Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Thunder Ranch Defensive Revolver... AAR

Okay, as promised, here's the After-Action Report on last week's Defensive Revolver class. First things first: go to the previous TR thread if you want to see a picture of Heidi.

I was more than a bit pleased and surprised to get a PM from 24HCF member gmoats about a week prior to the class telling me he was registered for the same class, so after several years of correspondence here on the 'Fire, we would actually get to meet in person. Bonus to the class! Greg is a modest guy and definitely not a name-dropper, but he's known and worked with some of the true legends in the shooting world including Jeff Cooper, Ray Chapman, and Bill Jordan, to name only a few of the more prominent ones. He's an experienced IPSC and IDPA shooter as well, and he acquitted himself with distinction on the range.

Here's a pic of gmoats with Shirley, one of Clint's excellent assistant instructors:



Now, here's a pic of the valley that Thunder Ranch nestles in, taken from the edge of the rifle range next to "The Terminator" (the shoot house, photo later):



That's "the big house" in the center distance, a real nice mountain house where Clint & Heidi Smith make their home. Thunder Ranch consists of over 1000 acres of mountain landscape, with a state of the art pistol/carbine range, shoot house, and longrange rifle ranges. There's a very nice pro shop & classroom building, a cabin for special guests, a couple of ponds, and an abundance of mule deer.

Anyways, getting to TR is a job, no matter where you're coming from. It's located just outside of Lakeview, OR, which is an even more remote location than where I live in Butt-F****n' Egypt, er, I mean to say, west Texas. I flew in to Reno, NV, rented a car, then drove 3-1/2 hours to get to Lakeview. Greg and the Colonel drove from Denver. Other guys drove from Oakland, Carson City, and other parts of the Pacific mountain west. For my part, my travel days were 12+ hours long. But the travel hassle was worth it.

Speaking of other guys, this revolver class was attended by 9 students, all of whom had significant amounts of grey hairs on their heads/beards. Apparently the population cohort that shoots revolvers seriously is distinctly late middle aged... This is indeed a sad state of affairs.

We started Training Day 1 in the classroom, with Clint giving us a rundown on his philosophy of training, including safety, etc., and then a rundown on the history of the revolver. He's got some pretty cool revolvers, BTW! (I had the privelege of handling his rare original Colt Lightning revolver, a sixgun I've wanted to get my hands on for years and years.)

One thing Clint really emphasizes is safety, which is something I really appreciate. (Nothing spoils a gun class faster than somebody getting shot and then I have to render emergency aid on the range. People really don't like it when I present the bill and insist they pay in cash before I'll let them load up into the ambulance...) Clint runs a clean range, and a safe range. Of course, it didn't hurt that every guy in the class was a very experienced shooter. I didn't see a single safety violation, even a minor one, in the full 3-day class, which is a first in my experience.

Here's a photo of the pistol/urban rifle range. The pistol range is set on a concrete pad, which makes brass call a real treat compared to a gravel range.



Another thing I didn't expect was that Greg and his good friend, the Colonel, are both retired USMC officers. One of our range officers was also a former Marine, and of course Clint served 2 tours in Vietnam in the Corps... so there was lots of Marine lingo, slang, and other stuff going on more or less constantly. It was a lot of fun, actually.

Here's a pic of the Colonel, myself, and Greg during a break in the action:



... and another pic of Clint and Greg discussin Marine mojo...



The Colonel stayed in the Corps quite a bit longer than Greg, who got out after his stint as a Lieutenant. You'll have to ask them personally if you want to know more about their service records than that. BTW, both the Colonel and Greg chose 45 ACP revolvers for this class, and spent a LOT of time loading and unloading full moon clips. They both had a lot of tape on their hands by the end of TD3, and it wasn't because their revolvers were rough-edged. The point to take home, if you're considering taking this class in the future and want to use a 45 ACP revolver, is to maybe buy a boatload of full moon clips and load them up well in advance.

As far as equipment goes, most of the class had either 6-shot 45 ACP revolvers or 8-shot 357 Mag revolvers. One guy had a Ruger SP-101 that he kept charged with Bianchi Speed Strips, which he was quite fast with. I took one of my competition-tuned 686's, and loaded it with Safariland Comp2 and Comp3 speedloaders.



I shot the whole class with this L-frame, although I brought my M65 as a backup gun just in case. I brought 5 L-frame speedloaders and wish I'd brought 10. We went through a LOT of ammo in each exercise, so there were lots of reloads. More than a few times I exhausted my speedloader supply and had to dig into my reserve (I kept 4 Bianchi Speed Strips in my right cargo pocket for backup once I ran out of speedloaders. If you're counting, that means that each typical exercise consisted of 30+ rounds, and on one occasion required 50+ rounds of ammo.

BTW, with the exception of George's SP-101, all the revolvers at this class were Smith & Wesson guns. Even the backup guns. Clint said this is pretty typical for his revolver classes. Most other DA revolvers aren't robust enough to hold up under this kind of round count, apparently. And there were one or two S&W's that had to be retired during the class as well, as it happens, mostly for minor stuff that got tweaked during the breaks.

