Precision Shooting Magazine is closing it's doors.

Sad to see this day come.

I wrote for David Brennan for nearly twelve years, from the late 1980's until 1999.

He gave me the freedom to do the accuracy things that interested me, from 1000yd Varmint rifles, to a nine month series on Schuetzen from A-Z, to Hunter Class Bench Rest shooting, to Ballistics. It connected me to people from Area 51, to Picatinny Arsenal, to nearly all of the firearms and components manufacturers on a first name basis.

We are diminished...

That is one voice that will be missed. Its the only magazine subscription I have. shayne

Sorry to hear that. I subscribed to it for many years. Why? Internet?
Peter.

What I should have said was, "We are diminished"

JMHO:

First let me say, that this is not about ME!! It is about the opportunities David Brennan allowed me, and the rest of the stable, to write about what interested us. A forum on all things accurate rifles.

Summer of 1988 I was donating blood at a church drive. I am a slow leaker, so I took the newest Gun Digest along. Dave Brennan had written an article titled "The Assault On Palmisano", about efforts to provide competition for the 6PPC. A gunsmith named Seeley Masker did his option, the 6mm SM Wasp, a tribute to Harvey Donaldson's 219 Wasp. Dave spearheaded a group that got the old Federal to make a run of 30-30 cases held to match tolerances with a small primer pocket by the same crew that made the Match 222 and 6mm-222 Magnum. AKA the 6x47. Remington was big in BR with the original 40X's for BR.
That evening I dialed information on several cities looking for his number. Got it, called him, and asked about the magazine. He got my address, and sent me a copy; and asked what sort of shooting I did. Rockchucks at longer distances. I wrote him a nine page letter on legal pad, and sent some pictures. Darned if he didn't run it the next issue, and sent me a check for fifty-bucks! It sort of spiraled from there.
Boyd Mace was in Rock Springs, writing about he and "The Old Fart" (Joe Kelly) and shooting Prairie Dogs several hundred yards away with custom rifles.
Mostly, the rest of the magazine articles were BR related. Creighton Audette was talking his "Ladder Method" for finding THE accurate load with a powder.

After a year or so, I started getting calls from people in the industry, offering access to things being developed. I had a source at Picatinny Arsenal who would update me on the new Algorithms for Ballistic Coefficients being developed for the space agency. It was released to Sierra, and that is what caused the new data to come out suggesting three BC's based on velocity.

I got to be friends with Carl Hildebrandt (head of their skunkworks) and CEO Ron Coburn at Savage, who sent me rifles to test, and people at Colt and S&W.

I wrote an article on Russ Haydon, who was an engineer at Boeing, and his fledgling reloading supplies company, the article got him enough ink and orders to get him to leave Boeing and go full time.
That next summer, Russ and I drove to the Super Shoot and he competed. I was introduced to Alan Hall, and Tony Boyer. He had bypass surgery three weeks before the shoot, and still won.

As a Christian I do not believe in magic, but those years at PSM were close...

I think Dave felt that there were enough readers out there to do a second magazine on HiPower and Long Range competition, and that spread the resources too thin.

Aside from that, he is in his mid to late seventies, and just ran out of gas. The past couple years, there was competition from the new NBRSA News, and the economy.

David was the consummate Irishmen, and always got the last laugh. I designed a wildcat Rockchuck hunting 25 caliber, the 6,5x68 Schuler case blown out and necked down to 25 caluber. With a slight dig at Dave I called it the "257 Banshee". Next issue, he promoted me to masthead, and, as was his wont, gave me the masthead title of "Obscurata & Mythology" his "Irish" response to the Banshee.

