“You know,” Marion said, “I met a woman once when I was a teenager. I knew she had gone through a lot but she was so strong, so compassionate. I asked her how she could be the way she was, and you know what she told me?”
Hadley shook her head.
“She said, ‘You can be broken, or broken open. That choice is yours.” ? Erica Bauermeister, Joy for Beginners
The Freeze Dry Guy is currently having a sale on LRP Western Eggs with Ham Entree, and they only have 100 cases left. Normally $159, it’s on sale for $95. LRP are special freeze dried rations, manufactured in limited numbers and usually only issued to special operation unit members. They are compressed and vacuum packed so they stack nicely in your backpack and allow the maximum amount of food to be carried. They’re great for a bug out bag!
o o o
Today, we present another entry for Round 58 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $12,000+ worth of prizes for this round include:
First Prize:
Second Prize:
Third Prize:
Round 58 ends on May 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.
I am a chiropractor and former Recon Marine 3rd Recon Battalion, writing this article as a little ray of hope to help those who at some point find they have been thrust into TEOTWAWKI and have either lost access to the stores or didn’t prep well or maybe did everything right but when the SHTF they lost all of their prep work or access to it because of some unforeseen circumstance. “Never give up” should be one of your mottos. This comes with a little bit of knowledge and experience. I have been in survival situations as a Recon Marine, and I currently work in my chiropractic practice with four different health degrees in an attempt to get patients to stop poisoning themselves with unnecessary drugs and surgeries. There are better ways to heal your body without hurting your body. The medical industry is not it. They make money on you being sick.
Are you ready for a survival situation? Can you ever be ready enough? I don’t think anyone can ever be ready enough. The best a person can do is try to prepare by learning as much as you can. I tell my patients to take one step at a time. When the SHTF, nobody knows what is going to happen or who they will be able to count on. When I was in the Marines and stuff started to happen, the people who you think are going to be the reliable ones aren’t always reliable or trustworthy. In TEOTWAWKI there is always going to be that surprising situation that you didn’t prepare for, that you don’t know how to handle. I know you are prepping, but there are always questions; for example, “Are you going to be able to access what you have prepared?” You can never know for sure.
If you can’t get medicine, food, and all of the other necessary supplies, because there is no more store, pharmacy, or cache you stored, are you going to be able to make it? Aside from that, are you going to be able to deal with the stress of killing someone or something to protect yourself or others? Are you ready to handle the hopelessness, death, loss, disease, or other stresses that may come?
A doctor I worked with was brilliant, driven, in shape, and had everything going for her. She was the one to turn to if you needed help. She was in a restaurant when someone started choking. That’s no big deal, right? You just do the Heimlich and no one gets hurt; you maybe even earn a citizens award or something. A few days later she started getting depressed and couldn’t function. She didn’t want to get up in the morning or even care if she went to work. She quite literally lost the will to live. This went on for weeks and she became totally not herself. Someone that cared for her finally dragged her in to a doctor to get some help. She was diagnosed with PTSD. Post traumatic stress disorder, just because she had saved someone’s life who had been choking on a piece of steak? They put her on some medicine and she fully recovered. She just needed a push in the right direction. The stress of the situation had thrown all of the chemicals in her body off. She couldn’t get back on track and get control of her life. She didn’t even care to. Situations you are trying to prepare for will certainly get much worse than someone choking on a piece of steak. What if this happens to you? Are you prepared? I don’t believe anyone is, but what can you do to be the best prepared you can be?
Another big thing to think about is are you on a medication for anything? Let’s take a heart condition, for example. Maybe you are being told by a doctor that your body has an aspirin shortage and you need to take an aspirin a day. Where are you going to get the aspirin during a survival situation when nobody is delivering to the stores? Maybe you have some stored up, but what if your cache gets compromised or destroyed? Every medication that is out there has been designed by taking a plant, leaf, root, stem, fruit, seed, and extracting a chemical out of the plant; “bingo”, the drug company can now market a new drug. Did you know you can take the same plant and have the same effect as the drug? The brilliance of taking the plant is that God made the plant with the chemicals in it to help the plant be assimilated and used as it goes through the body without hurting you. White willow bark– acetylsalicylic acid, or you may have heard it called aspirin– is one of those. I will talk a little about it in this paper.
