TargetTalk

I have been shooting a new to me S&W model 52-2 and have noticed a trend of vertical stringing with this gun while shooting gallery courses with my club.

I have been shooting a handload of H&G # 50 148gr. WC with 2.8 grains of Bullseye in a Remington case with Remington SP primer.

My groups left to right or horizontally are about 1/2" at 50' but vertically are about 3" with the first shot being centered and consecutive shots climbing vertically about 1/2" to 3/4" with each shot after the last one that was fired.

Could this be a problem of using the wrong handload causing vertical stringing or is it more of an inconsistant/wrong grip problem. I don't see as well as when I was younger but feel that if my groups were a round 3" then I would say time for a red dot sight but with a 1/2" horizontal grouping I feel that there may be something else other that my eye sight causing this but it has me scratching my head.

Should I try a different handload? Custom grips? Or just conceed to the fact that my eyes just aint what they use to be and get a red dot?

Kirmdog

See if this helps.
http://www.bullseyepistol.com/chapter2.htm

I wouldn't buy custom grips yet, use some "Premo! Sculpey" .
From your description you might need a bit of putty on the back top of the grip, where the thumb meets the index finger and goes against the grip.
Make sure your sites are not loose.

Paulo

Am I correct in assuming from your discription that you think my thumb may be floating around and changing possition from shot to shot?

This could be it as I find that the stock grips on the 52 to be small for my large hand and it's hard for me to find a comfortable grip with this gun but I do enjoy shooting it very much.

Sight are not loose and I just put in a new recoil spring because I had no idea as to how many rounds were shot with the old spring. It shot the same with the new and old recoil spring so I know it cannot be that. The guy I bought it from said that his best shooting handload was the same as mine except he used 3.0 grains of BE. I don't know if I should try that load because it seems a bit on the high side for a 52 but maybe others that shoot a 52 would know better than me about that

Kirmdog

BTW thanks for the web site!

The 52 has somewhat of an arched MSH shape grip. I am seeing in my sights shots that go high with an arched main spring housing on the 1911 when I don't grip like Zins. My non-Zins grip requires a flat MSH. Zins requires arched.

So make sure the 52 lower backstrap is set in the major crease between your thumb ham and pinkie ham.

OK, I replaced the recoil spring and shot a few matches with it and I still got vertical stringing and it was driving me nuts!

I decided to replace the main spring (hammer spring) because of the same reson I replaced the recoil spring, I don't know how many rounds have gone through this 52-2 before I bought it. BINGO, I'm back to nice round groups while shooting two matches with this gun and the new main spring. The only thing I can figure is that the originale main spring must have lost some of it's power and it had slowed the hammer fall down some. With the barrel time being long anyway for 38's and the slower hammer fall I must have been moving my sights and gun hand before the bullet was out of the barrel.

Problem corrected! : > )

Thanks everyone for your help.

Kirmdog