NRA hire rifles

[Dangermouse]

I am afraid this is a bit of a moan, but hopefully will be seen as an area that can be improved on.

I made a visit to see Eggernoskill at the weekend and met liquidice also on the 1000 yard point.

I believe Liquidice is still in his probationary period and had hired a .303 Enfield with a scope from the NRA Range Office for his days shooting. I understand he was able to get on target at 600 yards but when he asked about what adjustments would need to be made to get on target at 1000 yards I noticed his rifle was equipped with a poor quality "air rifle" scope with insufficient MOA for 1000 yards.

I remember Eggernoskill mentioning that he had a nightmare with the equipment that he was using during his probationary period, perhaps he can comment.

Personally I do not feel that it is acceptable for the range office to be issuing equipment which is either unsuitable or does not work. Especially as the primary users of these firearms are probationary members or those new to the sport who have not yet got their own kit.

I can only imagine that with the recent round of redundancies that the condition of these firearms is not going to improve and maintenance delayed if problems are identified.

I am not sure what the answer is, but I feel that the whole area of the hire equipment needs to be looked at. If it is a revenue earner, lets get some proper equipment that people will want to use. This will see a two fold sale with ammunition also being required - perhaps HPS could make some budget stuff.
If it is not a revenue earner, cut back the stock to what is only required for the probationary courses and don't let people waste valuable money on kit that is going to see them have a bad experience.

DM

[Ovenpaa]

Did Liquidice specifically ask for a .303? The range office used to have an Accuracy International AW 2-3 years ago however I am not sure if it is still available. It may just be down to what was asked for and when as I suspect the good stuff may be grabbed very quickly.

It wouyld be interesteding to hear more on this.

[Christel]

Is the Armoury not equipped/up for it to maintain rifles?

[fiveeight]

Some of the range office kit is a bit tired. For the NRASC Christmas shoot we had about eight 10-22s and three or four of them were unhappy about cycling in the cold weather (dirty?) or had some real sighting issues. On the other hand some of them were good and I had a K31 from the range office for the NRASC guest shoot at the end of January and it was clean, in good condition and really interesting to shoot.

I do wish there was a list of available kit because I'd love to try an AW out, or something in .30-06, .300 WinMag etc before I look at buying anything.

As far as kit for probationers goes, I know during my probation course there were a lot more people doing the scoped rifle module than the TR and service rifle modules (approx 15 for scoped vs 2 TR and 1 SR).

For me doing SR this was good, because I essentially had my own instructor, rifle (choice of SMLE or No.4) and target when I was shooting in the afternoons, but I think the scoped rifle class were struggling for kit and instructor time (15 shooters on two targets is a lot of down time). This carried over into the mandatory shoots with the NRASC which were very crowded at 600 yards on Century but much easier at 100 on Short Siberia. I probably had 3x as much trigger time during my course + shoots as the scoped rifle class for the same money and time invested.

[Dangermouse]

l believe that Liquidice did say that he was shooting at 600 and 1000 yards, it was the first Question I asked as well. Not sure if he specifically asked for a .303 or not.

I know that there was an AI on loan to the Armourer, not sure if it was on loan to the NRA or not. Certainly the armourer took care of who he let have it and I would not blame him if he did not let it out to people he did not know.

I have no idea how much maintenance / cleaning etc the NRA rifles get. I do know that I have friends that have volunteered to help out on open days and they have often commented on the condition of the kit they have been given to supervise on the point.

DM

[Steve E]

Right, I am going to have a rant now.
I have been shooting with and helping out with the NRASC (and with probationers) since its beginning (I was one of the Founder Members). Since day one the NRA Armourer seems incapeable of keeping scopes on rifles. Scopes seem to be swopped around willy nilly. Not only does it 'P off the people that are paying to use the rifles but it makes coaches jobs a nightmare and makes it almost pointless for the probationers.
On nearly every NRASC day Myself or one of the other coaches or a more experienced probationer has to take rifles to the Zero range. At the Beginning of last year all the scoped rifles were zero'd and records made. Within 2 months all the 'scopes had been swopped around. The whole zeroing and record keeping was pointless. Both Charles Perry and my self and the other coaches complained but nothing seemed to get done. I do'nt advocate redundancies but why oh why was not the Armourer made redundant and some one who did a good job like Nick Halford kept?

Rant over

Steve

[Quarters]

A bit harsh Steve.
I hired a few guns before I got my own and they weren't always great. But I did get the feeling that the money just wasn't there to keep a range of guns fully operational.

I've always found the staff in the Range Office very helpful including the armourer. In the armourer has been personally helpful to me on many occasions.

[M99]

A bit harsh Steve.
I hired a few guns before I got my own and they weren't always great. But I did get the feeling that the money just wasn't there to keep a range of guns fully operational.

I've always found the staff in the Range Office very helpful including the armourer. In the armourer has been personally helpful to me on many occasions.

Looking at the accounts posted in another thread - income from Range hire/imperial meeting and other shooting events was just shy of £1m - surely some of this would have been better allocated to the upkeep of what are in fact "assets" to the NRA.

Mike

[Steve E]

A bit harsh Steve.
I hired a few guns before I got my own and they weren't always great. But I did get the feeling that the money just wasn't there to keep a range of guns fully operational.

I've always found the staff in the Range Office very helpful including the armourer. In the armourer has been personally helpful to me on many occasions.

Its not being harsh its the plain facts. I've personaly zeroed rifles with 'scope X on them only to find that the next time the NRASC club had them out, the scopes had been replaced, often not aligned and definatly not zeroed. At least take a rifle to the zero range if you swop the scopes around but this seems to be beyond the armourers ability. On this I will speak as I find.

Steve

[Ovenpaa]

I am confused here, I seldom if ever take 'scopes off my rifles unless they are designed to come off quickly and even then I expect them to be out by up to 1 MOA on elevation when I refit them so why on earth should the armourer be swapping 'scopes around?

Seems odd to me and extra work for him as well.