All willow trees have some salicylic acid in the bark. People all over the world used to chew the bark or make a tea to help with pain and other ailments, until Bayer Company in the late 1800’s produced aspirin, making it convenient to pop a pill. When aspirin came out, too many people were getting hurt with aspirin. It seems it was causing severe intestinal bleeding, so Bufferin was developed. Bufferin is aspirin with a chemical coating to make it not burn you until it got further into your system. Common sense says chemicals are not good for you. I’m getting off track. The history can be read in books or on the Internet. The point is that you can find the willow tree, or if you have to take the pill I recommend storing up bottles of white willow bark. They look almost exactly the same. They cost the same. They have less side effects than Aspirin, which I think the research shows a negative reaction with every 1000 times an aspirin is taken. If you are taking a medication, do a little bit of research to find an alternative now. I guarantee there is one out there. I have seen patients surviving without the drugs or surgery many times. Find someone that is knowledgeable on the subject now and learn from them, before you are in a desperate situation and it becomes literally life or death and you become a statistic. What are some awesome plants that can be used for multiple uses nutritionally, medicinally, or practically to help you survive until things get back to tolerable? This is my short list. My criteria for this paper was that you had to be able to easily find and identify them, and do so almost anywhere in the world. Another thing I want you to think of is the very real life scenario that you may have no access to the store and buying what you want, when you want. I wanted to keep the list short so you will remember this article; the memory will help you with fighting all the possible hardships you are likely to encounter, like disease, radiation, injury, thirst, or hunger. As with all advice on plants or anything you put on or in your body, they can be dangerous if taken with anything else or by a person that is allergic. You will find many less side effects, if any, with a plant than with an acid, like medication, that is extracted from a plant. It is better to figure it out now, when things are what you would call normal than when SHTF and you are forced to go back to the way things used to be. This advice is given by a medical professional whose wife, family, and patients have used it for years. When trying anything new, always go slow when introducing it to your system and stop if you have complications. Your body can handle almost any toxin, if exposed to it slow enough and helped through the process. God designed your body to be pretty amazing. He also gave you tools to help you survive.
My first choice may make you change your mind about spraying chemicals on your lawn, if you are the kind of person that likes a green grassy lawn. It’s dandelion. Maybe you have heard of it or blown the little paratrooper seed in the spring time and watched them float all over. Come on, who doesn’t know what dandelion looks like? It is easy to find and located almost anywhere in the world. You can’t mistake it for another poisonous plant. It grows in all soil types. The dandelion is a plant that was designed to help pull other minerals, like phosphorous, calcium, and others, up to the top of the ground to help fertilize your soil and make it healthier. It was rated in the top five most nutritious vegetables from the USDA. It is rated in the top 10 for medicinal plants of Chinese medicine. All parts of the dandelion can be used as a water purifier, to fight bacteria, and help heal wounds. Dandelion has many uses internally or externally. It can be used for most digestive problems and to detoxify the whole body. It is more nutritious than most fruits or vegetables. It can be dried and saved for later, eaten raw, or cooked. It can be used as a bartering tool. It will help ripen your fruit faster too so that you can eat the fruit sooner, which could be especially useful for when you are on the move and have to pick fruit too early. Dandelion is anti-biotic and can be used against a host of bacteria, like perhaps staph infections, pneumonia, dysentery, typhoid, diphtheria– the diseases you are likely to face in a survival situation. Dandelion is great for removing toxins and poisons out of the body because it acts like a diuretic (makes you pee a lot). What makes dandelion better than diuretics is that it doesn’t push much needed potassium out of the system. The truth is it is loaded with potassium, and it replenishes the bodies’ supply of it. Just to make a long story short, it helps with just about everything in the body because of how nutritious it is.
