Repost: (+) THE ART OF THE (WEAPONS) CACHE (+)

Sad to say, the march of anti-constitutional laws continues to quicken the pace. Today tens of thousands of law abiding citizens face becoming "armchair felons" because they are not gullible enough to comply with mandatory registration and licensing of long owned firearms. Collectors have been raided on bogus pretexts, then arrested for "paper violations", and had their assets seized. It's a shame, but in many jurisdictions your AR-15 or SKS is an "outlaw rifle", and you are at risk every day that you keep it in your house. It is doubly a shame because these are exactly the types of arms the founding fathers were speaking of when they wrote the 2nd Amendment...

So if you will not register or turn in your weapons, and are reluctant to keep some of them in your house, what is to be done with them, to preserve them for use at some future date? Many folks just say "bury them" but this is simplistic and may be self defeating, for a buried gun may be rusted, forgotten, or paved over in time. The "art of the cache" is then the subject of this lesson.

First we must define a few terms, for there are several classes of caches. A fighting cache or ready cache is one where a rifle or other weapon is kept, sighted in and with the correct ammunition and cleaning gear, available on short notice. A long term cache should be able to lay undetected for years if need be. An Escape and Evasion cache will contain a complete getaway kit in addition to a firearm, against the day that the owner finds himself pursued by enemies.

An E&E cache will contain the items listed in Squantos' E&E kits, as well as hair dye, "instant tan" lotion, scissors, a razor, a nylon windbreaker and a hat for a quick appearance change. Cash, gold, a space blanket, a poncho for shelter and a pistol would also be included. All of these items can be kept in a .50 caliber metal ammo box available at any army surplus store.

What arms to cache? If you are considering caching any weapons, it makes sense to cache both your black "outlaw" firearms and your cheap surplus military rifles, the Enfields and SKS's and so on. The former may land you in legal trouble, the latter are inexpensive and may best prove their worth by waiting hidden and silent for the moment of need. Pistols also should be considered, particularly inexpensive surplus police revolvers. There is no other type of firearm which may be handed to a complete novice with confidence that the new shooter will be able to use it effectively on the first try, and you may someday be in the position of arming a complete novice. Millions of non-shooters may become ardent RKBA advocates in the years to come and you should consider arms for them as well as for yourself.

Where should you locate your cache?I will consider three broad areas: rural caches, urban caches, and underwater caches.

The Rural Cache: In the countryside, cache options abound far beyond the cliched hole in the ground, although that option is not to be left out! In the boonies, look for old private junkyards, every big farm has at least one on the back 40! Rusty forgotten tractors, cars, refrigerators and farm equipment are made to order, full of hidden nooks and crannies where a rifle or three may be inserted, yet remain readily available. Of course, hiding firearms in and around old iron negates the chance of technical detection. Abandoned farmhouses, barns, ruins, and foundations provide countless hiding places, as do small caves, worked out mines, and graveyards. And of course you can just bury your package, preferably near or around some clutter of old scrap metal to provide magnetic camouflage.

The Urban Cache: In cities and towns you must be a bit more creative to find a good cache location which will remain undisturbed for years. Abandoned factories and warehouses, forgotten steam tunnels, scrap yards and neglected corners of basements and attics of some buildings may be used. You need to find a quiet dark out of the way corner were you can remove some tile or blocks or panels to create a mini vault, then hide by replacing the cover. Old large diameter pipes or pump casings may be used as is. Sometimes it is possible to create a cache by adding a bogus utility box or fake run of pipe which has no other purpose than to look old and nasty, and hide a gun or two.

The Underwater Cache: Arms may be sealed into a PVC pipe, then sunk for a great cache. Ammo packed inside around the arms will provide enough weight to sink the tube. Tie a strong nylon or monofilament line around the middle of the pipe, and lower the cache under an old rotten abandoned dock or wharf. So much junk accumulates under old docks that one more slime and barnacle encrusted pipe section will attract no attention at all. Tie the top end of the line to a piling down under the waterline, the entire line will soon be so nasty that no one will ever touch it, except you!

Packaging the Cache: No matter where your cache will be located, you should go to great pains to make sure that it remains sealed and moisture proof. As mentioned, large diameter PVC pipe fits the bill perfectly. If you want access without cutting open the pipe, you can buy an end cap with a threaded center. For really long term storage, release the springs from your magazines and operating rods where possible. A chunk of dry ice dropped into a watertight package and allowed to "steam off" before sealing will purge out the rust producing oxygen. Store bought silica desiccant bags may also be used. Wherever ammo is stored, beware of using penetrating oils, as in time they may deaden the primers.

Plastic five gallon buckets with sealed lids may also be used, as well as heavy duty "white water rafting" bags, marine "flare kit" boxes and containers, surplus military ammo and ordnance boxes and many other types of containers. Where possible, for long term storage seal the lids with a bead of silicone glue.

