Monday, December 15, 2008

How to Tell if you are being mocked.


  Once I had worked my way through shooting deer with my stack of old military rifles, friends popped up offering to help.  Rol has an old brassy Enfield.  Roger has a Krag.  John has a Springfield 45-70 Govt he bought when he was 13.  When John came up to Clarksville this past weekend he toted his 45-70 along with free ammo.  Here it is.  Since it was missing the rear sight and the front sight was a dab of copper wire he mounted the cheapest aimpoint American money could buy and zeroed it.
  Last year at the National Matches I shot Garand, Springfield 1903, M1A and Vintage without a hint of a recoil problem and 2/3rds of those matches are prone, where you really soak up the impact.  I shot John's 45-70 twice off a bench to check the aimpoint, or destroy it, and came away with a shoulder that felt like it had been sledgehammered.
  John still had some of his original ammo that came with the gun.  He's 60 now, so it's not a fun gun to shoot.
  Needs a window weight duct taped to the forearm to soak up some energy.
  Stock cut down, rear sight stolen, front sight bubbaed, no sling, tang and trigger guard screws replaced with wood screws, aim point added.  All I needed was some match hollowpoints.
    Actually carried it into the stand with me and watched a couple of little bucks and a tiny doe.  Put the gun on them to look at the sights.  Heavy trigger- must be 15 lbs or so.
  I can't believe people used to shoot each other with these things.

Update:  Looked at Numrich for replacement screws and they had some, but not all.  Amazing.

4 comments:

catfish said...

Reminds me of a buddy's .303 Enfield. We called it The Punisher.

Standing or kneeling it was really not a bad rifle to shoot; but take it to the bench and oh my.....

catfish said...

Yeah, I never could understand guys who liked to shoot rifles that beat you to death.

I've got a job, don't need another one. ;)

Anonymous said...

What recoil? I've got a trapdoor - original rifle, not a cutdown. I find the recoil very manageable.

Anonymous said...

Shoot it off-hand, it should be a lot more manageable. Aside from the red-dot, thats' a handsome looking long-iron.