So a couple weeks ago I stumbled on to something called Guncon to be held in June out in Cleveland, OH. It was a convention of sorts with a range day for media the day before the convention started. It was a bit short on details, and I had no previous knowledge of the event, but hey, put me on the firing line with new guns to shoot and ammo someone else paid for- I am so in.
Turns out this was the 4th year for Guncon, all with a media range day attached. The range was at the Southington Hunt Club near Garrettsville, OH, about an hour east of Cleveland. The “media” who attended were a bit more digital than I was used to. They were bloggers and video people with Youtube, Facebook, Instagram and Rumble “shows” or “channels. When I checked in I was asked if I was a vendor or a “creator.” I was issued an ID on a ribbon which said I was a “creator.” I told them at my age I felt much more comfortable with more traditional titles like Shaman or Wizard.
Guncon safety check in on Friday consisted of caution words like “be careful” and a bunch of f-bombs which were weather suitable since it was about 90 degrees at start time. There were a lot of vendors present showing off a lot of mid-year introductions. I lost track of the actual on range number, but they were all present at the convention in Cleveland the next day and that included 52 vendors, and of course the big sponsor was 1st Phorm, a very pro-gun company who market energy and health drinks and powders. There must have been between 100 and 200 digital wizards present who spent the range morning shooting the free ammo in new guns and waiving barrels around in all directions.
Yes, gun media people are just as prone to sloppy safety rules as regular gun owners can be. Just because you own a guitar, doesn’t mean you can play it.
They were woefully unaware of Mikes 4 rules of gun safety.
1. Treat all guns around Mike as if they are loaded
2. If Mike is in the area, keep your booger hook off the bang switch unless it is pointed down range (an area with considerably less Mike in it.)
3. Don’t point your gun at Mike if you do not expect to be pointed back
4. Be aware of the backstop beyond Mike as there could be other people like Mike located there.
The “creators” range day was Friday, and the indoor open to the public convention was held downtown in Cleveland in the Twist Drill building (an enormous old industrial building from the 1800s) on Saturday. The public could pay $50 in advance (sold out) and lined up around two sides of the building to attend the indoor vendor display and listen to panel interviews from people who are probably gun celebrities from 10 AM to 6PM. The only ones I knew were Eric Pratt from GOA, Adam Kraut from SAF and Mr. Guns and Gear. I toured the same vendors I saw at the range the day before and the high heat inside the building and 90s outside drove me out waay before closing. There were an awful lot of Saturday attendees to see a room about the size of a small gun show which was a convention and thus no sales. A Cleveland Police Captain and the Cleveland Fire Marshal were on hand trying to keep a head count going. Like trying to count fish in an aquarium!
Some tasty items I saw and shot on range day include:
Align Tactical had a nifty Glock specific trigger pedal or thumbs forward stop. It slid in the Glock trigger pin hole and left you gripping with a very consistent index and grip. They run $55 to $64 each and Align Tactical has a list of 36 holsters they fit with. They also showed off a Sig P320 E2 extended mag release and magwell.
Herrington Arms of Salem OH, had an interesting brass weight which attached on the front of TLR HL pistol mounted lights. Shooting the rig with the weight attached soaked up a whole lot of recoil and had a different felt impulse. There is a hole in the weight so light can show through and it meets USPSA rules. $70-$80.
Raidian had a Glock Anchor and magwell system I had not seen before. Their flared magwell was a two piecer, one filling the empty space in the Glock frame and the magwell screws on to the first piece. They also had a compensator barrel they combined with the magwell on the tiny Glock 43X which resulted in the G43X shooting like a full-sized gun. They claim a measured 44% reduction in recoil!
Stuff and Thugs company easily won my personal designation of “Mad Scientists” after they completely redesigned the Kel-tec 50 in 5.57mm. They tore off the lower which had to be clammed open to reload the 50 rd mags and make a new conversion which allows you to just snap on a new loaded mag in front of the trigger guard without disassembling the pistol. They just dreamed it up and did it! They also redefined the AK-47 into a Personal Defense Weapon (PDW) pistol they call the Gedard, which is Russian for “Cheetah”. It is like no AK you have ever seen even the Draco or Krinkovs. I also got to see a wind-up cylinder which they said is a helical magazine which can hold 55 9mm rds for an adapted AK. These guys have weird dreams. Cool, but still weird dreams!
Recover Tactical had three different drop in/snap in kits which turn a Glock double stack into a wrist braced pistol suitable for longer range and more accurate shooting. All of their modular items are made in Israel and things like a vertical foregrip which holds a spare mag make theme Hollywood movie cool. They told me they are now making them for the Canick Mete line and Walther PDP. Base prices run $150, to $425 depending on how many pieces you assemble on your weapon.
Phoenix Trinity Firearms had their latest three custom grade double stack pistols on display the Lo Pro, Hi Pro and Hi Tac. Very very nice.
Romeo Hotel Engineering let me shoot their DP-12 polymer sci-fi looking double barrel 12 ga which holds 16 total rounds, oh yeah, and it had a suppressor on it. Yep a 12 gauge with a suppressor- yes sir I would like to shoot that! The shotgun is pump activated and is made all in the USA. It was not an immediate fit for me, but I could see getting used to it. When you pump the action, it loads both barrels. The coolness quotient was off the charts. Looked a lot like the guns the Space Marines used in Aliens. ” Game over man. Game over!”
