Freezing rifle test - Garand Thumb

[carbonbased]

Hmmmm seems like not many have experienced an ice storm, whoops, sorry, ICE STORM.

Anyway, for giggles here’s a 1996 vintage news piece on MN’s coldest recorded air temp of -60F. Got down to -73F I guess, but the National Weather Service poo-poo’d that as the residents moved the official weather recording box to the coldest location they could find.

Don’t miss the part with the bananas!

Here’s one of many crazy blizzards in ND. Three day blizzard in 1966, 30-40ft high drifts, 20-30” of snow, 70mph winds gusting up to 100mph, 74,500 head of cattle died. Dude is standing on a drift so high that he’s near the top of a power line pole. Look at the poles behind him.

Here’s a official NWS story on it if you think the photo is a fake: https://www.weather.gov/fgf/blizzardof66

When farmers had to use the outhouse in those types of blizzards they used to drag a rope tied to the front door. Why? Because people got lost due to the whiteout during a blizzard and died. The rope helped them find their way back.

Heck, in the middle of ND my dad’s parents didn’t get electric power strung to them until he was 18, in 1958! Christ what a hellhole. Looks like the damn surface of Mars out there.

I love historical cold weather stories. If anyone has a Finn or Russian etc contact with cool (but true) cold (or hot) weather stories, send ‘em my way. Love to chat with them.

Why hot weather stories? Why, because in the 1980s I lived through an actual goddamn 1930s dust storm in Fargo. Felt like Lawerence of Arabia (straight version lol) as I stood outside in my ski goggles and getting pelted. Was +100F. I remember watching that movie-quality giant cloud thing bearing down upon us, just thinking wtf do these people stay in this godforsaken place???

Wound up with 4” of tiny clay pellets all over my mom’s freshly laid sod. Had to power rake it off pronto.

National news at that time:
A small boulder rolls across the highway in CA? National news be all: OMG OMG OMG

 

[Mike_in_FL]

That’s 94 clicks/comments he’s not getting on YouTube, but that one video has generate more chatter here than any I can remember.

Time to retest the pepper grenades!

While that may be true and the ultimate effect might be less $ for GT, better information is in this thread than the video.

 

[RUTGERS95]

Hmmmm seems like not many have experienced an ice storm, whoops, sorry, ICE STORM.

Anyway, for giggles here’s a 1996 vintage news piece on MN’s coldest recorded air temp of -60F. Got down to -73F I guess, but the National Weather Service poo-poo’d that as the residents moved the official weather recording box to the coldest location they could find.

Don’t miss the part with the bananas!

Here’s one of many crazy blizzards in ND. Three day blizzard in 1966, 30-40ft high drifts, 20-30” of snow, 70mph winds gusting up to 100mph, 74,500 head of cattle died. Dude is standing on a drift so high that he’s near the top of a power line pole. Look at the poles behind him.

View attachment 7788307

Here’s a official NWS story on it if you think the photo is a fake: https://www.weather.gov/fgf/blizzardof66

When farmers had to use the outhouse in those types of blizzards they used to drag a rope tied to the front door. Why? Because people got lost due to the whiteout during a blizzard and died. The rope helped them find their way back.

Heck, in the middle of ND my dad’s parents didn’t get electric power strung to them until he was 18, in 1958! Christ what a hellhole. Looks like the damn surface of Mars out there.

I love historical cold weather stories. If anyone has a Finn or Russian etc contact with cool (but true) cold (or hot) weather stories, send ‘em my way. Love to chat with them.

Why hot weather stories? Why, because in the 1980s I lived through an actual goddamn 1930s dust storm in Fargo. Felt like Lawerence of Arabia (straight version lol) as I stood outside in my ski goggles and getting pelted. Was +100F. I remember watching that movie-quality giant cloud thing bearing down upon us, just thinking wtf do these people stay in this godforsaken place???

Wound up with 4” of tiny clay pellets all over my mom’s freshly laid sod. Had to power rake it off pronto.

