Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Proper bench technique for hunting rifles

Heard different ways from " standard " rifle on the bags with left hand squeezing the rear bag to resting and holding the forearm to prevent " bounce " .
What says you ?

My hunting rifles are very light weight, and my shooting got a lot better when I started firmly holding onto the rifle. I used to use left hand to squeeze the rear bag and try to hold the rifle gently in a “free recoil” strategy. But, for me it is not a good technique for light weight rifles.

FWIW I hold the rifle in both hands. I rest the back of my weak hand on the rest. I find that this way I get a POI which better reflects what I'll get in the field when shooting from an improvised rest. It seems to give me better accuracy with light rifles than letting the rifle rest directly on the bags and recoil freely too.

I also pay attention to details: buttplate on the shoulder, in the same position each time and with the same pressure, elbows in the same position, rifle "on aim" without muscling (natural point of aim). If the rifle boots a bit I might kneel behind the bench, or use a standing rest, so as to be able to "give" with recoil.

I also try to get there early and shoot in still conditions.

Like a camera, point and shoot.

Free recoil can work for many rifles, but I doubt that any rifle will respond very badly to a solid firm neutral hold. This is hunting accuracy out to whatever your "long" is.

Here's something I wrote on the subject:

Rifle shooters love benchrests, and so do ammunition manufacturers. Probably half the rifle ammo in the U.S.A. gets touched off by humans sitting behind a bench. Americans really like instant gratification, whether staring at our smart phone or trying to hit a target, and apparently hitting a bullseye every time feels as sweet as surfing the Net in a restaurant.

Handloaders often use benchrests to determine the MOST ACCURATE powder charge and bullet. Unfortunately, relatively few handloaders hold the rifle the same way from shot to shot. As a result tiny target-clusters are usually accidents, the primary reason “test” groups shrank from five shots to three during the past century: Three shots stand a far better chance of landing inside the magic half-inch, whereupon the shooter declares he has a “half-inch load” and carries the magic group in his wallet.

If you’d like to shoot tiny groups more often, here are some basics:

First, if the range doesn’t have any wind-flags, set up some sort of flag yourself. Competitive benchrest shooters use pretty fancy flags, but a strip of surveyor’s tape tied to a stick is better than nothing. Try to shoot when the flag’s waving the same way.

Make sure you’re sitting comfortably, and holding the rifle with as little strain as possible. If you need to force the rifle to line up on the target, then you’re likely to relax as the trigger breaks, shifting the rifle slightly as the bullet starts down the barrel. Rearrange the front and rear rests until the scope rests naturally on the target, the major reason for an adjustable-height front rest. (No, a stack of scrap 2x4’s does not qualify as an adjustable rest.)

Next, move your head back and forth behind the scope. If the reticle apparently moves back and forth across the target, that’s parallax, and some shots may land off-center even if you don’t flinch. If your scope has an adjustable objective lens or side-focus dial, look through the scope while turning the lens or dial, until the reticle doesn’t move on the target when you move your head. (Pay no attention to the numbers on the adjustment; 90% of the time they’re decorative, or what passes for decorative among gun guys.)

If the scope can’t be adjusted for parallax, move your head back until a black ring appears around the field-of-view, then keep the reticle centered inside the black ring when aiming. This minimizes parallax, because you’re always looking through the center of the scope.

Hold the rifle the same way for every shot, including the position and pressure of your hand around the grip, cheekbone on the comb, and butt against your shoulder. Place the forend on the front rest in the same place, with the front sling swivel stud at least couple inches in front of the sandbag, so the stud doesn’t slam into the rest during recoil, causing a mysterious “flier” and ruining a wallet-group. Most bench shooters don’t hold the forend, but when testing a hard-kicker it helps to hold the forend firmly just behind the front rest, a trick learned from reading Elmer Keith.

