We conducted a 1-day (8-hour) Carbine-1 Course at our home based range. The Carbine-1 Course is designed to give the user a solid fundamental base. Our day started with an introduction of our staff, and everyone doing their own introduction. From there we went through our safety rules, procedures, and our medical protocol (to include our rule of “Don’t Shoot The Medic”). The student base of this course was a mix of people that haven't had any formal training, some people who have trained with us or some other company, to people that have trained with us for decades.
Rifles present were a mix of AR15 type rifles in 5.56 like SLR15, Colt, BCM, LWRC, Daniel Defense, Noveske, DPMS, LWRC, Sig Sauer, PWS, Bushmaster, Stag, some custom builds, and an Olympic .40S&W carbine. Students Gear ranged from different chest rigs, plate carriers, battle belts, slings, and subloads. Handguns were a mix of mostly Glocks, a few Smith & Wesson M&P's, Sig Sauer, 1911's, Springfield XD, & Ruger.
We started the day with a short session on maintenance and lubrication, making sure all rifles were lubricated with Slip2000 "EWL" Extreme Weapons Lube. During the maintenance session, we found a DPMS carrier key (gas key) that wasn’t staked, we remedied this with a MOACKS tool.
We stepped onto the range and divided the group into two relays, so everyone has a partner. We went through a session of weapons handling, manipulations, loading, unloading, and shooting fundamentals. Our first shooting exercise started at about the 10yd line (what we refer to as room & hallway distances) going through a series of standing & shooting fundamental s. This standing position session is done to show everyone what is natural vs comfortable, what recoil is and how the body works with or not with it, and how to manage recoil, and shows everyone the differences between bladed vs squared up. We also introduced concepts of hammer vs controlled fire, with our emphasis on controlled fire.
Once everyone was finding their own preferred standing platform, we showed all the uses and differences between sling systems and mounting options. The sling type set ups included single point, traditional two point, tactical two point, and three point slings. Once everyone was good on sling usage, we did a transition drill to drive the point home of how and why to use a sling, and how and when to transition from the rifle to something else. This transition also shows people and our staff of where peoples pistol skills are at, and who needs pistol work. A few more drills were done for skill building of getting the rifle mounted, shots on target, and follow through procedures of our doctrine. Everyone was tasked with taking a lunch break to replenish fluids, nutrients, and ammunition.
After a short lunch break, we met on the 25yd line and lectured on zeroing. This included what the AR15 weapons sighting system was designed for and how it works, to include the A1, A2, and short sight radius guns like the M4 sighting systems. We also showed alternative zeroing options same plane apertures, optics, and gave examples of alternative zeroing distance tables (to include our preference of the 50yd zero). Everyone checked zeroes, this allowed everyone to see how the different sighting systems and zeroing targets work.
Once everyone had obtained a reasonable zero, we went through a session on traditional and alternative shooting positions. This session started from different ground positions of prone, sitting, kneeling, squatting, etc. The shooting position session allows everyone to see what a good stable shooting base allows for accuracy, and then we offer some alternatives that allow combat accuracy while using cover or concealment. We run through the shooting position session several times to make sure everyone is squared away. The last part of the day we moved to the 100yd line and put out the steel targets. At 100yds we allow everyone to use as many of the shooting positions and variables of them on the steel targets as they wish. The shooting on steel drives confidence home that you can hit targets with a rifle (even iron sighted) if you do your job, and it shows that all the positions work, that some positions are more stable than others, but all of them work if the shooter does their part. We ended that day with some of our reloading drills, and a few other exercises.
Notes: An excellent day by all. Everyone shot well, and did their part for safe weapons handling, and learning. We only had one weapon issue, and it was the Olympic .40S&W carbine that ran on Glock magazines, it had feeding issues of making it unreliable. It is our understanding that the student who owns the Olympic, has possibly made arrangements to obtain something in 5.56.
CY6
Greg Sullivan "Sully"
SLR15 Rifles
TheDefensiveEdge.com
(763) 712-0123