You do the leg work, not me !!!!!

[Petrol & Powder]

I think every generation believes the younger generations are lazy and spoiled.
I am quite certain our seniors complained about us!

I will submit that the way people learn is changing BUT it has constantly changed throughout history. HOW people learn is just as dynamic as WHAT people learn. It changes over time.

When most people were illiterate, learning was accomplished by verbal instruction, watching and doing the task. Trades were passed on by apprenticeship. Higher educated people might have to learn several languages just to have access to the few written works available and that was at extreme cost.
The advent of movable type and later automated typesetting, greatly increased literacy and the way that people learned changed with that shift in technology.
We are now about 1, maybe 2, generations into another HUGE shift in technology that is affecting the WAY people learn.

The incredible amount of information that is now instantly available is staggering. Yes, I know it's not always correct or reliable information but that is nothing new. Propaganda, misinformation, rumors and lies are nothing new. Despite the drawbacks of the digital age, there is a great deal of good included.

I am often frustrated that this incredible availability of information and knowledge is wasted on the dumbest, laziest, most underserving generation to every live.......and then I remember my statement at the beginning of this post. "Every generation believes the younger generations are lazy and spoiled. "

 

[hporter]

Every generation believes the younger generations are lazy and spoiled

I often wonder if there is some truth to that generalized belief.

My wife's grandmother just turned 97 last month. Last time we were up visiting she gave us a tour of all the places she had lived as a child, and to the schools she attended. The elementary school was a good 5 miles from their house. She said they did take shortcuts through friendly farmers pastures where they could, on her walk to school. But it was still a good haul.

And in my neighborhood we have an elementary school. And on drop off and pick up times, there are probably over 50 cars queued up to drop the kids off, as the yellow school buses pull out with about 25% occupancy.

That is just one example of the radical changes in the last century. And I understand that parents fear their kids might be abducted. But what example are we teaching kids when we drive them to school, so they don't have to ride the bus. Buy them $1000 cell phones when they are 6 years old. Allow them to sit and play video games for hours and hours after school.

The main reason I brought my wife's grandmother up was that she did not have running water or electricity in their house until she was in grade school. And then, only electricity. Think about that. Most of us have spent a lot of time outdoors and understand the planning and effort it takes to go without electricity or refrigeration for periods of time. These people lived that way 100% of the time, and then through the depression years. I always marvel at the toughness those generations exhibited. As well as the generations before them who struck out into the unknown to settle this country.

It is not hard for me to imagine why older generations generalize about the newer generations being lazy and spoiled, because compared to the lives they led, I think we are - relatively speaking. Not to say there are not many hardworking earnest people in our world. But we do have it hundreds of times easier, day to day, than they did.

I think the folks that are being described in this thread probably deserve the scorn they are getting.

But the most rewarding part of life is living long enough to share what you know, while still paying attention to what more can be learned.

Being a mentor to someone can be a rewarding enterprise. I liked JeffH's story of the young man who listened, understood the value in what he was being told, and willingly sat down and gave it a shot. I enjoy reading of Ben's stories of mentoring his grandson. I wish my grandfathers would have lived long enough to mentor me. Fortunately my uncle stepped in and fulfilled that role. And I will be forever greatful for that act of kindness.

 

[Ben]

Can I shoot a bullet made for a gas check without a gas check?


Don't we all wish we had a $1 for every time this one has been asked.
Ben

 

[Bisley]

It is the quick, fast, easy way that appeals to them ( with you doing all the research for them ) .

There's one jewel amongst the rubble, Ben. The reason so many have not hurt themselves is that range trips, setting up targets, supplying equipment (there's more than just the gun) takes time, money and gets monotonous. It even takes more effort than buying / referencing a book. It requires patience to test a load, and learn to shoot it well. Their focus changes. And then there's the whole issue of following directions, like rules on a firing range...

What I like referencing on the internet is, so many first-time gun owners selling back their guns because the novelty has simply worn off.

