Author Archives: mposting

Remington 700 Stock Upgrade

Last week I spent some time at the range with my father. While his pistol shooting techniques are horrendous, I’ll give him that he knows long guns.
We were shooting out at 200 yards, the new bullets I loaded for my 7mm Rem Mag in my 700 and his Marlin .35.
After a few shots he noticed my stock/barrel was pretty loose and not sturdy. There was just far to much flex for my liking. I took it home, took it apart and found out the SPS Stock from the factory… is just bad.
The fix? About $250 from Midway. A Bell and Carlson M40 Stock.

Before: The original stock on top, B&C M40 on the bottom

I just installed it and I’m impressed. This thing is rock solid. There is no more movement or tweaking.

Removing the stock is just two bolts at the bottom
of the rifle. Remember: the short bolt toward the front.

The Bell and Carlson stock on the left, the SPS factory stock on the right. The Bell and Carlson has aluminum bedding

The hardest part of the install was aligning/mating the magazine well to the action. Its a little tricky.

Stock upgrade complete

I think the new stock increased the length of pull just a bit. It does feel like it has a larger recoil pad. There really is no more movement. It’s a bit heavier.
Hopefully tomorrow I’ll get out and test it!

Midway USA Blemished 7mm Bullets

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I ordered these bullets from Midway, because they were cheap. Over 10 cents a bullet less than the usual Hornady SST bullets I load for my Remington 700. ($0.149 cents a bullet) bringing my 7mm 154gr cost per round to 36 cents per shot vs 50 cents per shot.

They look like Winchester Power Point bullets. but I guess they could be anything?

From what I see the only blemish is how the copper jacket is around the lead soft-point. Other than that, they really look fine.

Hornady SST’s(left) vs. Midway Blemished Bullets(right)

I found the bullet length and weight consistant.

And they seemed to load fine. I gave them a CCI Magnum rifle primer, 59 grains of IMR 4831 and seated to 3.240″ Tomorrow I plan on taking them out to the 200 yard range and see how they perform.

Lee Loadmaster Press

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My journey with reloading has been rocky. A few squibs, a blown primer, and of course the rounds that just go click instead of a bang. But thats part of the process. I started out just loading .40 S&W, but now I load 9, 45, 7mm, and .35REM.
This is really to outline the pros and cons of the Lee Loadmaster.
First, its the cheapest progressive you can find. With dies, you can find it for under $250. This includes a case feeder, a priming system. and pretty much what you would expect from a progressive.
Cons. Things on a progressive, just go wrong. Often. Sometimes cases don’t get primed, sometimes the press doesn’t index(turn, or cycle to the next ‘station’) sometimes bullets get seated wrong. Or sometimes it just jams and locks up. I really wish it had a light somehow built into the press. I’ve sort of rigged a book light in between the dies and it seems to work.
Most recently the issues I’ve had have been relating to priming/indexing.
If the press doesn’t prime correctly, in my case the primer pin would get stuck in an upward position. I also noticed the primers were getting stuck in between the pin and plastic
1) I sanded the primer trough smooth with very fine grit paper
2) Bent the arm that cases push back upward to get better contact with the case.

You will spend lots of time getting these issues worked out. Lots of time learning on how exactly the press works.
In all fairness Lee puts up many videos to explain how the press works and how to fix common issues. There is a whole site by loadmaster users with videos to fix common issues.
I would suggest you watch all of them while you wait for your press to arrive.
The good thing about Lee is the support. I’ve found e-mail works great to get in contact with them. They usually respond the same day and tell you new parts are on the way.
Common things that break:
Primer System(the plunger/feeder/spring)
Flipper gets worn
Decapping pins

All in all, I’ve loaded well over a thousand rounds on this, its cheap and gets the job done, but does have some issues.

Foscam FI8910W Wireless Cam Review

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I ordered this camera since I really wanted to see what the cat is up to while Emily and I are at work.

As expected, it seems like he just sleeps.

$110 on Amazon got me wifi, pan/tilt and IR night vision.
The unit shipped with an install disc(tossed) AC Adaptor, ethernet cord, power cord and mounting bracket. The unit has ethernet, wifi, power and audio in/out jacks(3.5mm.)

Install was quick and easy. Plug the ethernet into my router and once I found the IP I was on the admin page. No disc required. Connecting to my wifi was a little funny, at first it didn’t find my network. I think it may have been something to do with all the wireless access points near me. It eventually did after refreshing one more time and I was connected without wires.
The web interface is pretty simplistic. Admin options, set a password, FTP upload etc. It serves its purpose and is fine.

The picture quality is great. Its way better than my 8 year old Logitech webcam. Surprisingly the inferred works great too. It turns on automatically. The pan and tilt moves somewhat jerkingly but functions just fine. To make up for that it’s super quiet. I can’t even hear it when it moves. The image quality…pretty darn good!

Mr. Derp helping me write this.

The audio doesn’t work on my mac. They say install the VLC plug-in. Wrong, search some more, people are reporting the VLC plug-in does not work. I found this to be the case. I can get the audio to stream over VLC itself, but not two-way as advertised. I guess on Tuesday I’ll try the two way audio from work on my PC.

The cam works great with pretty well with webcamXP. Put in the IP and your credentials and the devices is added to your camera pool. The only issue I have found is you cannot inverse the pan/tilt controls which would come in handy as my camera is mounted upside down.

Now of course to get this viewable from the web you will need to setup the correct port mappings to your device.
Overall I’m happy with this device. I kind of wish it had a zoom but for the price It’s super neat! I hope the Mr. Derp doesn’t mind me checking up on him!