On Sunday, 3 other High Roaders and I participated in a Modified Defensive Rifle taught by Steve Moses. The “Modified” class is his standard 12 hour class taught to a small group in 8 hours. It’s an intro level class designed for those new to the rifle.
Steve Moses is a Deputy Constable and Eviction Unit Entry Team member who is also active in the Executive Protection business. Moses has been teaching for over 10 years, and he himself has attended over 50 weapons and tactics courses taught by some of the finest instructors in the United States. He is an active competitive shooter who holds an IDPA Expert rating. Steve Moses is the author of the book “Carbine and Shotgun Speed Shooting” available through Paladin Press, and has written articles for SWAT, Journal of Counter-Terrorism, American Handgunner, and Tactical Shooter magazines.
The other High Roaders that attended were Billmanweh, RRTX, and Texassigman. Billmanweh contacted Steve and set the class up. We attempted to have the class a couple months ago, but we were rained out.
The Training:
We carpooled from Grand Prairie to the Strategic Weapons Academy of Texas (SWAT) facility near Telico, Texas. It’s an isolated and remote facility, but was easy to find with good directions. The grounds were well maintained and it was clear that the entire facility was run by professionals. The amenities were scarce, but the area was squared away.
Once we arrived we each grabbed our own picnic table in the “Hootch,” the shaded area that we staged out of. We broke out our gear and started setting up for the day.
While we prepared, Steve began the class briefing. We took care of some paperwork, and he gave us an overview of the class and what to expect. He prepared us that we would be moving quickly with little downtime.
At the end of the briefing, we got a somber awakening as he described how we would evacuate in the case of an injury. It was something that none of us had thought about, but it felt good to know that he was prepared, and caused us to think twice about safety. Steve has emergency medical training and described how we would evacuate with the victim in the back of his truck with him attending, and he would designate a driver at that time to drive us towards Ennis. Based on the injury, he would make the call to drive straight to the hospital or call in a medivac to meet us at a pre-determined place suitable for landing a helicopter.
The weather that day was typical East Texas. It was solid 99 degrees with a Heat Index of 104. If you had asked any of us, we would have told you that it was hotter than that.
We started by verifying our zeros. We had all prepared beforehand, so all 4 of us were within a couple clicks of being right on. We originally sighted in at 7 yards, verifying our POI was 2.5 inches low. We moved back incrementally and our POI was right on at 50 yards when we shot from there. Steve explained that the reason we started so far forward is that he will get the occasional shooter that isn’t even on the IPSC target at 25 or 50 yards when they start. That wasn’t a problem with our group, as we had all hit the range just 2 days prior to the class.
After sighting in, he went on to demonstrate the mechanical offset that is so prevalent in rifles, especially ARs.
Steve has written a book on long gun speed shooting, so he passed some of the info on to us. He explained that the key to successfully shooting quickly was to balance the speed and accuracy based on the distance. Much of the drilling that we went through was learning the right speed and technique to use at different distances.
From close up, it was more of a “point and work the trigger” type of shooting. He taught us a front sight indexing for CQB speed shooting. It involved indexing the front sight over the rear sight and quick trigger work.
As we moved farther away, we struck a balance with aiming, taking longer for each shot, having bought ourselves time with distance.
Throughout the drills, we discussed various shooting positions and key points for each position. In each position, safety was something that was foremost in our mind. Steve has us working together tightly, even though we had plenty of room on the range. He emphasized that certain positions, while used by HSLD types, were also useful to armed civilians. We ran drills with low ready and sul that allowed us to use the weapons in close quarters or areas with bystanders effectively without muzzle-sweeping the wrong thing.
We moved from 3 yards out to 200 utilizing the different positions along the way. Up to 100 yards, we used paper targets and marked our impacts in between each drill. I was pretty impressed with everyone’s shooting. The whole time we were on paper, a solid 95% of impacts were inside the 5 ring on the IPSC targets we were using. At 100 yards, we switched to 8 and 12 inch plates. Hitting steel plates out to 200 yards, switching between and engaging multiple targets on command, and hearing the clangs is very confidence inspiring.
Prior to breaking for dinner, we worked out of the shoot-house on the premises, learning how to pie the corner, and when to deploy quickly around a corner. Running around the house with your gun at home when your wife is out is certainly not even comparable to being trained by a professional. Among other things, getting the heck back behind cover was something often overlooked when playing swat-ninja in your pjs at the house.
