Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Gun Show Today... High Comedy

The only reason I've gone to a gun show in about the last 10 years was to look/buy a new handgun. Normally the ones here will have nearly every model of new models in every finish etc...Easy to compare them all, and normally at or below anything you find at a retail store and don't have to pay the handgun shipping. Other than that it's been a waste of time.

Same thing happens here in Iowa and Missouri when you stay away from the metro areas. I've got some fine deals on antiques, which I prefer, recently.

Good guns are where you find them. Sometimes the shows - sometimes shops. It is the crowd rather than the prices that I find ammusing.

I could care less about an AR - probably spent too much time carrying them for real. But as a result, have always found the cammo'd up wannabe crowd patently ridiculous. Even saw a advert the other day that buying some AR or the other earned you a "man card". Right. The really ridiculous ones here in the commonwealth are our militia. They have a booth at all the gun shows and are really into the stern for away stare look - those who could see over their guts. Would love to have had one of those boys in the back end of a C-130 at o'dark thiry over Sicily DZ - or better yet - Panama.

They have invaded one of my favorite gunshops as well. Black BDU trousers, harness and para-boots (Doc Martins?), and all the earnest talk preparing for the pending end of times. As if anyone of them would last an hour against a regimental combat team from the 82d if it ever came down to it.

I am all for anyone buying an AR who wants one (as long as they are reasonably sane). But I am getting a little concerned about the belief in a fantasy world to which so many seem to believe a battle rifle provides some sort of access.

I was into antiques for a long time. The problem is what somebody already hinted at previously, the same guys with the same guns. I've seen some of the older guys drag around guns that they must've had for twenty years. It would be comical if a lot of these oldsters didn't have enough money to pretty much drive the marketplace. They'll just buy a gun and shop it around for years saying stuff like, "you can't ever pay too much for a gun, just too soon," and whatnot. Well some of them bought theirs damned early.

IMO, a lot of people on the outside of the aisles have done as much as Walmart and the government, to drive gunshop owners out of business. "I can get that same gun at the show in two weeks for a hundred less," and the like. I've been an FFL holder and a regular guy and I'm as much to blame as anybody, but the fact of the matter is that you can't run a gun business with a for real storefront at cost plus 10%.

The latest, greatest gunstore around here is run by a guy who actually has a fair-sized shop at his house. It's now in a building separate from his home and is pretty danged nice. The problem from the buyer's point of view, is that he won't keep any stock. At any given time he's got maybe two dozen guns. His thing is ordering you a gun. And he won't trade. His prices on an order are indeed, extremely low. And he provides a great service AND he is a great guy. In the end though, all he's doing is making money off the government's own penchant for laws and regulations. $20 a gun for an order. If he was in something other than an outbuilding in his yard, he couldn't make it.

The little shows are a crap shoot IMO. Some are great and some are a waste of time. The big shows have so much stuff that even in times like these, you can always find something to make you part with your dinero.

Things like this do aggravate me to an extent. I bought a stash of lowers a while back just in case. Figuring I could buy the parts whenever.

Right now I"m on a deer hunting rifle build and I guess I"m glad I can scrounge parts off other guns to build this upper.

But then again I don't need this one, I simply want it. I can grab a BCG from another gun, strip an upper off a test bed upper and so on. Aggravating for sure, but at this point thats about all .gov is good for, to piss me off and aggravate me.

I'll go if I need a laugh.

I really appreciate the small town shows as well: Low or no admission fee, no parking fee and great deals!!! The big shows are bogus and expensive.

I'm guessing i could sell my AR'S , since i have 5 complete AR's which would be considered custom on the market and two new lowers which will be complete in a week and buy myself a new truck . Nah , will keep them , don't need another truck.