SeekHer
Member
I bought a nice Wingmaster at a garage sale a decade ago. I put $200 into a nice 30" trap barrel and have been using it on the trap field since then. I've got less than $400 into the gun. Sure, it wasn't $1200 but I can shoot as well (and outshoot many) of the hotshots on the range with Beretta's and Benelli's. Those guys have a severe case of "the big I ams." They'd rather look good than shoot good. I'm not saying that some can't shoot good, they sure can, but the gun doesn't make the shooter. I love this Wingmaster and it shoots great. Nothing like embarrassing the big money guys on the trap field
The most important point in shotgun shooting is "fit" since you're only pointing the barrels at the intended direction of the clay/bird.
There is a small problem with your statement--In many ways it is the gun that makes the shooter not the other way around!
An ill fitting shotgun, with slow triggers, poorly balanced, light weight shooting heavy loads with no or little recoil pad will cause fatigue quickly, make you upset faster which will hinder your scores, hurt your shoulders causing flinching and being ill fitted you have to take valuable time adjusting the gun to your shoulder --then finding the target.
I take my custom fitted to me shotgun and I don't have the above problems...The gun mounts exactly where I'm looking, balanced off the hinge (where I like it), heavy enough with 32" ported barrels with a heavy rib, a couple of mercury tubes and a good modern material recoil pad and I have shot a 2,000 bird long weekend event with no ill effects to my body.
A good friend had a single shot 30" light full barrelled Cooey (Winchester model made under license here in Canada) 16 bore that fit him for LOP, DOH and DOC nearly perfectly so he had the stock steam bent for his cast (can't remember if it was on or off though) and for drop of comb and/or heel slightly and he destroyed many a Perazzi, Rizzini, Kolar etc. shooter with it...$40 gun, $200 for stock work but the gun was a miserable clays gun--not enough steel so after 50 fast shots the frame would overheat badly...He wanted it for a great Prairie Chicken and Hungarian Partridge gun...He was a good shot, a damn fine shot, but that stock adjustment for cast and heel made him an absolutely deadly shot...I was lucky to hit 12 of 25 with it as not one dimension fit me.
chevyman097 -- Go and get yourself fitted by a master stocker using a try gun and get a buttstock fitted to you, spend the $500 to $1,000 and you'll be shooting a Hell of a lot better...Those dimension will also be very valuable to you when you're going for your new O/U--why waste time of guns way out of your fitting range--1" makes a HUGE difference.
Check out:
Speedbump Stockworks
Soft Touch
Graco
G2 Stockmaster