I still remember in 1985, when Dad's arsenal of literature in the reloading room proved insufficient. Phil Sharps, early Lyman and Hornady reloading manuals, and even the gun rag solons proved insufficient to the collection of modern Sierra rifle bullets on hand. So I dug into my birthday and pop can money, and spent a whopping $15.00 and change for Handloading for Handgunners, and a Sierra reloading manual. I still have the Sierra, the Lyman, and refer to them the old fashioned way.

 

[glassparman]

I actually enjoy finding old data manuals so I con find what I need WITHOUT using that internet.
Funny statement coming from a 30+ year IT guy!

I just like to do things the old fashioned way without all the technology.

Mike

 

[Jeff H]

..............

I think Ian hit the nail on the head in post #12- They don't know HOW to learn.....................

I run into this daily. I have to teach people to learn before I can teach them what they need to know and be able to do. It is a monumental effort trying to squeeze what basically becomes two curricula in one semester.

Everyone wants Youtube videos - monkey see - monkey do. Nnnnnope! I advise them strongly to NOT look stuff up on the Internet unless I've vetted it or they've finally developed their olfactory senses to the extent they can distinguish between what's plausible and what fell out a bull's butt. Anything BUT the technical aspects are fair game for accessing information from that magic box in their pocket - literature, language, vocabulary, history, etc. is OK. I do actually make them source legitimate, official technical documentation that way in order to complete one lab - access REAL information from the manufacturer, not some hack's video-wisdom about how things work.

The good news is that most of them come around and eventually appreciate their new knowledge pertaining to how to GET knowledge, but the trend today is to put everything online and video yourself doing lecture or demonstrating things so students can access it at their leisure. Ummm, NO! This is WORK! Without WORK, it won't WORK! Work for them, and more and more work for me every year.

 

[Bisley]

They grew up with Siri. Blurt out a question and get an answer.
I deal with it all day at work.

I agree with Ian. They didn’t learn to search for an answer the way most of us did. Truly a generation gap.

We invited a friend and his wife over, who told us to always check if Siri was on.
"Why?" I asked. "I did not turn it on."

"Siri! What's the best way to hide a dead body?"

We check all the time now.

 

[RBHarter]

I'm just a whelp here . I was raised with WW1 war babies , depression babies and war babies .......we skipped boomers all together .
My great grandmother left Ohio in a covered wagon for Iowa . Then they rode the train to California and farmed what is probably a parking structure in the LA basin , Garden Grove I think . The wagon and train were the only choices besides walking or riding a horse or oxen . In 1925 she drove to Nashville from Los Angeles . She was in her early 60s and lived about 50 miles from where the first aircraft sonic boom happened so it's likely she heard it . Her son before he was 50 walked past a lab with a lit cigarette and messed up a Sidewinder tracking test . Shortly after she saw man walk on the moon .

In 90 yr we jumped from applied " arrvd SF CA . Jo" to seeing " 1 small step ....." Being about the same delivery time of transmission . In 50 yr we have gone from the cutting edge slide rule and a comp book paired with a stop watch to confirm 4 hours of punch card inputs to track a 90 flight . Now we have a magic box about the size of a pack of smokes that tells us how long , how far , how fast , when we should arrive , road delays , and which side of the street you're on . It can have and run an audio chronograph , drop calculator , 200 hr of audio , make a phone call , get you through a calculus class and stepped up to the full size of that cigarette/change purse every woman in the 70s had keep the collective works of Shakespeare , Poe , Bittanica , and Van Braun at your finger tips .
It does often refuse to do a thing for my spelling .......

 

[KeithB]

In today's world of global shortages I am a little more sympathetic to folks that CAN'T get the powders they would normally use and which are well documented online and in-print and are asking for help finding a suitable substitute that may have never been listed in a manual.

It's OK in my book to answer a question with a suggestion to look in a certain place to find an answer.

