DUMBEST things overheard at the gun store.

[DragonDoc]

More Gunshop Tomfoolery (From THR)

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Things overheard in a gunshop are the topic of a few threads here...and having spent time behind the counter on a very busy gun shop...I've heard my share of...things.

The other day, I walked into an argument in progress, and couldn't help but overhear the comments. It was pretty obvious that it was starting to become heated...so I tried to ignore it while I browsed around.

Then, the shop owner spotted me, and motioned for me to come settle the argument. Based on what I'd already heard, I knew that the man behind the counter was right, and Happy Harry Customer was dead wrong.

"This guy says that German machinegun in WW2 fired so fast that there were 3 bullets in the barrel at the same time. I say it can't happen. What do you say?"

"Can't happen" (As I moved slightly away from the one who insisted that it was so. He was a little large...quite a bit younger than me...becoming more agitated by the second...and he wasn't made any happier at my backing my friend.)

"Well, my grandaddy fought the Germans and he said it was so, so it's so. My grandaddy oughta know whut he wuz talkin' about and you wasn't there!"

"Your grandfather was mistaken or misinformed. It can't happen. In order for the gun to have three fired bullets in the barrel at the same time, the bolt would have to cycle faster than the bullet moves. Can't happen."

Louder and more agitated:

"BY GOD! HAVE YEW EVER HEARD ONE OF THEM THINGS SHEWT! DO YOU KNOW WHAT THE RATE OF FAR WUZ?"

Yep. 'Bout 1200 rounds per minute, give or take 10. That works out to 20 rounds per second...which works out to about 2 rounds in a tenth of a second. The bullets hit the muzzle at about 2800 feet per second. Not inches. Feet. The barrel is less than 28 inches long. (23 inches? 24?
I forget the specs for the MG42.)

"So?" (He was starting to try to do the math in his head at this point.)

"So...In order for the gun to put 3 bullets into a 28 inch barrel at the same time, the gun would have to cycle 100 times per second. It only cycles 20 times per second."

He's starting to blink...and then rallies. He announces that he going home to
call his grandfather and he'll come back and prove it. He stomps out and burns rubber as he hits the highway.

"I don't think he'll be back. I think he'll go look it up on the internet...get a calculator...and figure it out."

"Yep. Probably so. Too bad. I think he was gonna buy a gun."

"Win some...Lose some...and some get rained out."

"Yep."

[MegaHurts]

Not a gun shop moment but gold none the less.

A guy I know asked me where I could find a action for his bolt action rifle. He said his was broken?! At first I thought he had a kaboom but further inquiries went something like this.

Me -"So whats wrong with it exactly? What happened?"

"The Magnet is broke."

Me- "The Magnet?! You mean the extractor?!"

"Yeah something is wrong with the pull back"

Me- "You mean the bolt?"

"Yeah my dad shot it and a spring fell out of it. Now it won't fire and stuff".

Yeah....nuff said. lol

[FromMyColdDeadHand]

Had an odd conversation with another customer the other day. He was talking to the salesman about an SBR. There was a break in the conversation so I asked him if he was going the trust or corp route. He said he was just looking over the forms, so I asked him "Wow, so you can get a CLEO sign-off?" and he just gave me a blank stare and repeated the line about 'reading' the forms? He then proceeded to handle the rifle and sweep the whole store, so I started to wonder about his real skill level.

He also said that FN is suing over the ACR design? Did I miss the latest round of lawsuits?

[DragonDoc]

Ballistic Barbie

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Stupidest thing I can recall seeing in a gun store happened with a yuppie couple shopping for a handgun. Owner shows them various makes and models which either caught their eye or which appeared to fit whatever criteria they had. Not being that close and not really listening, I don't know if they had a collective clue, or if the owner was attempting to assist their actually getting one.

The owner has turned to get something behind him. Barbie, giving the acquisition of firearms the full degree of serious attention her little mind can devote to this matter, picks the pistol up, puts it to Ken's head and, with the vapid no-wrinkles pageant smile her ilk learns, pulls the trigger.

I only hope she doesn't breed.................


