What an awesome show for gun lovers. Red Jacket is an amazing gunsmith shop. I couldn’t believe some of the automatic weapons and suppressors they make. Most of that stuff is extremely illegal for anyone to own without a shit load of ATF paperwork. Manufacturing that stuff without a license could get you 20 years in the pen. Sure is fun seeing it made.
The discovery site currently loads a video showing a survival kit with a hidden gun. It even has laser sights. Very cool and useful camping. But, I don’t see how anyone could own it. Concealed weapons, inside a device, is another quick way to get hammered by the ATF. I’m not sure if there are exceptions or not.
I’ve seen a few episodes and I was thinking the same thing. I thought converting a semi-auto to full was illegal. Period. No paperwork. No permits. Illegal.
Haven’t all of those been for law enforcement customers? I think LEO’s fall under a different set of rules.
Interesting show, but I dislike the artificial time limits - “This has to be done by Wednesday.” If I’m hiring a gunsmith to do major work on gun, like full-auto conversion, I’d rather have him tell me it’ll be a few more days than he originally estimated than have him deliver a gun that continues to fire even when I release the trigger.
I think my favorite episode had to be the WWII medal of honor winner. He won the medal using a flame thrower. Sixty years later he still has this rusty, broken flame thrower.
Will’s shops repairs it and pressure tests the tanks for safety. The look on that old guys face when he got to shoot that flame thrower again was fantastic. He strapped those tanks on like they weighed nothing. Getting to relive a part of his military life obviously meant a lot to that veteran. I’m glad they were able to make that happen. Ooh-rah
It’s a pretty crummy show unless you like gun porn. Every time someone starts telling you something interesting about a gun’s history or construction, the boss snaps something idiotic like “I’m paying you to build guns, not teach a history lesson.” You don’t learn much of anything about designing or building guns. And anything you do learn would be massively illegal to try at home. So the end result is that you get to watch other (really annoying) people shoot guns. It’s like Orange County Choppers without the artistry.
The only episode that I thought was kind of interesting was the one where they designed the shotgun silencer because at least you got to see some of the design work and trial and error that went into it.
I have next to no personal interest in the subject, but the shop does have a fairly eccentric (and sorry, but frankly more than a bit creepy) collection of staff and visitors, and there is something compelling about having a job where you get to fire full-auto weapons as part of your routine daily work. Still, some of the stuff on this show has me rolling my eyes. The justification for the folding ‘flashlight gun’ seemed pretty contrived, for example, and the workmanship (just my opinion) left much to be desired.
I will say I was somewhat baffled by the point of the whole “convert a replica Thompson to full auto for the local sheriff” bit. With a wide array of modern automatic weapons available (presumably legal for a law enforcement agency to use), why would they go for such a heavy, not entirely reliable and (apparently) rather dangerous clunker instead? Gotta question whether that’s effective use of my (or the citizens of Baton Rouge’s) taxpayer dollars. If the Sheriff paid for it himself, OTOH, hey, knock yourselves out.
I will say that the shop’s owner, who is indeed something of an asshole, gave me a line that I use myself. After berating one of the employees for leaving the reception area unattended, the employee starts to make some sort of excuse, and the owner immediately cuts him off, saying “I do hope you weren’t mistaking this for a conversation”. Heh.
Or the pre-commercial teaser where you see the guy trying to work the action while everyone looks on anxiously, only to have it work flawlessly.
I was a fan…but it was the roof mounted M-16 episode that made me delete the series from my DVR. First, the cheesy as all hell “security expert” in the dark sunglasses at the meeting overlooking the river. Like a bad action movie parody.
Then Will complains, “I don’t want no inexperienced tweed jacket guy designing the rigging.” What? You don’t think a guy with a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering and Robotics could design something that could withstand the recoil of an M-16?
I found Vince to be the only intriguing guy on the show. Stephanie knows her stuff, but her voice is grating. Kris is a child. And Will is an arrogant asshole. I hope Vince makes some decent payola. He’s the only one that DOES anything.
I don’t think Will is an asshole. He definitely makes it clear that he’s the boss, but he’s not in your face-full conflict, like say, Paul Teutel. He seems to have an easygoing demeanor, and I’ve never heard him raise his voice on the show. And he praises his employees’ work verbally, both to them directly and in front of his clients. Especially the new guy, Femm, when he came through on the MG42 assembly. And I also recall him saying something like, “I’d hate to say these guys did a great job with this piece. They did a superb job.” Seems like a boss I’d like to have. Especially when your boss gives you an AK-47 for your birthday.
I watched a few episodes but I’m not a regular viewer.
I’m just not really that interesting in guns. So I can be interesting in the subject for a while because it’s something different. But once I get my fill of the subject and it stops being new, I have no real interest in the subject itself.
It’s like a documentary I once saw about people who dress up in costumes and walk the streets to promote businesses. Okay, that’s a subject I never experienced before so I can be interested in it for an hour or two. But I wouldn’t be interested in seeing it week after week.
If they have the proper FFL they can make pretty much anything they want. Selling to an individual, rather than LE or military is a different ball game. No machine guns made after 1986 can be transferred to an individual. That’s why the local police can buy a new M-16 for about $1000 or less and you’d have to pay in the neighborhood of $15,000. It’s just not fair! :eek:
I recently saw the episode with the Gater Killer. Looks like a “pen gun” to me. Classed as any other weapon (AOW). $5 transfer tax and about a four month wait. Hope those guys on the boat aren’t in any hurry.
They went to a full hour format season 2. Red Jacket Firearms celebrates their 10th anniversary. For the occasions they built a Triamese. Three M16’s strapped together with a single gas feed system. The barrels form a triangle and all three barrels fire simultaneously.
They opened up on this little fake house and it just exploded into pieces.
Seeing a gun rig like this is one of those jaw dropping, holy shit moments. No where near reliable enough for combat, but very cool on the firing range.
These guys build some crazy stuff. A lot Red Jacket’s military builds are going over to Afghanistan for test runs. If they prove reliable then our troops get some extra advantage when everything goes bad out in the field.
Looks like another fun season. Discovery is airing it again at 10 central. About 52 minutes from now. Got see this again.
I watched the first couple of episodes and thought "ooh, neat. Engineering + Guns + Explosions. It’s like testosterone on toast. Now… well… I still follow the show, but every episode has got me kinda cringing. Just… meh.
I enjoy the show quite a bit, but then I am a nerd and I love guns. Some of the things they do are phenomenally unfeasable for anything other than a toy, but it’s interesting to see.
That being said, I hope Will can pull his head out of his ass in regards to Chris and Stephanie. While she’s not MY cup of tea (well, I think she’s hot, but lord knows I wouldn’t want to talk to her… ) those two seem like a good fit.
