Like most non business organisations in this country both my club and Pistol New Zealand, the National pistol shooting body, run the same 1 July - 30th June financial year as businesses do. That means 1st July is the start of the new “completion year” for Club championships.
I run our club Service Match (90 shot abbreviated PPC/1500 match shot at 50, 25, 10 and 7 yards) and Classic Pistol (48 rounds at 10 and 25 yards) club champs using a ladder format throughout the year. Last Sunday was the first day for shooting our 2018/19 Service Match championship. It was also the designated day for our club to shoot a PNZ Service postal match.
So I loaded my range bag, a couple of hundred .38 special rounds and my 686 AFS into the car and trundled off down to the range.
After setting the targets up I ran the other shooters through the 50 yard course (6 shots prone, 6 standing/sitting, 6 right barricade and 6 left barticade in 165 seconds). Then I took the line. After checking the AFS was set on position 4, the 50 yard setting, I loaded and on the signal went through the series. It had been a while since I short a revolver but overall thought I did okay, until I reached the targets to score and was met by 4 blank targets.
One of the more experienced shooters told me he had been trying to spot my shots but couldn’t. Checking my sights I realiseD the front sight was high. The adjustment wheel was not properly set and my shots were going low.
I was about to sign a 0 score for the series but the others insisted I shoot again. Once more I took the line, felt most of my shots were good, but the “spotter” said I had been shooting high and the targets told the story. One hole in each of two of the four targets. Both in the 6 ring at 12 o’clock.
Now the last time I fired this revolver I had a similar problem and had carefully resighted the front sight. As everyone else moved to the 25 yard line I called a break and after raising the position 4 set screw half a turn with the allen key I fired 3 rounds into the 7 and 8 ring again at 12 o’clock and able to be covered by my palm. Giving the position screw another half turn I changed to position 2 for the 25 yard shooting and moved on.
Again I put everyone through the two 25 yard strings and took the line myself. This time I had 2/3 of the rounds on target, but again high, centered at 12 o’clock in the 7 ring.
At this point I decided to withdraw for the day and put everyone else through the rest of the match. With shooting officially over I set up a target on the left at 25 yards and one on the righ at 50 so I could shoot them both off a rest. After firing two rounds of 6 shots at each target I had both sight settings zeroed in and decided to double check by firing 6 rounds at each distance as if in a match.
The 50 yard rounds I fired single action from prone. A few rounds went off before I was ready, reminding me that I need more revolver practice. On approaching the target I was pleasantly surprised to find 3 10’s, 2 9’s and a 7 out to the right (one of the “surprise” shots before I was ready).
At the 25 yard line I grabbed the timer and set it for the 6 second string. Having removed my holster earlier I simply held the revolver at 45 degrees cradled in my left hand, hit the timer delay and assumed the start (surrender) position. This time I had one shot at 7 o’clock in the 6 ring where I snatched the trigger down, the rest were all well inside the 7 ring (scoring8 and above) and nicely centred.
I’m not sure why the AFS settings “wandered”. I have two different .38 special loads usin* the same 148 gn PHBWC and I may have got them mixed up on my previous outing with this gun, (hencehaving to change settings both times). When I got home I pulled the bullets on two rounds and confirmed by sight the powder and small charge weight before pulling a couple of the other rounds to double check.
One thing is for certain. In the next few weeks I will be taking the 686 back t9 the range and after reconfirming both sight settings will be adding a drop,of my wife’s clear nail polish to each front sight set screw.
Unfortunately I neglected to photo my tartrgets on Sunday and when I got back to the range this afternoon someone had shot the heck out of the one I had used at 25 yards. The 50 yard target was still locked away where I had left it so got a pic of that to post.