Eat dandelion all the time and you may never get something. Your body will be so strong it will laugh at sickness. Try not to think of dandelion as a medicine. Think of it more like a once-a-day vitamin. Dandelion is currently being studied and has been used for years for liver problems like jaundice and hepatitis, heart problems like high blood pressure, all kinds of inflammatory skin problems, including getting rid of freckles, zits, and warts. Seriously! It has also been used for problems like soothing the skin from burn, bite, or itch, for kidney and urinary problems, intestinal disorders, and digestive problems. It can be used, as I have tried, as a weaker version of coffee, for all you coffeeholics out there that can’t live without coffee. It’s “okay” in a pinch. You know coffee will be in short supply. I believe people will kill for it. Have you ever seen the barista at Starbucks get an order wrong? People go ballistic. I believe you could almost live off of dandelion, if you could find a source of protein and fat. This is one you should be eating right now to strengthen your body so it will handle the stress of what might be coming. There is research all over the world on dandelion.
HJL,
I’ve got a 35-mile commute to work. I’ve often wondered, if the lights go out, should I walk home during daylight hours or at night, which I believe would put me at risk of getting shot in the dark by trigger-happy people. I recall in Patriots the couple moving at night and sleeping during the day. This is a rural highway route, far from larger cities. – B.D.
HJL Responds: You will need to evaluate the routes(s) that you use to determine the best time of day for travel. If you do plan on traveling at night, I strongly recommend the use of NVG. The gear is becoming inexpensive enough that there really isn’t an excuse not to have it in your get-home kit. It gives you the complete flexibility to travel at whatever time you deem as the safest to arrive at your destination. Without it, you may find that you are at a disadvantage, primarily because of dogs that may alert others to your travel or because of those who do have NVG. If I wasn’t familiar with the route (meaning I had not actually walked the route before) and I did not have NVG, I might be hesitant to travel exclusively at night. The twilight hours, where there is too much light for NVG to work and regular vision struggles, might provide the best traveling light for concealment purposes. Familiarity with the route itself will give you the best indicator of what your needs are if it is a regular commute.
Additionally, you would need to be aware of the general attitude of the area during your travel. A time of panic or heightened danger would give you the most dangerous conditions to travel under, whereas just losing your vehicle because of something that happened where you work but that hasn’t filtered out to where you live allows you to travel much faster with less danger. Living in a rural area gives you a great advantage in that regard.
The signing of this law is a dark day for Oregon. Perhaps this will be the impetus that freedom-loving Eastern Oregon needs to start the partitioning of the state?
o o o
Charge: Ore. teacher burned students with Tesla coil. – RBS
o o o
Student’s prom proposal could lead to federal charges
o o o
Sadly, even the American Redoubt has its share of problematic politicians (though far fewer than most other places): Idaho city’s ordinance tells pastors to marry gays or go to jail
Gold Prices In 2020? Debt Drives Gold and Stocks
o o o
Russell Napier Explains What’s In Store For Gold If Cash Is Outlawed. – D.S.
o o o
Items from Mr. Econocobas:
The Graccident Hour Draws Nigh
Greece Hopes for Helping Hand as IMF Bill Looms
No Deal: Eurogroup Concludes Meeting On Greece, No Further Fund Disbursement
The Situation Escalates – Greece Is Now Taxing Cash Withdrawals
Two concealed handgun permit holders, both volunteer firemen, stop mass public shooting. – G.G.
o o o
Mike Williamson, SurvivalBlog’s Editor At Large, sent in this link about dealing with police who tell you to stop filming them.
o o o
1.6 Million Immigrants from Predominantly Muslim Countries Since 9/11. – G.P.
o o o
Experts urge cautious use of wireless devices as health effects reassessed. – D.S.
o o o
IRS Continues SWAT Raids for Evasion While Hundreds of Agents Avoid Paying Any Taxes at All. – H.L.
On May 11, 1949, Israel was admitted into the United Nations.
We have many needs; food, water, air, shelter, and heat come to mind. To acquire and use all those things, we have to be able to find them, and the tool used the most is our vision. Our eyes work great during the day but not so well at night, so having a way to make light is vital.
We started off making light the same way we made heat and cooked, with fire, but that has drawbacks. We finally came up with electricity, and now the most common way we make light is to flip a switch on the wall. We also have flashlights for when we want to be mobile. A drawback to electric lights, of course, is that they need electricity, which has to be provided by wires or batteries.