National news at that time:
A small boulder rolls across the highway in CA? National news be all: OMG OMG OMG

holy #hit that is a LOT of snow

 

[carbonbased]

holy #hit that is a LOT of snow

Just 2ft to 2.5ft of snowfall that time, but out in open country with +70mph winds equals big drifts. Even during “regular” blizzards, drifts are a hazard, especially at near-zero visibility on the highway. Boom!

 

[carbonbased]

So I finally watched all of Garand Thumb’s freeze video. That was pretty cool. Some thoughts:

• Getting caught out in a proper vicious ice storm, either without shelter or during a fight, would incur worse results than his second “slobby-water” test. As in more ice.
• He didn’t wear a hat the whole time. First rule of cold weather (even 20F) is, “If you don’t want to get cold, stay warm.” Sounds dumb until you figure the riddle out. A lot harder to warm up once you’re freezing. Second rule is, “Try not to sweat.”
• Didn’t see much foggy breath.
• The virtues of a reciprocating bolt knob became apparent (or at least a decent way to physically force the bolt home).
• The vid makes me want an AK lol. First time for everything, I suppose.

 

[RUTGERS95]

Just 2ft to 2.5ft of snowfall that time, but out in open country with +70mph winds equals big drifts. Even during “regular” blizzards, drifts are a hazard, especially at near-zero visibility on the highway. Boom!

that was my first thought but even in the background you can see it must be deep. surprised only 2.5ft. thanks!!!!!!

 

[Eurodriver]

Did not read all the replies. I did see enough to know that pouring water into a rifle in freezing temps is a bad idea.
One of the coldest large scale battles in history was Chosin R. Many weapons froze up but I think the M1's did as well or better than any IIRC.
M1 carbines not so much.

Came in here to say this.

I’m not a flannel daddy fanboy (he seems like a good dude but if I was gonna jerk off over online videos like his followers do I’d just go to Pornhub) and appreciate the stuff he shows but nobody is gonna pour a bunch of liquid water on their weapons in below freezing temps. I mean perhaps if you had to ford an unfrozen river, but then you’d die in a few hours anyway.

The KAC freezing rifle video is much more better. And it’s got a bronze star with combat V recipient in it…

 

[carbonbased]

Came in here to say this.

I’m not a flannel daddy fanboy (he seems like a good dude but if I was gonna jerk off over online videos like his followers do I’d just go to Pornhub) and appreciate the stuff he shows but nobody is gonna pour a bunch of liquid water on their weapons in below freezing temps. I mean perhaps if you had to ford an unfrozen river, but then you’d die in a few hours anyway.

The KAC freezing rifle video is much more better. And it’s got a bronze star with combat V recipient in it…

Errrr…perhaps you didn’t read my post and don’t live in the upper Midwest? I found ice storm vids from many places in the US, but by the looks of them, the following day was warm (compared to Fargo) and the ice came off rather easily.

A battle in an ice storm would not occur very often, that’s for sure, but in such a situation ice would indeed build up frightenly fast in a weapon that you are holding in your hands (and upon you as well). If you do not have a means to cover the weapon…

Now, testing for it…one could argue that it’s a rare enough scenario that it isn’t worth to test for. Ok, fine.

But realize Mother Nature (by way of Fargo lol) has some aces up its sleeve and will bring that hammer down.

Realize that the worst scenario is an ice storm followed by -20/-30/-40F. Then, unlike the below vids, the ice will not shatter with a rubber mallet if it’s thick enough, unless you want to dent the crap outta your car. This is what has happened to me multiple times.

Russian ice storm

Science behind ice storms

Ice on a car window

Car just sliding away…

Edit: the very first part of this vid is what it’s like to hit a blizzard in Fargo and just have to…stop. Now imagine it does not let up. For days.

Man, that wind howl is activating my Fargo-Weather PTSD…gaaaaaah!

Fargo is trying to kill you!

