​Anyone looking to enter the firearms industry would be well advised to look at two categories: accessories or revolvers.

Accessories. Accessories are a significant proportion of the firearms related market and don’t usually require any special permitting or an FFL. But you have to hit the market with a quality product and be able to spend 25% of your manufacturing equivalent on marketing and promotion. Business guru’s from all demographics will tell you it’s not what you sell, it’s how you sell it that counts and this is absolutely the fact in the firearms accessories arena because it’s entirely saturated with extraneous goods we honestly don’t need. The good salesman convinces us that want and need are interchangeable so once we are instilled with desire, the purchase will quickly follow. Guns essentially come pret-a-pousse (um…ready to shoot) straight from the manufacturer and we just need bullets to enjoy a nice day at the range or in the field. When I was growing up the gun you bought was the gun it would forever be, unaltered, un-enhanced and un-bejeweled. Hell the most you’d add was a sling and you most likely made that yourself out of an old belt (or at least I did). There were no accessories. Be that as it may, I really love all the aftermarket doodads available today and regularly convince myself I want/need them. They offer an affordable way to juice-up an old gun, or put a modern iteration on an archaic platform, or embellish a plain jane. As to what accessory you should manufacture? Follow your own interests and make that thing YOU feel is lacking, that item YOU feel you need but is not available. But be sure to browse the AFD resource page, and Google every variant of the term used to describe your intended product, because sometimes a similar item will exist but is buried deep in the internet because the hapless manufacturer forgot (or doesn’t know how to) budget for marketing. Then, when you’re pretty sure you’re onto an original concept then make it and promote the dickens out of it.

Revolvers. Many professionals will tell you their backup is a revolver. Why? Because if it’s required they’ll likely be at incredibly close quarters and possibly tangled up in limbs and clothing meaning a semi-auto will possibly jam after the first round. A revolver may have a limited capacity but at least there’s 5 or 6 certain chances to stop a threat. And yet there are no truly pocketable American-made DA/SA revolvers despite the ready market. Why is it that no DA/SA revolver exists that matches the compact slimline dimensions of a pocket semi-auto pistol? Yes Kimber came out with their full size snubby, and S&W, Ruger, Charter and Taurus USA have a full line up of revolvers from hand cannons to featherweights, and NAA has their tiny single action 22’s but there’s nothing down the middle marrying the compactness of the deep concealed carry pistol and the reliability of the shoot-every-time wheelgun. We can fly to Mars in vessels comprised of 2,500,000 moving parts yet we can’t come up with a truly pocketable revolver made from 35 widgets? We are collectively missing the biggest gaping hole in the firearms market. Okay, I know it’s no cheap task to set up shop and start manufacturing a firearm never mind the legal processes, but the returns for a niche-filling firearm are extremely handsome and would recoup outlay in a matter of months. So really? Has no one figured out how to engineer this? Well, we have. We at the AFD have finished drawings so if anyone’s interested in building it or investing, just give us a holler.

​ED

Why is the 22LR so revered? Why is it the most popular round? Why, if it's so ineffectual, are more people killed by the 22LR round than any other. Why is .22 (okay, sorry, .223) the primary dimension for our uniformed services’ ammunition? And if all those are true, why is it so derided by the caliber snobs? Are those caliber snobs the same people who buy behemoth pickup trucks but never swing a tool? Possibly. There are people who think size matters, and to some extent they’re correct, but it’s also what you do with it that counts (to misuse a cliche). 

One thing I know is that a 22LR rifle would be the weapon of choice if it was an all-out, everyone to themself test of survival because the number of bullets you can carry and the accuracy with which you can shoot them would determine the duration of your stay on this planet. There’s a very good booklet written by DD MCWolfe called THE ACE HANDBILL: THE HERMIT'S GUIDE TO SECRET FOREST LIVING IN THE TECHNOLOGICAL ERA, which outlines the best possible set of tactics for surviving unnoticed in a forest wilderness. He writes primarily from the standpoint of being a hermit, or a fugitive from modernity, but it’s application is equally well suited to those who subscribe to a pending zombie apocalypse. McWolfe argues that evasion is the first law of survival and that a 22 should be used only for food procurement, and ideally suppressed utilizing the one-shot-one-kill mantra. For self defense against larger predators (or zombies) he prescribes a large caliber pistol or pistol-grip shotgun used at very close range when your threat has literally discovered you hiding in the undergrowth as opposed to shooting over long distances and thereby drawing unwanted attention. I may not be doing it justice but it makes perfect sense when read.