The last thing we did before breaking was some weapon-retention excercises.
Dinner was a well-received break while we waited for it to get dark. The heat had really taken a toll, and the many refills of iced tea were thoroughly enjoyed while we charged our internal batteries for the last few hours.
We spent the rest of the time doing some low-light shooting. Part of the drill was working our way in from 100 yards while trying to identify specific targets with our lights. One of the purposes of this drill was to understand the limitations of your equipment at night.
We had two tests during the training, which served to reinforce the concepts we had learned.
The Rifles:
The four of us used AR15s for the class. That’s just about where the similarities ended.
Shooter 1:
LMT/RRA – A3 midlength carbine, Troy and PRI BUIS, M900 Surefire, Aimpoint M2
Shooter 2:
Bushmaster/LMT – A3 11.5” shorty, Troy BUIS, M500 Surefire, EOTech
Shooter 3:
RRA – A3 midlength carbine, Troy BUIS, Samco mount with 6P
Shooter 4:
DPMS/RRA – A3 carbine with DD12 rails, LMT and ARMS BUIS, Larue Battlelight
All shooters except for Shooter 3 use the Magpul M93 stock.
The Gear:
Shooter 1:
Hellcat chest rig, HSGI holster, Troy sling
Shooter 2:
Wilderness Mag Pouches, leather holster, Troy sling
Shooter 3:
Blade-Tech Mag Pouches, Comp-Tac holster, SOC sling
Shooter 4:
HSGI Weesatch, Safariland 6004 holster, Troy sling
What worked and what didn’t:
For the most part, we were each happy with our selection in gear. The gear prices ran the gamut from around $100 up to the $300 range. Each of us had their own reasons for selecting the gear we did, and based on follow-up conversations, there won’t be much switching around.
The internet is rife with stories of people attending classes and having gear revelations. Granted, this was a lightweight class as classes go, but everyone’s gear seems to have met their expectation.
The rifles were completely reliable, with the exception of one. One of the lowers suffered from a drifting trigger pin which caused the bolt to hang during forward travel. At this point, we’re chalking it up to an out of spec pin until we can determine otherwise.
One thing that I’m going to change is the A2 grip on my rifle. The rifle I used was one that I built recently, and the grip was something I hadn’t put much thought into. My other rifles have gappers or duckbill grips, but shooting this rifle all day started to blister my middle finger on my strongside hand.
On a related note, I had brought gloves and so I put them on after a blister started to form. This was my biggest slap in the face, as I had never shot pistol with my gloves on before. I put the gloves on prior to our transition drills, and the first time I drew the pistol, I realized that my grip was nothing like what I was used to. My pistol shooting was borderline embarrassing because of it (at least I had an excuse this time.)
Shooter 3 had issues with his hand guards heating up, and no gloves. He went into the training with low expectations for his Samco/6P illumination setup, and got exactly what he was expecting.
Regarding the illumination that everyone chose, we had very different results, and some revelations.
Shooter 2 had a Surefire M500 setup with the 225 lumen bulb installed. He was able to identify his target clearly at 100 yards. Shooter 1 had an M900 on his rifle with the 125 lumen bulb, and while it’s basically the same light as shooter 2 had, because of the difference in bulbs, Shooter 1’s light was only effective at 80 yards.
Shooter 3’s light was effective at 40 yards, a major difference noticed from the 9V lights on 1 and 2’s guns.
Shooter 4’s light was an LED light, and while it was very high quality and has its advantages indoors, it was not particularly effective past 30 yards.
The low-light shooting led to several revelations by the shooters.
1) In Texas, nighttime brings major humidity, and your eyepro WILL fog. Every single shooter had fogged glasses.
2) The white light is effective up until your first shot. After that, the light bounces back from the smoke cloud, and your follow-up shots are probably being made blindly.
3) The Phantom flash suppressors, along with flash-suppressant ammo like Q3131A, is highly effective. With non-suppressant ammo like American Eagle, there are a few small sparks visible.
4) The 11.5” barrel with a standard A2 FS is highly ineffective. When shooting XM193, the instructor thought someone was having a ND with the white light.
5) Having a tritium FSP would be priceless in a dark CQB environment. Having anything up there to index off of would have been better than nothing.
6) The red dot sights are irreplaceable as a sighting tool in the dark. The shooters that had them turned them off throughout the exercise and for lack of a better phrase, it was like night and day.