A fun new item I got to try out was the “Clay Copter”. You may have seen them advertised this winter. The launcher looks kind of like a bull horn, and it spins up discs that look like helicopter blades and they fly out of the launcher as an ariel shot gun target akin to clay birds… but the disks are flying vertically so they present a full 90mm or 110mm target. Why a new bird system? Well, the discs (not the ones you used in your Star Trek guns in the 1960’s) are made from plant and mineral materials and are nontoxic and completely biodegradable in 6-9 months. Clay birds with some limestone in them may take years to break down.
Also, the $200 launcher has a battery pack and can launch 300 copters before recharging. You don’t have to throw anything or lock out clay bird throwing arms. You just push down on the power button, and they fly! You can turn the speed control up and down and I got to “shoot” it and sent them on hi power out a full 100 yards in front of shotgun shooters. A tube of 50 copters will run $10 to $13 at Walmart, Bass Pro, Cabelas and Scheels.
At the indoor convention on Saturday, they were allowing visitors to shoot them into a suspended net. It was still fun. You just didn’t get to shoot at them.
Century Arms/Canik was there and had several of their 2025 variants of the fine Canik Mete pistols, but I only had eyes for their new H+K clone rifles on display. I saw them advertised about 10 minutes before the show and had to see them and put fingerprints all over them. They are offering up the AP51 which is an HK clone in .308 in a 16″ barrel instead of the old long barrels. I got to shoot the AP 53 in 5.56mm which is cloned from an HK Mdl 93. The feel is all HK and Euro 1970s style. Triggers were large and sights were post and aperture with the distinctive heavy ring around the front sight. Functioning was 100% which was not a surprise to me. They also had a new copy of their excellent AP5- HK MP5 clone with a faux suppressor like the HK SDS. They told me they are working with a company who can do a conversion into a full suppressed barrel with the appropriate legal paperwork and more than a few dollars being traded.
DSA from Illinois had some FAL .308 battle rifles on display and for shooting in different styles. They said they were not new designs, but they have an awful lot of variants. I remember going into their store in Lake Zurich years back and nearly falling on the floor laughing when I saw a cut down FAL pistol with wrist brace. Well, they sold a bunch of them pre-Pritzker. Joke was on me.
VKTR industries showed me a piston driven AR system which had a unique claim on recoil where their 6-hole sleeve “Self-Regulating Piston” bleeds off gas through 3 initial holes once a bullet passes and then mid recoil it passes gas through 3 more holes. I did not get to shoot it but they said the recoil impulse is very sweet.
Aim Surplus and Optics Planets had a lot of products on display, some were high tech state of the art pistol parts and optics and some were the house brand. If you haven’t looked at those two companies lately you will be surprised at the wide range they offer.
My friend Kevin Kolinda was there with Stellar Arms showing off three new versions of their excellent ARs. I talked to Kevin at the SHOT Show in Vegas in January and he was very proud of the rifle they were producing, and now he could talk about the three new variants openly and a new patented charging handle which was still hush hush back in January because it was patent pending.
Why look at Stellar Arms for an AR? Well for starts the owner/designer is a former NASA employee. Yes a rocket scientist is building and machining in house ARs at an engineering level that is hard to match. You can’t pass a piece of paper through almost any two parts on their rifles. Solid doesn’t seem to cover it. The entry level Technician is a 16″ bbl in FDE or black anodized. Kevin says they don’t Cerecote anything and anodize it all. The Specialist has a 13.9 bbl which is pinned and welded, $2699 and can be had in an SBR or pistol with ambi bolt release. The Maximus at $3955 is limited to only 150 pieces and there are only 5 made in the Executive Line in purple.
The proprietary and patented charging handle is of course like no other charger. It has two forward facing gas tubes coming out the front and away from the gripping handle- to route any gas which travels back during the recoil cycle away from the shooters face and eyes. A nifty idea, and fabulous for any AR with a suppressor which holds and pushes gas back into the breach.
My absolute fave, of the range day and convention was the made-in Arizona EXTAR AR type pistol with extensive polymer molded pieces. I knew nothing about this system and liked everything I learned. First up, it looks like a hybrid between an AR and maybe a MP5 or G36 with barrel shrouds and lots of rail on top. They make everything in house and don’t sell to wholesalers. Yep. They take orders from individual customers and ship them to their local FFLS. No middlemen. They have been making the EP9 pistol with wrist brace for a couple of years out of polymers, and it just flat works. It weighs 4 lbs with AR like controls and takes Glock mags- all for $449! It features a rubber baffle recoil delay patented system and an innovative and patented feed ramp and loading feature. Never mind the actual detail on that part. It just works. The reps amazed me when they added their manual advises owners to NOT LUBE the pistol. Whaa? Yes, it does not need lube! Apparently with all the polymer parts they don’t suffer the friction of metal and certainly no corrosion. It feeds hollowpoints and even wadcutters it is so voracious.
That was pretty darn cool data and price point for a PDW sized 9mm AR-ish gun, with a 6.5″ bbl, but of course they kept going. They have added in a .45 ACP version $600, and be still my heart, a 10mm to be sold later this year. I got to shoot the 10mm prototype and clanged every piece of steel they had down range. I have offered to stand in the hot sun of Lake Havasu, AZ outside their factory doors to wait for the first 10mm out the door.