The Savage Rascal fits the McWolfe bill for a food procurement tool. It’s mandatory single shot (no magazine) means you’re less likely to hastily discharge a second round at a missed target and thereby draw focus: a single unexpected gunshot is very hard to pinpoint among echoing hills, but a second shot will allow a person to triangulate and identify your whereabouts. The Rascal has excellent little peep sights that can be even finer tuned by a .040 aperture from Skinner (email Andy Larsson andy@skinnersights.com) and is very light at 3lbs (especially with the plastic stock) and short enough to shove in a backpack. It also wouldn’t take much to craft a folding stock for this sweet little rifle. The Accutrigger provides trigger precision (2.5lbs pull) normally only available on larger adult rifles and Savage has tapped good accuracy into this youth rifle’s spout. If you want it threaded you can contact Justin Gaunder at info@class3designs.com; he’ll fabricate a special adapter (the barrel is borderline too small at the muzzle end to tap a proper bore concentric thread) with thread protector and fit it to your barrel for $135 shipped.

So there you have it. Quit thinking of your kid’s trainer as a throwaway or stopgap to an adult rifle and start thinking of the Rascal as pretty much the only 22LR he/she’ll ever need, and one they could trust their survival to. GOM

​The lightest thinnest 9mm on the market is the Diamondback DB9. I’ve been wanting to love DB pistols since they debuted in 2009, and now in their Gen 2 iterations we’d sure hope the kinks were worked out. The 380ACP seems so be pretty much there, but, it seems from user reviews and online videos that the 9MM is hit and miss in the reliability department: some pistols run like a clock and others choke, and there’s no telling which one you’ll get when you make your purchase. I think if I was manufacturing such an unpredictable product I’d test-fire every one off the line 100 times and add the cost of ammo to each unit before it went out the door. If it didn’t run 100% it’d go in the “to be fixed” bin, if it ran flawlessly it’d get cleaned and shipped out. I can’t imagine returns are cost effective, with shipping, labor and parts it must just about erase all margins but it’s surprising how many manufacturers (in all industries) let the lemons out with the peaches. You’d think pride alone would mandate that level of pre-sale testing on each unit, plus also concern for user safety. 

Anyway, that bugbear aside, I do really dig the looks and concept of this mighty midget. It’s a true pocket pal in my book. 9MM, super slim, ultralight and thuggish as a hammer, it’s the Glock that Glock never made. And that in fact may be the root of the issues: Glock probably deemed such diminutive proportions as unrealistic for the 9MM -- this is also exemplified by the fact that the Diamondback full-size DB9FS is pretty well liked meaning this isn't manufacturer negligence, it's a matter of power v's weight (we'll give the DB9FS a look at a later date). The 9MM round is stout of recoil and I suspect there’s not enough beef in the DB9’s polymer bones to guarantee it’ll withstand the beating. Yup, sometimes it will, sometimes it wont (which is why they tell owners not to use Plus P ammo). Be that as it may, personally I think it’s worth the gamble for the benefits it offers - at about $200 online it’s a roll of the dice and hey, you may just hit the jackpot. All the same I wouldn’t flog it to death at the range, but if/once you’ve established it’ll run with a particular brand of ammo then keep it as a pocket pal when you want exactly that mix of firepower and discretion. 

I know 11oz is what makes it largely so attractive, but if Diamondback were to use aluminum (or steel) in place of polymer I dare say this’d be a consistently reliable weapon albeit with a whole different price tag too. Even a limited run, say once a year at Christmas - smithed to make them 100% reliable - would be a nice offering for those with slightly fatter wallets and I dare say they’d fly off the shelves even at $500. I do think they’re the coolest lookin’ pocket pistols available amidst a myriad of almost identically ugly subcompacts that remind me of the automobile trend in economy cars. I sometimes imagine pistol and auto designers intentionally create effeminate lines to steer male buyers toward more expensive, sleeker products. With cars and aerodynamics it makes sense, but why pocket pistols have to look like they were squeezed out the rear end of…um…er…a Play-doh Pumpy Barber Shop, beats me. The Diamondback is one handsome little son-of-a-gun and for that it can be forgiven a couple of flaws, as long as they’re not fatal to users of course! Well done Bobby Fleckinger. AH