We shot a lot in this class. I had a case of 1000 rounds of frangible lead-free 38 Special ammo delivered to TR for the class, and I used almost all of it. Here's a photo of all I had left at the end of TD3:

[img]http://i1200.photobucket.com/albums/bb332/DocDarkside/LeftoverAmmo_zps90757f40.jpg[/img]

That's right, I fired 970 rounds in 2.5 days of shooting. Pretty good round count per day, in my opinion. There were some blisters and cuts on most of our hands by the end of TD3. It might have been worse, but much of TD3 was broken up by doing house-clearing drills (live fire) in The Terminator, Thunder Ranch's state-of-the-art shoot house.

[img]http://i1200.photobucket.com/albums/bb332/DocDarkside/Terminator_zps476413a2.jpg[/img]

So what's the final verdict on Thunder Ranch's "Defensive Revolver" class?

I would personally give this class 5 out of 5 stars. Reasons:

1. Outstanding range facilities
2. Outstanding instruction. Clint knows his stuff and teaches it well. He is engaging in his presentation, knowledgeable about his material and the guns, tactically sound, and always respectful of his students. Yet at the same time I found him likable to a high degree, something I won't say about many of the guys I've taken firearms instruction from. Combine the two and you have an unbeatable instructor.
3. Oustanding safety administration. Nuff said.
4. An outstanding student cohort. It might be because of our advanced age, or it might be because getting to Thunder Ranch for such a class requires a higher-than-average degree of dedication, but this was an amazing bunch of guys to shoot with.

If you think you might make it to TR for one of Clint's classes in the next year or two, I would strongly recommend you move around funds or vacation time or whatever you have to in order to accomplish this. You won't regret the time & money spent once you've done it, and, well, as the appearance of our class showed us, none of us are getting any younger.

Thanks for the story. Interesting. GMoats is an extremely nice fella.

Unless you're going to TR to hone your match shooting skills, I'm not quite seeing the point in bringing a range gun to a defensive revolver class. Unless that's the gun you carry on a daily basis, in which case it makes sense, but that seems an unlikely choice for daily carry, at least to my way of thinking ... that is, unless your defensive revolver is strictly your house gun, in which case I can understand the choice.

Great write up. Thanks for the info. I thought Gmoats might be a pretty alright guy.

I noticed on the Thunder Ranch Facebook page, in the last couple days, they've been reviewing what not to do to a revolver if you'd like to keep it running.

Excellent report. Thanks for the information.

RS

EE, yes, gmoats is a very nice guy.

bhemry, I've noticed that trend on the TR Facebook page lately. One of the things Clint emphasized during the class was periodic maintenance checks on revolvers: primarily, check the screws on the sideplate, the rear sight, the crane, and the strain screw on the front of the handgrip.

TRH, if you're referring to my comment about my 686 being "competition-tuned", I should probably enlighten you a bit on that score.

Competition tuning for a revolver, IMHO (and that of the revolver-smiths I've used) consists of optimizing the DA function of the revolver without altering the gun's inherent reliability. This typically involves making sure the timing is adjusted if necessary, honing the trigger-sear connection, removing the single-action notch, and bobbing the hammer spur. That's about it. Springs remain full power for function, reliability, and speed. Sights remain unchanged. Grips may be modified to one's individual taste.

The particular revolver shown in the OP is an extremely reliable revolver, with well over 30,000 rounds through it since it last visited the gunsmith. I shoot 38 Special 158 grain +P ammo in it for competition and training, and 158 grain 357 Magnum ammo for some training, and for all hunting/defensive purposes. It has ridden my hip in CCW and hunting applications, as well as in IDPA matches. I've shot game with it. I wouldn't hesitate to use it as a carry piece, and have done so on more than a few occasions.

Very nice report, sounds like a good time was had by all.

Great write up, Doc! Thanks for sharing (and teasing us) with your adventure.

Ed

I'm jealous Doc. Glad you had a good time, good classmates can make or break a class.

Nice write-up, Doc. I doubt I'll make it to Thunder Ranch, but I have given some thought to taking Denny Reichard's snubby course.

Denny's snub gun course is good. Hell, any course Denny teaches is good. Man can shoot, and he can teach.

I usually just read and digest info on this site, but this thread is one of the best I have had the pleasure to read. DocRocket writes an interesting article and I think it would be a hoot to take a class with him. Thanks for the great read. Gary U

Very neat write up. One of my goals for 2015 is to take at least two courses at Thunder Ranch. Have my pennies saving up already and it's only a seven hour drive from the house

GaryU, I appreciate the kind words. Next time I go to TR I'll post well in advance, as I didn't do this time around, so you can register and we'll shoot it together.

Oregon45... good for you, you'll enjoy it I'm sure. Which courses are you planning to take?

Hey Doc!
Is there anywhere to find your powerpoint on bullet trauma? I'd love to see it.

Defensive Handgun 1 to start then hopefully either DH 2 or urban rifle.

SRM, I showed the guys at this class parts of my presentation which is normally part of my 1-day class, Shooting With Xray Vision. Only way to see it is to take the class... I teach it 2-3 places around the country every year.

I'm not trying to be a d!ck about it, it's just that many of the photos etc don't belong to me and I'm only able to use them because I've promised the owners I won't publish 'em.

I understand fully. Got a schedule for the class?