115 vs 124 Recil

JDBerg said:
OK, so what worked for me "might" not work for others, but if the OP trys it and the shots start to impact closer to where he's aiming, then we can call that progress, right? Another idea would be to invite somebody who shoots better than You to the range and see what you & this person can do with your respective guns. Or hire a good instructor for a hour at the range & see what you can learn to improve and perform repetitively.
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Right and I said the OP should try it. I just think the issue here is more fundamental, as I clarified after that quote.


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Recoil doesn't affect accuracy; you feel the recoil after the bullet has left the barrel.
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You may only feel the recoil after the bullet has left the barrel. But if a gun has excessive recoil you will be thinking about it prior to subsequent shots instead of thinking about aiming the gun. Recoil can affect accuracy.

But there has to be sufficient recoil to be noticeable to the shooter. I've noted that we all have a certain level of recoil we can tolerate. And everyone is different. As long as the recoil is below a certain level we simply don't notice. A 124 gr bullet does recoil more than 115 gr, but for me, and most others even the 124 gr bullet is below the threshold that bothers us and we simply don't notice the difference. There are probably people who will find that the 124 gr bullet's recoil is above their comfort zone while 115 gr bullets are not.

FWIW I find 124 gr ammo to be slightly more accurate in most of the 9mm's I've shot. But not significantly so. If I find 124 gr FMJ at a good price I buy it. But for cheap range ammo 115 gr is usually a lot less expensive so it gets used a lot. Try some 124 gr ammo and see what happens.
 
How well does the Beretta fit your hand? Does your finger easily reach the trigger with the correct placement on the trigger and no strain? What ammo?
Anyway, out of a 2 lb. pistol(about what a 92FS weighs), the 115 recoils with 3.8 ft-lbs. The 124 at 1157 FPS with 4.4 ft-lbs. Not enough difference to notice.
However, if the pistol doesn't fit your hand properly, shooting it well, at any distance ,will be an issue.
 
JDBerg said:
Bullet weight has nothing to do with not hitting a 7yd target. You need to dry fire practice and you need to maintain 75% of your grip force with your support hand, and only 25% grip force with your shooting hand. I would also recommend that your thumbs be locked down & pointed downrange.
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The reasoning behind what JD wrote, above, is that if you mostly GUIDE the gun with the support hand, then you don't have to grip the gun so terribly tightly that you unintentionally jerk the trigger finger as you press it. It makes good sense to me -- if you realize WHY that approach is suggested. Squeezing all of the fingers in the strong hand as you press the trigger can drag the gun off target. Holding it firmly (but not in a death's grip) works well, and you're able to free up the trigger finger for more precise application. (I know, I know -- folks are going to argue that you MUST strangle that darned grip!!)

We had a BIG discussion on this forum a month or so ago about how heavier and slower bullets changed the point of impact with a locked-breech, short-recoil gun vs lighter/faster bullets. (I learned a lot from the posts of a member named 45_auto, who cited the physics and the supporting math. His work also explained why it's hard to SEE big differences for most semi-autos, even though difference do exist based on bullet weight and bullet speed.)

Put simply, the bullet leaves the barrel after the slide has moved just a small fraction of an inch (generally less than 1/10th of an inch), and the recoil force transferred to the frame during that short amount of slide movement (through the guide rod being pressed against the frame stop) and the resulting EXTRA barrel rise from a slower/heavier bullet is real but very, very small Most of the recoil from a given load is transferred to the gun as the slide continues to the rear AFTER the bullet is gone. The amount of barrel rise due to heavier/slower bullet movement is so small it's hard to measure, and you can't even see it with very, very high speed digital videos.

When you get out to the greater distances, bullet speed vs gravity plays a bigger role in where the bullet ends up. All bullets drop at the same rate, regardless of their weight -- but faster bullets travel farther during a given time period than do heavier bullets. If the targets are side by side, and both guns are fired horizontally, the faster bullet will get to the target sooner and will have dropped less (a function of time and gravity) than the slower, heavier bullet. That's why we have adjustable sights -- mostly for the more distant targets.)
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As others have said -- most of the recoil you feel is going to affect you AFTER the bullet is gone. BUT, as jmr40 notes, above, that doesn't keep you from ANTICIPATING the upcoming recoil as you press the trigger. And, how you act in anticipation of what is coming can greatly affect what you do with the gun BEFORE the bullet leaves the barrel. :)

.
 
