Are you happy with your shooting?

The only gun I shoot offhand is my flintlock.

That is very good shooting.

I shoot 10m in my basement for the same reason. I do not shoot as well as you,

That’s a very nice group for standing and shooting freehand. Great job!! I like to shoot ten meter at home in my yard or garage. Like you, I am not competitive. I also really like to shoot silhouette; also at home in my yard. I would shoot silhouette competitions if there were any near me. I am happy with my shooting and I have actually noticed myself getting better as I keep practicing. I only have 30 yards in my backyard so I have begun to place the chickens at 30 yards for a bigger challenge. My hit ratio is slowly improving.
Kenny

Personally I'm very happy with my continuing progress but CANNOT shoot freehand anymore. Getting old sucks! I've lost too much strength & control of my left arm & shoulder to chance freehand shooting while hunting. Bipods are my friends! I'm OK with that.

I also shoot in basement (at least over winter) but at my age free hand is pretty much a waste of pellets. I do enjoy shooting from a bench, though. I also don't compete against other shooters, only myself. I am constantly striving for teeny little groups using my Weihrauch HW44 pistol in 177 cal. For instance these groups are smaller than the pellet diameter due to the physics of pellet shape and type of paper.

Pests are my favorite. I'm not even an average good shooter. I'll probably take heat for saying such, but it is what it is. I will say that PCP's surprised me as I would swear some models seem to make me more accurate. Sort of made me, "over confident".

I dont think so.
If i became able to hit something small repeatedly, i would just move the same further away and start over.

It is pretty much minimum average miss distance i deal in, not for a set number of shots though.

The 2" shoot and see targets i often shoot after, really it is just that middle .25 or something red dot that count for me, so even if i just shred the 2" target at great distance, if that red dot is still there i will not be happy.
It do just take one prefect placed .177 slug and the red dot is gone.

And when i do get it, even if it is as a result of 3 shots combined that do the red dot in, i am very happy CUZ it do not happen that often.
Some times i think i did it, but that is just from what i see in my 30 X scope, when i then get up there to the target i see a few Sq mm red is still there.

Mind you some times if the timing is good and the 5 first shots are pretty darn close together but not on the red dot i aim for, i will move on to the next target, and take a picture to show off what a damn good shot i am.
But inside, that red dot i aimed for haunt me.

Happy with my shooting....... well it depends on the day

I much rather shooting steel and critters. Paper isn't bad, but I much prefer shooting steel over anything else.

Steve Milbocker said:

I get that Gerry. When I was younger I was a decent off hand shot as far as hunting was concerned. Now that I’m 69 I’ve decided to try this off hand target shooting, something I never really did outside of plinking. I was really struggling with the weight of the FWB 300S. Now that I’ve learned how to set up with bone on bone and a few other things, it’s starting to get easier and I’m improving a bit at a time.

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"Personally I'm very happy with my continuing progress but CANNOT shoot freehand anymore. Getting old sucks! I've lost too much strength & control of my left arm & shoulder to chance freehand shooting while hunting. Bipods are my friends! I'm OK with that"

I understand that, I'm 79 and no longer had the strength to hold a heavy gun up very long. This did get me interested so I attached an old Freeland palm rest to my FWB 150 and started shooting at some swingers. Consistant hits on about a 1 1/4 inch target for about ten shots then it started getting hard so stopped. I'll practice like that some more in the coming days, I can shoot a little a lot faster like that than setting up my bench and front rest which I have to keep covered from weather and sun when not in use. I shot smallbore match back in college, but that was 60 years ago and I simply cannot see my self getting into a couple of those positions, sitting and kneeling. Prone would be ok shooting, but the getting back up would be difficult. We did have special shooting jackets and slings designed for position shooting which helped a lot. Don't think I want to go that route. The palm rest really helps a lot, lock left elbow onto hip, then forearm straight up and palm rest supporting rifle.

Steve Milbocker said:

I have a 32 cal. Flintlock built by Dennis Priddy. They hang beautifully for offhand don’t they!

