Question about centerfire hold. Also, hello, I'm new.

[Stavrogin]

Hi everyone. I'm sort of new to centerfire, and after some time at the range today, I think I just figured something out. I started shooting with spring-piston air rifles, and quickly learned that you really don't want to grip them. I always assumed this was NOT true of a powerful-ish centerfire rifle. After today, I think I might be mistaken, and I might have been making a fundamental mistake, which would explain my really poor results.

With my .22 (a CZ 452, btw), I can hold shots consistently inside a 4" circle at 100M with the stock iron sights (forearm rested on my spotting scope case, butt end just shouldered - I don't have a rear bag). Not great, but not terrible. Realized today, though, that I really don't grip the .22 at all. If anything, I shoot it much like my air rifle, with most of the pressure coming from my thumb and middle finger alone.

With my Mosin-Nagant 91/30 (I know, I skipped a couple rungs on the ladder), I was having trouble keeping the shots inside an 8" circle under the same conditions. But I have always gripped that rifle a lot more tightly, which seemed instinctively natural given the recoil. It seemed my results improved dramatically for the last 15 shots or so today, which was when I stopped pulling it hard into my shoulder and just let it sit, again using thumb and one finger to grip it.

It was hard to say how much it improved, because at that point I was having a hard time keeping track of the holes in the paper through the spotting scope, and I was probably also tired - I had been at the range for two and a half hours, and I put 80 rounds through the MN today. Yes, I have a recoil pad. No, I am not a big guy at all.

That said, though, in a 5-shot group, I produced one string of four holes that were within an inch horizontally, spread over maybe four or five inches vertically. And at 100M with the stock irons and no bayonet mounted, I really have to hold under POI (like, 12-14" under), so the vertical stringing came as no surprise.

So, the question, then: do you guys hold a rifle like that very tightly, or do you let it "rest on you" and let it buck however it will when the shot breaks, as one would with a spring-piston air rifle?

Any help would be appreciated. And I look forward to meeting you all!

Stavrogin

 

[Ro1911]

personally I like to let it rest on me, if you focus on holding it tight you'll never hit anything.

you do actually have to hold it against you though if it's not on your shoulder it will kick very very hard and probably hurt you.

 

[Stavrogin]

Thanks, Ro1911. Sort of what I do is tug the rifle into my shoulder to seat it, then relax the pressure. So, it's making contact, but I'm not pulling it back with much pressure when I pull the trigger. The only pulling being done is my the middle finger of my shooting hand, and with such a straight grip on a MN, that doesn't amount to much.

Does that seem right?

 

[henschman]

So, the question, then: do you guys hold a rifle like that very tightly, or do you let it "rest on you" and let it buck however it will when the shot breaks, as one would with a spring-piston air rifle?

The latter. Muscling the rifle is bad for accuracy. What you want to do is to build a solid and consistent platform for the rifle, either with the bone structure of your body, with artificial support, or both, which allows you to relax your muscles as much as possible. Relaxed is accurate. You also want to take a solid position so that your body absorbs the recoil and it doesn't knock you off position or beat you up.

Try this: first make sure the stock is pocketed firmly in your shoulder. It should sit in the soft part of your shoulder between the collar bone and the shoulder bone. If you're shooting off a bag, you can use your support hand to help keep the stock in your pocket. Then get your turkey neck and cheek weld. Turkey necking is stretching your neck as far forward as it will go, and cheek weld is resting your head on the stock in the hollow of your cheek. So stretch your neck out, and plop your cheek firmly on the stock. You do this for 2 reasons: 1) because it makes you consistently place your head in the same place in relation to the sights, and 2) because when the rifle fires, it pushes your shoulder back. If there is any slack in your neck, your shoulder will move rearward and your head will stay still (Newton's 2nd law and all that). This can be very uncomfortable, especially if your head comes in contact with parts of the rifle (if you see guys come back from hunting with a big fat black eye, you know that they didn't have a good turkey neck!). Also, instead of having both legs sticking out straight behind you, hike your trigger-side knee up as far as it will go and get your foot in line with the barrel of your rifle. This does 2 things: 1) gets your diaphragm off the ground so your breathing doesn't affect your point of aim as much, and 2) stabilizes you against recoil. Then shift your hips left, right, forward or backward around your forward support until the sights are right on the target when you are completely relaxed. This is called getting your natural point of aim. You don't want to be using any muscle to push the rifle onto target -- you want it to be pointed at the target when you are in a relaxed, muscle-neutral position.

That ought to tighten your position right up!

Tell you what, if you really want to learn to handle that Mosin Nagant, buy a 440 round can of ammo, some stripper clips, and make sure you have a sling for it, and take it to an Appleseed marksmanship clinic. They will get you sorted out and show you how to build solid, muscle-neutral field positions. They will also teach you the finer points of all the fundamentals of rifle marksmanship. They teach all sling-supported positions, but all the same fundamentals apply to shooting off a bag or anything else. www.appleseedinfo.org

 

[TonyAngel]

Stavrogin,

I agree with most of what Henschman said, but I don't agree with the turkey neck thing. Stretching you neck requires the tensioning of muscles and that's not good for accuracy. You want to be as relaxed as possible when you squeeze the trigger.

I have my scopes setup so that when I drop my head it falls where it needs to be, naturally. As far as your concerns with recoil go, don't worry too much about it. All you should be doing is holding the rifle firmly, not putting a death grip on it. With proper form and recoil management, especially if shooting from a prone position, recoil shouldn't be a problem. If it is, get a Limbsaver.

 

[Huckelberry75]

Is it just me, or is a bit unusual that he is using his middle finger for the trigger? I wonder how this might affect things. When I try this, I get unusual flex in my hand that doesn't seem to be there with the index finger.

