Cy and Lauren Hudson brought an updated version of their flagship firearm to SHOT Show this year, the Hudson H9A. We spoke with Lauren Hudson to learn what makes this new handgun so unique.

After long decades of mainly using pistols locally made by Forjas Taurus, Brazilian LE agencies have been turning their attention to products from overseas manufacturers, mainly in the wake of multiple reports of technical/safety issues with the “bull brand” weapons. It should be recalled that IMBEL – Indústria de Material Bélico do Brasil has been a longtime supplier of pistols for the armed forces and  some police forces, but, somehow, their single-action M1911-based guns are not so popular in the local LE scenario, although some models have been adopted by local agencies.

While I do like using iron sights on this particular rifle, I admit: The original buckhorn sights aren’t awesome.  They’ve worked alright for hunting wild boar at close ranges, but shots past 100 yards get tricky.  I worked up a table for my 3 primary hunting loads on this rifle as to where their point of impact is at what range on what rear sight elevation setting.  Despite this, I don’t ever want to be fumbling with the rear sight elevator during a hunt.  Back when I was testing out their new extractor claw, Ranger Point Precision was also nice enough to send me one of their front and rear sight assemblies to try out.

Guncrafter Industries are the people behind the .50GI, a .50 cal pistol round that can be used in .45acp pistol hosts. They caliber convert a 1911 and even a Glock.

A key part of the capability brought to the table by the US Army’s new Squad Designated Marksman Rifle is its chambering for the 7.62mm round. Specifically, this chambering allows the SDMR to fire the (also brand new) XM1158 Advanced Armor Piercing (ADVAP) round, designed to give the squad the capability to defeat advanced ceramic armors at combat ranges. There may be juuuuust one little problem, though: Cost. The US Army’s Ammunition Budget Justification for Fiscal Year 2019 was released this month; in it was procurement information on the XM1158 ADVAP, and a bit of a shocking sticker price to boot:

The US Army wants to give its soldiers more punch and reach: In the Fiscal Year 2019 Budget Estimate Justification Book for the United States Army, the service outlined its strategy for procuring M110A1 Compact Semi-Automatic Sniper System (CSASS) rifles from Heckler & Koch to outfit its squads with a 7.62mm precision semiautomatic rifle, called the Squad Designated Marksman Rifle (SDMR). The primary justification for this move was confirmed in recent Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) hearings to be the ability to launch the Army’s new XM1158 Advanced Armor Piercing (ADVAP) round, which is based on the projectile design introduced with the M855A1 Enhanced Performance Round (EPR), but with a core made of tungsten alloy, rather than steel.

While walking the aisles at the Great American Outdoor Show, I came across these at the Inland Mfg booth. Ohio based Inland Manufacturing are the guys behind the reproduction M1 Carbines and are also collaborating with Ithaca to make reproduction M37 trench shotguns.Inland Manufacturing is following the recent trend and offering short barreled versions of their shotguns and calling the line the Stakeout.

Shooting for Women Alliance had me at the tagline, “It’s not about pink. It’s about you”!

What do you do when you’re a hard working nurse practitioner mother and wife, your husband is in law enforcement? Imagine, you’ve got 6 kids, and just don’t have the time to find a holster that will work with the scrubs you have to wear every day or any other outfit? With no business background, Mike and Tessa Renaud created Lethal Lace to solve that issue!

Meet my new friend, Kristen. She’s the brains behind Packin’ Neat.

Boasting the tagline “designed to keep you beautifully concealed”, the ladies at Miss Concealed brought the heat this year at SHOT Show 2018 with their line of “Hidden Heat” concealed carry holsters.

Many women say that most of the EDC pocketbooks look outdated and are impractical. Gun Tote’N Mama’s founder Claudie Chisholm is changing the EDC accessory marketplace for women.

This year at SHOT 2018 Lancer has produced a new AR magazine well extension and a designated .300 AAC BLK Advanced Warfighter Magazine (AWM). After hearing of a designated .300 AAC BLK magazine I was somewhat confused as I had always assumed magazines would function the same whether running .223, 5.56, or .300 Blackout. When I asked more about the magazine I found the .300 Blackout magazine had a different internal geometry with increased rib clearance for better feeding and to prevent binding with 200-grain bullets or heavier, significantly increasing reliability.

The theme for this year’s SHOT Show 2018 (for this writer, at least) was the focus on the female shooter. Not surprisingly, there were more female-centered booths this year than any other year in SHOT Show history. One such booth was the Girls With Guns (GWG) booth.

SHOT show always boasts a wide assortment of new gear, with 2018 being no exception.  Visiting the Nighthawk booth a particular pistol stood out with its new collaboration between Nighthawk, Hillbilly 223, and Agency Arms. These companies came together to produce the Agent 2. The Agent 1 was Agency’s first collaboration with Nighthawk Custom Firearms announced last year at the NRA Annual Meeting in 2017. A conservative amount of only 50 units were made as they were a limited edition production. The Agent 1 is a 1911 in a Commander size frame and chambered in 9mm.

