1989 Ad

Shooting Industry, March, 1989 by Charles Askins

A VIEW OF SHOT SHOW '89

The Dallas Morning News reported that there was an attendance of 37,600 dealers, buyers and gawking onlookers at the 1989 SHOT SHOW that was staged in the Dallas Convention Center this past January 12th, 13th and 14th. It was the 11th revival and it was the biggest yet. The Center covers more than 300,000 square feet, and the show was held on two floors -- both of which were jam-packed.

Last year's bash was staged in Las Vegas and attendance was rumored to be "about 30,000" visitors. The NSSF sponsored extravaganza has gotten so big, in fact, that there are only a few centers big enough to hold it. For 1990, the show will return to Las Vegas, mainly because the Las Vegas Convention Center is big enough to contain it.

As for the show itself, any idea that this bash was simply confined to guns and the stuff we feed into them would be completely erroneous. Firearms were, in reality, a sort of minor item. There was clothing, treestands, blinds, scents, carmuffs, whistles, horns, bugles, traps, decoys, maps, books and chairs. To name but a few of the articles on display.

Last year at the Las Vegas SHOT SHOW the most fascinating offering was the 10-gauge shotgun with 3-1/2-inch casing and enough pellets to fill all of Lake Superior. Ithaca had an autoloader for the monster shell and Federal was ready with the big casing. Along with this Browning had commenced once again to manufacture the world's most satisfactory pump repeating scattergun the old Winchester Model 12. These were sensational doings in '88, believe me.

At Dallas, this year, the big news was the .416 cartridge. This was verily "The Year of The .416"! Remington kicked off the drama last fall at their annual Remington Seminar at the Hawkeye Hunting Club. The Model 700 rifle would be chambered for the .416. Now this cartridge is nothing new -- the Rigby company of England came up with the .416 Rigby in 1911. It has been extremely popular mongst African safari hunters ever since. The Remington offering was a mite different.

The Remington Custom Shop settled on the 8mm Remington Magnum cartridge and utilizing the casing, simply sized it upward to accept the .41 caliber bullet. Presto! There we have a new round. The cartridge will fire the 400-grain Barnes solid at 2,400 fps and will account for 5,100-foot pounds of muzzle smash. By way of comparison the .458 Winchester Magnum delivers 5,000-foot pounds.

Bill Ruger must have gotten wind of the doings at Ilion (New York) because he was at Dallas, dust-up, with his version of the .416, only the Sturm Ruger rifle was chambered for the .416 Rigby cartridge. It is quite as potent as any with the same bullet velocity and the same thump...i.e. 5,100-foot pounds.

Not to be out done, Kimber (the Oregon arms makers) also had a splendid .416, and like the Ruger Model 77, in Rigby configuration. Andy Cannon (the Victor, Montana gun maker) is also producing the .416 on the big Sako action. Still another is Dave Gentry of Belgrade, Montana.

The most exciting rifle of all, however, is the Weatherby Mark V. This number is chambered for the .416 but it is made up on the .378 Weatherby Magnum cartridge. With more propellant than its rivals, the latest Weatherby will drive the 400-grain projectile at 2,700 fps and will churn up 6,400-foot pounds of muzzle wallop. These ballistics place the .416 Weatherby completely out of a class with the others; and I'd reckon it will be highly popular with those safari sportsmen who are intent on critters like elephant, buffalo and lion.

An amusing development at this year's show is the fact that Winchester and Remington are both offering the .300 Weatherby Magnum cartridge as a regular loading. Too, the finest rifle -- the Model 70 -- can now be had in the caliber; as well the Model 700 Remington. What tickles me is that the .300 Weatherby Magnum, the world's best thirty caliber loading, has only been around for 35 years. Heretofore the big companies simply ignored the round but the demand grew so insistent they were finally compelled to admit its goodness.

The Federal Cartridge hasn't swung over to the Weatherby round as yet, but maybe just as interesting is the fact that the outfit now offers the .416 Rigby and the .470 Nitro Express. These cartridges --both claiming "merry olde England" as the point of origin -- are strictly dark continent fodder. Just how the Minnesota cartridge merchants figure there will be a worthwhile market is a good question.

The Taurus line of auto pistols and revolvers originate in Brazil and are bang up good firearms. The automatic is a faithful copy of the Beretta and the sixshooters follow S&W lines pretty closely. These are quality handguns and I'd be happy to go into combat with either the self-loader or the cylinder model.

The pistol that attracted the most attention at the Dallas bash was the Glock. This gun because it has some plastic parts was given an inordinately high amount of media publicity all throughout 1988. People flocked around the Glock booth to see the pistol. It is a 9mm and the wholly erroneous story that the gun cannot be spotted by the airport X-ray is poppycock. I picked up three of the pistols at their booth and each of them had an abominable trigger pull. Enough said!