CZ Czechmate now in the US
I am such a CZ fanboy. Love these guns. Finally reaching our shores is the CZ Czechmate. A great addition to factory produced open guns. The comp look well mated to the slide and while the price seems high at first glance, it comes with a lot. A big stick, 3 other mags, two extra barrels, slidestops, red dot sight, etc. Awesome package.
This would be awesome for USPSA open division. While not up to the 30 rnd mags of the STI, it would still be able to compete very well for most shooters.
What an awesome looking gun. But like I said. I am a CZ fan.
Here are couple of photos from Matt at CZ-USA.
CZ says the Czechmate comes with :
ambi slide racker
c-more slide ride sight 6moa dot
2 spare serial matching threaded barrels
1 26 round magazine
3 20 round magazines
mag loader
aluminum grips
aluminum magwell
comp hammer
4 port comp
barrel nut with removable front sight
rear fixed sight
2 slide stops with finger groove
4 without finger grooves
czechmate frame is different than TS grip is undercut, frame has notch for c-more mount,
cleaning rod
cleaning brush
If interested give CZ a call at 1-800-955-4486 ext 321
more info you can follow the thread at CZforum
My fantasy for the day? CZ calls me up and says “Hey, you want to take one for a spin?” haha. Hey it’s Friday.
Hi Point smackdown (cont.)
Well gonzo gun blogger Justin hit the range for some livefire action with the Hi-Point C9.
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I was disappointed not to make the range to see first hand and maybe get a chance to shoot the gun. But here is Justin’s first impressions shooting this gun.
The Way of the Multigun> Hi-Point Throwdown: Trigger Pullin’
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“Prepare For Glory” Eddie Rhodes
This year a great 3-gunner Eddie Rhodes passed away. Eddie was the proponent of what they call He-man or Heavy Metal Division. Iron sights, .308 rifle, 12gauge pump shotgun and .45acp pistol. Here is a short video by 3GunNation on Eddie.
This year’s local IBPO537/FOP7 Tactical 3-gun match was shot in Eddie’s honor. The match looked like a pretty good challenge for the shooters with a good mix of all three guns. One stage started out using a JP Rifle .308, which was later donated to one of shooters who was picked by a random drawing. Here are a few photos from the match.
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Do not let your hearts be troubled
Life is tough sometimes. I guess there are no promises that it will be easy. Like most these days, we have trouble getting the ends to meet. Lately has been especially challenging and at times I wonder how we will do it. Today I was doing some internet searching and came across this passage.
”Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.” John 14:1
I guess timing is everything.
Hi Point Smackdown ( cont. )
To catch you up to speed. Multigun blogger Justin threw down a challenge to all the Hi Point fans. Send him a gun to shoot in competition and if it holds its own, he will speak of the virtues of the Hi Point platform.
Well Charles Brown of Hi Point Firearms stepped up to the challenge and sent Justin a pistol and mags for the test. It arrived yesterday at Whistling Pines Gun Club and I got to check it out.
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From what I saw and handled. The gun is pretty solid. It has two color sights to distinguish the front sight from the rear. It is big on top, but I would think that is because of the direct blowback design and the weight is needed in the slide. The mag release was pretty easy to manipulate, but the mags did not come flying out like some other brands. The trigger travel seemed long and kind of squishy. There is a magazine disconnect. Six additional mags came with the gun. They are of the 10round variety with ext. basepads.
The gun pointed low for me and I needed to adjust my grip to be able to align the sights. I wanted to see how the gun came apart but found you needed to drive a pin out in the rear of the frame to do so and I didn’t have any tools on hand.
Hopefully sometime this week, I can catch up with Justin and see how the gun does in live-fire.
Stay tuned for more.
Shooting
Well Saturday afternoon I am out sweatin’ in the garage helping my wife clean up the mess we have when a friend from my early shooting days calls up. Says he is coming down with buddy and thinking of shooting the match, I should come along. Tell him I can’t cause I am short on gear, he says “taken care of”. Finish off the garage, which I must say is a big improvement from what it was, and get what I got ready for the match.