As we cast about for alternatives that need little or no electricity, someone came up with glow sticks that contain two chemicals that are kept separate until a glass vial inside the stick is broken by bending it. When the chemicals mix, presto, we have light. There are some major drawbacks, though, with these products; chief among them is a limited shelf life. I only get a year or so of life out of mine, but I am often told that if they are stored in a cool place and packaged in a tightly sealed container, they might make it to four years. I prefer for things to last longer than that. There is one more problem to contend with; they only work once, and then you have trash.
UV Paqlite https://www.uvpaqlite.com/ is an innovative company that has some ideas about how to deal with these problems. We have reviewed some of their products before, so I am mainly going to focus on some of the new ones introduced since the last review, but I will take a quick look at the whole product line.
I should first say that UV Paqlite is most well known for their use of strontium aluminate crystals– a fascinating material that absorbs electromagnetic radiation and ultra violet rays and then returns them to us as light. The really fantastic thing about these crystals is that they can charge in relatively low light and then remain visible for up to 24 hours. UV Paqlite has come up with a number of very useful ways to use the abilities of these crystals.
When you first charge the crystals up, they seem really bright, but they fade a bit pretty quickly. They aren’t a Surefire flashlight by any means, but they retain enough light emitting ability to be able to find things in the dark from dusk to dawn, much like one of the long-life glow sticks. I was initially disappointed when I ran into our darkest closet with them, but I realized that my eyes were not dark adapted. Once that happens, the UV Paqlites really show their stuff. I tried an assortment of their products on a Cub Scout campout. When I got up before dawn for a call of nature, I was pleased to be able to find everything I had attached them to without needing to wake anyone up with a flashlight. Sadly though, they were not a deterrent to Cub Scouts running between tents and knocking out the tent stakes the lights were attached too. I suspect they might have been using the lights to better target the stakes.
The main item I’m writing about here is The Orb. Orb is a word derived from Latin that basically means a glowing disk. Writers often wax poetic about the full moon as a glowing orb and UV Paqlite’s Orb is much the same. It’s a glowing disk, but it has a cunning trick that makes it much more interesting.
The Orb is about 1.5 inches in diameter and about 1.25 inches thick. It only weighs 1.5 ounces and goes for $25. It contains a generous supply of the crystals that make it glow for hours after it is exposed to light. It does more than that, though. There is a built-in LED light that does two things. First, it provides enough light to safely find your way down a trail or to wander about a campsite. It is wonderful for reading maps in the dark or searching the bottom of a backpack. While you are using the LED, you are also charging the crystals, so you are left with a period of rather bright light that will continue to let you read a map or find the toothbrush that somehow got mixed in with the dirty underwear. UV Paqlite says you will get about four hours of battery life when using the LED. which was about what I got in use.
Once you get over how well it does these tricks, check out the next one– a hybrid mode that uses a timer to turn the LED light on every two minutes for long enough to recharge the crystals to full brightness. If your eyes are dark adapted, you can see it for really long distances. It is brighter, of course, during the moments the LED is on, but since it is always close to fully charged, it is easy to find. Steve Nagel from UV Paqlite suggested a great use for it in this mode– hanging it in a very visible spot near your car while hunting or hiking to provide a beacon should you run late returning. I hung it on our tent while camping and had no trouble finding my way back on a moonless night.
An added feature– a light sensor– further extends the life of the battery if you are leaving it someplace during the day that you want to locate in the dark. You can set it to a mode where the LED only comes on once it gets dark. Since you can get about 100 hours on the battery in the hybrid mode, you should be able to get a week out of the nighttime only setting.
The battery is charged with a USB cord, and it comes with a short one. A small solar panel or one of the storage batteries people use to extend cell phone life can be used to keep the Orb going. I suppose you could probably use a small panel to keep one going indefinitely, if desired.
There is also a waterproof housing you can get that protects it to 300 feet. The Orb by itself is rated water resistant, but you have to make sure that the cover for the charging port is properly inserted.
