…or…
Words Mean Things
Hundreds of years ago, when most long guns were stocked to the muzzle, there was usually a metal part known as the muzzle cap at the end of the stock to protect the thin wood and end grain there. The half stock rifle, with which we are all familiar, often has a cap at the forward end of the stock also, but since it’s not at the muzzle, we call it a nose cap or a forend cap. The forward end, or forward portion of the stock, for hundreds of years, has been called the forend or forestock. For some reason hardly anyone, it seems, uses these terms anymore.
When I tell someone they need a nose cap on their AK before they can use a standard forend, they’re at a loss to understand. For one thing, it is no longer a forend but a handguard, and there is apparently no longer any such thing as a nose cap. In these modern times, when we’re still using the exact same features, we need the new term “handguard retainer”. If I try to add clarity by calling it a forend cap, it still doesn’t work. I have to use some version of “That metal thingy what holds the handguard on at the front of the handguard” but that’s a lot more syllables than the centuries old “nose cap”.
“Stock forend” or “forestock” no longer works. I hear “forearm” more often, but most common is “lower handguard” (but some AKs only have the one, so using “lower” only adds confusion. If a rifle doesn’t have an arm or arms, then it cannot have a “forearm” (the forward portion of an arm). Since a rifle is an “arm” (in a different sense of the word) then a “forearm” would be the muzzle, wouldn’t it, or the front sight or something out there?
What really throws me for a loop is the term “foregrip” which I always take to mean “forward pistol grip”. We sell forward pistol grips, so when you ask me for a “foregrip” I can only conclude that you mean forward pistol grip, which is after all a “foregrip” We sell forends too, but you need a nose cap for a standard forend. “You know; that foregrip you sell” applies, potentially, to a wide spectrum of products. When I ask, “Which one?” I almost always get a “what?” or a “the one you have on your web site”. We have a lot of them on our web site, which you would know if you’d looked at it, which I assume you did or you wouldn’t be talking about it. You might as well say, “You know– the one I’m thinking about. I can see it right here in my mind– why can’t you see it in my mind?”
Do you know where your rifle stock’s heel, toe, comb, wrist, forend, nose and nose cap are located? Or is each feature “That thingy, there, next to or at the end of that other doo-hicky, what holds the thing you hold on to…there…by the bracket”? I swear; I have several conversations per day that go along those lines.
Recently I had a guy completely reiterate everything I said, “just to be clear” in his words. He knew all the parts, he knew how to use the language, he knew what part he had called to talk about, and he got everything exactly right. I had to take a break, take a deep breath, and tell everyone about it.
Anyway; I take the common misuse of terms, or unfamiliarity with the jargon, to mean that there are a lot of new gun owners out there, so I try to be as patient as I can. The other day I told a guy he needed to be sure he got Picatinny rings for our M8 rail. Problem was, he didn’t know what “Picatinny”, “rail”, or “rings” meant, nor “Leupold” nor “Burris”. I had to explain the meaning and derivation of each term and how it applied to his situation. “Leupold is a manufacturer of optics including rifle scopes…” At one point in the conversation he said he’d have to call those folks at the Picatinny Arsenal and order some of those rings. He ended up spending a couple hundred dollars with us, so I must not have sounded too exasperated with him.
While I’m at it; a sight is not a site. This is the first time I have cited the use of “site” when “sight” would have been right.
for history that goes back over 40 years.