AGAIN: this is not about me, but the freedom and creativity David Brennan gave the writers. He was one of a kind in the industry. His whimsy was perfected in the "Swimsuit Issue" where he and several other middle aged staffers/shooters wore skimpy swim trunks and held benchrest rifles in strategic positions...

take care,

Rich
Obscurata & Mythology

Very sad. I have several issues that I am behind reading, that I will now cherish

Is this a certainty?
If so I will miss this magazine.
A loyal subscriber since 1992.

muck

A sheep hunter I guided gave me a subscription and kept it going for at least 10yrs, it was a great read and Bob Jordan was my favorite most of the time. One of my favorite articles was the fellow that loaded for his benchrest gun on a Dillon!

Thanks Rich for the refresher!

I understand NBRSA News is reaching out to a number of former contributors about their desire to write for them. They are looking to expand the magazine as Dave did at PS back about 1985. I expect they will be a bit more cautious about what disciplines they invest ink in.

Rich, had no idea of your industry connections. Fascinating! I never subscribed to PS, but often bought issues that interested me. One thing that always amazed me about Dave Brennan was that he always had exactly the same expression on his face in every photo! It was uncanny.

Funny, they were happy to take my credit card for a subscription last week........

If true, it's not the Net, it's just the general "dumbing down" of America.

Any questions ? Watch the movie:

http://www.amazon.com/Idiocrac...TF8&showViewpoints=1

Sad to hear. The same happened when they shut down their sister magazine " The Accurate Rifle" a few years ago.

mlfguns, I disagree. It's hard enough to make a magazine work without introducing another one to compete with it. When PS made the change from a sideline to a business, for the owners/investors, the quality went to hell. Smaller, simpler and less costly to produce would have saved the PS mag. I don't remember readers asking for full color covers, slick shiny paper and privacy envelopes for mailing.

quote:

Originally posted by DocEd:
mlfguns, I disagree. It's hard enough to make a magazine work without introducing another one to compete with it. When PS made the change from a sideline to a business, for the owners/investors, the quality went to hell. Smaller, simpler and less costly to produce would have saved the PS mag. I don't remember readers asking for full color covers, slick shiny paper and privacy envelopes for mailing.

Very true statement.

I have many of the original PS magazines, when it was written by its own readers. And I think it was a far better magazine that it went into later on.

Nooooo! The only shooting magazine I really read. I am devastated. Dave even published three articles I wrote. I guess I'll dump the idea for another article. Very sad.

No readership equals no magazine. Ask Newsweek.

It was a nice magazine but if we're honest, most of it was pretty anal and applicable to .0001% of recreactional shooters.

There are plenty of books that cover all the topics featured in PS, so it's not like the info is unavailable.

As a publisher (of books) I can tell you that is hard enough and I don't have to deal with subscription lists, multiple authors and a product that is obsolete after the next issue is printed.

Subscribe to Rifle, Handloader, Successful Hunter and Gun Tests. If what you seek is not to be found there, then start your own magazine and see how you do. (You'll fold after 6 months unless it's just and ego trip and profitability is of no concern.

Rags and books are on the way out... Mutch rather download and listen on books. Times change--lot of old goats struggle with it but it happens! I am 50 now and took the reading thing pretty hard but now not so bad...

Just to clarify. I don't want to see any firearm or hunting magazine go under period. But the fact of life especially in business there is no sure thing.
I used to be a regular subscriber in the 80's to mid 90's then on and off. I loved the home grown engineers and contributers who pushed their ideas to fruition. I am grateful for their input which pushed the accuracy game many notches for every ones benefit .
P.S. was always the the standard for accuracy and benchrest. Eventually it appeared to cater to individuals on the competition circuit. My interests became more field oriented. I enjoyed the:" Tactical rifle magazine." later renamed:" The accurate rifle." No matter what buss. model they adhered to. They had a first class cadre of writers that wrote about real experience and not a lot of hype or marketing .
A.R. was my favorite magazine. As previous writers have eluded, the internet is becoming and will overtake all other forms of disseminating information exclusively.

Sad news for the naysayers, David is negotiating with two unidentified potential buyer groups for the magazine.

