The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

What do you make of the survey they've asked us to complete ?

My gut feel is it will show 90%+ of handloaders have no formal training or min standards. Next step will be to introduce mandatory "Competancy Cards" after you've passed the required NRA course if you wish to use handloads but I'm curious where you think this ends up ?

Perhaps they can do a survey on how expensive shooting is for their members ?

Everyone who drives a car had a series of formal lessons, by a government approved instructor, then had to pass a government sanctioned practical test. There are still over two and a half thousand people a year killed on the road. Whats's their point?

And is it not the NRA with their blinkered view of "competition cartridges" that has been the vehicle for some shooters to completely push the SAAMI specs of those cartridges?

TJC wrote:What do you make of the survey they've asked us to complete ?

How/where did they ask you to complete this?

All I've received from the NRA lately is an Ages match invite that shared my email address with dozens of strangers (some of whom are no doubt infected with email harvesting bugs) and 3 virus laden emails from the NRA itself purporting to come from staff member Chris Dyers, who's NRA email account appears to be compromised - quite possible a result of the above.

..

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm= ... LgHg_3d_3d

Link to the survey above but from the email it seems it will only work for the recipient, email below.

"Home loaded ammunition is of critical importance to full bore shooting in the UK. Many full bore shooters use almost exclusively ammunition they have carefully assembled, and achieve impressive standards of accuracy, consistency and safety. The NRA is exploring schemes to ensure good practice on Bisley, MoD and private ranges and is considering developing a number of additional initiatives such as expanding training programmes etc.

We are however very aware that we have scant data about the amount of home loaded ammunition produced, where it is shot, the amount of formal and informal training received, and the reasons why home loading is becoming more popular.

I will be grateful if you could take 3 minutes to complete the attached survey - please click on the link https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm= ... LgHg_3d_3d - responses will be confidential and a summary of the results will be published later this year.

I can reassure you there is no hidden agenda (a good number of NRA Trustees are committed Home Loaders!) as we are keen to develop our strategies to support and develop this important area of full bore shooting on the basis of facts reported by our shooters.

Kind regards



Andrew Mercer
Secretary General




This link is uniquely tied to this survey and your email address. Please do not forward this message.

Please note: If you do not wish to receive further emails from the NRA through Survey Monkey, please click the link below, and you will be automatically removed from the mailing list.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/optout.asp ... LgHg_3d_3d"

I've completed it; it is not too well thought-out as far as gallery rifle shooters are concerned (perhaps not the current concern of the NRA, though I imagine we are up there anong with F-class shooters in the percentage of us who do handload). For example, .38 is not provided as an option when asking which calibres one loads for--often used in preference to the equivalent light loads in .357 cases. Another question asks the respondent to choose ONE option from the following reasons for handloading: cheapness, accuracy, ammo availability, lack of factory ammo, enjoyment--all equally applicable in my case. So the results are going to be somewhat equivocal, esp. since they have not asked questions to determine one's primary discipline, for example. A rather amateurish survey overall, and I'd mark this attempt quite harshly if one of my students presented it in an assignment.

I too fear where they might go with this. In the past decade the NRA (perhaps at the behest of the military) seem to go out of their way to dream up more silly regulations, issue (expensive) cards for stuff we already know how to do, etc. It acts to segregate the regular shooters at Bisley from everyone else--and makes it less likely someone will seek to shoot at Bisley, due to all the "faffing around" one has to go through in order to be able to. Thus they become less and less relevant to the wider community of shooters. How are their membership numbers trending, I wonder?

Its got to be linked to a money making idea that someone at the NRA has dreamed up - I can see another required course coming our way :cool2:

Possibly the most contentious questions in the survey were phrased something like "How many incidents have you had with handloaded/factory ammunition".

So if you had a bullet fall out of the case when you took it out the box because of too little neck tension, that's going to be classed the same as a factory load with a double charge of powder in it?

I agree it's been poorly thought out and worded. 'Rubbish In Rubbish Out' springs to mind.

nigelc wrote:Its got to be linked to a money making idea that someone at the NRA has dreamed up - I can see another required course coming our way :cool2:

...and trickled down for members of NRA-affilated clubs, no doubt.

I have just filled it in but its pretty poor.
Very ambiguous in places.
How would you answer a question asking if you reload for club members?
Surely illegal?
The list of calibres was odd too.
It only had one out of about 8 I reload for!
Smells funny!
Tony

Nothing good will come of this. Another nail in the coffin of Bisley I would suspect.