Another Gun, Another Caliber...

 ...of ammo that I need to pick up. You may recall that in my last post, I mentioned having the high bid on a Norinco Model 54-1 in 7.62 Tokarev. I am not going to say that I have never owned any of that ammo but to the best of my recollection, the five rounds of it that I gave away at a gun show this past weekend was all of it for me. Those few rounds were in a bag of maybe 150 other rounds of mixed calibers that I found loose in range boxes & bags, partially filled ammo boxes, ammo cans and other places. Those were all of the unspent rounds that I had accumulated over the years for whatever reason. Many were at least 10 to 20 years old but all evidently in good enough condition to shoot. Those that I found which were corroded, were kept by me. They will be disposed of properly at a later date. All of the ones I gave away looked to be in good shootable condition.

 

 Now, back to the 7.62 Tokarev ammo (aka: 7.62X25mm). It is a bottle necked pistol round which I guess makes it somewhat unusual among pistol ammo. There are other such pistol rounds out there but the are in the great minority. 

 

The pistol, for said ammo, arrived at my local FFL yesterday and I picked it up promptly. That is one of the few things I never procrastinate on getting done. It looked excellent on first glance at the store but I need to give it a much better inspection today. 

 

After looking it over better, I want to shoot it. So along that line, I ordered some 7.62 Tokarev ammo for it yesterday. Three boxes of Sellier & Bellot FMJ and two of PPU JHP set me back almost $160.00 at Saint Barb's Bullets. That included shipping and tax. My go to online ammo store, Target Sports USA, did not have any in stock, that was disappointing. 

 

Anyway, that is the thing about buying a new gun in a caliber different than that of your other guns. It means, tracking down and acquiring a new caliber for yourself. It may also mean paying more for it than other ammo if it is sort of an odd ball caliber.

 

 Then today, I woke up and I thought, I would like to shoot the new pistol as soon as possible, procrastination be damned. So, I called a few local ammo dealers to find that not only do they not have it in stock but most of them apparently had never heard of it before. Obviously not one of the most common types of ammo, which by the way is probably what makes it rather expensive for a small pistol round. It sells for about $25.00 per box of 50 rounds. Not cost prohibitive, yet way above the price of a much more popular pistol round like 9mm Luger (aka: 9mm Parabellum).

 

So, as it turns out. it seems I will have to await delivery of my ammo order before I can take my new pistol to the range for some shooting goodness.

 

A range report to follow, sooner or later.

 

 All the best,

Glenn B