For some people, gun fit is over rated. :-)

We're talking about gun fit, that reminded me my old friend Earl.

He came to L.A. to visit his kid at UCLA one year, I took him to my trap club because he said he never shot trap before.

I handed him a MX8 with 30" O/U that I shoot every week.
He had in his hands for couple seconds then started to look around the gun racks,
"Do you know the owner of that model 12?" He asked.
It was a badly beat up old heavy duck gun with no rib, and the D@H must be at least 2.5", I can't see the barrel when I mount it.
It belongs to my friend Rusty, he uses it for Annie shoot, he'll let anyone shoot it if properly asked.
I watched him mount the model 12, the stock barely touches his cheek, but he think it'll work.

Earl broke 25 with my 7/8 oz loads.

Then he said: "So this is trap?",
"Young man, next time you come to Arkansas, I'll show you how to shoot real birds. Let me tell you, they aren't flying straight!"

On the way back to his hotel, he made a comment about my MX8: "Only silly people drives Mercedes will spend that kind of money for a fitted shotgun."

Earl is a great guy to hang around with, drinks a lots of whisky, had many words of wisdoms from practical point of views.

 

A properly Fitted gun, whether done yourself, which is cheaper, or done by a FITTING Specialist that costs money, is the Moneymaker. Some people can shoot a Gun off the rack, if it is close to his dimensions, The average shooter, shoots a gun too long for him, and it shoots too low for Trap.

I will make you a bet a shooter who is better than average is shooting an 80/20 POI or higher.

I know this through Experience.

GB..................................DLS

 

Yes, according to Lucio (former VP of Perazzi USA), I'm lucky (I think he actually meant I'm very average), I can shoot pretty much all standard stocks from most shotgun makers including cookie cutting Remington 1100s.

Here's another story of myself while shooting trap.

One day I was shooting my friend's MX12 with after market 4 way adj. comb.
I set everything dead straight and square like a standard 1100.

Everything was fine 10 or 11 birds into the round I only missed one, then the comb got loose, if I put pressure on it, it'll move to the right.
Don't want to interrupt the squad and let people know I was stupid didn't tighten the screws, so I kept on shooting barely touching the comb, I managed to broke all remaining targets.

Well, it was a strange feeling but very interesting.

 

Considering standard stock fits at least 90% of the shooters, and that's enough for manufacturers to sell a shotgun.

Imagine those farmers in the south using model 12 to bring food to the table for 100 years, like my friend Earl, they never heard of gun fitting, he thinks its a fancy trick some gun sellers trying to pull on us city boys.

I went in to get my first shotgun fitted by Perazzi 20 some years ago, thinking I might get lucky to find one among their 40+ production stock dimensions so I don't have to wait couple months, then found out all I needed was their "most common standard" stock off the shelf.

Life was much easier after that.

 

Well, some of the best old gunmakers thought gun fit important enough to devise an adjustable stock they would attach to a long gun to obtain a proper fit for the shooter. They called it a "try-gun." I have a newspaper article written in August 1900 stating that Charles Lancaster, the English gunmaker,

"invented some years ago a gun in which the stock was so arranged that the drop could either be increased or decreased at will, so that if the customer ordered a weapon from him, he would use this "try gun" which could be loaded and fired the same as an ordinary arm, adjusting the drop at comb and heel until the gun came up rightly, and good results were obtained at the target."

Over the past century or more, numerous articles have been written with the premise "A Gun Must Fit." Yet, many shooters today believe adjustable stocks, choke-bores, recoil reduction devices, etc. are more modern improvements.

An advertisement in 1912

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But after looking at the below pictures, I can understand the how one could argue the issue of gun fit is highly over-rated. And how about those exhibition shooters breaking targets from the hip or with the shotgun upside down?

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Enjoy Our History !

HB

 

Thank you for you articles, that's important history of shotgun fitting.

I took pictures of my fitting session at Perazzi and Holland & Holland using their try guns, but those were before iPhone era, not in digital files, if I found them I'll post here.

 

I seriously doubt that 90 % of shooters today shoot any standard stock without making a few adjustments, which is relatively common because most guns come with adjustable stocks now days ... I recall 40 plus years ago when people would be in the parking lot bending barrels because the gun shot to low or to high ... There is that rare bird who will pick up a gun and hit something with it but they are few and far between ... You can bet somebody took the time to study and logic out that most people could not shoot a gun off of the rack, except on a rare occasion which is why they make them the way they do today ... I was on a squad with a guy who asked me if they really use shot guns shooting these targets, I said yes why ..? He said he could not understand how you could miss with a shot gun ... I asked if he ever shot trap before and he responded that he had not ... Well, guess what he shot a round and didn't hit one (ONE ) target, when we got done he said is sure is a lot harder than it looks and walked away ... I asked if he wanted to shoot a round for a few bucks, he said no thank you and kept walking ... WPT ... (YAC) ...

 

WPT is correct, clay shooters, especially ATA shooters most likely have some kind of adj. feature on their shotguns.
And they tweak it often after they missed a few birds.

Shotgun sport used to be a game for the rich and royalties in Europe with their custom shotguns. But our farmboys in the South learn how to shoot with what they had. I guess my friend Earl is one of them.

 

Safe queen at Vandalia THOF museum

 

The English made cross over stock for the same reason.

Never knew how practical that rib was in real shooting. But it sure can stayed in a museum for people to see.

Actually if it was made today, it only needs an 8~10" rib at the muzzle with a detachable clamp so you still can put it in a gun case.

 

I have found the harder I look at the target - my head doesn't have to be down, buried in stock.

 

I think its human nature we want to see what we're trying to get. So when the top rib or barrel gets in the way, we lift our head to have a better view.

Just like if you want to have a better view of a bathtub in a movie, you lift up your neck.
But that doesn't really help, right?