As a final check before shooting, place the reticle on the bullseye and dry-fire a few times. If the reticle shifts position after the click, you’re not holding the rifle consistently—or moving slightly after pulling the trigger. Many shooters unconsciously jerk their finger away from the trigger as soon the shot fires, a fault my friends at the FTW Ranch in Texas call “booger-flicking.”

Real benchrest shooters, who shoot tiny groups during the stress of competition, often don’t touch the rifle except with their trigger finger. Most hunters, however, are testing handloads or sighting-in, so need to hold the rifle about the same way we would in the field.

When shooting prone this often involves a bipod, or resting the forend on a pack. I use a fleece daypack stuffed full of lunch, spare clothes, a signal/shelter tarp, and a thick paperback book, in case I get lost and need to wait for somebody to find me. (So far I haven’t been lost that long.)

A harder rest, even a well-compressed sandbag, can increase group size, especially with the lightweight rifles many hunters prefer these days. When bench-testing lightweights, I fold a terry-cloth towel and drape it over the front rest, simulating my day-pack. Lead Sleds can also cause a rifle to shoot to a different point-of-impact, so after sighting-in try a few rounds without the sled.

Many shooters experiment with forend placement on the front bag, to find where the rifle “shoots best.” If you’re at the range for Saturday recreation this can add to the fun, and even result in wallet-groups. But I’ve lost count of how many forend-experimenters claim their rifle shoots best when rested on the front action screw, not the forend. Here’s a clue, dudes: There’s something screwy with the forend bedding.

Thanks for sharing that advice, John. A question about parallax: I've read that if the scope is in focus on the target (the target itself is focused, not necessarily the reticle) that will be the point where there is no parallax. I'm not sure that's true. I was shooting with an old 16X fixed Leupold last Saturday, which has parallax adjustment. I was shooting at 100 yards, but the best focus, for my eyes, happened when the parallax adjustment was set at "50 yards". However, it appeared that the crosshair moved a bit relative to the target at that setting. When I set it to 100, the target was not in sharp focus, but the reticle did not appear to move in relation to the target when I moved my eye position behind the scope. I also tried to adjust the ocular bell, to get the fine crosshairs in better focus, but I found it difficult to have everything in focus - target and crosshair simultaneously. I can remember some old posts by our friend E on here where he expounded on the process of focusing Leupold scopes, but he got mostly ridiculed for that. Can you comment on the best way to dial in a scope to reduce or eliminate parallax? Thanks! (Edited to add: I just read the other thread about parallax, and saw your post about adjusting for it. My old fixed 16X has the parallax adjustment on the objective bell, which seems to strongly affect the focus of the scope at various ranges. The adjustable eyepiece doesn't change the scope focus much as far as I can tell, but it does affect the focus of the crosshair.) I've always wondered if there's danger in unscrewing that eyepiece too far - causing the scope to leak out the nitrogen or coming competely off. Are scopes generally built so that doesn't happen?

You are gojng to get every answer in the book. Good luck with weeding through all of it. Ask how many of these guys participated in the moa all day long challenge and then ask how they did. The proof of what works is generally recorded pretty well on target downrange. Hint

Your such a tool........

fortymile,

Modern scopes are indeed built so they can't be disassembled too far without special tools. However, the nitrogen will generally leak out very slowly anyway. It's used inside the scope only to make sure the interior is dry after assembly.

Parallax occurs when the reticle isn't focused for that range--the reason you should try both to adjust-out parallax and focus the reticle, using whatever means the scope includes.

MD as usual has good advice. I'll just say you need the rifle to be held the same way at the bench that it will be held in the field and what works for the BR guys with a 12 pound rifle doesn't work for a hunter with a 6lb rifle.

Great info and advice .

Thanks gentlemen !

One more thing I discovered....If your barrel gets warm (hot) you will start to see mirage. If you shoot through this barrel generated mirage your groups will open up considerably. A small battery fan will get rid of it or a "mirage shield. Mirage shields however don't work to well on spotter bbls.

