I went to the Manchester, NH Firing Range this past friday with a fellow board member to rent a few full auto subguns. We were pleasantly surprised to be greeted by BISHOP, who read here that we were coming to the range. It was good to see you again, BISHOP! Sorry you had to go back to work.

When you enter the shop area, you are greeted by a large wall full of full auto HKs, UZIs, Colts, Thompsons, MACs, AKs, ETC. The counter area has a pile of range pistols. Probably more GROCKS than anything else. The floor area has a 1919 and a big Ma Duece. In short, a little slice of heaven that you won't find anywhere (legally!) in the socialist state of NY in private ownership.

We put a 9mm MP5SPW, a .45 UMP, a .45 Thompson, a  short-barreled Colt 9mm, and lastly, a battle-worn UZI 9 mm, through their paces. We went 1000 9mm rounds and 500 .45 rounds in, ahem, a short amount of time. The 9mm's were obviously more controllable than the .45s. The range is indoors with a max distance of around 20 yds. We placed targets (clamped to a pulley system and electric motor) at varying ranges.

We shot the MP5 first, the UZI last. These were our favorites. The winner, however, in our limited experience, was the old UZI. This sucker was accurate and had virtually ZERO muzzle climb when you dumped the rounds down range. Both the UZI and the Thompson were open bolt. This is a strange sensation at first. I shot one group at ~7+ yds on full auto...burrrp...all done. The full mag was in one 2-3inch ragged hole. Very neat. The only jam we experienced was with that same old UZI, 2 failures to feed. Perhaps the fastest cyclic rate we observed was a .380 MAC. That sucker was fast.

The young man behind the rental counter obviously likes his job and was very knowlegdeable about the guns. Some of the things of interest when talking about maintenance: The HK MP5 is their most popular rental. It hoses downs "10,000's" of rounds a year. Regular cleaning is necessary for reliability. Maybe a new barrel at the end of the year. The Thompson? "Oh, I never clean that!"

They also have frangible ammo to allow you to fire some of the larger caliber stuff. One guy shot an M60 with 3-4 belts of frangible .308 while we were there. Maybe next time.

Also many pistols for rent. We inquired about the .50 AE Desert Eagle. They have Eagles in .357, .44, and .50. Every single one was DOA with a broken extractor. Seems to be a pattern there. I guess they don't make great range guns.

In short, this place was a winner. We had a blast (pun intended!). I thought the prices were very reasonable.

I was very sad, however, as we entered back into NY, "home" of the She-beast and Chuckie Shumer. I guess its true when they say you won't miss something if you haven't experienced it. Now, more than ever, it sucked to head back to NY's restrictive gun laws.

Gotta love Manchester Firing Line.  Only NH could get away with putting a gun range right across the street from a little-league field.  hehe...  I was in there on Thursday afternoon after taking off from work early.  (Work in Bedford, MA).  Brought my Sig-229 up with me and used that a little.  I'm convinced I need to send it into the factory for some maintenance.  If I take a loaded mag (10 or 12-rd) of non-hollowpoint, load the mag into the Sig and then release the slide, the first round jams about 1/2 to 2/3 of the way into the chamber.  A slight tap to the floorplate of the mag allows it to continue feading.  But I digress...  Anyway, after using my Sig, I rented the UMP-45 and was pretty impressed.  Lightweight, holosight, 25-rd mag, verticle fore-grip.  Had some nice groupings with it even all the way out to maximum distance on the range.