Recoil

ModestoPete · Post by **ModestoPete** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 11:56 am

When shooting Free Pistol, if the gun recoils straight back, I know I have made a good shot. Sometimes it recoils left or right and I know the shot will be in that area of the target.

My question is this. Is it different grip pressure or a loose wrist which causes the differences in the recoil?

What do I need to work on to have the pistol recoil straight back every time?

RobStubbs · Post by **RobStubbs** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 12:23 pm

I'm not sure you can diagnose without observation. I'd suspect diffences in gripping or poor triggering - do you dry fire and if so do you observe any movement on trigger release ?

Rob.

ModestoPete · Post by **ModestoPete** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 12:47 pm

Yes, I dry fire.

Also, in the last match I had 2 misfires (some old Eley Black). The sights didn't move. I felt good about that, no flinching or heeling.

Isabel1130 · Post by **Isabel1130** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 1:30 pm

It is triggering. Poor triggering causes the gun to not recoil straight back.

renzo · Post by **renzo** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 1:46 pm

Isabel1130 wrote:It is triggering. Poor triggering causes the gun to not recoil straight back.

I myself am not so sure, specially when talking FP.

In my personal case, I've got my worst "up-and-right" mistakes when releasing the gripping pressure just when firing. I can clearly see the muzzle flipping and I feel the twisting recoil of the gun (I'm a rightie).

Isabel1130 · Post by **Isabel1130** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 3:56 pm

renzo wrote:
Isabel1130 wrote:It is triggering. Poor triggering causes the gun to not recoil straight back.
I myself am not so sure, specially when talking FP.

In my personal case, I've got my worst "up-and-right" mistakes when releasing the gripping pressure just when firing. I can clearly see the muzzle flipping and I feel the twisting recoil of the gun (I'm a rightie).

Free pstiols have very light triggers. This will mask a triggering error and make it hard to identify triggering errors. I can see why you would think that relaxing the grip pressure during a shot would cause the shot to go up and right but you are talking about heeling. This is an anticipation error. If you were not anticipating the shot, you would not be relaxing your grip. right? Relaxing your grip is probably causing your trigger finger to lose the nice even pressure, you shold be applying steadily until the shot breaks, and the heel of your hand is now pushing the gun. Just my opinion, of course.

ModestoPete · Post by **ModestoPete** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 4:22 pm

During the last match I had 2 misfires and the sights didn't move when the trigger clicked.

I felt good about that.

So why does the gun recoil straight back sometimes and sometimes not?

Grip, wrist, elbow, shoulder?

renzo · Post by **renzo** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 5:02 pm

Isabel1130 wrote:
Free pstiols have very light triggers. This will mask a triggering error and make it hard to identify triggering errors. I can see why you would think that relaxing the grip pressure during a shot would cause the shot to go up and right but you are talking about heeling. This is an anticipation error. If you were not anticipating the shot, you would not be relaxing your grip. right? Relaxing your grip is probably causing your trigger finger to lose the nice even pressure, you shold be applying steadily until the shot breaks, and the heel of your hand is now pushing the gun. Just my opinion, of course.

You're right about the anticipation error (which is most common) but I also had trouble - and sometimes still have - with excessively prolonged aiming where instead of aborting the shot I insist in shooting it, while loosing track (or consciousness) of my failing grip due to fatigue.

Not amazingly, ths happens often when having good physical tone, because when I don't the arm itself tells me inevocably that I'm taking too much aim.................

Of course, it's all about forgetting the basics.

Isabel1130 · Post by **Isabel1130** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 8:08 pm

Renzo, if I were you, I would train to either get the shot off immediately or put the gun down. One of the worst things you can do is what I call loitering on the trigger. If it takes more than a couple of seconds from the start of your trigger pull till the shot leaves the barrel, you are giving yourself too much time to doubt your sight picture and make any number of errors. When you attempt to shoot anway after holding too long, you are very likely to snatch the shot. Know how long your hold is good for. Training with turning targets is best but if you dont have those, get yourself a timer. In order to get good slow fire shots, I have to "think" that I am going to apply pressure immediately after my sights enter the aiming area. Some people like John Zurek seem to be able to hold the gun up all day and still shoot good slow fire. I cant do that. Most of us can't. If you usually shoot irons, try training with a dot scope. It gives you much more visible indicators that your hold is deteriorating. If you are shooting a free pistol, the long sight radius with the irons always appears to be moving. It can trick you into thinking that your hold is as good at the 8-10 second mark as at 4 seconds. All the studies indicate that it is not. This is what the experts have told me, and I believe them.

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Recoil

Recoil

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