An older product– the Mule Light– was composed of a Larry Light, a nifty little LED flashlight that works well for area lighting, and the UV GloStik. The idea was similar to The Orb. A bunch of the crystals in the GloStik could be charged with the light to provide a nice source of light at the cost of little battery life. The GloStik could be rubber banded to the front of the light or pulled off if you wanted to get all of the LED’s light on the subject. I like the fact that the Larry Light uses three easy-to-find AAA batteries. The combination worked very well, but UV Paqlite decided to upgrade it and add the hybrid functions of The Orb to the flashlight, which promises to be a very useful combination. This one has entered production at the time I wrote this and should be on the market soon. The price hasn’t been set.
Besides The Orb and the Mule Light, UV Paqlite has a number of products that are recharged purely by ambient light. There are several varieties of glow stick-shaped lights, a disk that looks like an oversized glowing Lifesaver candy for you to wear at night, Glow in the Dark spots you can attach to whatever you need to find, adhesive sheets that work much better than the stuff I have previously used in darkrooms, and several other formats of the glowing crystals to meet your needs for finding things when there is no light.
One thing I really liked is the Scout package that gives you several different UV Paqlites, all of which I found useful camping with Scouts, despite the fact they didn’t slow down seven year olds creating mayhem.
I reviewed some storage food from Valley Food Storage last December and overall came away pretty happy with what we tried. They have introduced some new choices and were kind enough to send four samples, which we have dug into. They are all packaged in sturdy Mylar pouches with zip seals to preserve any unprepared foods. The containers provide enough food for a family meal, which is a point I like. Larger containers offer some cost advantages, but you frequently have so much that everyone hates it by the time the large container is finished. Valley Food eschews genetically modified foods and MSG, which I appreciate.
I think it is helpful to know something about the tastes of the testers, but I don’t, however, want to repeat all that here for the sake of space and time. You might want to go back to the original review, if you are curious about us. I didn’t get a chance to have my sister sample any of the new entrees, so this is based on opinions from my wife, my 10-year-old son, and me.
I will reiterate that my most important criterion these days is that storage food be things we will eat in normal times. I have found myself throwing out food that no one would eat when the time came to rotate it, which didn’t make me happy.
The first item we tried was the Enchilada Beans and Rice, and it was enjoyed by all three of us. We didn’t have any fresh tortillas to serve with it, and that would have greatly improved it, as would some fresh grated cheese, chopped onions, and peppers. My wife said she would be fine with storing it and eating it, but she wouldn’t go out of her way to have it in normal times. She wouldn’t let it go bad when it came time to rotate it but would probably prefer to have something else. If I presented her with it for dinner, there would not be any issues with her eating it, though. The package promised five 230-calorie servings for $11.95, and it seemed reasonably close, assuming a meal would have other items to go with it.
The Strawberry Cream of Wheat was a big surprise for both my wife and me. She really doesn’t like cream of wheat, but she liked this stuff and would be okay having it around anytime. My son snubbed it, though, and refused to try it. I was pretty much the same as my wife. I like cracked wheat cereals and oat meal, but cream of wheat always seemed too much like paste. This, however, was good. If you had some fresh blueberries to throw in, it would be very nice indeed. The $34.95 package is said to provide twenty 220-calorie servings. However, if it is the only item on the breakfast menu, that seemed optimistic to me, especially if folks are doing any sort of physical labor. As a side with an egg or two and some bacon, though, you could walk away pretty stuffed and fueled for some serious work.
The Irish Pub Cheddar Soup was a huge hit with the adults, but I couldn’t get my son to try it due to the presence of some tasty leftovers in the refrigerator. I was surprised and impressed with how well the potatoes and bacon bits reconstituted. I’ve had other dehydrated products that had odd, disconcerting textures. This one was not as good as fresh-made from scratch, but it was very good and better than I’ve had in restaurants or boxes from the grocery store, largely thanks to the flavorful seasoning. My wife said I can buy this and serve it anytime. The five-serving package goes for $11.95 and provides 230-calories per plate. Again, you would want to add some sides to your meal to get the calorie count up, especially when working hard.