Zen21Tao Member
Join Date: April 15, 2004
Location: Gainesville, Fl
Posts: 1,945

Stupidest customer at a gunstore:

When a friend and I were at a gunstore a guy walked in and was interested in the militarty arms on the back wall that had orange/red tips (Air Soft). He asked to see one (and MP5) and held in for a couple minutes then gave it back to the clerk. He honestly thought it was a real gun and didn't know how to check the action of he would have noticed it wasn't real. The real gut buster was him talking about he used one just like it while he was a sniper in the Army.

Not necessaily stupid but a moment when a gunstore clerk ignorance worked in my favor:
I was in a gunstore where I saw a DA/SA Sig P239 .40 S&W with a barcode on the slide for $500. The clerk said that all Sigs come from the factory now with barcodes and that I should just rub the barcode off. If I recall correctly he said that he gave this same advice to someone else that he sold a barcoded Sig to. My friend, which is very knowledgble about guns, convinced me that I should buy the gun. Once the sale was done my friend told the clerk that the barcode means the gun was a homeland security gun and since the government only bought DAO this gun (being a DA/SA) must have came from the testing and evaluation program and was very rare.
__________________
UF Pistol Rifle Club
http://grove.ufl.edu/~ufprc/forum/index.php

[smokey0118]

i work at bass pro shops...soo needless to say i'm surrounded by idiots in front of and behind the counter that know nothing about guns. some favorites that spring readily to mind are...

dumbass arundel mills customer- "Yo man, you got that 12 cachunkachunk?!"..."how bout nine millimoe?"

Customer- "i'm looking for a semi-auto handgun under $600 i can use for home defense, but i'm also just starting out so i'd like it to be fairly cheap to shoot"
basspro worker- "Here's a Smith and Wesson 1911, that should fit the bill"
me-"Umm, you probably want to rent a few polymer 9mm's to see what fits you the best out of fnp's, glocks, xd's, m&p's, cz-75's...basically most things but taurus. While you're there a beginner's course for $50 can help you narrow down what works best for you"
basspro worker- "9mm?! ha! he said he wants it for home defense(turns to customer) 9mm just pass right through without doing any damage, you'll have to hit them 20 or so times.... now a .45....if you shoot someone with a 45, they will literally be knocked about 5 feet back so that if it doesn't kill them, it will at least stop them from charging at you"
me-"...that's painfully not true, look into that beginners class and renting some guns to try that aren't $700 more than you said you wanted to spend"
customer- "i dunno, i guess i should go with that 1911. i want something that will knock them back"
me-*facepalm*

while i'm showing a customer a xtrema II another one walks up and asks if we stock any ar's...i tell him nope, sorry and he walks away....
customer with the xtrema II-"geesh, can you believe he wants one of those babykillers? he's probably trying to get it to rob a bank or something. they need to make those illegal, i can't really think of any use for them"
me-"hunting, competitive shooting, home defense, pretty paperweight, investment against fiat currency...." also, if you're against an ar for being deadly then how come semi-auto shotguns are fine?
customer-"oh, please. those guns are for one thing...killing....not like shotguns at all. when was the last time you saw armies trampling off carrying shotguns?"
me-*facepalm*

[Eddiesketti]

Pretty much everything i have heard from the gun clerks at Gander Mountain has been stupid. I do not shop there much anyways. The 5.56 vs .223 comes up alot.

[Beretta]

i work at bass pro shops...soo needless to say i'm surrounded by idiots in front of and behind the counter that know nothing about guns. some favorites that spring readily to mind are...

dumbass arundel mills customer- "Yo man, you got that 12 cachunkachunk?!"..."how bout nine millimoe?"

Customer- "i'm looking for a semi-auto handgun under $600 i can use for home defense, but i'm also just starting out so i'd like it to be fairly cheap to shoot"
basspro worker- "Here's a Smith and Wesson 1911, that should fit the bill"
me-"Umm, you probably want to rent a few polymer 9mm's to see what fits you the best out of fnp's, glocks, xd's, m&p's, cz-75's...basically most things but taurus. While you're there a beginner's course for $50 can help you narrow down what works best for you"
basspro worker- "9mm?! ha! he said he wants it for home defense(turns to customer) 9mm just pass right through without doing any damage, you'll have to hit them 20 or so times.... now a .45....if you shoot someone with a 45, they will literally be knocked about 5 feet back so that if it doesn't kill them, it will at least stop them from charging at you"
me-"...that's painfully not true, look into that beginners class and renting some guns to try that aren't $700 more than you said you wanted to spend"
customer- "i dunno, i guess i should go with that 1911. i want something that will knock them back"
me-*facepalm*