 

[Hawk]

I get the main crux of the complaint, but isn't that generally what this forum is set up to accomplish. Not to give final, accomplished load data that fits all circumstances, that doesn't exist, but to discuss issues and give advice on solutions. Mentor, if you will.
I get asked all the time to recommend a caliber, gun and brand and type of ammuntion for self defense.
There is no correct answer for everyone, as is evidenced by some of the more lively discussions on this forum (9mm vs 45 acp vs 357 vs wheel gun vs 1911 vs glock vs grip angle, you get the idea). So I give advice that will help the person figure it out for themselves. Usually this involves letting them shoot a few of my guns, under my close supervision.
I try to mentor them. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.
I feel the knowledge, both collectively and individually, on this forum is tremendous. We each have specific knowledge and experiences unique to ourselves that we can share to help others. That's the reason I read every post on this forum.
I just see it as an opportunity to mentor someone and teach them how to figure it out for themselves and eventually pass on some of the knowledge I've acquired over my lifetime, as limited as it might be.
And who knows, they might eventually teach me something!
Sorry, I can really ramble sometimes.

 

[smokeywolf]

Learned the basics of using a slide rule by the time I was a teenager. Always kept one in a math folder during high school. Had to take a test one day in a geometry class. Teacher says, "No calculators during the test." About 20 minutes into the test, teacher taps me on the shoulder, points to the slide rule and says, "I'd let you keep using that, but it wouldn't be fair to the other students".
After class, the teacher asks me when I learned to use a slide rule. Told him, when I was about 11 years old I asked my father to teach me to use one. He wrote "+3" on my test. He said, that's for your ambition to learn. The following week he dedicated 2 days to teaching the class to use a slide rule.
Mr. Farrow was retired Navy and a graduate of Annapolis.

 

[Red Bear]

I wonder, now, if he still has all his body parts.
Maybe, maybe not..............
-----------------------------------------------------
The fact that we don't have more " blow ups " today, is a real testimony to the gun manufacturers and their metallurgy / engineering depts.

i for one do not take load advice on line except from powder company or other well known source. even then with a grain of salt. have seen load data that could not be right. others seem to want there gun to do things it was not intended to do. to some people everything is a magnum. even old manuals can have some rather ify info.

 

[Ben]

So very true ! !

 

[Mitty38]

Can I shoot a bullet made for a gas check without a gas check

So can You? LOL

My first experience with loading was as a kid. Watching my uncle wack a mole 45-70. With a full case powder charge. He had no book. Just knew the one load. Had ordered everything in a kit from Western Auto years before.
I had always wanted to get into loading after that but had idea where to get info, powder, bullets, moulds,l. Etc.
I had no Idea where to get books, or that Hodgden had a website.
Had no clue as to what questions to ask.
So had to start some where.

If it was not for a fellow answering my question, "what is the best gun to load for?" I would never have Started loading or casting. I would not have this rich experience to pass on to locals here who want to load.
A fellow on another sight(RIP) "Gandog", answered that. Told me to get a Taurus 357 magnum with a 6 inch barrel. Get that first, learn to shot it well with stock ammo, and he would walk me thru the rest. Whether right or wrong it got me started.
Then He and Lamar proceed to teach me where to go for materials, supplies, load info. What book to buy to get started. Etc
I will always be greatful to those two.
Now I help teach a hands on class. I teach hand loading for the .357 or 38.
Working on setting up a basic casting class.

So many people have benefited
From my one stupid question being answered. We never give them a final load, we do leave them with a Lee manual, and we'll instructed as how to work up a load.
Many of you have contributed to that class unwitingly.
We have about 1out of 10 actually follow thru beyond, the first class. Most just find out it is not for them.
When all it said and done,I make enough for the gas it takes to go over there, and a couple cups of coffee. It does benefit the local sporting goods store with a customer base, and our club with some good solid members But that is not what it is about. Nor is out about the 9 who never follow thru. Or the same stupid questions I get to answer twice a month.
It is about getting that One guy or gal, off to a good safe start, with a good solid hook to hang their hat on. Getting them in with a group of peers that can mentor each other.
I never give load info, except for a few rare cases.
I understand the reward of researching and working up a load and try to pass that on to my students

 

[Petrol & Powder]

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers."

Socrates (469–399 B.C.)

