A follow-up answer

by Bullseye

 
Jaks

The answer is no and yes. Now let me explain what I mean.

First no, if what you mean is actually seeing a hole appear in the target were the dot was. You should be concentrating on the target and dot all while squeezing the trigger slowly to fire the shot. Once the shot fires the dot will jump under the recoil of the pistol, here is where your mind should take a mental picture of where the dot was just prior to the recoil jump. It's that place where the hole should be in the target when you look downrange at your target. If it's not then you did something to the gun that millisecond prior to the hammer falling to disturb the shot, and this disturbance was masked by the recoil of the pistol. I'll explain the technique a little better later in this post.

Second yes, if what you mean is the hole should appear in the target where the dot was when the pistol fired. This means that exactly where the dot was should be where you look for the hole in the target through a spotting scope. If it's not where it should be then either the red dot scope is misalinged or you disturbed the pistol just prior to the shot.

Now, one way to get a good shot break is to use initial pressure. This is defined as the maximum amount of pressure you can safely put on the trigger which will not allow the hammer to fall. In other words, on a trigger that breaks at two pounds, you strive for an initial pressure of 1.5 to 1.75 pounds of initial pressure. Now, no one can approximate these weight levels exactly but you can get close with practice. Once you have a good initial pressure on the trigger then is when you can slowly add the extra pressure to fire the gun. Your only adding a little at a time and just enough to break a shot. For example: if you linearly add pressure on a two pound trigger from zero it will take you eight full seconds to break a shot, when adding it at a 1/4 pound per second rate. But with initial pressure you first add the initial poundage in the first second then linearly add the rest and you'll break the shot within one to two seconds afterward at a constant rate of 1/4 pounds per second. This method also vastly reduces the amount of trigger finger movement and cuts jerking way down to a minimum.

Practice this technique at the range and don't worry if you group isn't all in one place. What you should strive for in the beginning is being able to call your shot (that is where the hole is in the target based on where the dot was when it fired). Then, that the shots are grouping in a general area. With practice that area will shrink into a very defined spot. I usually tell beginners to work in increasingly smaller rings of the bullseye target (i.e. all shots within the 7 ring, then all shots within the 8 ring, etc.).

Hope this helps!
R,
Bullseye



Posted on Dec 17, 2002, 9:18 PM

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  1. Thanks. Jaks, Dec 18, 2002, 1:29 AM

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