of how changing lighting conditions affect point of impact using barrel sights. I'm an old M1 Garand shooter having shot with the US Army AMU at Ft. Benning, Ga. many years ago and we always blackened our sights when shooting and normally I do this when shooting my Hawken but I didn't do this yesterday when I was shooting from 60 yards at a 3" black bull. The time I started shooting was around 1500 hrs. and I shot until around 1800 hrs. I had moved my bench into the shade when starting and my target backstop faces northwest. As the minutes ticked by the sun moved progressively to the west and the sun started encroaching upon my barrel and a bright haze was appearing in the sky above the target board making visibility a little less. Even though I always shoot with a cap on it wasn't much help as far as visibility was concerned. With good sight alignment and breaks I was calling shots to center but alas...the POI were high and slightly left...and then the 'old training' kicked in. With a post front sight and the light coming in from the 9 o/clock side there is a shadow transferred to the right side of the post and a false image is given to the post and one has a tendency to hold to the left a bit. I was also experiencing a slight false image from atop the front sight and as a consequence was holding on the bull a bit higher causing the higher POI. Mind you...this information isn't what one could call 'iron-clad' or written in stone as it effects differently upon various individuals but it has always given me a problem when I didn't correct for it. The old rule is when the sun is coming in from one side or the other......click into the light....meaning either favor the front sight into the light or make an adjustment to the rear sight.
I may go turkey hunting in Wyoming one day on a friends' place up there so I was finding a load for this endeavor. I started out with 100 grs. KIK 2F and the first two shots were high. I then went to 70 grs. and these are the 3 lower shots. Changed to 80 grs. and this seems to be the medicine! There may be a gobbler in trouble....if I get to make a trip up to Wyoming!
Untitled by
Sharps Man, on Flickr
Topic: A classic example...... (Read 715 times)