 

[RUTGERS95]

Errrr…perhaps you didn’t read my post and don’t live in the upper Midwest? I found ice storm vids from many places in the US, but by the looks of them, the following day was warm (compared to Fargo) and the ice came off rather easily.

A battle in an ice storm would not occur very often, that’s for sure, but in such a situation ice would indeed build up frightenly fast in a weapon that you are holding in your hands (and upon you as well). If you do not have a means to cover the weapon…

Now, testing for it…one could argue that it’s a rare enough scenario that it isn’t worth to test for. Ok, fine.

But realize Mother Nature (by way of Fargo lol) has some aces up its sleeve and will bring that hammer down.

Realize that the worst scenario is an ice storm followed by -20/-30/-40F. Then, unlike the below vids, the ice will not shatter with a rubber mallet if it’s thick enough, unless you want to dent the crap outta your car. This is what has happened to me multiple times.

Russian ice storm

Science behind ice storms

Ice on a car window

Car just sliding away…

Edit: the very first part of this vid is what it’s like to hit a blizzard in Fargo and just have to…stop. Now imagine it does not let up. For days.

Man, that wind howl is activating my Fargo-Weather PTSD…gaaaaaah!

Fargo is trying to kill you!

some great links here

 

[carbonbased]

some great links here

Thanks man. The Fargo blizzard in the vid (occurred just a few days ago) wasn’t even a “bad” blizzard. Here is a bit worse one in a back road. I linked into 2:30. This dude has a funny commentary from a blizzard many years ago, but he’s only within Fargo city limits. Nice ice on the windshield, though.

Before cell phones, if your car crapped out or you got stuck, there was a real possibility of dying in your car if you did not have the right emergency kit onboard.

Can you imagine running into a 30-40 drift from 1966? Or, if you got stuck in it when it was “just” a wee 5 footer+70mph winds, you could just have been buried alive while napping in your car! Found a vid on that 1966 blizzard.

Anyway, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Unless you lose your legs and arms in a blizzard lol.

 

[corey4]

Errrr…perhaps you didn’t read my post and don’t live in the upper Midwest? I found ice storm vids from many places in the US, but by the looks of them, the following day was warm (compared to Fargo) and the ice came off rather easily.

A battle in an ice storm would not occur very often, that’s for sure, but in such a situation ice would indeed build up frightenly fast in a weapon that you are holding in your hands (and upon you as well). If you do not have a means to cover the weapon…

Now, testing for it…one could argue that it’s a rare enough scenario that it isn’t worth to test for. Ok, fine.

But realize Mother Nature (by way of Fargo lol) has some aces up its sleeve and will bring that hammer down.

Realize that the worst scenario is an ice storm followed by -20/-30/-40F. Then, unlike the below vids, the ice will not shatter with a rubber mallet if it’s thick enough, unless you want to dent the crap outta your car. This is what has happened to me multiple times.

Russian ice storm

Science behind ice storms

Ice on a car window

Car just sliding away…

Edit: the very first part of this vid is what it’s like to hit a blizzard in Fargo and just have to…stop. Now imagine it does not let up. For days.

Man, that wind howl is activating my Fargo-Weather PTSD…gaaaaaah!

Fargo is trying to kill you!

fuck all that!

thank you for posting though

 

[RUTGERS95]

here is one with the estonian lmt

 

[LRRPF52]

There’s even more to go wrong that would seize that gun up, and it still chugged along just fine. Impressive.

 

[RUTGERS95]

There’s even more to go wrong that would seize that gun up, and it still chugged along just fine. Impressive.

I thought that too. I remember reading that LMT improved their piston design, heat treating etc and would have to imagine that the trials for Estonia would have included cold weather testing but damn, that thing had water dumped on it, sat over night and he kickstarted that fker right up. impressed I am

 

[hlee]

Ultimate freeze test…

 

[Steve_In_29]

here is one with the estonian lmt

While he might have checked it off camera, he is damn lucky none of that water made its way into the suppressor to freeze solid.