 

[Stavrogin]

Thanks for the advice, henschman! I don't actually shoot prone, but if I ever do, I'll try to remember those tips. I'm usually shooting off the table at the range.

I've got the ammo (or had lots until yesterday), I've got the stripper clips, I've got the sling. I'm not sure about wrapping in to the sling on this rifle, since the sling slot is so far forward on a very narrow and flimsy part of the stock. It looks like any amount of tension there would put pressure on the barrel, since a MN's barrel is basically floated between the action and the muzzle, but makes contact with the stock at those two points. Also, I can't find any old photos of Red Army soldiers shooting wrapped into the sling, so it makes me suspect that they were trained not to for exactly that reason. I've ordered the english translation of the Soviet MN 91/30 manual, but it hasn't arrived yet; maybe that will clear things up.

As for the Appleseed, I've heard of it, but it seems it is a distinctly American phenomenon. Never heard of one being held up here in Canada, so I think I might have to learn what I can out of books and from the fine folks here. Fortunately, I'm generally pretty good at learning from printed material.

Thanks again for the reply! Feel free to keep the advice coming, though - I'll take all the help I can get!

 

[Stavrogin]

Huckleberry, I'm not using my middle finger for the trigger. My middle finger is wrapped around the stock like normal, and my thumb usually sits up near the tang. What seems to work is to let those two digits do virtually all of the gripping and pulling into the shoulder, so there's actually very little pressure on the rifle. Then my normal trigger finger does the rest.

 

[JoeMal]

I will agree that muscling the rifle has given me poor groups on the past. Position the gun to where it's comfortable, and use enough pressure to keep it there, but that's about all you need. When I used to muscle the gun I would wonder "Is this how much force I used last time?" and I started thinking about that instead of focusing on the shot.

And welcome to THR!

 

[KodiakBeer]

You'll shoot best if you use a sling. Adjust it for the correct length so that you can put your elbow inside and push outwards against your hand on the forearm. Some people take a turn of the sling around their forearm, but either way that will take most of the wobble out of offhand shooting. I agree that you shouldn't grip the rifle too hard, because that seems to introduce a bit of shake to the rifle.

 

[henschman]

When you turkey neck, you should not be tensing your neck muscles... you just crane it out as far forward as it will go and drop your cheek onto the stock. Your head should be resting on the stock without using any neck muscles. The idea is that you don't want any slack in your neck. Your neck and head travel rearward along with your shoulder when the rifle recoils. Your whole upper body absorbs the recoil, which makes it seem less harsh.

As for shooting from a table and chair with a front bag, do all of that same stuff I said minus the hiked up trigger knee. scoot your ass cheeks around to establish your NPOA instead of shifting your hips like you would in prone.

Yeah, Appleseed hasn't made it to Canada yet, though there has been talk on the forum of starting some sort of marksmanship clinics up there. Obviously they couldn't connect it to Revolutionary War heritage like they do for the American events, but hey, Canada has a pretty strong heritage of shooting, hunting, and outdoorsmanship. Anyway, there is plenty of good info on the Appleseed site about marksmanship... look up the 6 steps to firing the shot, and look up "hasty sling" (which is the sling method you would use on the Nagant sling). That is good stuff.

BTW the Russians never taught sling use because that technique was only "discovered" in the early 20th Century in the USA. Plus, Russia never really taught much precision marksmanship to their conscripts. Most other countries' militaries have always seen the sling as nothing more than a carry strap. I guess the US military is back to that mindset too -- the shooting sling is somewhat of a lost art. But it is a very effective way of stabilizing the rifle from field positions, in the event that you don't bring your shooting bench and bag into the field with you!

 

[Stavrogin]

Wow, thanks for all the responses! Maybe it's just my own perception, but again, using the sling on the MN seems so iffy to me. Would you say that you put just enough tension on the sling to steady the rifle, but not enough to really apply any force? That would make sense, but as I said before, the part of the stock that the sling attaches to is quite thin, and is at a point of the barrel that should be free-floated, while there is a part of that stock closer to the muzzle that contacts the barrel. I guess, though, with the 'hasty sling' approach, the tension on the sling should be straight back.

But wouldn't it also pull that part of the stock downwards a little? Again, maybe I'm just imagining way too much tension.

In addition to that Soviet MN manual, I have Jeff Cooper's "The Art of the Rifle" on the way in the mail. From what I've heard, there's a lot to learn from him and that book that would apply to what I'm doing, which is learning how to shoot well in practical circumstances and with rudimentary equipment.

Seems there is concensus on the "don't hold it tight" stance, though. Very well. Artillery hold it is, which makes my air rifle training time in the basement suddenly seem much more worthwhile.

 

[KodiakBeer]

Would you say that you put just enough tension on the sling to steady the rifle, but not enough to really apply any force?

Yeah, that's about it. You just want to take most of the wobble out of the end of the rifle and that doesn't take much force. The trick is to get the sling adjusted to the correct length for a natural hold. If it feels awkward, then it needs further adjustment.

 

[henschman]

Yeah, you're not going to be shooting matches with it using a big padded glove and pulse patch on your arm, so you don't want a super tight sling. Plus you're right -- that much pressure, might cause a noticeable POI shift. It just needs to be snug, with no slack in it. When set for a hasty sling, it will be a little tighter than what is comfortable for shoulder carry. BTW, Jeff Cooper advocated sling use too... he was an advocate of the Ching Sling, which is a 3-point sling made to be both comfortable for shoulder carry and quick to get into for a shooting sling.

As for POI shift, if you don't sling up super tight, it shouldn't be bad enough to worry about. You will be significantly more accurate with it over just an unsupported field position, so it will be worth it.