The class was definately an eye-opener for us, and we will be retaining Steve for further training.
Steve Moses is a Deputy Constable and Eviction Unit Entry Team member who is also active in the Executive Protection business. Moses has been teaching for over 10 years, and he himself has attended over 50 weapons and tactics courses taught by some of the finest instructors in the United States. He is an active competitive shooter who holds an IDPA Expert rating. Steve Moses is the author of the book “Carbine and Shotgun Speed Shooting” available through Paladin Press, and has written articles for SWAT, Journal of Counter-Terrorism, American Handgunner, and Tactical Shooter magazines.
The other High Roaders that attended were Billmanweh, RRTX, and Texassigman. Billmanweh contacted Steve and set the class up. We attempted to have the class a couple months ago, but we were rained out.
The Training:
We carpooled from Grand Prairie to the Strategic Weapons Academy of Texas (SWAT) facility near Telico, Texas. It’s an isolated and remote facility, but was easy to find with good directions. The grounds were well maintained and it was clear that the entire facility was run by professionals. The amenities were scarce, but the area was squared away.
Once we arrived we each grabbed our own picnic table in the “Hootch,” the shaded area that we staged out of. We broke out our gear and started setting up for the day.
While we prepared, Steve began the class briefing. We took care of some paperwork, and he gave us an overview of the class and what to expect. He prepared us that we would be moving quickly with little downtime.
At the end of the briefing, we got a somber awakening as he described how we would evacuate in the case of an injury. It was something that none of us had thought about, but it felt good to know that he was prepared, and caused us to think twice about safety. Steve has emergency medical training and described how we would evacuate with the victim in the back of his truck with him attending, and he would designate a driver at that time to drive us towards Ennis. Based on the injury, he would make the call to drive straight to the hospital or call in a medivac to meet us at a pre-determined place suitable for landing a helicopter.
The weather that day was typical East Texas. It was solid 99 degrees with a Heat Index of 104. If you had asked any of us, we would have told you that it was hotter than that.
We started by verifying our zeros. We had all prepared beforehand, so all 4 of us were within a couple clicks of being right on. We originally sighted in at 7 yards, verifying our POI was 2.5 inches low. We moved back incrementally and our POI was right on at 50 yards when we shot from there. Steve explained that the reason we started so far forward is that he will get the occasional shooter that isn’t even on the IPSC target at 25 or 50 yards when they start. That wasn’t a problem with our group, as we had all hit the range just 2 days prior to the class.
After sighting in, he went on to demonstrate the mechanical offset that is so prevalent in rifles, especially ARs.
Steve has written a book on long gun speed shooting, so he passed some of the info on to us. He explained that the key to successfully shooting quickly was to balance the speed and accuracy based on the distance. Much of the drilling that we went through was learning the right speed and technique to use at different distances.
From close up, it was more of a “point and work the trigger” type of shooting. He taught us a front sight indexing for CQB speed shooting. It involved indexing the front sight over the rear sight and quick trigger work.
As we moved farther away, we struck a balance with aiming, taking longer for each shot, having bought ourselves time with distance.
Throughout the drills, we discussed various shooting positions and key points for each position. In each position, safety was something that was foremost in our mind. Steve has us working together tightly, even though we had plenty of room on the range. He emphasized that certain positions, while used by HSLD types, were also useful to armed civilians. We ran drills with low ready and sul that allowed us to use the weapons in close quarters or areas with bystanders effectively without muzzle-sweeping the wrong thing.
We moved from 3 yards out to 200 utilizing the different positions along the way. Up to 100 yards, we used paper targets and marked our impacts in between each drill. I was pretty impressed with everyone’s shooting. The whole time we were on paper, a solid 95% of impacts were inside the 5 ring on the IPSC targets we were using. At 100 yards, we switched to 8 and 12 inch plates. Hitting steel plates out to 200 yards, switching between and engaging multiple targets on command, and hearing the clangs is very confidence inspiring.
Prior to breaking for dinner, we worked out of the shoot-house on the premises, learning how to pie the corner, and when to deploy quickly around a corner. Running around the house with your gun at home when your wife is out is certainly not even comparable to being trained by a professional. Among other things, getting the heck back behind cover was something often overlooked when playing swat-ninja in your pjs at the house.
The last thing we did before breaking was some weapon-retention excercises.