 

[GUNNER10]

I thought that too. I remember reading that LMT improved their piston design, heat treating etc and would have to imagine that the trials for Estonia would have included cold weather testing but damn, that thing had water dumped on it, sat over night and he kickstarted that fker right up. impressed I am

Not exactly sure what they have been doing with their piston guns but the 12 inch piston barrel that I picked up is really good. I am sure they have refined their design taking into account alot of the test data that they get from various defense testing. It shoots smoother than my 16 mid barrel, as smooth as if not better than my spec war barrel. I've never been a big proponent of piston AR's, but LMT's are damn good.

Not sure what voodoo Elliot used to get that rifle to run in ice cube mode but what ever.

 

[RUTGERS95]

Not exactly sure what they have been doing with their piston guns but the 12 inch piston barrel that I picked up is really good. I am sure they have refined their design taking into account alot of the test data that they get from various defense testing. It shoots smoother than my 16 mid barrel, as smooth as if not better than my spec war barrel. I've never been a big proponent of piston AR's, but LMT's are damn good.

Not sure what voodoo Elliot used to get that rifle to run in ice cube mode but what ever.

me too, never a big fan of the piston although I did have a m6a2 and a3 that I eventually sold but I'm about to find out with LMTs, I just bought one and it's on it's way to the ffl I want to buy a 14.5" barrel for it but oos

 

[GUNNER10]

Such a good barrel

 

[RUTGERS95]

Such a good barrel

I'm going to call lmt on monday and see about the 14.5 and the 16" barrels. Being in NJ, i need to change the comp which is a pia. I ordered a dead air brake which I like better.

 

[carbonbased]

While he might have checked it off camera, he is damn lucky none of that water made its way into the suppressor to freeze solid.

Yes, there is something a bit off with this fellow. So I slept on it and rewatched his video carefully.

He doesn’t allow comments on his videos. He also doesn’t mention what lube the rifle has going.

After he pours water on the rifle, he immediately gave it a couple stomps/kicks with a particularly odd one on the buttstock. That doesn’t make sense, other to shake some water out of the gun. And as others note, after the rifle is unearthed, he takes it offscreen. There, he grunts mightily. Odd.

The problems with the AR-pattern rifles in Garand’s videos were around the safety being extremely hard to move, ditto the mag release, mag issues (frozen mag springs or rounds freezing in mag), trigger group freezing, and the bolt not cycling. Here, at roughly 20 degrees colder than Garand’s test, exactly zero of those things happened…although he made it sound like the safety was hard to move (as he easily flicked it into place).

After he empties the mag, he removes it, and liquid (water?) pours out of the mag well. Seems a bit much? Or maybe not? Was it water, or something else? I don’t know, I’ve never done such a test.

In the limited research I did on this rifle, I didn’t find any special cold-weather enhancements done for the RAHE. However, the bolt is “euro spec” and can be put on safe even with the hammer dropped. Perhaps that makes the safety less prone to freezing?

If we spot the gun a “safety pass”, that leaves the mag springs, frozen rounds, mag release, trigger group, and ice-binding-the-bolt type of problems still in play, but the RAHE seems to operate like a gun at 70°F. Here’s another vid of his with a different AR with equally curious results.

All this with a rifle that, on its face, doesn’t seem materially different than the piston or DI ARs in Garand’s test.

This is strange.

He says he left the rifle for only one hour, but the captions he added later say two hours. Weird. I can’t say the time discrepancy would make any difference, but I’m looking for things that don’t line up.

At the test’s end, he nonchalantly tosses the rifle into the snow and later carelessly hoses it down (like he would with cattle or pigs) and finally, he leaves it on the garage floor as he swaggers off camera. All this feels strange.

There’s a dearth of reviews on Farro’s Lead Farm on the internet except for a number of 5 star Google reviews left by people that have one or two reviews to their name. He often replies to people that leave poor Google reviews with a hostile manner.

The biz does not come up on the BBB site, and there is a curious one star rating by a former employee on Glassdoor. I couldn’t even locate chatter on ARF or other forums.

