Home, home on the range
Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 2:29 pm
On my time off, I have made it to the range a couple of times.
First was out shooting with my mother-in-law's husband, who is a retired APD officer, along with my brother-in-law. We went the weekend before Christmas. We went to the Austin Rifle Club out in Manor. It was drizzly, windy, and about 35 degrees. First the three of us alternately shot my CW9 on the 15 yard pistol range. I was curious whether the tendency for me to group low-left was me or the gun, and after one of us shot high-right immediately it was clear that it's the shooter and not the gun. We shot at a life-size target that had a picture of a bad guy who looks like Keith Richards with a female hostage, this picture must be about 30 years old. I managed to kill the hostage before the BG :( We also shot at an Osama Bin Laden poster-target. I don't know where these targets came from. Then we went over to the rifle range to sight in the M14 with competition style stock, which included a new scope. This rifle weighs 14 lb and can only be reasonably shot from a bench. I shot five rounds within about a 1/2" group the first time. Shooting a rifle like this from the bench with a bipod and that adjustable butt leg whatever you call it is almost too easy to be any fun. Then we all got too cold and left :)
Next up I went to the private range that I normally go to with a friend from Colorado and another friend from Georgetown. I brought my Kahr CW9 and my Marlin 795SS. We shot a couple of rounds through the Kahr but pretty much stuck with the .22. We had a blast. One of my friends found a bunch of junk from a junk pile including a stuffed dog from Target (you know, the "Target" dog with the target on his eye), some CDs, we shot shell casings lined up on the target stand, pieces from a junked electric stove, an old 56K modem card. You name it, we probably had it there, and we shot at it. It was like our own little "Box O' Truth". We had a blast shooting everything we could find to shoot at, except for targets :) We shot the .22 with the 4x32 scope at 15 yards and could hit 1/4" spots at will. The verdict is in: reactive targets are best.
When I got home my wife told me that another friend of ours had just gotten a S&W 9mm for Christmas and wondered if we'd take him out shooting. So that friend and his son joined my wife and I for another day at the same private range the very next day. We shot both of my 9mms, his "new" (20 year old S&W) 9mm, his .22 revolver, and my Marlin. That was not nearly as fun and frankly I was kind of tired of shooting after two consecutive days and about 800 rounds of .22LR.
I guess I probably hit the 1000 round mark for the month of December. I was close to that in November.
This made me realize that I need to go out to this range and redo parts of it. We need a target stand 50 yards from the rifle bench. Shooting the .22 at 15 yards is just too easy. 50 yards makes it a sport. 100 yards with the .22 rifle is just too much ... out of the 18" Marlin barrel the POI is a good 7-10" low of the POA. Also that range needs to be equipped with some permanently-installed spinners for 9mm on the pistol range and .22LR on the rifle range. I think it's time for me to go do some work on this place where I get to shoot for free :)
First was out shooting with my mother-in-law's husband, who is a retired APD officer, along with my brother-in-law. We went the weekend before Christmas. We went to the Austin Rifle Club out in Manor. It was drizzly, windy, and about 35 degrees. First the three of us alternately shot my CW9 on the 15 yard pistol range. I was curious whether the tendency for me to group low-left was me or the gun, and after one of us shot high-right immediately it was clear that it's the shooter and not the gun. We shot at a life-size target that had a picture of a bad guy who looks like Keith Richards with a female hostage, this picture must be about 30 years old. I managed to kill the hostage before the BG :( We also shot at an Osama Bin Laden poster-target. I don't know where these targets came from. Then we went over to the rifle range to sight in the M14 with competition style stock, which included a new scope. This rifle weighs 14 lb and can only be reasonably shot from a bench. I shot five rounds within about a 1/2" group the first time. Shooting a rifle like this from the bench with a bipod and that adjustable butt leg whatever you call it is almost too easy to be any fun. Then we all got too cold and left :)
Next up I went to the private range that I normally go to with a friend from Colorado and another friend from Georgetown. I brought my Kahr CW9 and my Marlin 795SS. We shot a couple of rounds through the Kahr but pretty much stuck with the .22. We had a blast. One of my friends found a bunch of junk from a junk pile including a stuffed dog from Target (you know, the "Target" dog with the target on his eye), some CDs, we shot shell casings lined up on the target stand, pieces from a junked electric stove, an old 56K modem card. You name it, we probably had it there, and we shot at it. It was like our own little "Box O' Truth". We had a blast shooting everything we could find to shoot at, except for targets :) We shot the .22 with the 4x32 scope at 15 yards and could hit 1/4" spots at will. The verdict is in: reactive targets are best.
When I got home my wife told me that another friend of ours had just gotten a S&W 9mm for Christmas and wondered if we'd take him out shooting. So that friend and his son joined my wife and I for another day at the same private range the very next day. We shot both of my 9mms, his "new" (20 year old S&W) 9mm, his .22 revolver, and my Marlin. That was not nearly as fun and frankly I was kind of tired of shooting after two consecutive days and about 800 rounds of .22LR.
I guess I probably hit the 1000 round mark for the month of December. I was close to that in November.
This made me realize that I need to go out to this range and redo parts of it. We need a target stand 50 yards from the rifle bench. Shooting the .22 at 15 yards is just too easy. 50 yards makes it a sport. 100 yards with the .22 rifle is just too much ... out of the 18" Marlin barrel the POI is a good 7-10" low of the POA. Also that range needs to be equipped with some permanently-installed spinners for 9mm on the pistol range and .22LR on the rifle range. I think it's time for me to go do some work on this place where I get to shoot for free :)
for the day. 