Hardware

Contributed by Cooter

After being pleased with standard BKL rings and risers but disgusted with having to shim I chose to try their sloped riser block. Here is what I found.

I had a month between matches. I ordered the rings and risers two days after one match hoping to have my rifle reassembled before the next. The rings were available immediately but it turns out the riser block is a special order part. The website did not make it clear to me that this riser block would be a "Custom Shop" part. My wait turned out to be significantly longer than one month.

The riser block I ordered was BKL part number 258. I ordered it with the .004 inch compensation and in matte black. The rings, which were off the shelf items, were part number 263 and also in matte black. These parts are aluminum and the matte black is actually black anodizing. Because the riser block is a custom shop part, the anodizing does not perfectly match the rings.  more

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News

We are happy to announce the addition of a forum here at Steelchickens.com. After hearing a growing number of requests, we decided it would be a worthwile addition to the site. We know that there are other firearms related forums we will be competing with. Our intention is to carve out a niche by catering to silhouette shooters.

We want to be your silhouette source. If you believe our forum categories don't best serve you as a silhouette shooter, drop webmaster a line and tell him what's what.

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Technique

With winter around the corner, indoor practice might look enticing to some. At least one of the authors here at steelchickens.com is interested in getting in some indoor practice. We decided to ask the master and find out what he thinks. A big thank you to Dave Imas for taking the time to answer our questions.

What type of air rifle and scope do you use?

I am currently using a Walther LG 300 XT Match Rifle with an old Weaver T10 scope for practice. It is the only free scope I have at the moment. I would prefer to have a 16x scope on it because that I what I use on my silhouette rifles. In the past I used a Weihrauch spring gun with a Bushnell Banner 6x-18x scope.

I chose the Walther but, for my purposes, any Match rifle would do. The match rifles have a pellet velocity of around 550fps. Relative to smallbore rifles this is very slow and demands excellent shot execution. Follow through is imperative. If I'm shooting well with my air rifle it directly translates to better performance with my smallbore and highpower rifles.

How important is the accuracy of the air rifle?

In my limited experience I’ve yet to meet an air rifle that wasn’t more accurate than my smallbore or highpower rifles. That said, I believe accuracy is important from a feedback perspective. We need something to tell us when we are doing well or when we stink. That should be the shot location on the target. If we are using an inaccurate rifle we may not get the proper feedback for good execution and then won’t reinforce the behavior. If I didn’t have a rifle that would put the pellet exactly where I broke the shot I don’t think I would use it. Fortunately, such rifles are not hard to come by.  more

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Hardware

Contributed by Uncle Irv

Editor's Note: This article was submitted by one of our newer readers recently. I was intrigued by some of the ideas. It hit home, too. I started with a 10/22 with a similar, but not nearly as successful, approach. If you think you have something other silhouette shooters would like to read about drop us a line at webmaster@steelchickens.com.

Not being in a position to afford a top of the line scope with dependable repeatable adjustments needn't keep you out of the running. By experiment, I found that my 10/22 with high mounts, Fajen Stock (Epoxy bedded at the barrel clamp), Adams & Bennett Barrel, and a Simmons 3-12x40 AO Airgun scope could compete with far costlier equipment by using one setting and a range card.

The rifle put 10 rounds inside 1/4" at 25 Yd.s indoors, off a rest, but the repeatability of the sight adjustment was not dependable.  more

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Hardware

Contributed by Shooter Mike

I'll be honest up front - I do not know everything there is to know about rings and bases. As a matter of fact, I probably don't know half, but I have gleaned enough to help the beginner over a few pitfalls that yours truly has experienced first hand.

First - What's a ring and what's a base? Well - a ring is the device used to hold a scope in place above the rifle. Sometimes these rings will incorporate an integral mount on their bottom that can attach directly to the rifle. A base is an interface device that is securely fastened to the rifle and allows the addition of rings with the same mount-type (Weaver, dove-tail, turn-in, etc.).

Typical beginner's rifles will have some sort of ability to take a scope. Most often, smallbore rifles will have at the very least a set of grooves, called a dove-tail, down the length of the receiver top. This is intended for use of a clamp-type mount. Most American rifles have this dove-tail at 3/8" wide. Many European rifles will have it at 11mm wide. Actually, these grooves are usually 11mm wide at the top and 3/8" wide at their bottom. The difference is in the angle of the cut. American rifles are approximately cut at 45 degrees and the European at 60 degrees. This means that, depending on how the mount or ring base is made, it may work on one dovetail type or it may work on both. more

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Hardware

After hearing various reports about aftermarket magazines for Anschutz rifles we decided some first hand research was in order.

The main benefit of an aftermarket magazine is it's price. The ones procured for this evaluation were about a quarter of the list price of a factory Anschutz magazine. They are probably easier to find, too, as they fit more than just the Anschutz rifle. The mags evaluated here were procured from Brownells and were listed as fitting 6 different Savage models in addition to the Anschutz action.