 

[Snakeoil]

Blame the school system. In elementary school, the entire class would go to the library once a week. You could read books, find a book to take out or research some assignment in the various encyclopedias that were there. Pretty sure that continued right up thru the 6th grade. Not sure if they even use the library anymore.

I'm sure the generation that is our age said similar stuff about us when we were young idiots. I've always been fascinated with anything mechanical and would take my toys apart when I was a kid. But not everyone is like that. My finance guy would come to the house and ask what I was working on in the shop. When I showed him the Suzuki roadracer I was building, his jaw dropped. He said he is always in awe of anyone that understands mechanics. He, on the other hand is a wizard with numbers and investments. So, if he wanted to ride a bike, he'd need lots of help from someone that knew what they were doing. Financially, he'd done very well for me.

I'm sure everyone here learned stuff from a big brother, their Dad, a uncle or just an older guy that would let kids hang around his shop and ask questions. I'm not sure that parents are as engaged with their kids as ours were. Normally, both parent works. Kids get dropped off at soccer or some other sport or diversion and the folks pick them up later. Family camping trips, picnics and such are probably not something that happens as regularly as it did when we were kids. Hell, the two great picnic areas that were just open land along a creek no longer have any picnickers at all. The big state park in the mountains above our house is never full of folks picnicking. I'm not sure what families do together anymore. So, think of yourself at that grumpy old guy that ran the service station on the corner and that kids hung around and picked his brain for wisdom in building their hot-rods.

I would not be too hard on the new entries to the sport. Teach them to fish, rather than give them a fish. Those that are truly interested will be grateful for the help and venture forward. Those that are not interested in the learning process will just have to find something else to do. I think that was true when we were kids and still is. We are all a product of our environment. Don't just tell them to get a loading manual. Tell they why it's a good idea and what it will contribute to them learning about all the pitfalls and black magic that is reloading.

We have a guy at the club that is a total mystery to most. He's been shooting for years and seems to have learned nothing. Guys bitch about him and talk about him behind his back, making fun of him. They are like a bunch of high school kids. Some are concerned he will blow up a gun and hurt somebody. I don't know him well, but others do. Why not offer to give him some guidance. Explain the risks of not knowing all there is to know. We have another shooter who was experimenting with loads by "just adding a bit more" to a load. Not measuring it, not even understanding what kinds of pressures he might be producing. He was just flat out ignorant on the subject and has since been schooled by a few guys in the club. He just didn't know. And if you buy a loading manual, are all the warnings in the front that important or just some junk lawyers made them put in there?

 

[RBHarter]

What would you say to 26.0 Unique in a 264WM ? 3 sources . I didn't go there made me sad to even think about a 12ga 1-1/8 oz charge of powder in a rifle case with such a tiny hole in the front of it 8-9 yr later I've found lots of data that suggests that Unique is stable into the middle 40kpsi level ........ Who'da thought ?

I made an honest but really stupid mistake in the course of learning from that I've found a particular line of moulds really aren't anywhere near as accurate as they are commonly known to be . NOE is by casters for casters . Should that be castors ? No probably not . Anyway theirs run fat usually in areas over looked by those that aren't dedicated to level 4 and above .
RCBS has been an adventure , they run with WW amalgamations 6-12.5% over listed values .

There's a significant difference in data from 500-530 gr , there's also a significant difference in case intrusion between 530s that seat at 2.55 and 3.10 in a 45-70 even with smokeless at TD levels . Then there was the 200-230s in the 06' seated out to 3.99" , I don't remember what's standard for an 06' anymore but I know it's not 93gr at 2.875 or 230gr at 3.99 .

I really want to believe that first and foremost if a person is asking for suggestions that they are doing so because the choices are just overwhelming , they have tried loads that looked good on paper but just won't talk to their arms , or their just looking to get in the right group of pews so they don't have to try out every one in the whole church . There are a few that don't want to do any work . For those I'm pretty sure that most of what I offer is useless , they won't have a 50+ yr old rifle that was special order at a time when when an 8.5" twist in a .308 dia 30 cal was just foolishness let alone in an 06' that seats out to 3.99 to think about kissing the lands .