It pleases me to post this good news...

Thank you my fingers are crossed.

So, IHS, when you buy a magazine, what do you get? Serious question!
Peter.

You get the copyright, a mailing list and maybe some unpublished material.

And hopefully the advertisers list and contracts!

I expect David has all of the back issues since he assumed reins of the magazine.

The new owner(s) would be able to see when the subscriptions began to rise, and fall, and have a good idea of what sells subscriptions and what does not.

What did not work would be more important, to me, than what did.

The BR part would be less of a factor, since the NBRSA has their own newsletter.

People want to see new things, but also what other "Rifle Cranks" across the country are doing.

I'm going to miss PS. It was one thing I looked forward to. Yes, it was technical, but compared with a lot of the standard blather in other magazines (which is better, the .270 or .30-06?), I learned something new in each issue.

We are really diminished...Dave published 3 articles I wrote, but declined an offer to publish an article on building my 45-100 double rifle on a Merkel 12 ga action. I see his point--some nitwit would try to build a .458 Win Mag on a hammer damascus, and the lawyers would win, as usual. Good man, Dave, godspeed.

I was unaware that PS was in trouble. I've been a subscriber for many years. I will continue to support it under new owners, at least until they get their feet on the ground and show what they can do. PS has been a major contributor in reducing my ignorance over the years.

New owners?? Eh? Haven't heard of any resurrection. Hey, Saeed, I have a great deal for you.......

Precision Shooting is a unique publication and if it is going out of business we ARE diminished. Anal? Because it presented information that was unique and never seemed to be driven by shooting industry advertising dollars? Interesting to less than .001 percent of the shooting public? I guess most shooters want a Kimber product written up every month in American Rifleman? That magazine used to be excellent and published submissions from readers, now it is a rag that repeats the same crap every month. Ditto for ever other slick gun magazine out there. Very little competition and generally poor writers. Naysayers indeed.

Thank you, Rich, for the information and a peek behind the curtain.


Matt Organ
Carlton, WA

Rich,

Please keep us posted of any development of a "new" Precision Shooting Magazine.

God Bless, Louis

the latest is that there are two separate business entities negotiating for purchase.
If it happens, I may have to hit the new owners up for a job...

I always enjoyed Merril Matins articles. You fellows gave us a rare treasure of information. Thank You.

Merrill & Rick Hornbeck were the last of the "real" writers for PS. Recent years saw a brief series by Calfee which I enjoyed very much.

Do any of you have a copy of the "Swimsuit" Issue?

That might have been the highlight of Dave's stewardship...

Other than Boyd Mace and I!

ps has needed a face lift for some time, 6mmbr.com has shown what ps needed to become, you know benchrest competition has really been at a stalemate since early 1980's its time to change the distances and try something different.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:

quote:

Originally posted by DocEd:
mlfguns, I disagree. It's hard enough to make a magazine work without introducing another one to compete with it. When PS made the change from a sideline to a business, for the owners/investors, the quality went to hell. Smaller, simpler and less costly to produce would have saved the PS mag. I don't remember readers asking for full color covers, slick shiny paper and privacy envelopes for mailing.

Very true statement.

I have many of the original PS magazines, when it was written by its own readers. And I think it was a far better magazine that it went into later on.

I agree 100%, The Handloader magazine also was much better when they published more articles by non-professional writers. Most of what the professional writers write is just advertising. Not of much value to an experienced shooter/reloader.

When anything transitions from fun to focusing on the bottom line...

I.S off topic,but you might want to let your contacts in the benchrest game know what someone ( the socalled C.E.O.of Lothar Walther thinks of their business ?(see SmokinJ's post in the cast Bullets forum, He claims a close friendship with this guy)..,,,Nate

Nate, real BR shooters know the straight scoop on LW ( Blackstar) barrels. Hence you never see them in the equipment lists of registered BR match reports.

they are, hunting rifle barrels...