How to shoot a B-28......

[mikeiniowa]

The 28 can be a bit of a hand full if you don't know how to shoot it so here goes......you should have a I don't want to touch the rifle attitude before you pick it up to shoot, cock and load the rifle, put one hand under the fore stock right in the middle of where the checkering on the sides is, raise the rifle to firing postion and adjust the front hand until the rifle is balanced on that hand. Keep this hand open and don't let the thumb and fingers touch the sides of the fore stock. You should now be holding the rifle only with one hand and the butt touching your shoulder with about one ounce of pressure, you should just be able to just feel the butt of the stock. Now raise your other hand and push the safety off, put the thumb on the back of the pistol grip very lightly, bring your trigger finger up until it just touches the trigger, bring your head down and find the sights, don't let your face touch the rifle or at the most very lightly get them on target,  now squeeze the thumb and finger toward each other. It's going to feel funny but you will get used to it. The less you touch the rifle the better it will shoot...

[tjk]

Funny thing you should mention it Mike. Yesturday I was experimenting with my hold on the B-28,..and noticed it would behave better if I slit my hand a bit more foreward on the stock. Being a big rifle,...and me not being  a big statured man,...I still like to use the "artillary hold". But through practice, I noticed if I leaned back a bit further, I could still excersise this hold and use a  more foreward grip on the stock. Groups got even better too!!!! tjk

[mikeiniowa]

When watching people shoot I have noticed that alot of shooters tend to hunch over the rifle, don't do that, stand as straight up as you can. It's like Mom always told me "Walk upright"....

[thebookdoc]

Mike, That's great info. I hear about soft hold but not too many people describe it very well. About keeping your face from touching the rifle...I don't know if my head is abnormally large -- I certainly don't have a swelled head about my expertise in shooting -- but the cheek rest on my guns that seem similar to this (TF89 and Remington Vantage 1200) comes up high and it'd be tough to get my head in there without cricking my neck or WORSE tilting the gun. I was recently looking for an offset scope mount to take the scope 45 degrees or even 90 off the barrel, but these all seem to be made for paintball guns which don't seem to have the kick of one of these rifles. What do you think of offset mounting for a scope to help with the light-hold issues? Any idea where I might get a sturdy offset mount? Or if that may have other drawbacks I am not considering (changing rotational balance weight of the gun)?

[mikeiniowa]

I've seen off set mounts on fire arms but that was years ago...it shouldn't effect the rifle much.

[TexasShooter72]

That Weihrauch HW90 I had was a pain in the ass to shoot.  I ended-up sending it to my good buddy in California who ran into the same problems.  THEN, one day he calls me all excited because he'd figured out how to shoot it consistently with the same principles you've mentioned.  He says, "you wanna hold like you've never picked up a gun before, balance the gun with your left hand and let it move as it wishes".  Tadah!

He loves that gun now and has made me envious.

[atchman2]

My 350 is also hard to shoot.  I figured out what Mike said, but I wish I had read this instead of trying to figure it out for myself!  

Getting the balance is key.  If you have it balanced too much forward it will kinda snap up and you'll miss.  

My main issue with these guns is the weight!  With a scope they weigh almost as much as two Whispers!  It takes awhile to get the right hold and shoot them semi-accurately.  Mine also snaps a bit to the right as it is fired, but it hasn't been tuned by anyone.

[thebookdoc]

Atchman, my guess is that a tune will help reduce kick and pull. You can just ask one of the tuners that frequents here if I'm right...I don't own a B-28, but I don't think the TF89s are that much different...and my recently tuned TF89 has lost just about all the pull, kick, flutter, twang and fliers. Anything that goes wrong these days appears to be operator error ;-) I'm getting another TF89 in .22 to customize -- and certainly I'm getting it tuned! It's worth it.