.45 bullseye pistol 1.5 guarantee

First topic message reminder :

i saw two brands of gun what guarantee 1.5 groups at 50 yards and the ammo they mention is federal match. i have a range officer,super accurate and mega close groups,is possible a range officer make 1.5 groups at 50 yards or is the ammo??? thanks!

Slarty, the difference is 20 years bullseye experience with his Ruger Mark II vs. 5 months for me.

I started with a Ruger 22/45 Lite because it was what I had.  I cursed at it for a few months trying to upgrade it into something it was never meant to be.

One of our local guys wanted to sell the Hammerli and let me try it out a few times and even shoot a match with it.  In one night, that gun taught me lot about what a superior pistol can bring to the table- an out this world trigger and the removal of any doubt that the bullet landed EXACTLY where I pointed.  I purchased it the next day.

As for .22, here is no excuse anymore for my crappy scores, except that I am not as good a shot as the guy next to me and I try to improve from there.

Thanks for the responses everyone.
I could have afforded to buy a $3000 pistol, but decided to start modestly and not blow that kind of money on something I had never tried. So after holding a few pistols in the store, I settled on the SW22 Victory. Love the feel, a little worried with a jammed screw (see my thread for details).
I figure if you can't shoot a group as well as the gun can in a machine rest then the guy is probably better than you. The trick I suppose is to be wary of spending money on the gun to accomplish things that won't help you improve as a marksman. And to get a feel for how much of the randomness of results is wind and ammunition.
And sorry to drag this thread off topic.

I think it boils down to if you have a 4" gun, shoot 4" groups with it.  Let the score fall where the may.  Upgrade when you can.  Meanwhile work on consistency and making 10" groups into 4" groups

So tonight, we were done with League shooting for the night and only me and my nemesis, Mr. Ruger Mark II were still on the range.  Tonight was only .22s during our regular match, but we both wanted some .45 action, so just the two of us shot a half match at our .22 targets from earlier.  His "gunsmithed" Kimber vs. my stock RO, iron sights @50ft.

The showdown was on and just thinking about what I typed earlier today about our friendly .22 rivalry had me holding hard!  We shot most of the match at a drumming pace, each firing a shot in answer to the other. BAM!BAM!--BAM!BAM!--BAM!BAM!  We jammed through targets like dueling banjos and in the end it was pretty close.  Hands down, the most fun I have had on a league night. 

In the end he had me by 1-X, but I had him by 2 points.

Maybe its not the shooter or the gun, but the attitude.

Good for you guys! BAM! Nothing like friendly competition
I love Ruger MKII's by the way. I hope you both become greatest of friends!
Jon

I am new to Bullseye, shot my first match ever last Saturday, a 1200. Didn't do very well, but had a "blast". Amazing how much tougher to shoot with flipping targets. My equipment is far superior to my skill, but I like that, takes away many of my excuses. I am finding the combination of trigger and balance to be super important. I am quite fortunate to have an outstanding LGS and coach.  Age is not really on my side, but still time for lots of improvement. Now for some dry fire practice.....

When reading something like The Pistol Shooter's Treasury you have to take in consideration when the article time period was written about. Keep in mind that Master Classification was 90% (today's Expert) when Blankenship was shooting. There was no High Master Classification back then! I don't suggest that a new shooter get the latest super accurate and very expensive pistol especially since I've seen that those claims of super accuracy are more hype than reality. However a 4" grouping gun will not offer much when trying to learn how to shoot.
 The actual group size is the group size the shooter is capable of plus the group size of the the gun.

Froneck wrote:When reading something like The Pistol Shooter's Treasury you have to take in consideration when the article time period was written about. Keep in mind that Master Classification was 90% (today's Expert) when Blankenship was shooting. There was no High Master Classification back then! I don't suggest that a new shooter get the latest super accurate and very expensive pistol especially since I've seen that those claims of super accuracy are more hype than reality. However a 4" grouping gun will not offer much when trying to learn how to shoot.
 The actual group size is the group size the shooter is capable of plus the group size of the the gun.

