So I did!

Well, all right, technically I didn't rent a machine gun. They did have one available, a Colt LMG (which is really just a beefed-up M16, but it's technically classified as a light machine gun, hence the name, or squad automatic weapon), but I decided for my first-ever experience with full-auto I should be a little less ambitious, so I went for their H&K MP5 instead. There was a briefing, I had to sign a waiver, and since it was my first visit to this particular range and my first full-auto experience the range safety officer had to stand right there behind me the whole time (which I certainly didn't mind, hey, unknown quantity and all).

I suspect prior customers may have set the bar as far as staff expectations pretty low, since part of the safety briefing was, and I'm not kidding here, "Let's try and keep it outta the ceiling."

In the event, this proved to be not difficult. The MP5 is quite a docile submachinegun. It's chambered in 9mm Parabellum, which is not exactly a ripsnorting cartridge in a handgun, let alone a small shoulder arm. It does tend to climb a bit - the point of aim drifts upward and toward the shooter's strong side - but only to the extent that after three or four rounds you're not on target any more. (Burst fire is where it's at with these things.) You'd have to be completely not paying attention, or panicking, to actually manage to start shooting up the ceiling. Once I demonstrated to the range officer that I was not in fact a complete yonk, the three of us all got on quite well.

And I didn't suck! Which was nice. Particularly considering that the over-glasses safety specs I had to wear had fogged up to the point where I more or less couldn't see the front sight any more by the last magazine. :) (I didn't have my machine-shop-certified safety glasses, which would surely have been sufficient for range use as well.)

I haven't been shooting at a proper indoor firing range in years. Since I moved back to Podunk in... gosh... 2002, it's been all goin' out to the gravel pit all the time, and I haven't even been arsed to do that for a few summers now. Until this place opened, the only indoor range within a jillion miles of here belonged to a rod & gun club, and they only let NRA members join. Since I'm not gonna join the NRA anytime soon, that was a problem.

Anyway. If for some weird reason you find yourself in the greater Bangor, Maine area and hanker after some range time (or you need a camo net, some hand warmers, a THESE COLORS DON'T RUN flag, or a German 3-piece mess tin), Maine Military Supply out in Holden will hook you up. Nice facility, friendly folks, as right-wing as you would expect of surplus store staffers but not anywhere near as scary as the dude who used to run the other army surplus store in that area back when I was in high school. Unpaid endorsement. My only complaint is that they carry very few old, weird used guns; almost all of their stock for sale is new.

The man tells me they will soon have a full-auto AK-47 in their rent-a-machinegun stable. Sadly, the Maxim gun on display in the showroom does not work, and is neither for sale nor available to cart out to the range and shoot. (Nor is the MP 40 on the wall.) However, if you have $300 and an empty space in your living room that you just can't think what to do with, they will sell you a Vietnam-era M29 mortar.

Also, they have a MiG in the parking lot.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

...!
Gott's Leetle Feesh in Trousers!