This SMALLBORE Business
I did not have a timber stocked rifle to experiment with but, it was really obvious that the bipod altered the recoil characteristics of a rifle swinging free and that the longer legs on the bipod, gave more rotational movement, though they settled a little faster indicating the weight of the balls was significant.
I did not try a fullbore rifle, as the neighbours would complain bitterly! Later on, I borrowed a timber Anschutz 1411 prone rifle to test and found the motion was less though the movements were similar.
So armed to the teeth with information, I placed my 20X Lyman scope on the action and started to watch the effects through the magnification of this superb telescopic sight.
Shooting prone, with the Lyman up top, I was able to hold the ten-ring easily, with a circular movement of the lee dot/cross-hairs reticule around the dimensions of the X-ring on a 50m target. On shot release, the cross-hairs rose to just inside the ten ring at 12 o’clock and with the follow-through returned to the previous aiming around the X-ring. I loaded up again and fired another proof shot, the rifle behaviour was pretty much the same. Both shots were inside the ten-ring. The ammunition was Eley Tenex.
So then I placed the bi-pod into the rail under the fore- end and returned to the experiment.
The hold dimensions were much the same with the cross-hairs rotating around the X-ring again, so I fired the next round of Tenex and I was stunned at the difference!
The shot recoiled, setting up a shimmer in the hold, but the recoil lifted fractionally more and finished on the 2 o’clock edge of the ten ring. This shot was a ‘loose’ ten so I loaded up and went again.
The second shot produced the same shimmer and the shot stayed inside the ten-ring at 8 o’clock. I then moved the bipod further out and watched the next shot carefully again. The recoil stayed inside the ten-ring but the shot was a 10.0 at 11 o’clock. The recoil moved even further with the same shimmering factor. I actually felt that I was not following the shot through, that there was something loose under the rifle….
I knew the bi-pod was tight, so I fired another and produced a 9.5 with that shot once more over the ten-ring. Shot number three with that bi-pod setting still produced the same rattling feeling, it sounded different (a lot sharper) and once more I lost the ten-ring with a worse 9.2 but on the bottom of the diagram. From that moment on I knew I was onto something!
I got up from the firing-point and put a longer bi-pod into the rail, this time further back to just in front of the hand stop, laid back down and shot another group of five shots.
The hold was pretty good, much the same as normal but the recoil system was far worse and took a long time to stop moving. Not only that but the recoil shape was a ‘figure eight’ movement. Totally unacceptable, so I replaced the bi-pod with a shorter bi-pod with wine-bottle corks for rests on the end of the bi-pod steel. I placed this one just forward of the hand-stop about a centimetre and fired another shot. The movement of the recoil was worse and this did not settle quickly either. I shot a 47 x50 with those five shots.
Then I changed to the R100 ammunition and watched the recoil destroy itself!
So, taking the bi-pods completely off my rifle, I shot a solid 50 with the R100, and some R50 I had in my kit produced the same result. Returning to the Tenex, I watched the recoil stay inside the ten-ring, return to aiming centre and placed all five shots into the X-ring in a quite small one-hole group of shots.
From that day onwards my readers, I have never used a bipod on my smallbore rifle while shooting from any position.
It is a simple matter to remove it and place it near my ammunition box and the use of the 20X Lyman scope really painted a picture.
This is just attention to detail! Brooksie.
48
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