I actually think that most of the articles are still very relevant today. Winning a match is winning a match, so the classification breakdown is irrelevant. Other articles by Gil Hebard say that the most important qualities of a target pistol are reliability, accuracy, quality trigger pull and good sights. Having a grip and grip angle similar to the 1911 is a quality I like. It helps in transition. I started out with a Ruger MKI, but switched to a Hi Standard because of the similarity in "feel" of the Hi Standard to the 1911. When starting out, I think it is important to have a pistol that will group in the ten ring regularly, so one knows that those hits outside the 10 ring are the shooter and not the gun. I don't think that a 1.5" gun is necessary (there is nothing wrong with it, just not necessary). Speaking about 1.5" guns, I would only believe that if I had shot the gun myself and obtained those groups. IMHO, trigger pull is much more important that mechanical accuracy. A shooter loses points because of improper trigger control.

Froneck wrote:........
 The actual group size is the group size the shooter is capable of plus the group size of the the gun.

well you might have driven to Camp Perry every year for 35 years straight and have a son at FT. Benning but you don't know the most basics of statistical analysis, and justifying a 1.5" pistol over a 4" pistol is about statistical analysis. You do not add the errors together to find the total error of a system, there is something called normal distribution and standard deviation. Even the most basic and simple calculation is the root,sum,square method and it shows that for a 10" hold shooter (7 ring) the difference in the overall group between them is just over half an inch.
A real analysis would show the SD vs. ES and the results would be even more clear that a 1.5" pistol would not significantly improve a person that regularly puts shots into the 7 ring. A person has to have most of their shots in the 10 ring (low SD) before a sub 2" pistol might make a big difference in their score. Working on reducing the biggest error in a system is much better than slightly improving the smallest error in a system.

Believe me there are plenty of 2600+ shooters that do not have a 1.5" pistol.

Just a newbie on the forum.  I spend a lot of time trying to get my Gold Cup NM to shoot tight groups.  My Ransom rest is telling me it is at best a 5 inch gun at the long line.  I want a Les Baer Bullseye Wadcutter but am to old to wait 18 months for one and can't find a used one anywhere.  Qualified Expert in the Navy back in 84 with a 1911 that rattled when it was in battery so I can shoot a little.  I enjoy working up loads and spend far to much of my shooting time firing from a rest or the Ransom rest with my Lab Radar.  I turn 70 next month and am sure my wobble wasn't this bad 30 years ago.

Magload wrote:Just a newbie on the forum.  I spend a lot of time trying to get my Gold Cup NM to shoot tight groups.  My Ransom rest is telling me it is at best a 5 inch gun at the long line.  I want a Les Baer Bullseye Wadcutter but am to old to wait 18 months for one and can't find a used one anywhere.  Qualified Expert in the Navy back in 84 with a 1911 that rattled when it was in battery so I can shoot a little.  I enjoy working up loads and spend far to much of my shooting time firing from a rest or the Ransom rest with my Lab Radar.  I turn 70 next month and am sure my wobble wasn't this bad 30 years ago.

David Santurri in North Attleboro, MA can fix you up pretty quickly.

Not sure a Baer is the ideal way to go, but if you really want one, Champions Choice has them in stock.

Magload wrote:Just a newbie on the forum.  I spend a lot of time trying to get my Gold Cup NM to shoot tight groups.  My Ransom rest is telling me it is at best a 5 inch gun at the long line.  I want a Les Baer Bullseye Wadcutter but am to old to wait 18 months for one and can't find a used one anywhere.  Qualified Expert in the Navy back in 84 with a 1911 that rattled when it was in battery so I can shoot a little.  I enjoy working up loads and spend far to much of my shooting time firing from a rest or the Ransom rest with my Lab Radar.  I turn 70 next month and am sure my wobble wasn't this bad 30 years ago.

