bit to press that "BUY NOW" button.

The marketing is a bit much. They made a fuss about the gun being light, but it's really not. 6 lbs. is an easy benchmark nowadays, and full 16-inch carbines that are well within its competitive range, such as the Sionics (which arguably are perceived as a higher tier than SA's offerings) Patrol Three, for example - nothing special at all, using full-weight "MilSpec" components and a forged lower - actually tips the scale a hair over an ounce less. Given SA's focus on the gun being "quick handling," one would want to minimize as much as possible any forward weight, and I really think that there is a problem, here. One would assume that there would at least be an ounce or two taken out of the billet lower (the magwell obviously has less material, and there are chunks machined out of the rest of it as well, reminiscent of 2A Balios Lite, and even moreso the Battle Arms Development Billet Lightweight Lower) versus the typical forging, so we can do that math, there. Add the known-quantity buttstock (BCM sloped), and the full-weight internals (and I'm not suggesting that this is a bad thing, here), we can then assume that all that weight is going to be forward of the receiver. And this is what's unfortunate, because we know that this is what's going to kill that "lively-in-hand" feel, as the weight is so far forward on the moment arm. So is it the barrel that's killing it (but it's supposed to be a "lightweight" barrel), or is it the handguard? Or maybe it's that honkin' muzzle device (which would be nice, as this could be easily changed out by the end-user)? SA's ARs have already come under a lot of fire from the AR-crowd. Some deservedly, others, less so. Here, I'm just wishing that they didn't give the detractors as much ammo to feed off of as they did. It's a feature-rich gun, and it's certainly priced right given what you're seeing out-the-door. They should have just let it ride on its own merits.

You guys obviously do not live your lives a quarter mile at a time.

What's your purpose for the gun? If you're looking at plinking with an occasional training class a year or two, the Vortex will do just fine. If you're looking for a gun that you're going to use primarily as a class gun and may press into a defensive role, I'd recommend that you make the spend, now, for a more rugged optic. A bit more spendy are the Holosun units - which are OE for Primary Arms and also, many suspect, SIG. The latter tends to see a hike in price, but SIG also runs a much more aggressive warranty on their units, which in-turn have led some (myself included) to suspect that while it may be rolling off the same OE line, it's likely either got better components and/or sees more rigorous assembly and/or Q/C. I'm actually very impressed at the price that SA is able to offer the Edge. It's no secret that I've got a slight beef about some of its setup/features, but no, that's not why I asked you what I did - I wasn't fishing to chop you off at the knees , I really was just honestly curious as to what appealed to you the most. Enjoy the gun : just remember to take a moment and insure that the bore is clear before you get out there on your first range-day. There's been more than a few reports of a Saint self-destructing because a piece of the chamber-flag that SA uses having broken off during shipping/transport and obstructed the bore.

What was the price? What made you choose the Saint Edge, specifically?

There existed a time in American history when men of a certain age would not have stepped out-of-doors in anything less than a suit with a hat, properly fastened necktie, and spit-shined leathers. Then it became an open neck button-up shirt with a pair of dress-pants. Next came the "Dockers," and suddenly boat-shoes and loafers were acceptable. Soon we were comfortable in a T-shirt (an undergarment, by my grandfathers' definition of menswear), jeans, and "athletic" footwear. Getting a gallon of milk or going to the Office Max to pick up something or another for my daughter's ridiculous homework assignments? I have no problem doing so in sweats, a T, and an old and tattered pair of sneakers (I try not to wear flip-flops out, simply because it's hard for me to run in them, and who knows when I might have to use the Nike defense ), but I don't think you'd catch my great-grandfather - or even my grandfather - dead in that same outfit (or, heck, "demeaning" themselves for such tasks, which clearly should be work for the womenfolk ). And I'd sure as hell bet that they think what I wear every single day (T-shirt over jeans, with a baseball cap and some kind of metro-tacticool footwear that shows my social standings when with friends ) is way inappropriate for a professional scientist. Sure, that man in the right-side panel in ehsnils's post may not fit my personal definition of manly style...but can I see someone like that coming into my home to take my daughter out on a date? Let's put it this way - what did *_your_* father - or, better yet, your wife's father - think of you and your fashion sense? What did their fathers, of theirs? Face it, boys. We're just getting old. After all, I'll admit, there was a time in my life where I thought looking like this would get me all the women:

The only problem being that I'm a new shooter, myself!

Not just dry practice. The same consideration also extends to live-fire as well. It also should be noted that certain skills cannot be successfully trained dry-only, such as recoil mitigation. The big picture is that "training classes" should be viewed as just that lesson presented in the lecture hall, and no more. A lot of folks believe that the few reps that the instructors have the students do is sufficient to ingrain the skill: it's not. Those reps are just so that the student can be exposed to the skill being taught, and that the instructor and his/her cadre can insure that you are performing it at least safely, if not completely properly. The student will never achieve proficiency with that skill if they don't take the time - be it dry fire or live - to properly ingrain/integrate that skill by themselves, outside of those few reps where the skill is presented in class.

My scope is pretty limited to this portion of the Mid-West, indeed. I'm not much help, here, I'm afraid. Check and see on M4Carbine.net as well as the Primary & Secondary groups what the training-heavy folks there think of these two outfits. Neither offer a very comprehensive/detailed look at who's actually behind the scenes and what their qualifications are, exactly, and this isn't something that I look upon favorably. Agreed. I'd start with your background, first. From there, I'd do an honest (read: quantifiable) assessment of your skills. With that data and your background for context, I'd then list out your goals. Here, be specific. The trainers/schools you select should look to address SPECIFIC areas in your goals. For example, top-tier military take lessons from top-flight competitive shooters not to learn tactics, but rather to specifically hone their ability to run the gun efficiently. Similarly, if you're looking to learn how to run the gun in a clench fight, spending the money to privately book a top-tier competitive shooter for a day isn't going to get you the same gains versus if your goal was to get better at "reading" competition stages or moving through them efficiently. I agree with you 100% - you need to sit down and figure out what your goals are, first.