Unlike mirage generated by the sun you cant hold differently and shoot through barrel mirage.

Barrel mirage will destroy a group even more than those excellent things pointed out by MD


Lefty

I also suspect that it is because on a hunting rifle it is generally the widest place on the stock, which can keep the rifle from being canted as much which as we all know will cause a larger group.

drover

Good point.

It's also often the "squarest" place on a sporter stock--or, especially, "varmint" stocks, which are often designed more for shooting off rests than field positions.

Did i hurt your feelings? Honesty hurts sometimes doesnt it. Shoot or shut the fu ck up.

I often heard that one is not suppose to rest his rifle on a hard surface when shooting. Mule Deer takes it one step further and places a terry cloth over his front rest. My question is why do bipods work so well? Dont they closer resemble a hard surface than a soft one?
Thanks

I did extensive testing of shooting over a hard front rest (a piece of pine firewood) several years ago. Some rifles didn't shoot as well, but some did--but did NOT see the change in point of impact that many people have written about, where rifles shoot higher off a harder rest.

The only time I use a folded towel is when benching rifles weighing less than 7 pounds, where it can really make a difference in accuracy.

Bipods can also affect accuracy if they're rested on a harder surface. The way to find out is to test 'em compared to accuracy from a softer rest.

Re. biopods & POI

My wife & I went on a guided 2x1 mule deer hunt some years ago & my wife was shooting a very accurate Remington 725 in .280 R. Upon arriving @ the outfitters ranch we checked our rifles for zero on the outfitters range but our guide wasn't present & we didn't meet him until breakfast the next morning @ 5AM & it was clear that he wasn't thrilled with guiding a woman hunter.

He insisted that my wife put his Harris bipod on her rifle explaining that he had much better luck with women, kids, & new hunters that way. My wife neither a kid or a new hunter & I insisted that we were not putting a bipod on my wife's rifle since she had never used a bipod before & we had not checked zero on the rifle with a bipod installed. After lots of arguing & insistence from him that zero wouldn't change we got our way & my wife hunted w/o a bipod. The guide was really grumpy & unhappy until my wife made a nice one shot kill @ about 225 yds. shooting prone off of her pack on what ended up being one of the nicer bucks taken that year.

Several year later we were planning a combination pronghorn / mule deer hunt & I thought having the option of using a bipod in certain types of terrain wasn't a bad idea so I bought one & checked it out on the rifles we were going to use. On my rifle, a custom M70 .280 R in a composite stock the POI didn't change significantly with the bipod and I did kill a nice pronghorn using the bipod but with previously mentioned .280 Remington 725 of my wife's (which was factory stocked w/ tip pressure) the POI was about 5" low @ 100 yds shooting off the bipod compared to shooting off sandbags or prone off a daypack.

When a fella starts finding out his darling's secrets he will discover all manner of idiosyncrasies if the effort is diligent and thoughtful. The only light rifles I own are a couple of Contenders, the rest are kinda hefty, so maybe I don't know giddy up from sick'em on this topic. I use bags, sometimes front and rear. both leather and both filled with bird shot. I'm careful to insure the sling studs don't impinge on the bags. I hold all firmly to my shoulder but seldom hold the forend. A few other guns use what is called a foot rest which is screwed tightly to the barrel about 6" behind the muzzle and it is designed to slide on a steel plate that is part of the rest. These are BP slug guns and weight anywhere from 19-30 pounds. Other days and other purposes find me using an elbow rest. Why? They are hunting rifles and I don't take a bench to the woods. Sometimes they are shot offhand, other times might find me leaning against a tree. I figure it best to simulate field conditions with such guns when zeroing for the hunt though I don't do it when working up loads.

Example: The .45-70 weighs around 10# and is a hunting piece, not a movie star.



For the curious, the target above was shot with a tang sight, a bullet of ~530 gr cast with 30:1 alloy and Swiss 1.5 FG. I have a scope for the gun but see no reason to use it.