I’ve saved the only one we didn’t like for last. It was the $11.95 Mac and Cheese. We would eat it in bad times, but the flavor just wasn’t up to the standard grocery store brand or Kraft Macaroni and Cheese kits. At first, I just wondered if the problem was that it is just different, but I decided I really didn’t like the cheese. The flavor wasn’t what I expect with macaroni, and the texture wasn’t smooth enough for me. The noodles reconstituted well and were fine. So, it was all about the cheese. My wife or son didn’t like it either; so this one won’t be on our buy list, unlike the other three or the ones we tried last year. This one gives you 280 calories per serving.
Overall, Valley Food has some very useful products for food storage. I am a fan of a number of brands of storage foods, but Valley Food is carving out a nice niche of tasty and different entrees at a decent price that could greatly reduce food boredom in a crunch. Some of us can handle boring food, but I can’t think of anyone who doesn’t appreciate a tasty meal every now and then as well as some serious variety. In the end, food is fuel, but good food can provide a lot of comfort in times of adversity.
– SurvivalBlog Field Gear Editor, Scot Frank Eire
Over the years, I’ve owned more 1911 handguns than any other type of handguns. No matter what new type of polymer handguns that come into my hands, I always turn back to the grand ol’ 1911 as my favorite handgun. It’s just hard to argue with success. The 1911 was first made in, well, 1911, and it celebrated more than 100 years of age a few years ago. To be sure, I honestly can’t keep track of all the gun companies that are making 1911s these days. If a person could sit down and start counting all the different companies who are either making or did make 1911s, I’m sure it would number well over a hundred. Then we have to look at the different models of 1911s, which easily number in the hundreds and hundreds of different models. One 1911 maker alone produces more than 60 different types and styles of 1911s. Wow!
The 1911 is unique when it comes to handguns. It is the only handgun, that I’m aware of, that has a trigger that slides back and forth. All other guns have triggers that pivot. The sliding trigger explains why the 1911 handgun has one of the best trigger pulls on the market. Maybe your particular 1911 doesn’t have the smoothest trigger pull right now, however, it can be made to have a smooth and slick trigger pull with very little work. Also, let’s not forget the reset once the trigger is pulled on a 1911; it’s very fast and VERY short, as to my knowledge no other handgun has a shorter trigger reset than the 1911. I can put eight empty .45ACP brass cases in the air at the same time with a good 1911 in my hand. Try that with any other handgun. I can shoot the 1911 faster and better than any other handgun I’ve ever tested, bar none!
I’m not aware of any other style of handgun that is customized more than a 1911, nor any other handgun that has its own entire parts catalogs, like Brownell’s 1911 parts catalog. To be sure, there are also more gunsmiths who specialize in the 1911 than any other handgun in the world. The world is awash with polymer handguns and more new models seem to come out every week, but none are as popular as the 1911. The 1911 is as American as American can be.
Enter the Springfield Armory 1911 Loaded Operator, which is a new model for 2015 that I received about a month ago for this article. I’m here to tell you that this factory 1911 is absolutely a top-of-the-line 1911. It has everything you may want and nothing you don’t need. The Loaded Operator is a full-sized Government-style 1911. It has a 5-inch barrel and full grip frame, plus it also has a Picatinny rail under the dust cover in case you want to mount a light or laser on it. That’s nice!
Let’s take a closer look at the Loaded Operator. We have night sights front and rear on the slide, with the rear being a Novak combat-style rear sight, which is the best of the best, in my humble opinion. The slide is opened up and flared back for sure ejection of empty and loaded rounds. There are also angled slide serrations, front and rear, for a sure grip when loading a round from the magazine into the chamber. The barrel is stainless steel, match grade, and it has been throated and polished to feed any type of rounds you might want to throw its way.
Moving down to the frame of the Loaded Operator, we have a match-grade trigger that breaks clean at 4-lbs, which is just about perfect for street use. You don’t want a trigger pull much lighter than that, nor do you need a trigger pull any lighter than that. We also have an ambidextrous thumb safety, expertly fitted, that *snicks on and off with authority and no play at all. A beaver tail grip safety that is timed perfectly is a joy. The back strap is checkered for a sure grip, too. Springfield Armory also included an extended magazine chute for getting a mag loaded into the gun as fast as possible; this is really, really nicely fitted, too. The gun comes with two 8-rd magazines, too. The grips are checked black G-10 with a groove milled into the left side grip panel, so there is easy access to the magazine release. On top of it all, there is zero play between the slide/frame/barrel, and I mean zero play that is expertly fitted. The slide rides on the frame are butter smooth, too. The hammer is a combat style, and the firing pin is titanium for a fast lock time.