Meet up Sunday morning, saying my hellos, and there is my buddy. Big smile, big handshake. We chat it up a bit and he hands me a gun ( an old Don Fisher custom 1911 ), mags and ammo; says we are signed up and ready to go.
Awesome day. A lot of laughs at our bad shooting, watching him learn how to use a palm (stagescore) for scoring was too funny. Getting a chance to compete again after my time away was great. It came back to me pretty well. My shooting was good, I shot only 5 Ds for the six stages with no misses or penalties. My movement while not speedy was decent. No real missteps, hit all my reloads, two malfunctions which I will blame on my friend.
I ended up winning single stack division by about 12% and came in 8th overall at 72% of the limited and open division winners.
Pretty awesome day. I was hot, tired and sore from cleaning the day before. But it was great.
______________________
OK, been sitting here thinking about the day’s shooting and the feeling I had.
I remember walking through each of my plans. My friend would ask and we would go over the steps, the target order, the reloads. On my pre shoot routine, I can remember seating the mag and engaging the thumbsafety as this was different from shooting production division. I remember seeing the serrations on the front sight and the unusual glare on it. Later I noticed it was a ramped from sight. ahha. I do not remember the reloads. On reflection I only noticed two. One where the last round in the mag hadn’t fed properly and was hanging up under the extractor. The second where the round was slightly out of position when it entered the magwell preventing the mag from seating. So my awareness was in the moment as I remember seeing those and I still see the picture of them but the 15 or so other reloads I do not remember, or I remember them as effortless and so of no significance. I do not remember the feeling of recoil, but do remember seeing the sight lift; maybe it was the glare on the sight that made that memorable, I have a movie in my head of the sight lifting and resetting.
Nothing felt blazing fast, but nothing faltered either. I only won one stage in single stack, but had no misses for the day.
Anyway…
Shooting USPSA
Just for fun. A match video shot by GM shooter and photographer Dave Re of me way back in 2008 from the Double Tap Championship in Wichita Falls, Tx. If you get a chance to shoot the match, DO. It is a great match with a lot of challenging shooting and great competition. Robert Porter keeps improving this match every year and it is never a disappointment.
USPSA ( United State Practical Shooting Association ) shooting is a lot of fun. How can running and playing with guns not be. I have been doing this since the late 1980s, shooting open, limited, limit 10, production and single stack divisions. I gave revolver a try once, but I guess that is not really fair. I have been shooting production division lately, which has limits on the amount of customization you can do to the gun.
I have been shooting a CZ for the past few years. For this match it was the tricked out SP01 with an awesome trigger. The gun ran great for this match and I really have not had any problems with platform. I have tried a Beretta Elite, Glock 34, Smith M&P and I keep coming back to the CZ.
If you want some fun and get better at your gun handling skills, find a local club and try out USPSA shooting. You’ll be hooked.
Hi-Point pistol challenge
Blogger friend Justin has thrown down the gauntlet to all the Hi-Point pistol fans. Check out Justin’s challenge.
In great support to the challenge Hi-Point president Charles Brown graciously offered to send Justin a gun to run through the ringer of competition. It would be great if someone would toss in some factory ammo so that there is a known baseline.
Justin is local so I look forward to the opportunity to watch the testing, maybe photograph and video some of the fun. Either way you look at it, it’s trigger time and fun.
Stay tuned..more to come.
Stormy Skies
Crazy weather lately. Big rainstorms and hail; the skies just open up. Crossing the street to the parking lot I took a look at the peak and saw the dark clouds carrying more rain and just a couple of fingers of sunlight reaching down. Quick thought: it was like God reaching down through the darkness.
Heavy rain again today. Will see what’s in store for tomorrow. God Bless.
Lone Survivor
Been spending some time rereading the book by Navy Seal Marcus Luttrell titled “Lone Survivor” . It’s a good read detailing his recollection of Operation Redwing which lead to the biggest loss of life in the special operations world.
