Sixtigers
Member
I'm a gun guy, have been for a while. Never really been into EBRs, but lately have felt the itch--in no small part because of fears of post-election surprises. So, for the last couple of months, I've been putting together a "California" AR-15 lookalike, comprised of an off-list lower, 10-rnd magazine, tool-required magazine release, etc. Basically, the gun is similar to an AR-15, but is no longer considered an assault rifle because the magazine is not easily removed. Semantics? That could be argued...but I thought I'd go ahead and build one anyway.
I'm a military contractor, and my job requires me to have a security clearance. No clearance, no job...and times are hard. So while I wanted to build the rifle, I did not want to have any issues with BLM or LE when shooting--I am playing the game by the letter of the law, but I really don't have the money to prove that in a court of law.
Other members in my work center saw what I was doing, and many are prior military. Five of us decided to build together. Mike finished his first, and went to go test it on BLM land Saturday. He broke the rifle into two pieces, upper and lower, and walked it out to the trunk of his car this way (he didn't have a case for the rifle).
At the same time, a passing sheriff's deputy saw Mike with the weapon, turned around, and parked his car behind Mike. He was an older man, and Mike's about 26 or so. Mike says the sheriff was actually pretty cool, and asked him to step away from the trunk politely, saying something along the lines of "Sir, no offense--but I don't think that you're allowed to have that rifle in this state."
Mike explained to the officer as the officer looked at the rifle about the magazine no longer being able to eject, which the officer tried. The officer asked him how was the rifle supposed to be loaded, and Mike explained about breaking the weapon in two, and loading rounds into the mag. The deputy asked for and received Mike's ID, and ran the ID and the serial number of the weapon through his car's computer. We bought our stuff legally via a sympathetic (and brave) FFL in town--most of the local FFLs will not touch any AR-15-esque weapons. Everything came back good, and the officer told Mike he had a nice weapon, to be careful with it, let him know that a locking storage case is required by law and to get one soon, then drove away.
For myself, it was a vindication that we were still on the path of law. Maybe another officer would have reacted differently, but it was still good to see that our local LE can still tell the good guys from the bad guys. It was also a good test of that California tool-required magazine release. Our local LE carry A3s in their cars now, and this officer was obviously familiar with the weapon. That magazine was NOT coming out when that button was pushed.
I've stressed to the guys that I work with the game needed to be played, and to never, ever 'change' a magazine when shooting in California, even using the tool-required release, and never, ever use mags that hold more than 10 rnds (we're all prior military, so I assume some of these guys may have some old souvenirs from the sandbox)...and Saturday's incident really brought that home to the guys.
My FFL told me that a couple of customers of his had their off-list lower rifles confiscated by BLM because they were changing magazines. They were using a tool to do so, and it takes much longer, but all the BLM officers see is a shooter with an illegal gun. We've been hoping that if we play the game to the letter of the law--and we realize that it hasn't been put to the test in a court of law yet--that LE would still be OK with us and our EBR variants, and this was a nice confirmation of that. It made my day!
I'm a military contractor, and my job requires me to have a security clearance. No clearance, no job...and times are hard. So while I wanted to build the rifle, I did not want to have any issues with BLM or LE when shooting--I am playing the game by the letter of the law, but I really don't have the money to prove that in a court of law.
Other members in my work center saw what I was doing, and many are prior military. Five of us decided to build together. Mike finished his first, and went to go test it on BLM land Saturday. He broke the rifle into two pieces, upper and lower, and walked it out to the trunk of his car this way (he didn't have a case for the rifle).
At the same time, a passing sheriff's deputy saw Mike with the weapon, turned around, and parked his car behind Mike. He was an older man, and Mike's about 26 or so. Mike says the sheriff was actually pretty cool, and asked him to step away from the trunk politely, saying something along the lines of "Sir, no offense--but I don't think that you're allowed to have that rifle in this state."
Mike explained to the officer as the officer looked at the rifle about the magazine no longer being able to eject, which the officer tried. The officer asked him how was the rifle supposed to be loaded, and Mike explained about breaking the weapon in two, and loading rounds into the mag. The deputy asked for and received Mike's ID, and ran the ID and the serial number of the weapon through his car's computer. We bought our stuff legally via a sympathetic (and brave) FFL in town--most of the local FFLs will not touch any AR-15-esque weapons. Everything came back good, and the officer told Mike he had a nice weapon, to be careful with it, let him know that a locking storage case is required by law and to get one soon, then drove away.
For myself, it was a vindication that we were still on the path of law. Maybe another officer would have reacted differently, but it was still good to see that our local LE can still tell the good guys from the bad guys. It was also a good test of that California tool-required magazine release. Our local LE carry A3s in their cars now, and this officer was obviously familiar with the weapon. That magazine was NOT coming out when that button was pushed.
I've stressed to the guys that I work with the game needed to be played, and to never, ever 'change' a magazine when shooting in California, even using the tool-required release, and never, ever use mags that hold more than 10 rnds (we're all prior military, so I assume some of these guys may have some old souvenirs from the sandbox)...and Saturday's incident really brought that home to the guys.
My FFL told me that a couple of customers of his had their off-list lower rifles confiscated by BLM because they were changing magazines. They were using a tool to do so, and it takes much longer, but all the BLM officers see is a shooter with an illegal gun. We've been hoping that if we play the game to the letter of the law--and we realize that it hasn't been put to the test in a court of law yet--that LE would still be OK with us and our EBR variants, and this was a nice confirmation of that. It made my day!
I was quickly skimming through the page, and barely glanced at that and at first thought you just got out of prison after being there 21 years, and I was assuming it was because of the above weapons.