This video is an older (1999) video from the US Marine Corps dealing with the fundamentals of Marine Corps marksmanship. Every Marine is a rifleman, and the Corps prides itself on its marksmanship training.
This video may be old but its message is timeless.
(it was created in 1999, the year I was discharged)
Being a marksman is a vital skill for preparedness. Ammunition is only going to become more expensive and harder to find. The day is looming that ammunition will be registered or otherwise strictly controlled.
Being able to get rounds on target quickly and efficiently without waste is a key skill.
In my years as a firearm instructor I have learned that marksmanship is partly knowledge (knowledge that is found in the great video below.) but is also the willingness to apply that knowledge and the discipline to practice when it is not convenient, easy, or fun.
I learned to shoot a rifle in the Marines, and while I am rusty, some things are never forgot.
Due to the quality of Marine Corps rifle training, I can pick up a rifle and remember the hours spent aiming at the white drum pained with targets. One thing the Marine Corps does well is make riflemen out of teenagers.
Today’s post is to show you how to go about CETME Field Stripping.
As with all gunsmithing, remove all ammunition in the room while you work on your CETME.
I know you are an adult, and smart enough not to accidentally load and fire your gun negligently. However, but so were thousands of other folks right before they fired an “unloaded” firearm.
I am light on the pictures because I was videotaping the process of CETME Field Stripping, so if anything is unclear just watch the video.
How to Field Strip a CETME Rifle
Remove the magazine. A forward press on the magazine catch will release it. Then just pull it down.
The cocking handle will not work if the firearm is on safe, so put your CETME selector on anything buts “S” – some rifles have “T” for single shot and “R” for burst, mine just has “S” and “F” for fire. In case you are wondering “T” stands for “Tiro a Tiro” (shot by shot) and “R” stands for “Rafaga (burst).
Pull firmly the cocking handle rearwards. (The cocking handle is on the left side of the gun forward of the receiver and almost to the front sight). This is not the easiest thing to do, it’s not like a poodle shooter – you are fighting the resistance of both the recoil and hammer springs. When you get the handle fully to the rear, push it up into its lock notch.
Check the chamber both physically and visually for any rounds – then do it again – You may think its stupid to do it twice, but there are no records of a negligent discharge by checking twice, and many of them for failing too.
Next perform an “HK Slap” to release the cocking handle so as to relieve the tension on the spring. (Just take the palm of your hand and give a slap to the top of the charging handle to knock it out of its locking slot – This action adds enough cool points to make up for checking the chamber twice – sometimes I do it just so I can feel “Teddy Tacticool”.
Remove the Buttstock
The buttstock assembly is kept in place by a couple of pins. Those pins are just pushed out like the pins holding an AR together. Some CETME buttstocks have two holes to put the pins in so you don’t loose them. (some may tell you to use your magazine feed lips to help remove the pins, but that is stupid because the magazine lips are one of the most stressed parts of your rifle, pretty fragile, and damage there WILL cause cycling problems.
Pull on the butt stock to release the assembly – mine takes a good slap, and not a gentle tug, but they all slide out.
Next you need to remove the fire assembly, it tilts downwards. A nice slap on the back of the pistol grip towards the muzzle will release it.
Now, with the rear of the gun angled downwards, grab the charging handle and pull it back a little. The barrel assembly should slide right out.
That is pretty much fully field stripped, however, if you want to remove the bolt and get to the firing pin, you will have to rotate the bolt head counterclockwise 180°. This can be a little tricky, so you may need to use a pair of pliers.
Next rotate the bolt carrier 90 degrees counterclockwise and remove it to expose the firing pin and spring.
Pull out the firing pin and the firing pin spring.
To Reinstall, Reverse the Order
When installing the barrel, the two round rollers will be pushed out and locked, and the assembly will not slide into the receiver. The bold has to be retracted to allow the rollers to unlock. The way I do it is to reverse the bold and slide it backwards and “slam” it – (forcefully, but not violently) in the gun, this unlocks the bolt rollers, so I can then pull the assembly out, and reinstall it normally and it will then slide right in the gun.
Remember, once you get it all back together to function test it to make sure it works. That is another reason you don’t have ammo in the room.
When function testing a defensive gun that I keep loaded (say my carry pistol) I will then say OUT LOUD “I am done cleaning my gun and am not loading it” It may seem overkill, but it sets up a mental stumbling block to keep me from function testing my gun after I load it – another way of preventing a negligent discharge from “cleaning my gun”
Cheap is cheap for a reason. I cannot always afford to buy the best, but neither can I afford to keep replacing the cheapest junk every time it breaks. There is a difference in a 40 and a 400 dollar grain mill.
This prepper precept is one I still struggle with. I believe it in my head, but sometimes I make choices to buy cheap equipment. I do this knowing I won’t be satisfied with because I can’t wait.
Harbor Freight and Northern Tool gets more money from me than they should, but when I make bargain purchases of cheap equipment I make a calculation to ensure that it is worth it. I believe in the idea of “buy once cry once” and love quality tools and equipment. However, you don’t always have a choice – just make sure that before you buy cheap stuff you really don’t have a choice.
These precepts are my creed, and having prepper precepts guides me when I face tough choices. A wise man once told me that when facing a moral problem, the right choice is usually the action you don’t want to take.
I am not a pollyanna person that is wishy washy or blindly follows rules, heck I have a little rebellious streak and love to know the WHY of rules, but I do respect and understand the need for law and know how vital it is for a society to have a moral code.