Here is a short description of the book .
“Four US Navy SEALS departed one clear night in early July, 2005 for the mountainous Afghanistan-Pakistan border for a reconnaissance mission. Their task was to document the activity of an al Qaeda leader rumored to be very close to Bin Laden with a small army in a Taliban stronghold. Five days later, only one of those Navy SEALS made it out alive.This is the story of the only survivor of Operation Redwing, SEAL fire team leader Marcus Luttrell, and the extraordinary firefight that led to the largest loss of life in American Navy SEAL history. His squadmates fought valiantly beside him until he was the only one left alive, blasted by an RPG into a place where his pursuers could not find him. Over the next four days, terribly injured and presumed dead, Luttrell crawled for miles through the mountains and was taken in by sympathetic villagers who risked their lives to keep him safe from surrounding Taliban warriors.A born and raised Texan, Marcus Luttrell takes us from the rigors of SEAL training, where he and his fellow SEALs discovered what it took to join the most elite of the American special forces, to a fight in the desolate hills of Afghanistan for which they never could have been prepared. His account of his squadmates’ heroism and mutual support renders an experience that is both heartrending and life-affirming. In this rich chronicle of courage and sacrifice, honor and patriotism, Marcus Luttrell delivers a powerful narrative of modern war.”
If you want to pick up a good read check it out at Amazon.
Other links that might interest you: Lone Survivor Foundation, Marcus Luttrell on Facebook, Boot Girls Boot Campaign.
KDM Designs
Krina has always been a pretty creative person, doing things like scrapbooking, cakes, sewing and jewelry. She really has a talent for creating really nice pieces of jewelry using gemstones, crystals, silver, gold, etc. So we decided to see if the rest of the world thinks so too.
She waited for months to get a showcase at the American Classics Marketplace in Colorado Springs. If you go by it is case 113, to the right and back from the cashiers. She also decided to open a online store on Etsy. Etsy is a cool website for people that like to make things, so if you get a chance, check it out too.
Well we will see where this all goes, but I know she has fun being creative. You just got to love the girl.
PS: You can also check out her jewelry on Facebook.
Shooting a CZ
I have been shooting a CZ pistol in USPSA production for a few years now. The small grip fits my hand extremely well and the guns point perfectly. With some love the triggers are fantastic. A 5# double action with a smooth light stroke is attainable as is a 2# single action. If you don’t know how to do this yourself Angus Hobdell or Matt Mink are two really great guys that can do this for you.
I usually do some reliability work which entails re-profiling the slidestop, beveling the breechface, polishing the middle rail on the slide’s underside and polishing the extractor.
There is a pretty good sight selection available for CZs. Plain black front, fiber optic front, high visibility fixed rear and adjustables. My favorite is a plain black serrated sight. I take the plain black and thin it to .100, then serrate it with a 25lpi file. This is pretty coarse, but really sets the front sight off from the finer serrations of the rear sight. For a rear sight, I like the CZcustom tactical rear sight.
Grips for the CZ are plentiful. CZcustom, Hogue, Denis Marschal and Omega are a few of the choices. Again my favorite is from CZcustom. The flat aluminum grips are the best. No other choices for me. These are flat, and allow my hand to get a tight, high grip on the gun. Perfection.
Indulgences
OK. I love summer berries. Raspberries and blackberries are my favorite. Love the tartness of raspberries and the sweetness of blackberries together.
My mom used to make a really great raspberry pie, which I always chose for my birthday. Sadly to say I never learned to make my mom’s pie crust. So the next best thing that I found that comes close to that taste is a large scoop of berries over plain vanilla ice cream. It makes me happy.
Here I am
Not sure what I intend to do with a blog. I tend to meander between photography, competitive shooting, my church, my kids, my work, my wife’s hobbies. Who knows it might just all end up here. Anyway I hope some of it is interesting, most of it probably not; but it’s here. Don’t pay attention to punctuation, spelling or structure. Not my strong suit. God Bless.