The barrel bushing is stainless steel, and fitted just right; it’s tight, but you can still turn it with finger pressure instead of using a bushing wrench. On the Springfield Armory website, it states that the Loaded Operator comes with a one-piece guide rod. My sample has the standard Government-style, short guide rod, which I much prefer over a one-piece guide rod. The gun has what is called an “Armory Coating”– a hi-tech polymer finish that is black in color and very tough. It will outlast any blued gun by far.
Springfield Armory ships the Loaded Operator in a very nice polymer carrying case. Inside the case was the gun with two 8-rd mags, as well as a holster and double magazine pouch. There is a cleaning rod/brush and excellent instructions, as well a coupon for discounted Springfield Armory products, like more mags if you want to have some spares on hand.
The only change I made to my Loaded Operator was that I added some skateboard friction tape to the front strap of the gun. It was a bit too slick for my liking. Then again, I do this to almost every 1911 I’ve owned. I like the gritty feel on the skateboard friction tape. It gives me a better hold on the gun under all weather conditions, and skateboard tape is $1.99 per foot, which is inexpensive. I replace it once a year, if needed.
I’ve customized quite a few 1911s over the years, not only for myself but for friends and customers, when I had a gun shop. However, I didn’t turn out one 1911 that was as nicely fitted as the Springfield Armory Loaded Operator that I tested for this article. I’ve also owned a couple high priced 1911s from custom 1911 makers that weren’t as nicely put together as the Loaded Operator. Additionally, these guns easily cost twice what the Loaded Operator sells for, and they didn’t shoot any better, either.
I had an outstanding assortment of .45 ACP ammo on hand for testing, too, from Black Hills Ammunition. www.black-hills.com I had their outstanding 230-gr FMJ, which is always a great performer in the accuracy department, their 230-gr JHP, 185-gr JHP, and I found some of their 230-gr JHP +P in an ammo can. From Buffalo Bore Ammunition, I had the following: 160-gr Barnes TAC XP low recoil all-copper hollow point round, 255-gr Hard Cast +P load, 230-gr FMJ FN +P, 160-gr Barnes TAC XP +P all copper hollow point, 200-gr JHP +P, 185-gr Barnes TAC XP all-copper +P hollow point, and 185-gr JHP +P load. Whew!
In all, over several shooting sessions, I put more than 600-rds down range. It was some fun shooting and some accuracy shooting. For my accuracy testing, I did my usual rolled-up-sleeping-bag-over-the-hood-of-my-pick-up-truck shooting at 25-yards. For function testing, I burned through a lot of ammo as fast as I could pull the trigger, and I have plenty of extra 1911 magazines on hand at all times. The gun got hot, but it never missed a beat. During the accuracy testing, no load shot more than 3-inch groups. That’s pretty cool. Most groups were well under three inches. If I did my part all of the time, I could get groups under two inches. Keep in mind that this is a factory gun! The best group from all my shooting was from the Black Hills 230-gr JHP load. I got several 1 1/2 inch groups, so long as I was on my game. The Loaded Operator also liked the Buffalo Bore 160-gr Barnes TAC XP lo-recoil load. I was getting some groups close to an inch and a half. I can’t complain in the least about the accuracy with any of the loads I tested from Black Hills and Buffalo Bore. They both produce top-notch ammo. Tim (Buffalo Bore) and Jeff (Black Hills), you guys are doing up ammo right, and folks need to really take a close look at all the different ammo you make.
