Idaho Form 40 Instructions: Fill & Download for Free

I am going to begin this discussion by quantifying that I am an NRA certified rifle and pistol instructor AND I live in the free state of Idaho. Therefore, though it is none of anyone’s business about how much ammunition that I maintain, I am not afraid to answer the question.Though I have a sizable collection, they seem to be associated with specific cartridges with a few outliers for variety. Anytime there is a great sale on ammunition, I purchase the maximum allowable sales amount. In addition, I also handload specific cartridges based on cost or obtainable accuracy.The vast majority of my ammunition is .22LR because I like to start off new students with low recoil firearms (rifle or pistol). As we move up to other popular cartridges, I stockpile each of those as expected. The next desirable cartridge is the 9x19mm (9mm Luger or 9mm Parabellum) because of sheer popularity. I burn through countless rounds of these two cartridges. (Note, I call them cartridges or rounds because caliber is merely referring to the bullet diameter.)For rifle, aside from .22LR cartridges, I have .223 Remington and 7.62x39mm because of lower recoil than hunting cartridges. If I can develop techniques with low recoil rounds then as the shooter moves up to higher power cartridges, the techniques will already become habits. That said, several of my rifles are in .308 Winchester.My popular pistol cartridges include: .22LR, 9x19mm, .380 ACP, .45 ACP, .38 Special, .357 magnum, .44 magnum, .40 S&W and 10mm Auto. My popular rifle cartridges include: .22LR, .223 Remington or 5.56x45mm, 7.62x39mm, and .308 Winchester or 7.62x51mm. I would consider low inventory when any of these drop below 1000 rounds. For .22LR, 9x19mm, .223 Remington or 7.62x39mm, my break point is 5000 rounds. Why? Because I go through a significant amount of these popular rounds while instructing students.If you were to look at my ammunition inventory, the 12 gauge target shotgun shells followed by the 20 gauge target shotgun shells would fill my storage by volume. Why? Though I am not yet certified by NRA to teach shotgun, my main “relaxation” sport is trap shooting and dabbling with skeet shooting and sporting clays. The dynamics of shotgun sports is awesome. Aside from developing real world shooting skills such as upland game hunting, there is something to be said about hitting a small clay target launched into the air. I can go through thousands of shells per month with these activities.I also enjoy long distance bench shooting using .308 Winchester and 6.5 Creedmoor. I like to maintain an inventory of around 1000 rounds for .308 Winchester because it is not only my primary hunting round but it matches several of my firearms. For hunting, I use factory ammunition; for target shooting, I enjoy playing with hand loads. As for the 6.5 Creedmoor, I have about 200 rounds of commercial Hornady rounds to use as reference. I like to hand load about 50 to 100 rounds at a time. Then, as my conditions change, I can adjust the specific load. There is something to be said about dropping a bullet on a 2′x2′ steel plate at 1000 yards. Reading the environment and adjusting the scope are the exciting part of the distance shooting sport. Because I am changing things up, I do not like to keep a large inventory of finished cartridges. However, I have thousands of bullets and a several pounds of specific smokeless powders.While I am on the subject of hand loading ammunition, I try to keep my powder choices to a minimum to avoid confusion. However, what powder I have is in several kegs for cost and convenience. I have the raw materials to load several thousands of rounds of ammunition. At this point, as you cringe, I have many other cartridge choices that are much more economical to hand load: .500 S&W magnum, .460 S&W magnum, .45 Colt, .44 Remington magnum, .41 Remington magnum, .357 magnum, .45 ACP, .40 S&W, 10mm Auto and any rifle hunting rounds. Hand loading, in itself is an enjoyable activity. As I mentioned, living in Idaho means that my outdoor shooting season is dampered during the winter months. Hand loading is a great activity to fill those winter months.Going back to the original question, I will maintain at least 1000 rounds of my popular cartridges and at least 5000 rounds of the most popular (.22LR, 9mm, .223/5.56 and 7.62x39mm). Now, using your imagination, and noting that I am an engineer, a safety factor of 2 to 10 is my true minimum . . . and I have never come close to breaching my minimum inventory. I will point out that anything around 100,000 of .22LR is acceptable. :-D

This depends on your age.Like many other states, Idaho has a Graduated Driver’s License (GDL) Program which takes effect if you are under the age of 17.UNDER AGE 17: If you are under 17, you must first get a learner’s permit, and then meet certain requirements in order to get a license. These include taking an approved driver’s education course. Once this is completed, the Driver Training Permit becomes a Supervised Instruction Permit, which allows the learner to complete a certain amount of behind-the-wheel driver training both during daytime (40 hours) and nighttime (10 hours). They must then pass both a written and road test.OVER AGE 17: An individual over age 17 does not need to pass the same requirements as under age 17, and must simply pass a written test and a road skills test to get a driver’s license.For more information about the GDL program, the official Idaho page is here.In order to study for the written exam that must be taken by all individuals, regardless of age, you can take free tests based on the Idaho driver’s manual. The driver’s manual itself is available for free here.Please feel free to comment with any additional questions, and good luck!

I built an AutoGyro Calidus in late 2016 and it was an experience I wouldn’t trade for anything. In total, I spent $117k on the project and there are a lot of costs typically not considered when you buy a kit in Germany. I’ll start from the beginning.The aircraft are not crated as you would expect. All of the main parts come in individual wrapping and are loaded into a container. They show up like the photo below.You see the crates in the background and the spar. Seems simple enough, but the spar isn’t wrapped and you have to get it from Maryland to your build location. In my case, Boise, Idaho where the dealer was located. I pooled with another buyer to get the aircraft to the dealer and that took time. Once there, the build process begins.It took about three weeks and very long hours to build the gyrocopter and it was exhausting work. I was sore every morning, only to get up and start again.I had two build assistants who had real Calidus experience and made it easy for me to follow the instructions. Under the FAA rules, they can only assist, so every step was laid out for me.This looks like easy work, but it’s not.The process requires a lot of build documentation so there are hundreds of photos as you document every little step for your certificate of air worthiness. The examiner will stop by while your in process to check your work, but usually doesn’t come out until you’ve made substantial progress.You have days of wiring and testing and retesting, followed by trouble shooting and retesting.Once the build is complete, you then have another hurdle to overcome. The aircraft must remain within 100 miles of the build location for the first 40 hours of flight. This is the real deal-stopper. This means you can’t fly it home from the dealer and they get to fly it to burn off those 40 hours which took all winter and well into 2017. The dealer can’t carry passengers so you can’t even train in your own machine.I had the dealer make arrangements to fly off the hours the get it to my hangar near Seattle where I could continue training.Here it is, fully completed and home in early 2017. The whole thing is a very serious project so know what you’re in for and allocate the time to do it right or you will have a miserable experience.I wouldn’t do it again, but it was a great bucket list thing for me, having grown up in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, home of the EAA. It was a dream of mine to do it and I’m glad I got to go through the experience and fly something I made.