By knowing what I believe in you can know how I will act. This is very important in times of stress. If you don’t want to read each prepper precept individually, the completed list can be found here: Completed 27 Prepper Precepts.
If you reload long enough the draw to cast your own bullets becomes almost impossible to resist. It is one thing to assemble to bullets. However, to actually make them is something entirely different. After that comes swaging. Unfortunately, I am still trying to convince the wife to let me spend that money. Casting is relatively simple. But when you start using cast lead in high velocity rounds you have to ensure that the bullet does not get eroded by the hot gasses. Additionally, you must prevent it from being stripped bare by the rifling leaving heavy lead accumulations in your barrel.
What is a Gas Check
It did not take gunsmiths and shooters long to invent the gas check. They discovered that if you apply a thin coating of copper to the base of the bullet it would protect the round from the hot gasses. It also would protect the barrel from excessive leading. This cup of copper is called a gas check.
Gas Checks are so pliable that they are not matched as precisely to the caliber of bore as a round would be. This is because the process of installing the check to the round will swage it to the proper size. For example a .30 caliber gas check will work from .300 to about .315 so it will work on .30 caliber, 7.62, 308, and .303 British.
Gas checks are generally sold in boxes of 1000. The most recent price I found was around $30 a box. This is pretty inexpensive. However, you will need a tool to seat and crimp the base of the round.
You can buy premium tools that do this. However, I have discovered a Lee Precision sizing die will; work very well, while still being inexpensive.
This die fits in your press and is designed to size cast bullets to an exact diameter. Different lead alloys shrink by different amounts. Additionally, some molds are a little large. The sizing die allows the bullet to be forced through the die. Basically, swaging it to the proper size. If you put the check on the base of the bullet as you size the die, the copper check will also be smashed into the bullet allowing a very tight connection.
The Process is Simple
The process on how to install gas checks cheaply is pretty simple. My video shows it all. However, I will tell you that I left the lubing step out in the video. I was going to try tumble lubing the bullets after I installed the checks. It did not work like I had thought.
If you have a pan lube bullet, you will need to go ahead and lube it before you install the checks. You will need to wipe as much lube off the base as possible before you install the check, but otherwise the video shows all the steps.
Internet searches I have done while researching this video say to run the bullet in backwards to allow the check to be swaged first, but I got pretty good results (as well as it being much easier) to run the bullets in tip first just like I was simply sizing them.
Like I said, this is a pretty simple process, and pretty inexpensive, but it is absolutely vital if you are going to shoot lead bullets in centerfire rifles, or very fast handguns.
I don’t prep for any particular hazard, but try to build skills and equipment to deal with many/most/all problems. One way of doing this is to look at what has worked in the past. I look at what has happened, why it happened, how it could have been prevented, and how people survived and incorporate that into how I operate.
That being said looking back at historical situations I believe economic collapse is something that has a high likelihood of occurring and if/when it does occur, it would have a pretty catastrophic effect on my life. Therefore, I devote some of my research time to looking at situations that occurred in the Weimar Republic (1919-1933), the Great Depression (1929-WWII including the 1937 Great Recession), and the 3 Year Argentine economic crisis (1999–2002).
Anything that documents how the general public survived in these SHTF situations interests me – especially firsthand information like the YouTube Cooking with Clara videos. Of particular interest to me are books like Fernando “Ferfal” Aguirre’s The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic CollapseWhich documents how he survived the 1999 Argentine crisis.
So when I opened my email to see an email from SHTFSchool.com inviting me to review Selco’s One Year in Hell Course, I jumped on the opportunity. Selco is the online identity of an individual that claims to have survived a year in a Balkan City during the Yugoslav Wars of the early 1990’s. It only took a few minutes to get a login, but it took me several days to work through the material.
The course has several aspects – It is primarily a series of 17 audio interviews. These interviews cover the months and days preceding the conflict and how “preppers” were seen to be crazy, and how the media and government kept reassuring the populace. They move through the actual crisis periods and talks about group dynamics during the crisis and what tools and supplies are needed. He talks about foraging, trading, hygiene and the dubious value of gold. I learned a lot from the interviews, however, his accent is pretty thick, and on occasion it was hard for me to follow.
There are a few video’s in the course that explain certain concepts like home defense in greater detail.
The course contains a couple PDF downloads – some are lists of what is needed and why, as well as a short text that backs up the other material.
Lastly, the course contains access to forums for students to share information.
I think this is a pretty good deal if you approach it with an open mind. Selco talks about what worked for him, including certain moral ideals and mental health issues and how people coped with the stress. He butchers a few sacred cows.
I cannot say I enjoyed the course, it was pretty raw – like sitting down in your living room and having a frank discussion with a war survivor, but I can say it gave me more than a few things to process and think about in my personal survival strategy.
In particular, I like how he elevates skills over stuff. Discusses how he foraged at night, and the steps he took to keep as safe as possible while doing so. Selco was a nurse at the time of the collapse, and had no experience with firearms, and he describes how that changed and how his group operated. He has some frank discussions about morals during times of collapse that any prepper needs to hear and think about.
His first couple of recordings talk about the time leading up to the collapse and the signs that some saw but most discounted. It was eye opening to hear how even smart people in his circle did not think that their leaders and their citizens could devolve into chaos and war.
I have recommended it to my personal prepping friends and think that the $30 course fee is a fair trade for what you get.