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I had an NRA certified instructor watch me shoot a few times and that's how I was informed that "most" of my grip force needs to be from the support hand, and lock the thumbs pointing downrange. Its tough to understand a forum member's shooting problem when you don't know where their shots are impacting relative to the point of aim. There is no doubt that a Beretta 92FS from 7 yds. will group shots close to the point where it's being aimed, the only variables are that the sights may be off, and the capabilities of the shooter. I think every YouTube video on shooting technique should begin with this disclaimer "this is what works for me, try it out & see if it works for you",
 
As I said above, I didn't mean what I said as a dig or dismissal of JD's comments. I'm just of the opinion that when someone is missing the target entirely then the two main fundamentals of sight alignment and trigger control are off in a big way. Now thumbs forward grips and a good distribution of hand pressure can help with that, but honestly even with a death grip on the pistol and one hand (or a thumb over revolver grip) you can still hit the target at 7 yds, but you need those two fundamentals. Even if you have a good grip distribution and a thumb forward grip if you're not maintaining a sight picture as you're pressing that trigger then you still won't hit. The way I see it is a person missing the target is like a new driver that's going off the road. Yea his seating position relative to the pedals and the steering wheel is important, but I think the problem is more basic than that.

We've seen idk how many threads since I've been on here of people having issues while shooting. In the majority of cases I can remember the "solution" was for the shooter to just go to the range and try again. We provide tips and maybe they help, but not being there is a pretty big limitation. I think it was Jerry Miculek who has a saying on the order of, "How do you get to be the best? By being the first person on the range and the last one off it." In essence it's a process.
 
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Training with a professional a time or two is your answer.

Honestly, I don't really feel the difference between the two rounds. I carry several guns at a time, and several types of ammo, and the difference between 110 and 125 is most noticeable in blast and noise, with actual recoil energy being almost the same.

Trade that for my .38. A 158 grain, match wadcutter, 125 grain, any +P round, and God forbid, an actual.357 magnum through the slightly heavier gun, the feeling is far more pronounced.

I'm an idiot for telling you all of that, right? We're talking about you.

Get some training, learn how to hold and control, realize what your limitations are and create expectations. Once you are comfortable with your gun, at least several hundred rounds n dsl, then buy $60 or so of reasonably priced hollow points in various weights, and assess it for yourself. Act on your assessment.

You can buy fifty cent hornady or federal, or rounds that cost three times as much, but here's a secret. It ain't gonna matter the chances that you will die because you didn't spend$500 training with and equipping yourself with $2 rounds is absolutely incalculable small.

Again, an absolutely irrelevant comment, I use 125 grain Sig. Good design, reasonable price, shoots a bit high of point of aim, but not badly. Aim a bit lower from center of torso. Good round.

Even if someone proves that I'm doubling, my risk of death from only one in a billion every time I handle my gun, I don't care.

I'm a really lucky guy. I was born with feet, I haven't died in my car, none of those medium rare steaks gave me salmonella. I actually won two tickets to see Rush in Kansas city. When the lightning struck my house and hit my bed, I was an hour late getting there. I expect to die when a meteor crashes into my bathroom while I'm busy, I don't have time to worry about having an ineffective round. I'm usually too busy going to my basement bathroom, the one that is equipped with a farraday cage and lightning rod.
 
Spenser,
I use 124 gr. TMJ Speer Lawman for target and Speer 124 Gold Dot HP for SD or Fed HST same weight.

I notice a slight difference between 115gr. and 124 grain ammo, but every instructor that I ever talked to always told me to try and use the same weight
for practice and SD.
 
Sorry. Just re read your post. Tunnel Rat gave out excellent advice.

Try talking to your range master and ask him what are you doing wrong? Almost everyone I ever asked for advice gladly gave it.
 
sigarms228 said:
A drill to see if you are flinching.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxyTFzgWjhk
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Thanks for posting this link. It's actually more for when you know you're flinching, this drill will help correct it.

I developed a bad flinch somehow and was hitting about 6" low at 10 yards with both my BHP and P228 (not sure why, but my revolvers didn't seem to be an issue).

I more or less knew exactly what I was doing wrong, I just wasn't able to correct it with dry fire drills alone. So I took my Shield out today and tried this drill, after about 40 rounds I was hitting dead on and no sight movement on the follow-up "dry" shot. Will take the P228 out later this week just to confirm it, and I'll practice this drill on a regular basis from now on.
 
Adam's a bright guy. You can do the same thing with mixing in snap caps along with live ammunition, though the way in the video keeps you from having to hunt them down.
 
Not sure how the Sig will handle it, but with no mag in the Shield about 95% of the spent casings fell down through the mag well, so I set my brass bucket right in front of me and saved a lot of time hunting them down.

This drill really seemed to work, at least for me.
 
Not sure how the Sig will handle it, but with no mag in the Shield about 95% of the spent casings fell down through the mag well, so I set my brass bucket right in front of me and saved a lot of time hunting them down.

This drill really seemed to work, at least for me.
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Cool! :)

It is a great drill. You should not have a problem with your P228 as I have tried it with mine and my P226 before. It is the first thing I try if I am having a bad range day and it gets me right back to "normal". If I find I have a flinch I do the drill and dry fire maybe a dozen times on the target I was firing at concentrating on trigger press until I am consistently right on target with the dry fire and repeat drill if needed which usually is no more than a couple times.
 
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