I first started shooting the centerfire and .45 matches with a series 70 Colt Gold Cup NM. The only modification was a trigger job. I was a Sharpshooter back then. It seemed to me that my slow fire shots weren't regularly on on call, and I didn't have access to a machine rest. I was shooting a match at Ft. Sam Houston in San Antonio. I was squadded next to Ken Buster of the All National Guard team. Something on my Gold Cup broke. I can't remember exactly what (this was in the late 70's). Ken asked their armorer to fix my Gold Cup and loaned me his back-up 1911 to finish the match. He advised me that the Gold Cup really wasn't capable of shooting good groups at 50 yards. After this experience I sold some guns, including the Gold Cup and ordered a wad gun from Jim Clark, Sr. My scores started to climb regularly and I made Expert. IIRC the minimum for Master changed after I made Expert (from 90 to 95). It took me quite some time to make Master. My point, after all this rambling, is that in my experience the Gold Cup isn't bullseye ready, out of the box. I can also relate about the wobble. I'm not too far behind you in age. What's seems to be worse at this stage of the game, is I get the shakes from, what I suppose, is match nerves now. I shoot far better in practice now than when I was younger. When I was younger, I'd mostly shoot better in matches than practice. Old age has made me more emotional, I suppose. Don't give up, though. Keep on, keepin' on.

I did the same as BE Mike, was shooting great with .22 and 38 in CF but when it came to .45 with an out of the box Gold Cup I went into the toilet. Fred Kart seen my scores winning most in .22 and CF in Marksman class at Perry but was off the charts in .45 ( I have won the match beating local Masters {HM not a Classification yet} with the .22 as a Marksman)
 He looked at my gun and told me it would not shoot a good score! He took it to work on it, when I returned home I had another .45 built, shot it until Perry and made Expert before I returned to Perry. Kart's worked on G.C. came the day I left for Perry. I made the Civilian Expert Team, Got Leg Point with Kart's G.C.and had a Master Classification Card waiting for me when I got home.
 I didn't mean to imply that classification has anything to do with it other than the scores were lower back then. Furthermore the accuracy of the pistols back then were much better out of the box than available today. S&W made great shooters out of the box and so did Colt, High Standard were good too. It was rare to see an imported gun being shot at Perry. A great shooter like Blankenship was could use an average out of the box pistol back then and win a championship.
 Simply put a shooter will not learn anything with a gun that will not shoot a great group! I don't mean a 1.5" pistol that is more hype than reality. The AMU is using sub 1" guns but they have a top smith keeping them at their best constantly.  Any gun will shoot a 1.5" group using a machine rest but the good gun will group 3" or less every time it's tested. The out of the box will do it once in a Blue Moon! Except of course some gun put together with spare parts found on e-bay or gun show nor some ex military issue gun grandpa had in his draw not being able to print on the target.
 OK now getting back to your averages. Target shooting is not averages, Classification is. Nor is group size unless you want to fool yourself. If taking an average of the shots fired for a group is not the way it's done, it's the size of the circle all the shot hole centers are within. One shot will increase group size by it's distance from the other greatest distant shot measured at the centers so it will become the addition of the shooter and the gun. Plus as mentioned it should not be a one time shot group or it might be one in a Blue Moon! Learning to shoot the shooter must be able to see the results of his shots. If he did everything correct and the shot should have been an X but he gets an 8 or scratch 9 at 9 O-Clock there is no Ah Ha moment so he shoots again, does exactly the same thing but now get an 8 or scratch 9 at 3 O-Clock he has again no Ah Ha moment yet he did everything right!
 Worse is the newbie with a screwdriver, takes a shot, looks and makes an adjustment, shoots again, makes an adjustment and so on until he is totally confused.
 Your example of a shooter that is shooting a 10" group don't say much. Is it the shooter shooting that or with the 4" gun. If in fact it's the shooter, then he should be Dry Firing. Any shooter must define his error. I doubt that he is pulling the trigger when the sights are in the 7 ring. If then the actual location of the gun is aligned with the 7 ring when the bullet exits the barrel due to shooters error then it's possible that a 4" grouping gun will add an additional 2" and a 5 will result! I doubt very much that a consistent 2600 shooter uses a 4" gun, if so then he has something like a Pardini .22 and .32.
 Keep in mind shooters like Blankenship were AMU and had the best available. I knew Bill and talked to him often, Adam met with him many times at Perry and Benning, he was a great guy! Since every year a new shooter is required for the "Ball" or National Match team (though "Ball" is a thing of the past with the CMP) the AMU has to train a new shooter every year. Putting the best available in a new shooters hands will do very little. As per Adam training a new shooter is easier if he is not a shooter but is willing to accept training, not remove former bad habits. Now having top of the line equipment and willing to accept instruction the new shooter quickly develops into a top shooter!
 Again I'm not suggesting the new shooter get the best available with all the bells and whistles but a 4" or more gun will not due. However getting a Starter Gun that is capable of being made into a tight shooting gun is a good way for those with a limited budget to get into shooting. On the other hand I don't suggest anyone get a 1.5" or any other tight group gun without talking to others because too many of them never shoot what they are supposed to.

