SmallCaliberCentral

What are your secrets to bench rest shooting? Breathing, trigger pull, esp front and rear rest techniques.

RedLeg- A good article on bench tecnique can be found here:

http://www.varmintal.net/ashot.htm

Scroll down towards the bottom of the page to find the article. I am certainly no
benchrest shooter, but my groups have shrunk dramatically through practice and the study
of proper tecnique. Here is a typical group from when I first became interested in
accurate rifle shooting a couple years ago.



Here is a typical group now:



Again, not BR accuracy, but good enough to test reloads. Now some suggestions. First and foremost, get a good adjustable front rest and rear bag. You can spend as much money as you want on a front rest, but something like a Cadwell "Rock" (~$70) will work fine. I highly suggest a leather rear bag with "rabbit ears", and filled with something HEAVY. It needs to be solid and not shift under recoil. Sand works fine. I filled mine with lead shot, and then added sand to fill the space between the shot. This makes for a very heavy and solid bag. I filled the "ears" with sand only to conform to the stock easily. My front rest is a MidwayUSA brand (discontinued) and a Protektor rear bag:




Cost me $75 used on Ebay. Notice how far forwards on the forend the rifle is sitting on the bag. This really helps stabilize the rifle, just make sure your sling swivel doesn't interfere with recoil. There are a few little tricks I use when shooting off this setup, all of which can be summed up to making sure the rifle sits on the bags and recoils the EXACT same way every time. I adjust the rifle to aim at the bullseye without me touching it, then tighten the set screw on the front rest. If I move the cross hairs even an inch to shoot at another bullseye, the front rest puts torque on the rifle and can string shots horizontally. So I always loosen the rest and re-adjust. After firing the shot I carefully slide the rifle forwards untill the cross hairs are back on target or I use the front stop on the rest. I place my left hand (I'm right handed) on the bag and squeeze to make any minor adjustments. You also have to make sure you are comfortable and relaxed (this really comes with practice). Getting gittery and exited can really blow a nice group! Anyways, thats a look at how I do it, YMMV.

1) Lots and lots and lots of trigger time.
2) Never, never, never "spend" a shot. Make a study of each one, deciding what you did right or wrong each time.
3) I'm with Neil S, that recoil must be identical shot-to shot. Do whatever it takes to ensure that, and you are driving to the grail
4) Decide weather or not you will contend with the wind; ie, if you are shooting for load development, REFUSE to do that in the wind. If you are shooting to develop skills for competition, treat the wind seriously, don't ignore it thinking that it "doesn't matter"... big mistake!!

Here's what I can expect from a bipod and rabbit ears as long as I do the right things for recoil (the two 300y "x's" were transposed from another piece of carboard):

In addition...make sure you have a good position. You should never have to force the sights on the target...even a little. When squeezing the trigger, the only part of your body that should be moving is your trigger finger...nothing else!

HTH

I should have mentioned that a benchrest guy may not be happy with my range test result, I was good w/ it. There was just a tad of left-right wind, and the 300y 3-shots gave me about 1". I'm sure If I went 5 shots, it would have opened up some more...