Edit: He said it was "2°F a little while ago" in the Jan 20th uploaded video, and suggested the viewer confirm this (without telling us the date of filming). He uploaded the slow-mo footage on Jan 16th. On Jan 16th, the airport near his biz showed this historical temp record:
7am: 2°F degrees (low); 3pm: 39°F (high). 39°F is downright balmy.

The airport is ~10.7 mi from his biz as the crow flies.

But perhaps he conducted his test on Jan 7, the next earliest possible time in which it got down to 2°F during the daylight hours.

The point is, why not tell us the exact day? I mean, Iowa is not particularly cold as cold states go (but he sure makes it seem like it's the coldest place on earth). Again, it's just sort of weird.

I guess I would discount the tests from this fellow. It all seems too easy, and he also sells guns (perhaps not ALL the guns he tests). As you may recall, we've just had a master scammer get booted off the site. Retrospectively in that last situation, lots of very knowledgeable/experienced people (Terry Cross was one) said they noticed a bunch of little things that just didn’t line up, but their enthusiasm made them ignore their gut. Here, I’m trying not to let that happen with me.

I just feel like I’m being sold something, you know?

 

[carbonbased]

I dug a little deeper into the temperature record and other stuff and updated my post above. FYI.

 

[RUTGERS95]

impressive, most impressive! If I could give you the Darth Vader vid I would!

 

[GUNNER10]

Yes, there is something a bit off with this fellow. So I slept on it and rewatched his video carefully.

He doesn’t allow comments on his videos. He also doesn’t mention what lube the rifle has going.

After he pours water on the rifle, he immediately gave it a couple stomps/kicks with a particularly odd one on the buttstock. That doesn’t make sense, other to shake some water out of the gun. And as others note, after the rifle is unearthed, he takes it offscreen. There, he grunts mightily. Odd.

The problems with the AR-pattern rifles in Garand’s videos were around the safety being extremely hard to move, ditto the mag release, mag issues (frozen mag springs or rounds freezing in mag), trigger group freezing, and the bolt not cycling. Here, at roughly 20 degrees colder than Garand’s test, exactly zero of those things happened…although he made it sound like the safety was hard to move (as he easily flicked it into place).

After he empties the mag, he removes it, and liquid (water?) pours out of the mag well. Seems a bit much? Or maybe not? Was it water, or something else? I don’t know, I’ve never done such a test.

In the limited research I did on this rifle, I didn’t find any special cold-weather enhancements done for the RAHE. However, the bolt is “euro spec” and can be put on safe even with the hammer dropped. Perhaps that makes the safety less prone to freezing?

If we spot the gun a “safety pass”, that leaves the mag springs, frozen rounds, mag release, trigger group, and ice-binding-the-bolt type of problems still in play, but the RAHE seems to operate like a gun at 70°F. Here’s another vid of his with a different AR with equally curious results.

All this with a rifle that, on its face, doesn’t seem materially different than the piston or DI ARs in Garand’s test.

This is strange.

He says he left the rifle for only one hour, but the captions he added later say two hours. Weird. I can’t say the time discrepancy would make any difference, but I’m looking for things that don’t line up.

At the test’s end, he nonchalantly tosses the rifle into the snow and later carelessly hoses it down (like he would with cattle or pigs) and finally, he leaves it on the garage floor as he swaggers off camera. All this feels strange.

There’s a dearth of reviews on Farro’s Lead Farm on the internet except for a number of 5 star Google reviews left by people that have one or two reviews to their name. He often replies to people that leave poor Google reviews with a hostile manner.

The biz does not come up on the BBB site, and there is a curious one star rating by a former employee on Glassdoor. I couldn’t even locate chatter on ARF or other forums.

Edit: He said it was "2°F a little while ago" in the Jan 20th uploaded video, and suggested the viewer confirm this (without telling us the date of filming). He uploaded the slow-mo footage on Jan 16th. On Jan 16th, the airport near his biz showed this historical temp record:
7am: 2°F degrees (low); 3pm: 39°F (high). 39°F is downright balmy.