Apparently also unpopular , I shoot heavy bullets and slow powders for cal/cartridge alot above 35/9/38 cal pistols and in most rifles . It does make it easier to brag jacketed speeds with cast . Long ways to go in a 25-06' that is in the rough with a 120 jacket and a death ray with 115&117s , different story all together though .

When I joined over there was just before the population explosion .
Whether you like the blovations or not there was a massive lunge forward in distilled knowledge and a lot of shoulder standing happening there . I don't remember all of the names and I guess that isn't important really . There was the guy with the 300 RUM shooting paper patch sub MOA with a 180 gr bullet at 3000 fps .
There was the purpose built rifles for the 3000 fps 150 gr 30 cal .
The 44 mag with some insane round count ....30,000 and counting ?
3,000+ pages of HyTek data .
Beagle .
Leementing .
Bruce B soft points .
And 10,000 other posts prefaced with " my data is mine and you use it at your own risk " or some iteration of that .
I wouldn't be doing the things I'm doing with the rifles I'm doing it with without all of that sharing of data . While I say that as a gross reference to all of the information and knowledge gleaned in the last 17 years it applies to all of the try this in about this window . Sometimes it was a success and sometimes it wasn't but when it was a failure then I knew the other direction was where I needed to go .
One of the loads I shoot now is so completely wrong in terms of normal inputs for nominal results that it really shouldn't work at all . Without shared data specifically for the cartridge , barrel combinations , alloy information , and what is more a particular purpose specific bullet it wouldn't have happened for me . I've shared that with several others openly so probably 1000s indirectly . I won't take credit for every success because the 6.8 SPCII is pretty easy to make shoot well but a lot of folks borrowed details and got the same results with awfully close inputs .

I love the storyline of how 2 horses backsides in Rome about the time Pilotus washed his hands dictated a design feature of the Space Shuttle in circa 1978 . Without sharing whether it's the big picture or the pin point detail we wouldn't be doing what we do every day at the range .

 

[JWFilips]

Learned the basics of using a slide rule by the time I was a teenager. Always kept one in a math folder during high school. Had to take a test one day in a geometry class. Teacher says, "No calculators during the test." About 20 minutes into the test, teacher taps me on the shoulder, points to the slide rule and says, "I'd let you keep using that, but it wouldn't be fair to the other students".

Smoky, Same here but with reading "vernier calculating instruments": In the early 1970's I always preferred using the original late 1800's calculation
Optical micrometers that came with the 9" Alvin Clark telescope, when Keystone College bought the telescope from Dave Garroway! A beautiful Brass masterpiece of an instrument for calculations of double stars distances and the size of the nucleus of a comet, Etc. I guess I have always been fond of History and antiques! Amazingly, a bunch of my other associates were into all of the new electronic instruments used for measuring things in space that were donated to the new Keystone Observatory!... That was right about the time of the introduction of the HP 45 hand calculator!
They did a test a few times with my manual calculating instrument against
their new fangled electronic equipment and mine were the same or closer to the published documentation for that time!

 

[RicinYakima]

I try to look backways to what I am doing. If I am loading powder made in the 1930, I look for original 1930's loading data and reduce and work from there. My lathe is 75 years old, so when I need to learn something new, I use the appropriate material.

 

[Bret4207]

I have the same Audels book, and many others in the series. Great info in there!

To be clear, I'm all in favor of helping someone. Absolutely, positively, 100% in favor. I'll walk them through step by step to Point A and maybe B+C too. I figure Point C is about where I'm at, so I'll give all I've got. But that's for people that ask for help, not for people who DEMAND answers. There was a guy here a couple 3 months back. He wanted exactly what he wanted, didn't want any other thoughts or angles on what he was doing and he wanted it NOW! He was actually rude in his posts when guys were trying to warn/clue him in about the dozen other options and angles available to get where he seemed to want to go. I believe he made it about a week or 10 days before he was ushered out the door.

Those are the people who don't deserve help. They need to learn how to learn and some basic manners. I would imagine that guy was under 30 and would be one of the entitled types we run into more and more these days.