So, having the weekend off, me and the lady decided to make a day of it and drive an hour and a half to "scenic" Muncie to heck out the gun show, her family's ancestral church and just to waste some time.
The show:
Paid out $5 tribute to get in. Polite staff. Lighting in the place is the WORST of any gun or militaria show I have ever been at. I mean, all gun shows have low lighting for a reason, but jeez, I literally needed a flashlight on half the tables. Very well-attended. We got there around 1:30pm and had to park in the mud. Could barely get through (admittedly too-narrow by any fire code) isles.
First, the hilarious and the utterly insane. NO 5.56/.223 ammo available at any sort of reasonable pricing. The lowest i saw was $17/20rd box of some no name steel cased stuff. Not even crappy Ukrainian/Russian steel cased jusnk that sticks to the chamber on a hot day. I think this $17 stuff was made in Guatemala or Comoros islands out of used tin cans for casings and old WW2 propaganda film for powder. Everywhere else, $20/20ct for a box of ANY .223, even the above-mentioned craptacular bear/wolf/badger/etc. Some guy had a box of some "match grade" stuff i remember selling at Dicks for around $25 a box before this insanely priced at $60 a box of 20 rounds. Really wanted to ask him if the bullets were made of silver to justify that price. And most of it didn't seem to be moving. Hopefully some dealers will learn a lesson there, especially if they leave with full inventory.
Funny story here, on our last run-through (we walk the show at least twice before settling on what the good deals are and buying, and then doing a final round to see what we missed) I am by a table where a guy has chest-rig battlepacks of 5.56 in bandollers. Here's a part of his ''end of day 4pm" sales pitch we overheard him giving to some younger guys in a panic buying mode: "Tell you hwat, this is what I'll do for you. Here I's gots 500 rounds of 5.56 Lace City ammo. Now if you know ANYTHING, you know this is the BEST ammo out there ever made. I'll tell you hwat, best deal you'll get at the show, I'll sell you all 500 rounds, with stripper clips and bandoleers for ONLy $475. Best deal you will ever get on this, they ain't making no' mo' Lake City ammo". We had to walk away I actually started giggling, but didn't want to be rude and screw up his sale to fund his latest tractor part, or whatever guys like him spend money on.
AR's priced at insane levels. Anywhere from $1200 for a dinky lightweight "will start falling apart after 100 rounds" bushmaster carbine toy to $5000 "holy crap why did you attach all this useless stuff all at once to you rifle" pieces. Not even worth touching. AK variants also hovering at $1000 mark. No WASR's or any of the other common stuff even on tables. Only 1-2 SKS's, all way overpriced. Saw a dealer buy an sks-m from a kid though. I walked by him a few times and was planning on getting it off him, but somehow kept getting distracted.
Typical fair of 100 shotguns to 1 other firearm. 5k for some absurd over/under made by someone I never heard of. About half the dealers seem to be displaying personal collections and are just there to hang out with friends, which is typical for a smaller gunshow anyway. Many friendly dealers, which was a big plus.
Mosins couldn't be touched below $200 for total junkers. Not a SINGLE Walther PPK or PPK/s to be seen.
No beef jerky stand (unless we missed it). And we were actually in the mood for some non-FDA approved hillbilly made beef jerky too!
Chatted with Walt of Indiana Self Defense for a bit, he let me fondle some new stuff. Gotta sleep on something he showed me, will likely go pick it up form him during the week. Always great guy to run into and has VERY fair prices of any dealer.
Now the good: yes there were SOME deals to be had. A bunch of 7.62 ammo was seen back to it's cheap pricing, saw a bunch of $8 boxes of the steel lacquered-cased crap. We only shoot brass, so let that one go. Did break down and buy a bag of 50 rounds of Egyptian 7.62x39 for $20 flat. last time i shot the Egyptian brass cased, it performed VERY well, and I am even OK with the price, considering current situation. This saves me from blowing though any of my good Yugo stuff. I should have bought more. If you are going tomm, it's on the left side as you walk in, almost the left corner, first or second table by the wall. Guy seems to have a bunch of bags of it.
Some more obscure modern stuff was decently prices, like saw some Tec 9, Cobray and etc semi-auto "uzi" stuff at a decent pricing. Almost took one home, but the $ was reserved for something specific, so i decided it should just stay in my pocket for the week.
Score of the day: 40 Round AR15 magazine. Just sat there on the second table we looked at right after we walked in. Did a full walkthrough to check all magazine prices, came back and it was still there. The woman ended up buying it right after I pointed it out to her on our second walk-by. As she was fishing for $ in that huge unholy contraption called her purse that houses everything up to a soviet ballistic missile (I assume, I am not brave enough to go in there), some guy asked what it was and if the dealer had anymore. proceeded to eye the mag and drool in almost animal-like fashion. I really thought he was going to fight her for it!
