So, it's been forever since I shot any of my DA revolvers. Ever since I got my Colt Lightweight Commander .45 and my CZ-75, the allure of the wheelgun has just been less potent.
Headed out in the desert with the following objectives. Some of them are woefully behind the times and inappropriate: Should have been done months ago, but set on the wayside until today.
The shameful objectives include function checks on both of my Redhawk revolvers. The older 5.5" blued one has had a lot of modification done to it: Fiber optic front sight, V-notch rear sight blade, lightened hammer spring installed. Who knew if it would even function, or shoot to point of aim? All this was done over a year ago, and I hadn't put a single round through it in that time. The newer 4" stainless Redhawk was heavily customized from this summer up until September: bead-blasted finish, chromed cylinder turn line, lightened hammer spring, lightened trigger return spring, optimized trigger for double-action shooting, fiber optic front sight, and the big one: cylinder cut for .44 moon clips.
Aside from the health checkup on my pet wheelies, I had these 5 skills to begin working on:
1. 1-handed DA target shooting.
2. 1-handed DA point-shooting.
3. 1-handed SA target shooting.
4. 2-handed SA target shooting.
5. 2-handed DA defensive shooting.
My tools for skill development include a Taurus model 94 5" .22 revolver, a Ruger SP-101 3" .357 revolver and the above mentioned Redhawks.
I began with the 1-handed DA target shooting with the .22. I set out a target at approximately 20 feet and put on my shooting glasses: the right eye is taped on these glasses as I am trying to get my left eye to become my dominant shooting eye (since I shoot left handed). My target was a bull circle about 2 inches across, and I didn't get a single shot inside that bull. Predominantly high and right, but some went high and left, too. I noticed during trigger pull that I had a tendency to not put tension on the grip with my pinky, which caused the front sight to climb during trigger break. I practiced dry-firing with the spent casings in the gun for a bit and reloaded, targeting a fresh target on the paper each time. I was now getting about 1/3 or 1/2 of each cylinder into the bulls, and the remainder were around the upper perimeter of each target, no more than 1-2 inches from the edge of the bull. I was happy with that, but this Taurus was a dog of a gun. The DA pull was horrific on it even with the lighter spring I had put in it.
My shoulder was starting to get stiff from the 1-handed target shooting, so I switched to some point-shooting for a bit. I found an old bottle out in the desert and from 15 feet fired at it on the ground, holding the revolver at my hip. The goal was to fire rapidly but not out of control, about 3 shots per second or so, going for an instinctual alignment of the gun with the target in my eyes, not unlike pointing at it with my hand. My first two shots hit just in front and just behind the bottle, missing by inches and the third shot sent it flying. I repeated this several times, bringing the gun back into the holster between sets. Draw, present, shoot: fire until the bottle is moved. With the Taurus .22, it was never the first shot but never more than 5 before I found my mark. More practice would be required.
I switched over to my SP-101. I was shooting some old ammo I had loaded up years ago... plated .38 reloads pushed by a light charge of Titegroup powder. Definitely not +p material, and not even knocking on the door of max standard .38 loads. Very soft stuff. I started in with the 1-handed DA target shooting.
I did extremely poorly with the little SP. The trigger pull was so drastically different from the Taurus. Though a lighter spring than the rimfire revolver needed, it stacked differently and increased tension as I squeezed. I gave it a good try, but couldn't find a rhythm with that gun with this drill. After 40 or so rounds, I gave up and found myself doing 2-handed SA shooting. I asked myself the point of this with gallery .38 loads and a short-barreled gun: I'm not likely to hunt with the SP-101 and especially not with light .38's. I was practicing nothing, so I put the gun away and switched to the next one.
This was the 5.5" Redhawk. I tended to carry this gun on hiking or hunting trips, in a Hunter leather holster and cartridge belt, and the 25 cartridges in this belt had been there for about 2 years. They were starting to build some tacky residue from being in leather loops too long. A goal for this rig is to locate some nickel-plated .44 magnum cartridges so the tackiness is less of an issue for long term storage. For today, however, I intended to shoot off these cartridges and reload the belt with fresh ammo.
I shot the gun 12 times in single action two handed, and from 25 feet. It hit about 4 inches high at 25 feet, even dialing the rear sight all the way down. The load was a 240gr lead semiwadcutter pushed by 16 grains of AA #7 powder. This is my standard load. It grouped consistently so my sights aren't loose or anything, but apparently either the rear V-notch blade is taller than the stock square notch, or the front fiber optic blade is shorter than the stock front sight. I'm going to need to do some range testing with this load, as I love how it shoots from both my Redhawks and it's my standard load... find out where the load comes back "down" to intersect with my sights, and what the peak height it reaches is, and where? I shot the remaining cartridges in the belt double-action two handed: I'm not ready for .44 magnum recoil in a one-handed grip yet.
Finally, I moved on to my pet gun: The customized 4" Redhawk. I started out with some 200gr lead roundnose .44 special loads. I shot six rounds single action, seated on the ground, with elbows braced against my knees, to confirm zero at 25 feet. Spot-on. I did do some 1-handed target work with this gun, using the .44 specials. Nothing to write home about. I found the gun had a tendency to twist in my hand slightly from the recoil, and my shots tended to move high and right from this. The mating of the grip backstrap to the webbing of my hand was critical to avoid this. Even slight variations would send the bullet in wildly different directions. After a dozen rounds like this, I moved on to DA two-handed shooting: Draw, fire 3 rounds, crouch and fire 3 rounds, get off the X and move sideways while reloading, keep moving and fire six more.
An aside: I don't have any spare moonclips for the gun yet, so I'm using HKS Speedloaders. These rely on gravity to drop the cartridges into the chambers. I found that after a handful of lead rounds downrange, gravity couldn't overcome the gunk that provided friction. I had to assist some of the cartridges to seat. This won't be an issue with moonclips, as a moonclip can be seated from the center with mild assistance from a single digit of the shooter.
The drill went well and exposed a weakness of my revolver when it comes to using speedloaders. I'll be ordering moonclip tools in the next couple weeks. Marksmanship was acceptable for defensive standards: Everything was getting inside of a 6" circle while firing, crouching, or moving sideways. Of course, the target was stationary. :-) Ken at Wild West Guns did a fantastic job on the DA trigger of this sixgun.
For grins and giggles I put a dozen full magnum loads downrange at about 50 feet, seated on the ground, single action. two handed. All in the bull and with touching circles. Probably a 1.5" group or so. Seems like the 4" is the only one cleared to go hike with me, until the 5.5" one gets its sights regulated back to normal.
Things I've realized:
1. I've been spoiled by 1911's and single action CZ's.
2. My trigger finger has the beginnings of a blister. I don't shoot often enough. Gotta fix this.
3. My left wrist is weak, as are the muscles responsible for holding that arm up. Push-ups and light weightlifting should help that, along with dryfire practice.
4. I trust the 4" Redhawk to carry as a daily defensive piece.
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