Dinner was a well-received break while we waited for it to get dark. The heat had really taken a toll, and the many refills of iced tea were thoroughly enjoyed while we charged our internal batteries for the last few hours.
We spent the rest of the time doing some low-light shooting. Part of the drill was working our way in from 100 yards while trying to identify specific targets with our lights. One of the purposes of this drill was to understand the limitations of your equipment at night.
We had two tests during the training, which served to reinforce the concepts we had learned.
The Rifles:
The four of us used AR15s for the class. That’s just about where the similarities ended.
Shooter 1:
LMT/RRA – A3 midlength carbine, Troy and PRI BUIS, M900 Surefire, Aimpoint M2
Shooter 2:
Bushmaster/LMT – A3 11.5” shorty, Troy BUIS, M500 Surefire, EOTech
Shooter 3:
RRA – A3 midlength carbine, Troy BUIS, Samco mount with 6P
Shooter 4:
DPMS/RRA – A3 carbine with DD12 rails, LMT and ARMS BUIS, Larue Battlelight
All shooters except for Shooter 3 use the Magpul M93 stock.
The Gear:
Shooter 1:
Hellcat chest rig, HSGI holster, Troy sling
Shooter 2:
Wilderness Mag Pouches, leather holster, Troy sling
Shooter 3:
Blade-Tech Mag Pouches, Comp-Tac holster, SOC sling
Shooter 4:
HSGI Weesatch, Safariland 6004 holster, Troy sling
What worked and what didn’t:
For the most part, we were each happy with our selection in gear. The gear prices ran the gamut from around $100 up to the $300 range. Each of us had their own reasons for selecting the gear we did, and based on follow-up conversations, there won’t be much switching around.
The internet is rife with stories of people attending classes and having gear revelations. Granted, this was a lightweight class as classes go, but everyone’s gear seems to have met their expectation.
The rifles were completely reliable, with the exception of one. One of the lowers suffered from a drifting trigger pin which caused the bolt to hang during forward travel. At this point, we’re chalking it up to an out of spec pin until we can determine otherwise.
One thing that I’m going to change is the A2 grip on my rifle. The rifle I used was one that I built recently, and the grip was something I hadn’t put much thought into. My other rifles have gappers or duckbill grips, but shooting this rifle all day started to blister my middle finger on my strongside hand.
On a related note, I had brought gloves and so I put them on after a blister started to form. This was my biggest slap in the face, as I had never shot pistol with my gloves on before. I put the gloves on prior to our transition drills, and the first time I drew the pistol, I realized that my grip was nothing like what I was used to. My pistol shooting was borderline embarrassing because of it (at least I had an excuse this time.)
Shooter 3 had issues with his hand guards heating up, and no gloves. He went into the training with low expectations for his Samco/6P illumination setup, and got exactly what he was expecting.
Regarding the illumination that everyone chose, we had very different results, and some revelations.
Shooter 2 had a Surefire M500 setup with the 225 lumen bulb installed. He was able to identify his target clearly at 100 yards. Shooter 1 had an M900 on his rifle with the 125 lumen bulb, and while it’s basically the same light as shooter 2 had, because of the difference in bulbs, Shooter 1’s light was only effective at 80 yards.
Shooter 3’s light was effective at 40 yards, a major difference noticed from the 9V lights on 1 and 2’s guns.
Shooter 4’s light was an LED light, and while it was very high quality and has its advantages indoors, it was not particularly effective past 30 yards.
The low-light shooting led to several revelations by the shooters.
1) In Texas, nighttime brings major humidity, and your eyepro WILL fog. Every single shooter had fogged glasses.
2) The white light is effective up until your first shot. After that, the light bounces back from the smoke cloud, and your follow-up shots are probably being made blindly.
3) The Phantom flash suppressors, along with flash-suppressant ammo like Q3131A, is highly effective. With non-suppressant ammo like American Eagle, there are a few small sparks visible.
4) The 11.5” barrel with a standard A2 FS is highly ineffective. When shooting XM193, the instructor thought someone was having a ND with the white light.
5) Having a tritium FSP would be priceless in a dark CQB environment. Having anything up there to index off of would have been better than nothing.
6) The red dot sights are irreplaceable as a sighting tool in the dark. The shooters that had them turned them off throughout the exercise and for lack of a better phrase, it was like night and day.
The class was definately an eye-opener for us, and we will be retaining Steve for further training.