Where tight cache space is a consideration, you may have to merely wrap your weapons in plastic. In this case use the biggest thickest heavy duty lawn and garden bags you can find. After placing the arms inside, suck out all the air you can, twist the end, put a few strong wires ties around the neck, fold it over, and put more wire around it again. Then do this again inside another bag. Long rifles which will not fit in a bag will have to be wrapped in industrial plastic sheeting, taped up, and kept in a fairly dry location. This type of packaging may be considered where a weapon may be in a "fighting cache", ready for use on short notice.

Locating Your Cache: Nothing is worse than stumbling around looking for a cache so well hidden that you cannot find it, so give a lot of thought to the landmarks you will locate it by, and write them down! Don't put the entire location on one piece of paper (for security), just the final directions which will not make sense if the paper is compromised. Remember, your cache area may look very different in different seasons, so choose landmarks which will stand out in summer foliage or winter snow. It is a good idea to take compass bearings from several permanent landmarks, as well as pacing the distances where possible. Or you may locate the cache by aligning it with an old wall, or between distinctive boulders, just make sure the features are permanent: bushes and gullies may disappear. Be alert to construction around your cache, and if the survey stakes go up, move it out ASAP. You may use GPS coordinates, but consider that GPS may be degraded or turned off at any time, and mark your location the "old fashioned way" first.

Cache Security: When you look for a cache location, consider that you will need a "cover for action" to explain your presence in the area. If you jog cross country, go on hikes, bike or four wheel drive you have it made. The cache location must have terrain or vegetation cover to conceal your loading and unloading it: forget the "cover of darkness", in this era of NVGs that is a thing of the past.

Before returning to a cache do some counter-surveillance: loop around the area looking for the "watchers" who may be staking it out, or a new "utility box" which may contain a remotely operated camera. When finally approaching the cache, don't go directly to it, first "fish hook" your trail, double back and observe your own path in to check for followers. Finally, walk right past your cache and make a "false unload". If you are taken down at this point, they may not find the true cache, and your "cover for action" (eg.: taking a leak on a routine hike) may pass muster. Only when you are truly sure of your safety should you go to the cache and unload it.

In addition, you should leave "tell-tales", small innoucuous secret marks which will tell you if anyone has disturbed and replaced your cache. It is a favorite trick of security forces to put tracking devices into cached weapons in order to follow the guerrilla back to his base and catch the entire band. A tell-tale may be a bit of thread or a pebble etc. placed in such a way that if the cache is disturbed it will break or fall out without the security forces noticing it.

In Summary: I hope this has been an informative and thought provoking article. Even if you do not think it is necessary to cache any weapons (or an E&E kit!) at this time, you will at least be able to take walks in the woods to scout out some likely sites for future use. Look for sites at various distances from your home from a short walk to a day's drive: don't keep all your eggs in one basket. It is a good idea to "load" a cache with some old tools just for practice. See if they rust, see if the local eleven year old boys find them, see if you can get in and out of the area without being seen. Practice makes perfect, so try some "dry runs" today so that you will be a seasoned pro if and when it becomes necessary to cache "the war iron" for real and for keeps.

NEVER tell ANYBODY about the fact that you own a gun. For a lot of us that fact is written all over us, in the way we dress, what we drive and our life style in general. I suggest gun owners drive pastel colored Volkswagens with rainbow stickers, walk with a swish and talk more about baking, fashion and etc. Only our hairdressers would know for sure.

Very nice. In the scenario described in this thread, where things have gotten so bad and un-Constitutional that confiscations are occurring and only those who react appropriately to the threat and modify their behaviors have any chance of retaining their weapons, there will always be those who think that it can never happen to me and continue on as if nothing has happened and accuse anybody who suggests minor and proportionate modifications of their actions to suit the threat of being a fag. Those people will be the first to lose it all.

The first rule of any stealth operation is 'keep your mouth shut'.....this doesn't mean that you're a queer or giving it all up, it's a basic rule that needs to be followed in order to complete the mission i.e returning America to Constitutional Law.

NEVER tell ANYBODY about the fact that you own a gun
Hide like a good little chicken.
No thanks. We need to grow some spine, not give up the last of it.

Clearly, some of us are more firm in our convictions than others, some would dearly love to still believe that *it can't happen here* and will wait until the most egregious examples finally prove that it has, and some have much more to lose than others.

No problem, that just means that some will serve as *canaries in the mine* for others who come later to the party, and whose reinforcement will be desperately needed. See the late Colonel Cooper's thoughts on such matters in his story Survivor, telling of one Gerhard Tauchnit's escape from a post-WWII Soviet concentration, in Cooper's anthology To Ride, Shoot Straight, and Speak the Truth."

Superbly stated, thank you.

Please refer to ATF for actual advice, but as far as I know, it is. The rationale may have been that 1) .06 is obsolete 2) .06 is not a naughty black plastic rifle caliber 3) Much surplus .06 is steel core anyway. I really don't know. One other theory is that AP .06 is a better and more stable long range target cartridge--in other words, a sporting round. Or if your oddly afflicted like myself, that some folks are trying to place things under the radar of loonies and criminals. Not a lot of drive bys and robberies with .06.