I'm kind of pissed I had to learn Calculus and Statistics for my Bachelor Degree when I should have just spent the time at the range and become a high master and arrogant enough to think that "knowledge" transfers to all areas of life.

I suppose you mentioning "....is willing to accept instruction..." doesn't seem a little ironic to you does it.

When I was assigned to the AMU we never had a new shooter that wasn't already a shooter work out. It was a fun job for them. The soldiers who were already shooters loved to shoot and therefore became better shooters/marksman. There might be the rare bird but typically have never seen it myself. 
Jon

Been there done that, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering. Now running my Machine shop Trig is an every day use.
 I did accept instruction and why I went from Marksman to Master in one year. When Adam started shooting I put tack drivers in his hands. Now he is my instructor.
 Yes the large group gun can cause a shot directed at the 9 ring due to shooter error to become an X because of gun error but that causes the shooter to think that what he just did resulted in an X, he learned nothing and probably got a false Ah Ha moment. The smaller the gun's group will allow the shooter to understand what he is doing and strive to correct it. However no matter what the shooter does he can't correct errors created by the gun especially if he don't know it's the gun! If eventually he realizes it is, he then get the gun fixed or replaced.
 Calculating why the shot was a 7 will do you no good using averages. Kind of results from garbage in equals garbage out.
 Putting a tack driver in a Marksman's hands will not change his score but it will point out the errors, soon his score will increase and be on the way to High Master if he's willing to analyze the results and make the necessary corrections, shooting with a clunker will keep him in the Marksman class!
  Over the years I've talked to some of the Best there were from Harry Reeves, Bill Blanklenship, Bonny Harmon, Frank Higgenson to just about all the current champions. They sound like a broken record as they all say about the same thing. Their instruction help my shooting and now I'm trying to pass it along!
 Jon: I'm not sure how new shooters are selected and am sure they don't just pick-up some GI that never shot a pistol before especially at that level. However Adam was telling me that he has an easier time with someone that has little experience shooting competition than with someone that has a considerable amount of time shooting especially those that think they know it all. Those willing to accept instruction accelerate at a faster rate than those that don't and usually those are the ones that are dropped and return to where ever they were.

Totally agree my Gold cup is a nice gun IMHO but not a BE gun.  That problem is fixed the Les Baer Wadcutter is on the way and will ship Monday.  i can no longer blame the gun.  It was a rude awaking when I shot many different loads and ran 5 and 6 inch groups.  The gold cup has now become my pistol to upgrade on my own.  A learning tool.  I was brave enough to drill and tap the ten holes for the scope mount in the frame myself and next will be a bushing and new barrel.  Tempeted to make it a 9mm or the 38 Super I have always wanted.  Don

If its a 45 you'll need a different slide for 9 or 38.
Jon

robert84010 wrote:I'm kind of pissed I had to learn Calculus and Statistics for my Bachelor Degree when I should have just spent the time at the range and become a high master and arrogant enough to think that "knowledge" transfers to all areas of life.

I suppose you mentioning "....is willing to accept instruction..." doesn't seem a little ironic to you does it.

Stupidly, I turned down a chance to be a member of the Berlin Brigade Shooting Team. At the time, I had no experience shooting competition and little experience in casual shooting. When I informed the NCOIC of my inexperience, he said, "No problem, we will make a shooter out of you!" I started shooting bullseye in college for recreation, after my military service. An experienced bullseye shooter got me started. Unfortunately, I never got any coaching and after a lot of years of reading about bullseye shooting and learning on my own, I became pretty much un-coachable. I wish I had had access to a good coach from the get go, once I took up the sport. Although I don't consider myself talented in the area of shooting, I undoubtedly, would have advanced much quicker and much farther over the years. The good part about it is that although, I struggled, I met a lot of good people and had a lot of good times.