Is there a difference between calculated recoil and felt recoil or is it all in our heads?
Some say that there is a difference. Others say that there isn't. I flat don't know, and I don't know how to quantify personal impressions.
Some note or theorize that an especially loud muzzle blast adds to and emphasizes the over-all "felt" effect of the shot. Makes sense.
A lot of
felt recoil depends on
how you hold the gun. For months, my buddy Wyatt Keith chortled at the thought of having me shoot his nearly weightless single-barrel 12-gauge. He often said (laughing at the prospect) "It'll kick you right out from under your hat!" Clearly, he was eager to see that happen.
Finally, on a weekend trip home, he brought it back � with two boxes of hot buckshot loads. After five rounds, he couldn't take any more kick, and he had a huge black-and-blue bruise covering the entire front of his right shoulder. I shot the rest of that box of shells and all of the next box, but suffered no pain and developed no bruise. Same gun. Same loads.
The reasons were painfully obvious. Wyatt � short and stocky � gritted his teeth and leaned hard into the gun, and it didn't move him much. He was determined not to let that gun kick him out from under his hat, and it didn't. The muzzle didn't rise more than a few inches. On the other hand, I � at six-plus and about 140 pounds � stayed limber and let the gun jolt me back a step and turn my upper body around about 90� and bend me backward at the waist until the muzzle pointed almost straight up.
Wyatt nearly strangled with glee at every shot that I took. But he groaned every time he shifted gears or turned the steering wheel of his Pontiac.
I think it's safe to say that
� the
physical recoil velocity and energy of the same shotgun, with the same loads, was the same no matter who was shooting 'em, and
� Wyatt felt the same recoil much more than I did.