AN END TO MUSKETRY?
It’s how you play the gun that counts
A RANGE OFFICER friend and I were watching shooters setting up their equipment. He observed that modern shooters, going by what we saw, were starting to rely too much on their gadgets and not enough on basic musketry skills. For that reason, they weren’t even getting the best out of these gadgets, and were unaware that any bad results at the target end were more than likely due to their lack of attention to crucial points at the firing end, rather than to their gear. However, since everyone else was apparently shooting the same way, the answer for most shooters seemed to lie in more and better gadgets. Never discount the power of public opinion. Possibly we need to get back to basics.
So, what does this mean? I have debated accuracy with several KZN hunters who agree that rifles zeroed at sea level will shoot several inches high (that’s 50mm or so) in the hunting field anywhere higher than Estcourt. Their reason: altitude. I wonder if that is true. I came to my own full-bore rifle shooting experience through more formal methods, which involved lying prone with iron sights, a sling on my rifle and concentrating on my hold, sight picture, breathing and trigger squeeze. On that basis, I found little practical difference between Durban and Johannesburg sight elevations in 100m and 200m competitions – both typical hunting ranges. Are there other reasons why points of impact may vary once the rifle leaves home after sighting at sea level? Is it perhaps the equipment used by the unsuccessful rifleman, or is it that they are following the fashion of the times in the way that they are using it?
FASHION 1: Collapsible shooting benches: When I started shooting at a particular club about four years ago,
several kind-hearted citizens asked me where my collapsible shooting bench was. Everyone knows that the most accurate rifle shooting is done by the US bench-rest shooters, so it stands to reason that to succeed in this business, a man must have his shooting bench. My response that it just wasn’t the fashion when I got started back in 1963 seemed to cut no ice at all. Many of the shooting benches I have seen are rather flimsy structures with a built-in wobble that didn’t seem to offer any advantage at all, compared to a rigid concrete platform or good solid earth to shoot off. Wobbles are not good. Would the zeroing of sights done off a bench still be the same when the rifle was used in the field? More to the point, if the shooting bench isn’t taken into the field, why bother to practise from it, as your hunting conditions will be different.
FASHION 2: Shooting position: The bench is not even the real problem. A number of shooters at the bench often seem to adopt a shooting position which holds the butt to the shoulder but leaves the fore-end of the rifle free to float on some sort of sandbag and recoil in any direction it likes.
Just for fun, I have more than once set up a 100m experiment to see what happens under those conditions and a couple of points struck me immediately. The first problem was ‘steadiness’. Most traditional prone rifle shooters lie at an angle of say 20 to 30 degrees to hold the rifle comfortably pointing at the target, but with many shooting bench-rests, you are either seated behind the rifle or alongside it. Either way it is uncomfortable, which leads to muscle tension and wobbles, and there’s your accuracy gone. More to the point, in traditional prone rifle shooting with a sling, you are actually shooting off a tripod (two arms and a chest) with the butt anchored for every shot by both a downward pressure from the cheek and a pull into the hollow of the shoulder, with the whole system lashed together with a tight rifle sling. I have shot on ranges where the firing point has elbow-holes beaten into the earth if you know where to look for them. Under those conditions, that rifle just doesn’t move, and the groups shrink accordingly.
If you don’t take care over your firing position on the bench to get a good, consistent grip, your elbow isn’t supported very well, and there’s your consistent accuracy gone again. Going
A number of shooters at the bench often seem to adopt a shooting position which holds the butt to the shoulder but leaves the fore-end of the rifle free to float on some sort of sandbag and recoil in any direction it likes
by the twelve shots visible in the second target (previous page), half of the group is sub-minute of angle, and the rest is over two-minutes of angle. It was the same rifle, same shooter, same sights, same ammo, but an unacceptable result. Any such sighting-in is worthless.
By the way, shooting 13-shot strings is my fashion because that is what my competition shooting rules allow. Others say that only three-shot groups have any value on account of the rifle heating up. The reader may follow his own conscience in this.
The point is that rifles are intended to be fired two-handed while pointed in the right direction. Fired one-handed, and held only at the back end, the fore-end will recoil off-target and shoot somewhere else. The other bad thing you may do is allow the toe of the butt-plate to hit the solid ground – that will entirely change the leverage exerted on the rifle by the recoil forces. The muzzle will go up instead of backwards, and that introduces a different system of dynamics.
FASHION 3: Bipods: One modern answer to the ‘free front end’ problem is to install a bipod on the fore-end of the hunting stock and shoot it ‘sniperstyle’. Speaking of true sniper arms, which have built-in bipods (and straight-line stocks and muzzle brakes), these have now gone a long way beyond traditional firearm designs in their adjustable plastic stocks.
Bipods steady the hunting rifle laterally and, given a decent weight in the barrel (and some extra muzzle weight and recoil reduction with a sound moderator), the muzzle is kept steady. I have seen some excellent groups shot by club members using this system.
However, when questioning experienced hunters as to why they don’t shoot prone in the traditional style, they answer that this is not always possible on hunts because of long grass. It seems to me that the same objection could be raised against bipods. Bipod legs, of course, can be extended, and a standard accessory on sale in gun shops is the long-legged bipod, which
echoes the crossed sticks of the buffalo hunters of the Old American West. There is no denying that when these are used correctly, they work well, but my point here is the evidence of getting a wandering zero as a result of a slight shift in position that was experienced with this type of rest. As with all forms of shooting, you must be consistent in the way you hold your weapon, especially holding the rifle down against the recoil to simulate two-handed firing.
Often it is the shooter who is the problem, not the gear. I believe this is where we need to look for a solution.
SOLUTION 1: Shoot the way you mean to hunt.
In a world free of fashion and prejudice, it makes sense to practise the same way you intend to hunt. That includes finding out exactly where your rifle’s zero is when shot two-handed under field conditions. This can be simulated off a bench by holding the fore-end in the palm of the hand which in turn is supported by a sandbag beneath it, in what is called the ‘wrist rest’ position. That at least replicates the two-handed hunting position and gives dependable results.
Shoot the way you mean to hunt. In a world free of fashion and prejudice, it makes sense to practise the same way you intend to hunt
SOLUTION 2: Learn to shoot offhand. Nobody seems to shoot offhand these days – it just isn’t the fashion. I can think of only one shooter whom I have seen practising offhand at any of the three clubs where I shoot, which makes it the exception that proves the rule. The way out of the difficulty is to recognise that a rifle with a hunting stock has the cheek-piece mostly below the line of recoil which means the barrel rises on firing. However, to make these alternative bipods and rests as productive as possible, the direct line of recoil through the barrel and action have to be transmitted to the shoulder in as straight a line as possible. It helps to have a high cheek-piece, a heavy barrel and some sort of recoil reducer (a sound moderator) on the end, or even to go to a much more modern straightline stock like an M-4.
Whatever you do, learn to shoot with the rifle you have, control the recoil with a consistent holding system, and do not rely on gadgets. Rather make your practice as close to field conditions as you can. Otherwise you will shoot as badly as I do these days, any time I go shooting higher than Estcourt.