If I was going to cache some firearms, I would not cache all. First off, I would sort by which ones have a paper trail. Those would be left at home for the JBT's to find. After all, they already know I have those ones . . .

Those with absolutely no paper trail (no 4473, no sales receipt, no gunsmith records, etc. ) would get cached with ammo and cleaning kits.

That way, if they come they will collect what they think I own. They will think they have it all. Later I can always acquire another collection by using what was stored away.

>>>They are all pretty much varients of your standard .30 cal round with various case lengths, bullet weights, and powder loads .30, .30-06, .308, 7.62x54R, and the .30-30 are the more common types.<<<

I believe all of those use the .308 caliber bullets, except for the Russian (7.62x54R) which uses a slightly larger caliber (.311 I believe).

What I was getting at is for most of it is too late. Our neighbors know we hunt. The see us load up and go to the range. We got the trucks that say "Sportsman". There's the bass boat. We're already profiled.

Yes, and when things get so bad in the USA that firearms confiscations begin, you won't be able to use them for hunting or going to the range anyway and so you can cache them securely, along with your Smith and Wesson T-shirt and Colt belt-buckle until a more enlightened era comes around. You can continue fishing and take up bow-hunting and tell all of your friends who have become sheep and turned in their guns to be destroyed that you have done the same, and then change the subject. You can even show them the receipt for the 'junk gun' that you actually turned in as evidence of this.

Some 'select' weapons are of course kept for home protection, so that you will at least have the opportunity to be judged by twelve as opposed to being carried by six if some criminal thug decides to break into your home or carjack you.

And all the while, you tell NOBODY that you have a gun.

After all, how are you going to be able to get to the polls to vote for rescinding the gun ban if you are in jail for firearms violations?

All of us have different circumstances but a thoughtful and a suitably creative person can usually find a way to deal with a threat, and also to have the agility and stealth necessary to make changes in order to address a changing threat.

Nope. They are all .30. The 7.62 in the diameter of the bullet in mm. 7.62mm =.3".

The same 150gr boattails I load in my .30-30 are the same ones you load for the .308Win and the .30-06. Look up a bullet manufacturer like Speer. You won't find a ".311" bullet listed. Just .30cal. Some do give bullet dimensions, most go by common caliber name.

10mm and .40S&W pistol shoot the same bullet.

My thoughts.

A junkyard where cars have been there so long that they have trees growing up through the hood is a good place to hide guns.

Also, I have suggested using a fresh grave as a weapons cache. If the occupant was a patriot, he/she wouldn't mind. If they were a gun hating liberal, just think of the irony as they watch over your cache for years.

If you feel the need to tell someone where the cache is, lie to them the first time and watch them to see if they are a snitch.

And lastly, if it comes down to having to cache our weapons, it is long past time to use them.

>>>Nope. They are all .30. The 7.62 in the diameter of the bullet in mm. 7.62mm =.3".Nope. They are all .30. The 7.62 in the diameter of the bullet in mm. 7.62mm =.3".<<<

Listen carefully. The "7.62" Russian is not the same as the .30 caliber used in the 30-06, .308, 30/30, and .30 carbine.

>>>Look up a bullet manufacturer like Speer. You won't find a ".311" bullet listed.<<<

Actually, they are common. The following link is Hornady's list of Russian 7.62x54 bullets. The bullets are listed as .310 and .311 inches:
http://www.realguns.com/loads/762x54r.htm

It is okay to reload a .308 bullet into a Russian casing, but not the other way around. A Russian bullet will increase chamber pressure in a .308Win or a 30-06.

If you intend to reload, I would recommend you make a habit of NEVER, EVER making assumptions like you did with the Russian bullet diameter. Reloading with too large a bullet diameter is just as dangerous as improper case trimming or overloading powder.

One more thing - I read an account once by a Korea veteran about one night his outfit was trying to hold back a Chinese human-wave attack.

When it was over, the stock was charred from the heat of the barrel, and his shoulder was numb for several days and black-and-blue for weeks.

The fact that he was alive to tell the tale implies his M1 did not fail him.

If you can't use you guns there isn't much point in having any. If anything we need more people with more guns and those people using them. Owners need to be organized. There is more safety in numbers.

Anyway, the government can't stop all the other illegal crap that's going around now, how could it take up all the firearms? Prohibition never works.

http://members.nuvox.net/~on.melchar/762russ/index.html

http://www.russian-mosin-nagant.com/reloading.htm

http://7.62x54r.net/MosinID/MosinAmmo.htm

Further, the Russian bullets weren't swagged and could vary by up to .02, so if you want to pick another friggin' nit, your CUPs might rise by a few hundred but you probably won't notice this unless you are pushing max compressed loads on a bench gun.

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