The Obsolete Rifle Match That Wasn't

As noted in an earlier post, I recently participated in what was billed as a military "obsolete wooden stock rifle" match. Now, seeing that title, without any other description, suggests to me that the focus of the match is probably bolt guns like the one above, or possible semi-autos of the '40s or not set up for quick magazine changes.

What it turned out to be was three guys (to include your curmudgeonly author) with three different generations of rifles: a competition grade AR, a competition grade M1A, and........

A rather old but serviceable Egyptian Hakim in 7.9 x 57 mm Mauser. At this point, I'd argue that only one of us was serious about using an obsolete rifle.

After checking the gas settings for the 154 grain surplus Romanian rounds I was using, we had two sighting rounds, and moved to standing slow fire. There were a couple pleasant surprises here. First, my rifle was actually accurate. Second, the significant weight and length led to more stability in the standing position. Third, I had high score for this portion, which was more of a shock than anything else given the rifles present.

Next was seated rapid fire, with one mandatory reload. With a stovepiped round on the second shot, and the Hakim's ability to smash a digit exceeding a Garand, this didn't go quite so well. Dumping six rounds into a target at 200 yards in less than the ten remaining seconds isn't an accuracy enhancer.

The next two stages, including prone slow fire, showed that shooting against competition grade rifles, shooting coats, slings, and and gloves with an standard-issue slingless military rifle, no gloves or dedicated coat, and surplus ammunition isn't going to generally go well. Something like going to the country club skeet match with your grandpa's Browning Auto-5: it'll shoot, but people will look at you like you're crazy and you'll get your butt kicked competitively. Or they'll say something like "Isn't it amazing how people used these crude primitive rifles", leading to choking back comments on the amazing lack of knowledge of what went into rifles of this era. Flint and firelocks are primitive and crude, my friend; that's a whole different concept form "obsolete".

At least my '70s era ammo didn't do this:

If the price of the primed "once-fired" 5.55 mm brass that guy is selling is too good to be true.........

Still, it's good to get an old rifle out and see what it can do. Especially when you're pleasantly surprised that the old rifle is accurate if you do your part.

Rimfire Silhouette Match

The club's first silhouette match at the new range occurred this Sunday. I was disappointed that only six showed up, but I notice that new events tend to attract only a few shooter at first, with more becoming interested as word spreads. There was a considerable spread in rifles, with bolts, semis and even a lever action:

This was the first time I've shot one of these, and it was much more challenging than I expected. I wasn't aware that it's all standing unsupported, with no jackets, gloves, slings, etc. Very dependent on the shooter's fitness and the quality of the rifle's trigger. I was shooting my '30s era Winchester 52B with the scope set to 10x for most of the match. It's damn hard to steady a rifle intended for prone (lots of weight) in the unsupported standing. I won the match, with the incredibly impressive score of 11 out of 40. Out of six competitors. Yes, I'm impressed too.

Given the number of shots where the trigger broke as I was sweeping through the target so that the shot was nowhere near the target, I'm seriously in need of standing practice before the winter four-position season. Then again, a shooting jacket and glove make a world of difference. Anyway, I'm hoping the guys running the match continue doing these. It's difficult, but enjoyable and casual.

Following the match, I got a little recreational time in. First, twenty rounds of Romanian 7.9 x 57mm through a '20s vintage Brno Gewehr 1898. Basically, fun to shoot, but don't expect too much for accuracy. Some Turk went to town on the muzzle with a cleaning rod after the Czechs sold them off. Still, it's always a good time playing with a vintage rifle.

Following that, a Spanish M43 in 7.9 x 57mm. This one was shooting groups of about eight inches at a hundred yards. Yes, not great, but three factors to consider: I was shooting prone unsupported (no sling, rest, etc.), the top of the front sight (if you know Mausers, you know how wonderful that front sight is at it's even at it's best) was a nice, bright silver, as the bluing had worn off. And I didn't bring my sharpie to darken it up, so it pretty much disappeared on the target; and I got a little flinch after a pierced primer on round three dispersed a lot of smoke and gas into my glasses. I'll be doing a little file work on this one later this week.

Now, a little elbow grease to get all the nice thirty year old mercuric salts out of the barrels. The joys of surplus ammo.

Shoot, Then Shoot Some More

Competed in an across the course high power rifle match today. Eighty-eight rounds of .30-06 through an M1 Garand set up with National Match parts and glass bedding. Nice day for shooting, with not much wind and a clear sky, although wearing the leather shooting jacket while sweat pours down into your eyes isn't fun. We're fortunate enough to have actual pits for our targets, so everyone takes turns being a "pit pig" raising, lowering, and marking targets.

.223 makes a nice sharp snapping noise when it goes over your head, and a pretty good thump when it impacts the loose dirt in the berm.

Our target holders are vintage, having been salvaged from an army post where they'd been scrapped as obsolete. If I recall correctly, they're around one hundred years old. Several of the members put a lot of time into restoring them to working order. The rest of the rifle pit is only two years old, but is probably one of the nicest in the Midwest. Lots of work left to make it look pretty, but the foundations are all there.

The match ran from 0800 to 1330, with shooting from 200 & 300 yards. Then a short break for lunch, and on to my match, the NRA Combat Pistol Event.

We've just started outdoor pistol matches on the new range this summer, although it's been operating about four years. Today was a minor landmark, with eight shooters present, including a young woman who had never fired a handgun before.

Shooting for the Combat Event takes place at 7, 25, and 50 yards. I'm finding a lot of people who've attended will shoot their pistol at less than 25 yards, and haven't even considered trying to shoot out to 50 yards with them. Even a 25 yards, the scores begin to drop rapidly.

