Day at the Range

Today's trip to the range was accompanied by a rather large agenda of tasks that I wanted to accomplish.

First and foremost I wanted to work on my draw from concealment with live ammo to see if my dry fire drills have created any bad habits. I had nothing to worry about, as a matter of fact my first shot on target accuracy has improved significantly. While working on my drills, I was also continuing my Tripp Research v Wilson Combat magazine test. I used the same magazines as my previous tests, and the results were pretty much the same as before. I am going to gather a lot more data before posting again, but I am pretty confident that the earlier issues are not random. I was also testing out the first batch of reloads through my Lee Pro 1000. They ran great up until the point when there was a small "pop", and nothing when I pulled the trigger. I found a round with no powder. The bullet did not even completely clear the case. That turned into a "take the gun home and fix" issue. All is well now.

The next task on my list was to try out my new Ruger SP 101. That is one fine revolver. The front sight takes a bit of extra concentration, but I held very good groups with .38 Special rounds. My groups opened up a bit when I shot the Buffalo Bore Tactical Short Barrel Low-Flash 158 gr .357 rounds. I am very happy with this revolver.

While I was doing all this, V was shooting her Hi-Power. While we were at NRA Con, V received a bit of instruction from one of the guys with Novak Sights. V noticed right away that her shooting had improved. She put quite a few rounds down range and was very pleased with the results.

My final task for the day was to break in the bore of my new Savage Scout, and sight in the Leupold FX II Scout Scope. This was where I bit off a little more than V could chew. The temperature got into the 90's and the day grew long for her as I shot one round, then cleaned the barrel, shot another round and ...

I started at the 50 yard range to sight in the scope. Moved to the 100, then out to the 200 yard range. When I was sighted in at 200 yards, I started ringing a gong that I hung out there. V was watching the plate swing through a spotting scope. That is when I started missing the plate. I went from nailing a 3" orange dot to missing an 8" wide plate. Something was up. The factory mounted forward rail had worked loose. Did not make it through the whole break in procedure, but that will wait for another day.

Now it's time to clean some guns. Now, where did I put that loctite...