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I have a 36 cal in southern mountain style. Nice iron hardware, by Dan Caywood

Steve Milbocker said:

I recently took up the challenge of being a better off hand shooter. I happen to like 10 meter shooting and since I can only shoot in my basement because of where I live right now that works well for me. I have no desire to compete nor do I have the time or skill to be competitive, those 10 meter shooters are amazing and I know the hours and hours of dedicated hard work they put in to be as good as they are. I go to the basement and shoot a few groups of 5 shots when I have the time and feel like it and when I can keep my 5 shots in the 3/4” dots I’ve been using lately I’m pretty happy about that One thing I know about this discipline I’m never going to get bored! What type of shooting do you guys like best and are you happy with it?View attachment 560278

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That's good. The last real offhand shooting I did when I was shooting 4 position, smallbore match back in college, but that's been 60 years ago now. This got me interested so I put a Freeland palm rest on my FWB 150 and went out for a few shots. The palm rest helps a lot, but still I tired out holding that heavy rifle and I was not trying for groups, just shooting at a swinging target, the small disk on a dueling tree. 7-8 shots were good then fatigue got to me quick, with a 80th birthday looking at me in about 5 more months did not help either.

I think I will try this every day, maybe a couple of times a day for a few weeks and see if I can get any more consistant, then try for some groups

I have a very unorthadox shooting style....Simply sitting in a comfortable chair left arm braced on my knee....Comfortable for me and I can shoot accurately to my satisifaction...most times. Bullpups and short carbines and compacts work best for me. My Bobcat and four Veterans are my favorites. Been shooting this style since 2010....started with a springer and lots of pratice. I can usually hold my groups to around .5" at 50 yds....wind permitting...I've been trying to arrange a "shooting session" with an AGN member to wittness some of my groups...difficult to set up, so far, but still trying. This 5 shot group was at a measured 47.5 yards with a Taipan Veteran compact .22 with JTS 18 grain pellets from my chair...been wowed by this compact with a 350mm barrel! Pushes the JTS 18s at 840fps. I'm older too just turned 70 but still passinate about printing small groups.

Gerry52 said:

Personally I'm very happy with my continuing progress but CANNOT shoot freehand anymore. Getting old sucks! I've lost too much strength & control of my left arm & shoulder to chance freehand shooting while hunting. Bipods are my friends! I'm OK with that.

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Gerry, I used to be pretty good offhand until I bought a Trigger Stick tripod. Love the tripod.

I shoot almost exclusively standing unsupported. My satisfaction with my own abilities is fine, I guess. Having shot powder-burners all my life, I know that my fundamentals are well beyond what is needed to hit the targets I want to shoot.

I also know that my HW77 is not nearly as accurate as I would like it to be. We’re talking 3-5 MOA over 20 shot strings from the bench. The mean radius is a bit better at 0.8-1.2 MOA. So most of my shots are good, with a few outliers destroying the extreme spread.

Lately, I’ve been trying to progress to the point that I can range my HW77 .22 out to 50 and 75m whilst standing. The constant summer wind here in Finland makes this a nightmare.

Just yesterday I went to the fields and ranged out to 50m, dialed my elevation, and got a first round hit on a 3.5” spinner. I shot that for a while, getting more hits than misses, until I decided to attempt 75m.

Well long story short, I never connected at 75m and the wind condition deteriorated as the afternoon waned into evening. There were 3-4 separate distinct winds between me and the target, and all 3 were shifting constantly.

I decided to walk back to 50m, but even then the wheels fell off for a long time. The hits sporadically returned until the wind decided otherwise.

To preserve my sanity I moved to 30m and was nailing everything. That pretty much eliminated me and the rifle in my mind. Oh well.

Great to read this thread and see that I'm in good company

At 73, I'm a member of the "old guys club" and like others, age is wearing on me. My health is reasonable but everything is less that what it was, at least what I remember it to have been.

I've always been an off hand plinker and going for a walkabout with an airgun was a favorite activity. Still enjoying that though I'm finding that my lighter weight HW30 and DRS are seeing a lot of use. Off hand shooting is still pretty good... at closer ranges and walks are a bit shorter.

Seems that I'm sitting at the bench more as well. The heavier airguns are more comfortable to shoot from a rest. Modern airguns/optics, quality pellets and decades of practice let's me shoot respectable groups. That keeps me entertained though I am easily distracted from the target and start shooting at the push-pins. LOL!

I'm finding .22 pellets to be OK but .177 to be a bit fiddly to handle, I may look at getting a "pellet pen" for my single-shot airguns.

Thank heaven for PCPs and a good compressor as they make extended shooting sessions possible. It's great to be retired - bonus to be able to spend quiet hours shooting!

So yeah, I'm happy with my shooting, as good as it is (or isn't) on that particular day.

Cheers!

The older I get the better I was, but back to the conversation at hand. I mostly shoot in my yard out to 70 yards max depending on wind. mostly 60yards on paper. I have a few spinners set up and shoot my springers at closer ranges. I too started to practice shooting off hand with my HW95 in .20cal. I have improved a lot but still not ready for the olympics. Still Im happy with my ability.