The downside may be the quality of the magazines. We cannot confirm or deny this. A difference that we did notice is the size and shape of the magazine floorplate. The aftermarket magazine has a simple stamped steel floorplate. If your hold is under the magazine, the difference in profile of the floorplate could be a deal breaker.  more

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Hardware

Not every shooter has a scope with target turrets. Some even have cheap hunting style scopes (See Cooter's article here). If you fall into one of these categories you may be interested in Stoney Point Target Turrets.

These turrets screw onto the threads revealed when the elevation and windage adjuster dust caps are removed. The shaft inside the turret is shaped to engage the scopes adjuster. Rotating the cap turns the scopes adjuster. The cap has set screws that fasten it to the shaft. After finding zero you can loosen the set screws and reposition the cap so that the zero on the cap lines up with your shortest range.

Before we received our set for evaluation, we had heard some negative reports. We split the pair up so that two staffers could evaluate them seperately. When the dust had settled the news wasn't all bad. Both staffers would rate them as good. Numbers in the cap are etched and are very readable. The design allows the user to hear or feel clicks if the scope is so designed. The downside is that these caps actually limit your scopes adjustment range. When the elevation or windage adjuster is turned on some scopes it will move up or down. If it moves far enough up it could bind the adjuster. If it moves far enough down it may cause the shaft to disengage from the adjuster. They easily accomodated the ranges involved in smallbore silhouette.  more

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Competition

Contributed by Shooter Mike

This was my first Conard Cup experience and it was a truly enjoyable time had by all. Nearly 100 shooters wrangled for top honors. Approximately 1/3 were Masters, 1/3 were AAA and the rest were AA & A shooters. It was a superb environment to learn from the best. People came from Canada to Mexico, Texas to Montana and every other western state to compete on a truly inviting range where an enduring legend, Conard Bernhardt, practiced his remarkable skills. In fact, Conard still holds the record for number of consecutive hits (aka the Long Run event) on Chickens (120) and Pigs (179).

The equipment was pretty standard among the shooters. Anschutz 54's and Leupold 6.5-20x's were very common in the racks. Each top-rate contender had a Kowa scope on a tripod with a spotter to call their shots. It was art in motion.

Each shooter was assigned a starting relay (1-5) and position to begin the first match. There was a 45 minute wait between relays and you "added an animal" to each match for your next starting position. It all went rather smoothly.  more

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Competition

This years Conard Cup was a record setter. Cathy Winstead reclaimed the record by scoring 149 out of 160. She also shot a perfect 40 along the way. This breaks Agustin Sanchez Jr.'s old record of 147/160.

The full results are available. Sorry for the large file size.

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Competition

Can't get enough of the Pacific Northwest? Want an excuse to visit when it isn't raining? Located about 5 hours north of Seattle, the Heffley Creek Gun Club Range in Kamloops, B.C. is hosting the 2005 Canadian Rifle Silhouette Championships. The smallbore competition will run July 31 through August 2. Highpower will take place August 4th through 6th. All the details here.

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Hardware

Slope, lookdown, whatever you want to call it, in a perfect world the bore of our rifle and center axis of our scope should not be parallel. They should, instead, converge a certain distance downrange. For shorter ranges and flatter shooting cartridges, slope can usually be ignored. But when we shoot slower cartridges or longer ranges we may have to pay attention to scope slope.

Our goal is to keep our scope in the middle of it's elevation adjustments. If there is a 40 click difference between our chicken and ram settings, we want the scope 20 clicks above the middle of the adjustment range when we are on rams, and 20 clicks below when we are on chickens. The question becomes how much slope is required to get our scope positioned so it is working in it's most efficient range; the middle. We will attempt to answer that question here today.

This is two part article. You get both parts today. And for the impatient or math intolerant we will get straight to the solution. The second part is for the mathematically curious. We will explain how this is computed.  more

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Hardware

Here is a link to an article we found interesting http://www.lasc.us/RangingShotBarrelMakingFeature.htm. We must give credit where it is due. Todd Spotti authored this and many other articles on The Los Angeles Silhouette Club website. Enjoy.

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Hardware

Contributed by Cooter

Not everyone can afford a buy a high quality scope. Not everyone is convinced they need to. I used a Simmons Prohunter variable for a year and here are my observations.

The model was Prohunter by Simmons. It was manufactured in the Philippines and was a variable power from 6 to 18 power and featured an adjustable 40mm objective. It was purchased new in the late 90's for $100. The scope was not new when it was mounted on my Anschutz Hunter Class rifle. It had spent a few years on a heavy barrel .223 target rifle. I don't believe the mild recoil of that rifle had any negative affects on this scope.

When I mounted the scope I didn't add shims and my bases did not have any slope built into them. The scope easily accommodated the large amount of elevation adjustment that was required to zero at 100 meters. The rifle was sighted in from the bench for the various ranges. It was given no more attention for the next year.  more

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Technique

The plan is simple enough. Get into position, breathe, hold, break the shot on target. When it works, all is well. But how do we deal with things when they don't go well.