Some guy had some VERY well-priced cold-war era east German surplus stuff. Rucksacks with attachment points for $4, AK 4 mag holders for something like 5-8 bucks, beretta plastic real hinge pistol cases for $5 spot and so on. Almost seemed cheaper then fleabay pricing, plus no shipping or waiting! Picked up a bunch of his stuff as well.
Got a shotgun forend for a double barrel for a $10 bill. Figure I have some older ones missing those forends, so I might be able to fit it. or always trade it/sell it to someone else.
The lady bought some freeze-dried foods too, didn't ask her the prices or anything, she says it was a good deal. I know better then to argue!
Overall, we were pretty happy with the show. For the $10 paid, we got a solid 3+ hours of entertainment, bought some cheap stuff we could use, had a ton of good conversations and met some interesting and fun people. very friendly staff, dealers and fellow attendees.
pet peeves:
1. Guy with a ******* CROSSBOW on your back. The isles are tiny, your stupid piece of pawn store junk almost took my eye out, as well as many other people's. If you feel the need to have something that will stick WAY past your shoulders on your back, use an iota of brainpower you have to be considerate of others and sling it on your side.
2. Obese gentlemen who had more tears in his tshirt to even classify it as a t-shirt anymore. No one needs to see your FULL gut sticking out through what I would only assume would be a hillbilly belly cut-out shirt. If you can afford $5 admission, you can afford to cover yourself up. We're in close proximity here man, I really don't need to be exposed to your sweaty pasty gut-flesh
3. Someone needs to start setting up a table selling cheap male deodorant. Or, you know, take a shower at least a FEW days before attending a public event?
We continued the day by visiting a church the where lady's ancestor was the first pastor and her great-grandfather build the wrought-iron work inside the main hall. Drove a bit around the town. Kinda empty and depressing, but lots of gorgeous Victorian houses and buildings.
Followed by a delicious BBQ ribs dinner right off the White River and a too-long drive home.
Worth the 3+ commute back and forth? Why the heck not!
P.S. none of the above-mentioned characters resemble real people. if you fund yourself resembling anyone in the write-up, be glad I didn't use names or took pictures to go with the story. Feel free to ***** me out privately if you are still angry.
The show:
Paid out $5 tribute to get in. Polite staff. Lighting in the place is the WORST of any gun or militaria show I have ever been at. I mean, all gun shows have low lighting for a reason, but jeez, I literally needed a flashlight on half the tables. Very well-attended. We got there around 1:30pm and had to park in the mud. Could barely get through (admittedly too-narrow by any fire code) isles.
First, the hilarious and the utterly insane. NO 5.56/.223 ammo available at any sort of reasonable pricing. The lowest i saw was $17/20rd box of some no name steel cased stuff. Not even crappy Ukrainian/Russian steel cased jusnk that sticks to the chamber on a hot day. I think this $17 stuff was made in Guatemala or Comoros islands out of used tin cans for casings and old WW2 propaganda film for powder. Everywhere else, $20/20ct for a box of ANY .223, even the above-mentioned craptacular bear/wolf/badger/etc. Some guy had a box of some "match grade" stuff i remember selling at Dicks for around $25 a box before this insanely priced at $60 a box of 20 rounds. Really wanted to ask him if the bullets were made of silver to justify that price. And most of it didn't seem to be moving. Hopefully some dealers will learn a lesson there, especially if they leave with full inventory.
Funny story here, on our last run-through (we walk the show at least twice before settling on what the good deals are and buying, and then doing a final round to see what we missed) I am by a table where a guy has chest-rig battlepacks of 5.56 in bandollers. Here's a part of his ''end of day 4pm" sales pitch we overheard him giving to some younger guys in a panic buying mode: "Tell you hwat, this is what I'll do for you. Here I's gots 500 rounds of 5.56 Lace City ammo. Now if you know ANYTHING, you know this is the BEST ammo out there ever made. I'll tell you hwat, best deal you'll get at the show, I'll sell you all 500 rounds, with stripper clips and bandoleers for ONLy $475. Best deal you will ever get on this, they ain't making no' mo' Lake City ammo". We had to walk away I actually started giggling, but didn't want to be rude and screw up his sale to fund his latest tractor part, or whatever guys like him spend money on.