while i'm showing a customer a xtrema II another one walks up and asks if we stock any ar's...i tell him nope, sorry and he walks away....
customer with the xtrema II-"geesh, can you believe he wants one of those babykillers? he's probably trying to get it to rob a bank or something. they need to make those illegal, i can't really think of any use for them"
me-"hunting, competitive shooting, home defense, pretty paperweight, investment against fiat currency...." also, if you're against an ar for being deadly then how come semi-auto shotguns are fine?
customer-"oh, please. those guns are for one thing...killing....not like shotguns at all. when was the last time you saw armies trampling off carrying shotguns?"
me-*facepalm*

Guy comes into store and asks for a shotgun "butt plug" :rofl:

Guy goes into a store with a shotgun and says he put the choke in but can't load shells...search reveals choke has been racked into chamber :facepalm:

Got a Mossenburg?
Got red tips for a (enter calibre)
Got a Picadilly rail for a resticle?

I was a sniper in vietnam....really what rifle did you carry? uhh uhh uhh.

etc etc etc

[smokey0118]

Guy comes into store and asks for a shotgun "butt plug" :rofl:

Guy goes into a store with a shotgun and says he put the choke in but can't load shells...search reveals choke has been racked into chamber :facepalm:

Got a Mossenburg?
Got red tips for a (enter calibre)
Got a Picadilly rail for a resticle?

I was a sniper in vietnam....really what rifle did you carry? uhh uhh uhh.

etc etc etc

"you mean there's a difference between 270 win and 270 weatherby???"
you should've see the mk V he blew up cracked the stock and blew the mag out the bottom. oooh boy.
Attachment 4149

[DragonDoc]

i work at bass pro shops...soo needless to say i'm surrounded by idiots in front of and behind the counter that know nothing about guns. some favorites that spring readily to mind are...

dumbass arundel mills customer- "Yo man, you got that 12 cachunkachunk?!"..."how bout nine millimoe?"

Customer- "i'm looking for a semi-auto handgun under $600 i can use for home defense, but i'm also just starting out so i'd like it to be fairly cheap to shoot"
basspro worker- "Here's a Smith and Wesson 1911, that should fit the bill"
me-"Umm, you probably want to rent a few polymer 9mm's to see what fits you the best out of fnp's, glocks, xd's, m&p's, cz-75's...basically most things but taurus. While you're there a beginner's course for $50 can help you narrow down what works best for you"
basspro worker- "9mm?! ha! he said he wants it for home defense(turns to customer) 9mm just pass right through without doing any damage, you'll have to hit them 20 or so times.... now a .45....if you shoot someone with a 45, they will literally be knocked about 5 feet back so that if it doesn't kill them, it will at least stop them from charging at you"
me-"...that's painfully not true, look into that beginners class and renting some guns to try that aren't $700 more than you said you wanted to spend"
customer- "i dunno, i guess i should go with that 1911. i want something that will knock them back"
me-*facepalm*

while i'm showing a customer a xtrema II another one walks up and asks if we stock any ar's...i tell him nope, sorry and he walks away....
customer with the xtrema II-"geesh, can you believe he wants one of those babykillers? he's probably trying to get it to rob a bank or something. they need to make those illegal, i can't really think of any use for them"
me-"hunting, competitive shooting, home defense, pretty paperweight, investment against fiat currency...." also, if you're against an ar for being deadly then how come semi-auto shotguns are fine?
customer-"oh, please. those guns are for one thing...killing....not like shotguns at all. when was the last time you saw armies trampling off carrying shotguns?"
me-*facepalm*

Sounds like you have a blast at work. I'd tell your co-worker to STFU and just fill out the forms and take the money.

[82ndtrooper]

With all these stories I have yet to meet a "Gun shop" guy has any real experience with firearms.



Sure, they know how to hunt Deer and Turkey, but ask them a question about anythint elsee and they just make shit up, or repeat what some COP some told them during their donut visit.