In an age where everything has to be “Tactical”, GPS gets to the point (although the company does have some “tactical” themed lines”). The company was founded by a Trap and Skeet shooter who simply needed a better way to carry range equipment back and forth. What I’ve always liked about the company is their vision to make a shooting bag tailored for a shooters needs. Different pockets purely made for magazines, cleaning rod holders, separate ammunition storage compartments, etc… A range bag really needs this sort of design input because of the peculiar things needed during a training session. Such as the fact that the bag needs to support a large amount of weight (such as firearms and ammunition). But at the same time, you’re not going to be running through an obstacle course with the equipment.

The sanctions on Russian companies have hit the American AK enthusiast hard – no longer can we import inexpensive Izhevsk Kalashnikovs to feed the beast. Yet, there is a silver lining: Domestic AK production is on the rise to meet the demand, and one company in particular is staking its name – the biggest name in the business – on American-made AKs done right. That name being, of course, Kalashnikov USA.

Trigger Point Technology is a small company in California that has integrated visible and IR light and aiming lasers into controls on the magazine well and trigger of the AR platform.

In the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Wednesday, top Army officers talked about their plans to modernize the force, and, as part of that, replace both the M249 SAW and the M4 Carbine, the latter of which has been in service since the early 1990s. The replacement effort is called the Next Generation Squad Weapon (NGSW), formerly referred to as the Next Generation Squad Automatic Rifle (NGSAR), and will involve an industry competition to select the weapon that best meets the Army’s requirements for the future. In his testimony, Deputy Chief of Staff, G-8 Lt. General John G. Murray, spoke about the NGSW:

A long-awaited update on the much-delayed Compact Semiautomatic Sniper System program came with the recent Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) hearing that was conducted Wednesday. In his testimony, Deputy Chief of Staff, G-8 Lieutenant General John M. Murray told the Committee that the Army’s Squad Designated Marksman Rifle program, an evolution of the CSASS, is expected to hit the field sometime this year. The Squad Designated Marksman Rifle was revealed as an offshoot of the CSASS program by the PEO Soldier Program Office in September of last year, although reportedly it constitutes a modified version of the base M110A1. Accompanying the new weapon will be the new Advanced Armor Piercing (ADVAP) round coming in 2019. The ADVAP is an improved tungsten cored anti-armor round which will replace the much harder to produce and much more expensive M993 AP round. Lt. Gen. Murray said:

Despite the suggestion being raised more than once in Congress, the United States Army will not be buying M27 Infantry Automatic Rifles from Heckler & Koch, but instead is devoting its small arms resources towards the Next Generation Squad Automatic Rifle program, which is now being referred to under the broader name “Next Generation Squad Weapon”. The NGSW program is focused on delivering a new “10x” improvement over current small arms, with the focus primarily on defeating heavy ceramic body armor at combat ranges. According to testimony from Deputy Chief of Staff, G-8 Lt. General John M. Murray during a recent Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, the NGSW program will use an intermediate caliber between 5.56mm and 7.62mm, and leverage lightweight ammunition in the form of cased telescoped (CT) technology. From his testimony:

TFBTV’s Corey Wardrop speaks with Henry owner Anthony Imperato on his millionth H001 repeating rifle.

At SHOT Show 2018 we speak with Christopher Goodall at the Davidsons booth. Chris gives a brief overview of the history of the company – which now offers services to both dealers and individual buyers via galleryofguns.com, and he shows us some of the firearms he’s most excited about.

In this episode of TFBTV, James discusses his Top 5 Guns from SHOT Show 2018. There were a lot of innovative and interesting new guns at SHOT 2018, and in this video, James gives consideration to all of them, from the practical, to the tactical, to the fantastical. See what James believes to be this year’s best 5 guns.

What’s not to love about Faxon? Between their insanely accurate barrels, their pricepoint that works with just about any dollar figure you’re looking to spend, and the fact that they are consistently reinventing themselves as the market changes and fluctuates – it’s obvious that the folks at Faxon truly love what they do and are GREAT at it.

In today’s episode, we follow Miles to Shot Show 2018 at the Surefire booth.

The Jard J68 is a bullpup carbine developed by Jard Inc. Jard operates out of Sheldon, Iowa, and is known for the aftermarket triggers they offer for a variety of firearms. However, they also have some innovative firearm designs of their own, and one of them is the J68.

SHOT’s tough. Not only is it demanding of your time and patience, but it’s physically challenging, as the TFBTV cast is usually up at 7am every day to film video, and then they cut that day’s video until 2am or later. Wash, rinse, and repeat that process for the week so we can upload SHOT vids to YouTube and TFB within 12-24 hours of recording. It’s a grisly and fatiguing process, but we do it for TFB readers, TFBTV viewers, and just for the love of the Show so you guys can get hot and fresh coverage while SHOT is still happening in Vegas.

While this mythical knife-gun – the Arsenal RS-1 – has been to a few SHOT Shows in the past, this year represents the last of these hand-made, unusual pieces, as they are no longer being manufactured. Sure, they are pretty neat and unique but – are they worth $2,500? Thoughts in the comments below.

In this episode of TFBTV’s SHOT Show 2018 coverage, James discusses SIG’s new 716 Gen2 DMR (designated marksman rifle) in 6.5mm Creedmoor.