The solution is easy enough; don't take the shot. A rushed shot has a lower chance of hitting it's mark. A better shooter has an expectation of a hit. Don't settle for the chance of a hit.

So what happens when we have fallen out of the groove and start to feel rushed? We are nearing the end of our 4 to 8 seconds of air. We start to contemplate this and think about breaking before our hold becomes less steady. Instead of panicking and maybe forcing the situation, the better shooter restarts the process. more

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Hardware

There is no denying the appeal of CZ's 452 bolt action line of smallbore rifles. They are considered by some to be _the_ entry level rifle for Smallbore Metallic Silhouette. Our local range even uses them as loaner rifles to get first-timers interested.

We aren't going to tell you all there is to know about this rifle. Eric Brooks has already done that. If you are curious, take a look at the FAQ on www.cz452.com. What we are going to point out is some information we nearly missed.

Since budget minded CZ452 silo shooters might be looking for some budget accuracy improvements, we think we should point out this page. We found a link to this article on www.cz452.com. Using some ingenious but low tech ideas the article describes and shows (with large images) how to make a better trigger for target use. Since it was written, Eric has developed an inexpensive kit to help the DIY'er. The article involves modifying the trigger so due caution must be observed. Our disclaimer is as follows: if you don't know what you are doing, stop.

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Competition

Here is handy little number. If you haven't been in this game for ten years and don't have the smallbore rifle silhouette rules memorized, here is a little primer. A big thanks to the folks at Central Florida Rifle & Pistol Club for this Cliff's Notes version of the rules.

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Hardware

We wanted to write this article to get people into the game of Smallbore Silhouette shooting quickly when it comes to the selection of ammunition.

While it seems there are reams of .22 Long Rifle to choose from, and no doubt there is, you'll be happy to learn that the field can be narrowed quickly and easily.

Since this article is geared toward beginners, we're going to assume a beginner's budget and beginner's rifle and look at the available beginner's ammunition. This is not a limiting factor by any means. Ammunition manufacturers make a dizzying array of options for .22 Long Riflers to choose from and you need to learn to read the boxes with care. Some manufacturer's boxes all look the same - only the description or model number may tell you what is different. You want to make sure you're getting the velocity of ammunition you desire. Also note that some boxes may only be (40) forty rounds to a box when you think it's the typical (50) fifty. more

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Technique

Here's some info gleamed from a recent shooting clinic. We liked the presentation and decided to repeat it here.

As a silhouette shooter our goal is to put the crosshairs on the animal and break the shot. Our common enemy is wiggle. Nobody is immune from the wiggles, but the better shooter has methods to control it. If we break down all the random movements they are either in the vertical or horizontal direction or a combination of the two. The following techniques are aimed at minimizing movement in the vertical direction.

The best support for our rifle is a solid one. The silhouette rules outlaw rifle supports that don't come standard on the human body. The most solid part of the human body is bone and that is what we will build our rifle support out of. Every human body is different. Each shooter will likely need to tweak and modify these methods to suit his or her body shape. more

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Hardware

Contributing Editor

Finding the right part is sometimes half the battle. The master shooters know how important having the right setup is. Whether you need to improve your rig's accuracy or just make it fit your frame, making it right is half the battle. Our lonely guru "Shooter Mike" is preparing a look into the oft overlooked scope rings and base selection process. Expect a detailed report on prices, quality, and just where to get it.

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Competition

NRA registered Smallbore Rifle Silhouette Tournament
April 23 & 24, 2005
Sponsored by PeEll Sportsmens Club

The Conard Bernhardt Cup Championship is a combined smallbore 80 shot Standard rifle and 80 shot Hunter rifle aggregate match, a total of 160 shots count towards the final score. This NRA Registered match will consist of two 40 shot matches with each rifle category for each of the two days competition, and a total 80 shot match for each rifle category. The 2005 NRA Silhouette rules for Registered events apply.

Entry and competition information

All competitors must be current NRA members, and members of their respective state NRA affiliate organization, or the Washington State Rifle and Pistol Association (WSRPA). If not, WSRPA membership forms will be available ($30.00 membership fee). Competitors must have a current NRA silhouette competition book. Competitors may buy one at the event. The first relay on Saturday will be at 9:00 am. Sight-in or practice starts at 8:00 am. A range meeting will be held prior to the first relay, each day and each competitor's shooting schedule will be identified. Alibi shots in any given relay will be completed prior to the next relay. Competitors may arrive a day early and use the range for practice and sight-in. Camping and Motels are also available in Centralia and surrounding communities. See enclosed listing. Entry fee is $75 for the 160 shot combined rifle aggregate Conard Bernhardt Cup Championship competition. Entrys will be limited to 80 competitors & must be signed up by April 15, 2005 . Entry fee includes the cost of a catered dinner. For non-competitors the dinner cost is $10/person. Lunch will not be provided. Restaurant and a convenience store food is available in PeEll. Advance entries are requested. Entries after range capacity is filled, will be returned. more

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