AR's priced at insane levels. Anywhere from $1200 for a dinky lightweight "will start falling apart after 100 rounds" bushmaster carbine toy to $5000 "holy crap why did you attach all this useless stuff all at once to you rifle" pieces. Not even worth touching. AK variants also hovering at $1000 mark. No WASR's or any of the other common stuff even on tables. Only 1-2 SKS's, all way overpriced. Saw a dealer buy an sks-m from a kid though. I walked by him a few times and was planning on getting it off him, but somehow kept getting distracted.
Typical fair of 100 shotguns to 1 other firearm. 5k for some absurd over/under made by someone I never heard of. About half the dealers seem to be displaying personal collections and are just there to hang out with friends, which is typical for a smaller gunshow anyway. Many friendly dealers, which was a big plus.
Mosins couldn't be touched below $200 for total junkers. Not a SINGLE Walther PPK or PPK/s to be seen.
No beef jerky stand (unless we missed it). And we were actually in the mood for some non-FDA approved hillbilly made beef jerky too!
Chatted with Walt of Indiana Self Defense for a bit, he let me fondle some new stuff. Gotta sleep on something he showed me, will likely go pick it up form him during the week. Always great guy to run into and has VERY fair prices of any dealer.
Now the good: yes there were SOME deals to be had. A bunch of 7.62 ammo was seen back to it's cheap pricing, saw a bunch of $8 boxes of the steel lacquered-cased crap. We only shoot brass, so let that one go. Did break down and buy a bag of 50 rounds of Egyptian 7.62x39 for $20 flat. last time i shot the Egyptian brass cased, it performed VERY well, and I am even OK with the price, considering current situation. This saves me from blowing though any of my good Yugo stuff. I should have bought more. If you are going tomm, it's on the left side as you walk in, almost the left corner, first or second table by the wall. Guy seems to have a bunch of bags of it.
Some more obscure modern stuff was decently prices, like saw some Tec 9, Cobray and etc semi-auto "uzi" stuff at a decent pricing. Almost took one home, but the $ was reserved for something specific, so i decided it should just stay in my pocket for the week.
Score of the day: 40 Round AR15 magazine. Just sat there on the second table we looked at right after we walked in. Did a full walkthrough to check all magazine prices, came back and it was still there. The woman ended up buying it right after I pointed it out to her on our second walk-by. As she was fishing for $ in that huge unholy contraption called her purse that houses everything up to a soviet ballistic missile (I assume, I am not brave enough to go in there), some guy asked what it was and if the dealer had anymore. proceeded to eye the mag and drool in almost animal-like fashion. I really thought he was going to fight her for it!
Some guy had some VERY well-priced cold-war era east German surplus stuff. Rucksacks with attachment points for $4, AK 4 mag holders for something like 5-8 bucks, beretta plastic real hinge pistol cases for $5 spot and so on. Almost seemed cheaper then fleabay pricing, plus no shipping or waiting! Picked up a bunch of his stuff as well.
Got a shotgun forend for a double barrel for a $10 bill. Figure I have some older ones missing those forends, so I might be able to fit it. or always trade it/sell it to someone else.
The lady bought some freeze-dried foods too, didn't ask her the prices or anything, she says it was a good deal. I know better then to argue!
Overall, we were pretty happy with the show. For the $10 paid, we got a solid 3+ hours of entertainment, bought some cheap stuff we could use, had a ton of good conversations and met some interesting and fun people. very friendly staff, dealers and fellow attendees.
pet peeves:
1. Guy with a ******* CROSSBOW on your back. The isles are tiny, your stupid piece of pawn store junk almost took my eye out, as well as many other people's. If you feel the need to have something that will stick WAY past your shoulders on your back, use an iota of brainpower you have to be considerate of others and sling it on your side.
2. Obese gentlemen who had more tears in his tshirt to even classify it as a t-shirt anymore. No one needs to see your FULL gut sticking out through what I would only assume would be a hillbilly belly cut-out shirt. If you can afford $5 admission, you can afford to cover yourself up. We're in close proximity here man, I really don't need to be exposed to your sweaty pasty gut-flesh
3. Someone needs to start setting up a table selling cheap male deodorant. Or, you know, take a shower at least a FEW days before attending a public event?
We continued the day by visiting a church the where lady's ancestor was the first pastor and her great-grandfather build the wrought-iron work inside the main hall. Drove a bit around the town. Kinda empty and depressing, but lots of gorgeous Victorian houses and buildings.
Followed by a delicious BBQ ribs dinner right off the White River and a too-long drive home.
Worth the 3+ commute back and forth? Why the heck not!
P.S. none of the above-mentioned characters resemble real people. if you fund yourself resembling anyone in the write-up, be glad I didn't use names or took pictures to go with the story. Feel free to ***** me out privately if you are still angry.
