Those are fun little guns, and the write up was cool!
We might be best advised to keep this unit solidly in the plinker category, however. For my 2 cents, it made me think of a few things:
a) 22s should not attempt to be serious defensive rounds. We consider longarms for defense only because pistols, although convenient, are very poor performers. Rifles are not convenient, but they are more powerful. This gun is inconvenient and a worse performer than pistol rounds, which defeats the purpose of going to a longarm as a tool in the first place.
Even the 223 is on the low end of defensive rounds (typically won't go through a car door). Still, a 223 is cheap and barely kicks, and thus will work adequately for weaker, smaller statured shooters and/or women. Save your 10/22 money and get a Ruger Mini-14, for example.
b) Customization is better left undone on defensive guns. The last thing you need in court is to explain how you "got the chance" to use your "super-duper galactic comp gun" to repel invaders. Be normal. Buy something that works out of the box for defense and take this 10/22 to the range for fun!
c) Lasers are a poor choice compared to iron sights. Paraphrasing Ayoob, "they are best utilized as a very expensive toy for your cat." Serious defense guns do not need gadgets. A gun we trust our lives to must be able to be abused, dropped, weather inclement weather and fight long past battery life. Better we train our fundamental cheek and chin welds to aid us in less than ideal situations, not trust bells and whistles.
d) A big consideration is left handed shooting. Often we require our defensive longarms to be capable strong and weak sided. This gun, when shot left handed, looks to throw the cases right into your face. Ill-placed side saddles on shotguns suffer the same fate. Not ideal!
e) Longarms benefit from slings for defensive purposes.
As martialists we must seek swordfighting, not swordmaking. There's nothing wrong with that gun, necessarily, but it is clearly inferior to other choices within the scope of defensive longarms. A dressed up plinker is still a plinker.
Again, very cool article. I'd love to have one of those and a pile of cans!
Respectfully yours. :asian: