75B with CGW 10x bushing at 25 and 50 yards today

[Joe L]

This is my Kadet host frame, full of CGW parts, with a factory stock 9mm barrel and slide except for a CGW 10x bushing and a red dot sight on a Springer Precision mount.  It is my backup bullseye match gun, but I have never had to use it in a match.  My match gun is a 97B"E". 

I haven't shot this combination in a real bullseye practice session in many months.  I shot a few rounds through it at 100 yards two months ago. 

Below is a video of one 50 yards slow fire target, then a rapid fire target, followed by 10 rounds from a rest at 50 yards, just to check the zero and get in a little more trigger time. 

The video won't finish uploading until abut 10:30pm CST.



I have always had trouble transitioning from the Kadet to the 9mm slide on the same frame.  The trigger pull "seems" lighter.  It isn't, it is all mental, but I have to follow through and carefully reset the trigger if I am to avoid an early shot.  Today, I had 3 early shots in the first 50 rounds fired, just because I was sloppy with the trigger.  I can get away with it with the Kadet slide, but not with the 9mm.  If I shoot a 100 rounds a week with this combination, I can shoot it very well in bullseye and from a rest. 

I shot the P-09 today also, but really struggled with it.  With a pistol that I can usually shoot 1 to 1.5" groups with at 50 yards, today I could only manage 3-4 inches.  Some of that was some vision problems and trying to use too small of an aim point, but mostly it was just no trigger time after thousands of rounds through the Kadet/75B frame.  They are very, very different, especially on the same day, switching back and forth between pistols. 

Shooting from a rest is not trivial, even with a red dot.  All I could muster today was 2" out of a known sub 1.5" gun/ammo combination.  And the P-09 group sizes would have been fine at 100 yards, but not at 50. 

But it was a great day.  I was able to put 19 rounds out of 20 in a 6" group single hand standing at 50 yards, and then shot a 98 rapid fire target with the backup gun with less than 50 rounds practice.  I'm usually pretty happy to shoot a 98 with the Kadet on a good day after practicing twice per week for months.  Go figure. 

This is fun.  This is not easy.

Joe

[Mister Coffee]

Great video. I like they split-screen. And the commentary. Thank you, sir.

[Big Dave]

Excellent shooting Joe.  Very impressive. 

[Joe L]

Excellent shooting Joe.  Very impressive.

Thanks.  I guess what I confirmed for myself on Sunday is one of my own generalizations based on several trials over the years.  One shoots his "best" guns not so well when one first picks them up after shooting something else for a few months.  I've spent this whole year shooting the Kadet and P-10C instead of the 9mm 75B and P-09.  My P-09 used to be my bullseye match gun and is pretty well known for being as perfect as a hand gun can be at 100 and 200 yards, when I was shooting it regularly.  My particular sloppy factory bushed 75B 9mm slide remained in the drawer until CGW produced the 10x bushing, which I bought and installed and then shot a bunch, providing many hours of fun with photos and videos of tiny groups out to 100 yards.  The "dog" slide was now a match slide with that simple change.

So, I had assumed I could just pick up the 9mm 75B slide, install on my Kadet frame, and control the trigger exactly like I do when shooting the Kadet, which is pretty good usually.  Nope.  Add some recoil, and a tendency to get off the trigger too quickly, and I was in trouble at first, but settled down some after a few rounds.  I was dreading the rapid fire target practice over lack of confidence in trigger control, and it showed in the first rapid fire target.  But only long enough to refresh myself mentally that I could do it, thus the second target result of 98. 

What is harder to accept and for me to work with is the difficulty I had with the P-09.  I think the P-10C has taken its toll on erasing the P-09 trigger finger skills.  The contact areas are different, the trigger finger placement is different, the trigger feel is very different.  I couldn't span the differences in 50 rounds.  Simple as that.  I haven't shot a 50 yard group with that pistol that was over 2" in years.  The best group has been 1".  Prior to Sunday, I expected to be able to just pick it up and shoot every group under 1.5", just like with the 75B.  I was off with both pistols, worse with the P-09, and it is due to lack of practice and some vision struggles, but i is NOT the guns! 

I guess that is my conclusion, at least for us old guys with lots of physical limitations that vary daily in intensity--good results come with practice, excellent results come with consistent practice over thousands of rounds of good practice.  And I have a corollary.  Poor results, at least in my case, result from shooter physical or visual limitations and less than perfect trigger control due to lack of practice, not some imagined mechanical change in the gun.

This is why I score bullseye targets during practice.  I can quantify my current skill level with a specific handgun and I can see when I am making progress and when I am not.  I know that, if I miss a few weeks of practice, it will take me a few trips to get my skills back.  I expect this now, rather than dred it, so I don't get irritated now when I take a bag queen out and struggle with it at first.  Nothing changed on the gun while it was in the bag.

This IS fun.  This is not easy.

Joe

[Joe L]

Great video. I like they split-screen. And the commentary. Thank you, sir.

Thanks for the comment.  I'm trying to do a better job of adding commentary and in anticipating what questions folks may have as they watch the video.  The best bullseye shooters have someone else shoot and record their videos for them so they can remain focused on the task at hand!  I struggle with multitasking, but I am better now than I was a year ago, because I practice with the cameras I have, instead of with newer ones with their own learning curves.  Just like with the handguns, repetition helps develop autopilot skills so that one can shift efforts to the task and hand and away from the cameras/recorders themselves. 

Joe