The airport is ~10.7 mi from his biz as the crow flies.

But perhaps he conducted his test on Jan 7, the next earliest possible time in which it got down to 2°F during the daylight hours.

The point is, why not tell us the exact day? I mean, Iowa is not particularly cold as cold states go (but he sure makes it seem like it's the coldest place on earth). Again, it's just sort of weird.

I guess I would discount the tests from this fellow. It all seems too easy, and he also sells guns (perhaps not ALL the guns he tests). As you may recall, we've just had a master scammer get booted off the site. Retrospectively in that last situation, lots of very knowledgeable/experienced people (Terry Cross was one) said they noticed a bunch of little things that just didn’t line up, but their enthusiasm made them ignore their gut. Here, I’m trying not to let that happen with me.

I just feel like I’m being sold something, you know?

LoL... Not sure I would of put that much energy into a silly youtube video/ I can't really dispute any of the above observations, but only can offer that the limitation of the AR as well as the AK are fairly well known. as long as one keeps a water bottle away from an AR in cold weather or a wheel barrel of mud away from an AK, both system tend to work well.

 

[carbonbased]

I can't really dispute any of the above observations, but only can offer that the limitation of the AR as well as the AK are fairly well known. as long as one keeps a water bottle away from an AR in cold weather or a wheel barrel of mud away from an AK, both system tend to work well.

Could I ask you a favor, my good man? Please telegram Mr. Farro with your insights? He doesn't quite appear to have received the memo.

 

[Naaman]

Such a good barrel

So much 'Murica in this pic. I love it.

 

[elwarpo]

I remember on exercise, I was training officers of the US 10th mountain infantry in winter warfare in the late 80s in northern Quebec. We still had the FALS (C1A1 and C2a1), Stirling SMGs and Browning HPs. They had M16s (cant remember which ones, possibly A2s). Weather was typical -20s during the day and -30 to -40 at night. One night got down to almost -50. Most of the 10th followed our instructions of delubing them with Kerosene and then either using a silicone based lube or graphite. Both have advantages and disadvantages. A couple of them did not and regretted it. No live ammo only blanks (I did have 1 mag of live 7.62 for bears and wolves in a bright yellow mag to make sure it was not used by accident), We trained with the Rangers who were armed with Lee Enfields.
We had one section of infantry - 6 C1a1, 2 C2a1 and I had a Stirling because I liked them. There were 22 of them all with M16s, and we were lucky to have 5 rangers with us. For those that do not know the Rangers are made up of Inuit men and act as a reserve force. They are truly the arctic experts, and while I spent 15 years in the Canadian Infantry, was a winter warfare instructor, I never stopped learning new things from them. One C2 has an issue (faulty safety sear, so full auto only), otherwise all the FALS ran without an issue. Of the M16s the ones they did not lube were pretty much useless, if they worked at all they were single shot. We ended up dunking them in a drum of diesel and they ran better after they were graphited. Overall the M16s ran about 95% of the time, one or 2 malfunctions per mag until they warmed up. After about a week they started to run better as we wiped out gunked lube and used graphite. Remember we were firing a lot of blanks and they really dirty up a weapon. The stirling ran like a champ, the heavy bolt and heavy spring made the difference, that plus very few moving parts. One reason I liked it. The Fals were 40+ years old and well worn, we replaced them with C7s (M16s) about a year later and i always missed them.
The real take away is if a weapon got wet, we warmed it up and dried it. The easiest way to dry it is fire a mag or 2 of blanks. Except for one time where we had a surprise freezing rain followed by quick freeze, I never saw weapons get wet. We made sure of that. The arctic is so dry, if water did melt on the weapon, it evaporated quickly. Water is unique it sublimates, goes directly from solid to gas without going through the liquid phase.
Long story short, proper lube will keep any weapon running in the cold.