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Traveling Armed in America: Why is it so Complicated? (ft. Elite Tactical Systems)
Description
State of the Second hosts Kaylee and John sit down with Eddie from Elite Tactical Systems (ETS) for an episode that runs from magazine engineering into the maze of laws gun owners face when they travel across state lines. Eddie has worked in the firearms industry for about 20 years, including stints at Remington, AOB, Timney, and Crimson Trace, and he explains why he left big companies for a small one. His line is that "big ships turn slow" while small companies stay agile, which is why ETS can develop a brand new magazine for a gun like the Echelon in the same time a large company spends just getting the paperwork done.
Most of the show dismantles magazine myths and explains why the magazine is so often an afterthought in gun design. Eddie says the old advice to never leave mags loaded no longer holds for magazines made in roughly the last decade, because wear comes from cycling, not from sitting loaded. He walks through ETS testing, including laser scanners that measure every critical dimension so a bad batch can be tracked, quarantined, and kept off the market. He says there are probably about eight true magazine engineers in America, calls tuning a magazine a "dark art," and points to the industry trend toward standardizing on AR, Glock, and CZ pattern mags. Kaylee and Eddie also push first-time owners to get training and go shoot, since both hosts note how overwhelming and expensive the first purchase can be.
The Soapbox segment turns to the episode's title question: why traveling armed in America is so complicated. Eddie describes routing a trip through Memphis to add an hour to his drive just so he could legally carry his gun and the rounds he wanted to use. John recounts driving a U-Haul full of guns through Illinois and being "butt puckered" the whole way, then learning later that some restrictions only applied to residents. Kaylee argues the pro-gun side keeps losing "the battle of language" by adopting terms like "high capacity magazine" and "red flag law," which she calls a gun confiscation order. They cover the push for national reciprocity, the absurdity of state rosters that reject a gun over a screw type or the color of a chamber flag, and the way restrictive places like D.C. normalize what they call tyranny. The episode closes with ETS contact info and a plug for GOALS in Knoxville, Tennessee on August 9th and 10th.
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Questions this episode answers
Why did Eddie leave large firearms companies like Remington and Crimson Trace to work at a small company like ETS?
Eddie's view is that big ships turn slow, so the large companies he came from move at a crawl. A small company like Elite Tactical Systems stays agile and can develop a brand new magazine for a gun like the Echelon in the time a large company spends just on paperwork.
Do you really need to avoid leaving your magazines loaded, and how often should you change them out?
Eddie says the old advice to never leave magazines loaded no longer holds for mags made in roughly the last decade. Spring wear comes from cycling the magazine, not from sitting loaded, so leaving a modern mag loaded is fine.
Why is the magazine so often treated as an afterthought when a new gun is designed?
Tuning a magazine is what Eddie calls a dark art, and he estimates there are only about eight true magazine engineers in America. Many designers build the gun first and treat the mag as an afterthought, though the better approach is to build the gun around a mag that already works.
How does ETS test its magazines for quality?
ETS uses laser scanners that measure every critical dimension of a magazine. That lets the company track a bad batch, quarantine it, and keep it off the market.