Posted by Paul A. Cianciolo on July 15, 2001 at 13:56:18:
Hello Folks,
First again I would like to thank all the people who posted responses to the
board, and private email. The sport of shooting is new to me so all aspects of
it are very exciting.
I do regret however the mess I seemed to have caused
on the board. For that I am sorry but I cannot let it stand in my way to better
shooting.
Well here is my question...
A number of assumptions need to be
made first. Some will obviously be wrong but I will use them to keep the numbers
simple. (For Me!)
Math was never my strong point.
1) A pellet rifle with
a barrel length 2 feet.
2) Muzzle exit velocity of 500 FPS.
3) at this
rate the pellet would exit the barrel in .004 secs
4) The pellet needs to
accelerate to 500 FPS so I would assume that it's time in the barrel would be
longer. How much I do not know?
5) There must be some amount of time in
which the pellet can still be affected by the barrel even after it has left is.
I would guess the escaping gasses could have an impact as the pellet moved away.
Another unknown to me.
5) "Trigger time" for the lack of a better term. The
time is takes for the release of the time till the time the pellet begins to
move.
With all this said. It seems like a very short period of time that a
person can have an affect on the pellet.
So why do I hear/see/read about the
importance of follow through? The questions are not meant to insult anyone on
the by being basic in nature, its just that is all seems to happen so fast?
Again all the above are assumptions on my part. Please feel free to correct
my mistakes; otherwise I will not learn anything
Thank you all again..
Paul A. Cianciolo
Harwinton Connecticut
Posted by Larry Lohkamp on July 15, 2001 at 15:54:31:
Let’s see if I can
say this without resorting to multiple entities. If you plan to put the gun down
immediately after the shot, the body will start getting ready to perform that
action as you are pulling the trigger. The elbow starts to unlock, the shoulder
loosens, and the shot is spoiled. If your body intends to keep the gun alignment
even after the shot, then the only movement will be in response to recoil.
Follow through is just as important with a 1000-fps bullet traveling down a
5-inch barrel.
Posted by Marcus Raab on July 15, 2001 at 16:35:10:
Hi Paul,
Firstly,
YOU did not cause the trouble, your question just happened to be the one that
got the responses. Not your fault.
You do raise an interesting point that
many advanced shooters fail to grasp. It is indeed correct that the barrel time
and lock time are very short. In fact you really can't do much to move the gun
away from where it was pointing when you pulled the trigger. Your reaction time
is in the range of .2 to .3 seconds. and as you point out the time from pulling
the trigger to the time where the gun is no longer able to influence the pellet
or bullet is an order of magnitude shorter.
: So why do I hear/see/read
about the importance of follow through?
The reason follow-through is so
important is that you keep from moving "BEFORE" the shot! During the reaction
time of .2 to .3 of a second before the shot up until the moment the pellet is
out of the barrel is a significant amount of time. We spend a relatively longer
period aiming and if we do not trigger automatically then the thought creeps
into our head to pull the trigger now because it looks good! So now you are
thinking about pulling the trigger and not focused on holding the gun in the
middle. Wide shots are the main outcome.
Everybody has a "Follow-through".
Some good, some not so good. It is just that better trained shooters
follow-through before the pellet is out of the barrel.
Continue to aim,
continue to hold continue to hold your breathing, and continue to apply pressure
to the trigger. This will usually result in a shot which is within the "wobble
area" (Which by the way NEVER stops, you just need a more sensitive instrument
and the laser at Colorado Springs is not a pinpoint like the electronic trainers
of today). Most people also hold better than they think they can.
Posted by geo. anderson on July 15, 2001 at 17:07:50:
: It is indeed
correct that the barrel time and lock time are very short. In fact you really
can't do much to move the gun away from where it was pointing when you pulled
the trigger.
Well, yes ... but: For a long time, I had a random problem of
shots going low left, about 7:00 several rings away from the "10." This occurred
with my LP-1, my High Standard .22s, and with my .45. I blamed it on poor
trigger control. To make a long story short, the problem was that I was dropping
the gun as I fired. Sometimes it was just "finally I'm done" with the last shot
in a series. Sometimes it was "finally I'm done" after overholding. Clearly,
given the time scale, I was not reacting to the "bang." My best guess was that I
was reacting to the trigger breaking but possibly I was actually breaking the
trigger consciously. Something along what Larry says below: "... The elbow
starts to unlock, the shoulder loosens, and the shot is spoiled.
Interestingly, I looked at the CMP bullseye tapes yesterday for the first
time and the thing that struck me the most was the way every shooter followed
through, even to the point of aiming a sixth shot in rapid fire. (Yes, the tapes
are worth the $35, but barely. If your VCR does not have an operable fast
forward you will die of boredom.)
YMMV
Geo.
Posted by Marcus on July 15, 2001 at 17:48:32:
My point is that you can't
react to the bang or even the trigger breaking. You are anticipating the end of
the shot and putting the gun down before you even pull the trigger!
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