The collection of arms today was pretty eclectic. We had a Glock, Walther, Makarov, Beretta, Kimber, Taurus, and some others I didn't get a close look at. It's interesting to watch handling proficiency as the owners operate under pressure. What's effortless when you're casually shooting turns difficult with stress in place. I'm hoping it will motivate some of these shooters to practice more. I believe a lot of shooters become complacent about their skills over time, because they shoot the same way repeatedly.

It's easy to think you're good when you're never challenged.

Saturday Pistol Match

As predicted, I did manage to bugger up something unexpected at the pistol match. It's a good, good, idea to make sure before shooting a match, that you don't grab the oldest, crappiest, beater magazines you own. I had one magazine launch a couple of rounds straight out the top of the pistol when I slapped it into the pistol, one that I had to pry out after firing it dry, and best of all, one with a failure to feed that left half the cartridge in the chamber, half in the magazine. Ended up having to tap the round back into the magazine through the barrel, then tap the cartridge straight down into the magazine before I could drop it.

Thinking about it when I got back, I realized some of these magazines are over ten years old. Guess it's time to stop being a cheap bastard and cull a few, then invest in some better quality name brand mags. Also, I shouldn't assume just because I put the magazines away a few years ago, that they were actually clean. Amazing how much better a magazine loads when it's not full of grit.

Even with the screw-ups, any day I can go out and shoot on a sunny day in the '60s with a light breeze with good company is a good day. Next month, I'll try to put on an NRA action pistol match.

Pistol Match Tomorrow

I'll be running a modified military format pistol match tomorrow morning at our range. This will be the first time I've tried to run one instead of merely competing, so it should prove interesting. Over the years I've learned that whenever I do something new, I'll screw something up somehow. I'm curious to see what I'll have forgotten tomorrow....if anybody shows up. I'd be happy with five to ten people. A good manageable number for getting started with.

One thing I learned from a long time ago: check the dimensions on my hand loads. Many years ago when I first started at a local IPSC match, I came out with a fresh load of .45 ACP I'd assembled the day before. I'd shot a couple matches before with no problems with my handloads, so I didn't expect any this time. My turn came, I stepped into the starting box, loaded the pistol on command.....and the slide stopped just shy of completely chambering. OK.....it took what seemed like minutes to clear that one round, although it was less. It was hung up in there pretty tight, and did take a lot of effort, but cleared it was. Start again, and....same exact result with the next round. At this point I'm just embarrassed, clear the gun, and step back to the prep area to find out what's going on. After clearing my magazines, and looking at my extra rounds in their boxes, I found I'd assembled a couple hundred rounds that were consistently over crimped just enough to prevent chambering.

Ordered two new tools the next day: a kinetic bullet puller and a .45 ACP cartridge gauge to test fit assembled rounds.

Tonight that gauge probably prevented five jams while I ran all my competition cartridges through it. One bad case mouth and four cartridge heads bulged out of spec. At least I won't have to blame cases for any failures tomorrow.

Reloading

Started assembling loads for the M1 last night. I shot my first Garand match this past winter, and would like to make another 2-3 matches this summer. My current load worked well for last summer's practice conditions, but didn't reliably cycle the bolt in the middle of winter (not fun to find out during a rapid fire match). I'll be evaluating the current load for actual velocity vs published expected velocity, then working up to a little higher pressure load for enhanced reliability in cold weather. I'm considering tracking temperature variations effects on my standard load across the summer season also. Which means relearning the operation of my chronograph I haven't run in 5+ years, along with getting more familiar with my computer's spreadsheet programs.

I'm also looking forward to the mini Palma matches scheduled for our range this year. I've never shot one, but the descriptions sound interesting, and gives me more excuses opportunities to play with my old Winchester 52B. I'd considered taking the 4x-24x scope off this summer, since 10x was the most I found useful during 50 ft four-position competition this winter; with shooting at 200 yards, I'm thinking that the higher settings will see more use. I'll at least be learning some lessons on reading the wind with the little 40 grain bullets practically coasting out to the targets, compared to my 22-250's velocities.

Off to the dungeon to organize for a practice session tomorrow.

Done For The Season

Finished Smallbore 4-position on Monday night. Finally met my goal of scoring 350 out of 400 possible for the first time with my scoped Winchester 52B. This has been my first season using a scope, and I found out the hard way that a rifle built in the late 1930's wasn't engineered with optical sights in mind (I'm the only one in my competition group that seems to have a thing for playing with curious and relics). I suspect that with it's heavy bull barrel, wide forearm, and six position screw-in sling swivel placement at the far end of the stock, my particular rifle was intended for 100 yard prone shooting that I've seen in vintage advertising in E-Bay. It now has a standard handstop, courtesy of a member of my local gunclub who is also a talented machinest. The channel for the handstop was ordered from Champion Shooters Supply, with the inletting and fitting done by this gentleman. Looks like it came from the Winchester factory except for a lack of wear. Had to rework the the right hand grip, as it had been customized by filing away the wood for finger recesses of a previous shooter. While well done, the gentleman had hands of a different size than mine. Since the stock had already been altered, I've worked it to fit my hand better, as the collector value of the stock is shot. It is now uglier, but better fitting for me. So, my score has increased as I've fitted the rifle to my ample frame over the season. Sadly, holding a 12 pound single-shot steady in the standing position without having purchased a shooting coat yet is singulary difficult. It's next on the list, if I can find one that allows for a beer gut. Ah well, spring is around the corner; let the Garand Match training begin!