There are a good selection of holsters on the market for 1911s these days. However, I really like the line up from Blackhawk Products – Their SERPA concealed carry holster is great. It holds the gun high and tight to the body. Their Tactical Thigh holster is great for SWAT cops and military use since it holds a 1911 on your thigh, right where you need it to be, and it would be my first choice if I were a SWAT cop or carrying a 1911 in the military. One thing that drives me crazy, and in my case its a short drive to crazy, is watching people in gun shops buy really nice guns, like this Loaded Operator, and then purchase the cheapest holster they can find. Why? Do yourself a favor, check out the Blackhawk line of holsters. They are priced right and will last you a lifetime.
Now, as savvy SurvivalBlog readers know, quality never comes cheap. You can buy cheap all the time, but do you want to bet your life on a cheap 1911? I have several 1911s that are made in the Philippines. They’re really decent guns for the money, which was well under $500, and they are fun to shoot. However, do you really want to bet your life on a “cheap” 1911? The Springfield Armory Loaded Operator 1911 retails for $1,399, and as I’ve said before, you only have to buy quality once. I’ve paid twice this amount for some custom-made 1911s that were no better made than this Loaded Operator.
After my testing, I replaced the factory 16-lbs recoil spring in the Loaded Operator with an 18.5-lbs recoil spring, which is a smart thing to do if one plans on doing a lot of shooting with +P .45ACP loads. The gun never missed a beat, and I even mixed different types and brands of .45ACP ammo in magazines during my testing. The gun gobbled up everything I threw at it and perked along just fine. So, if you’re in the market for an outstanding 1911, take a close look at the Springfield Armory Loaded Operator. You may find yourself doing what I did. I took the gun apart, looking for the built-in radar that Springfield must have installed, because I don’t usually shoot this good. I’m a better than the average shot, because I shoot a lot– several times per week, but this Loaded Operator just seemed like it zeroed in on the target like it had radar and placed all those rounds on target like the gun had built-in radar.
– Senior Product Review Editor, Pat Cascio
Ingredients:
Directions:
All recipes are meant to be tweeked
o o o
Do you have a favorite recipe that would be of interest to SurvivalBlog readers? Please send it via e-mail. Thanks!
HJL,
This was an excellent piece, the kind of concise and practical advice your deep woods grandfather would give. The statement “The ground will be littered with unfired rifles” is a prediction my team has made as well. The powerful lure of “bling” guns has to be the greatest detriment to prepping that I routinely encounter.
DD in CO
o o o
HJL,
I agree with almost everything he said, until I got to the hand-to-hand fighting section.
I always look upon things with skepticism, especially if they cost thousands of dollars and claim to do fantastic things. So I did some research. First of all, a person tends to lose credibility when they say that anyone who has something negative to say about something is ignorant, especially when someone says there is “a lot” of it out there and that it all spawns from ignorance. The SCARS website has many bold claims that just cannot be backed up and that don’t make much sense when you look at the whole picture. It smacks of slick marketing rather than truth.
My personal recommendation is to research and try out new things. Nothing is the “best”. Listen to people that have been there and done it and constantly ask yourself if it’s realistic for you. Try to understand your limitations and the changes in your body as you age. What works for you at twenty may not work at sixty. There is no system that can teach you to be undefeatable in three days. – D.D.
Congress Tells Court That Congress Can’t Be Investigated for Insider Trading. – H.L.
o o o
DHS Approves Amnesty Applications Despite Court Order. B.G.
o o o
Catnip Repels Mosquitoes More Effectively Than DEET. – H.L.
o o o
Bibb deputy implicated in elaborate real-estate scam. – D.S.
o o o
Wearable gadgets portend vast health, research and privacy consequences. – D.S.
o o o
You might want to take a look at our advertiser APEX’s new website. It’s been a long time in the making, but it is finally ready and launched. If you need gun parts, check them out.
“Survival often demands our courage.” ? David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas
May 10th is the birthday of the late Col. Jeff Cooper (born 1920, died September 25, 2006).
May 10th is also the birthday of the late Janis Pinups (born 1925, died 15 June 2007). He was one of the last of the Forest Brothers anti-communist resistance fighters. He came out of hiding, after five decades, to obtain a Latvian passport in 1994, after the collapse of eastern European communism. (He was never issued any communist government identity papers and by necessity lived as a nonexistent ghost during the entire Soviet occupation of Latvia.)