Got my first rifle. Do I need a bench rest?

Dry pinto beans in a clothes washer garment bag make for a fine "sand bag" without all the dust or sand leakage.

Want a BIG sand bag rest? Zipper pillow cover + pinto beans.

I have also used white rice as filler in a bra-specific clothes washer garment bag. Buy new, don't use your wife's...
 
Keep it Simple

A friend passed along one of these rest with a the bells and whistles. Awesome to see. The decision was made that the rest was designed in China by person who had never fired a long gun. Don't get snowed by all that crap. A useful uncomplicated rest is a shooting basic.
 
Trap or skeet?

If you know anyone who shoots a lot of clay targets ask them for some empty shot bags.
They tend to be nice heavy duty bags. Don't bother with the reinforced plastic shot bags, I am speaking of the old school canvas bags that a lot of shot makers still use.
 
If you have a portable tripod chain vise table (that pipe fitters use) lying around your garage or basement...you can jury rig it up to make a sturdy bench rest table & gun rest out of that. I bought such a tricked-out rig from a guest on our range for $40 --- yet a new one runs in the $500-$700 range.
 
The attached photo is of a home-made bench and stool that I designed and we built ten of, for our club. It uses a half-sheet of 3/4" waterproof flakeboard top with 6x6 legs, 2x6" sides/braces, etc.

They were made about 15 years ago and held up well, being made to withstand moving around on a concrete slab. After replacing them with concrete benches, I brought one home and am using it in our blueberry field range. They're very strong and haven't deteriorated.

We don't have plans. You can see that it's ambidextrous and pieces cut in the top were used as leg braces.
 

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I'm going to say no, you don't need a bench unless you need more space to put gear on. Most of the time at the range the first thing I do is drag those things out of the way.

I'll use a bench sometimes for a zero on a rifle or if really interested in testing the accuracy of just the rifle, but beyond that the most supported position I use is a bipod and rear bag (which is 99% as good as a bench anyways). The thing with a bench is that it's purpose is to remove the shooter from the equation as much as possible so you can test just the rifle. If I'm confident that the rifle is accurate, there's no fun in testing it again. I want to focus on improving my shooting and will go for some other position.
 
Do you need a bench rest? I'm going to recommend it simply because it is your first rifle and you do not know it's capabilities. Shooting without a rest can cause you to develop bad habits that are hard to break.

If you don't have a bench then an inexpensive outdoor table can be bought at Lowes or Home Depot. A folding chair can also be purchased there and they are usually the correct height for their tables.

A bipod for your rifle will get you started but you can use sand bags or spend the money and get proper shooting rests.

I use a Lead Sled for my larger caliber hunting rifles. It keeps me from developing a flinch and most importantly, it takes much of the human factor out the process of sighting in a rifle and determining it's accuracy potential.

Once my rifles are sighted in and I'm shooting good groups I put the sled away and see if I can repeat from the various positions that I might encounter while hunting when no sand bags or fancy shooting rests are available.
 
I never used a bench for the first 20 years of my hunting/shooting hobby. Sometimes we'd shoot over rolled-up blankets on the roof of the car, but we didn't have powerful scopes and shooting was mostly in gravel pits where we mostly shot offhand, prone or sitting.

Accuracy was something we tried to achieve for hunting varmints or deer and not as a quest for tight groups, just needed to adjust a scope or irons for hunting/plinking.

When I joined my first sportsmans club, we had a bench and used whatever we could find to rest rifles on, usually bank bags or cut up old jeans legs full of sand. Still, my .22-250 Rem shot some pretty nice groups.
 
Amati said:
I've shot them before but they were M1 Garands 30-06 and shot mostly offhand. Now it's a nice rimfire to be shot, eventually, in some form of benchrest competition.

There are many benchrests and they are priced all over the map so what is the smart thing to do in the beginning? Get a couple of sandbags, go straight for the ones where the position stays unchanged shot after shot or go for something in between?

Suggestions much appreciated.
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You have come to the wrong forum.
eventually, in some form of benchrest competition.
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And the advise, use a 4x4. Seriously, do your self a favor and join another forum. rimfire central is ok place to start.
 
Good suggestions on sandbags. To go with the sandbags supporting the front I would suggest making yourself a rice sock. Take a knee high sock and fill it with rice about 2/3 full. Cradle the rifle in your non-firing hand elbow pointing in the direction of the muzzle. The sock goes in your non firing hand under the buttstock. If you stack the sock right, you can squeeze or relax pressure to adjust elevation.

Very stable and comfortable too.
 
The benchrest is good for what it's good for. It's great for sighting in. It's great for load development and analysis. But I despise the bench. It's a laboratory tool that is, at times, a necessary evil. It the Devil's tool to addict you and ruin your field marksmanship. Use it if and when you must, then walk away and shun the infernal thing. Learn to stand up on your hind legs and shoot like a man. Do I ever use one? Yeah, on the occasion, but I know darn well that it's detrimental to real-world marksmanship. It's a good tool for ballistic research and accuracy trouble-shooting. We probably all know people that can't hit anything at a hundred yards without using the bench. Consider it for prescription use only, like morphine. Here's the obligatory smilie: :) ,but it's still true.
 
ratshooter said:
Amati this is what I use for a front rest. Its made from scrap 2x6" lumber I got out of the scrap bin where new houses were being built. I made 3 of these and have been using them for over 20 years. And like the other poster I used old blue jean legs filled with sand for shooting bags. I made one lightweight bag filled with pinto beans.
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Love those rest's! Never seen one like them before, gonna have to make one!
 
Picher said:
The attached photo is of a home-made bench and stool that I designed and we built ten of, for our club. It uses a half-sheet of 3/4" waterproof flakeboard top with 6x6 legs, 2x6" sides/braces, etc.

They were made about 15 years ago and held up well, being made to withstand moving around on a concrete slab. After replacing them with concrete benches, I brought one home and am using it in our blueberry field range. They're very strong and haven't deteriorated.

We don't have plans. You can see that it's ambidextrous and pieces cut in the top were used as leg braces.
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When he mentioned bench rest that is what I though of right away. But reading some post's I figured I miss understood. Then with bench rest firmly planted in my brain I couldn't come up with rifle rest, maybe that's wrong too.

I did make my own bench and it's portable. Actually have made a few and they all sort of worked! My top is cut from 1 1/8th inch car decking. Double 3/4" would work as well I think. Underneath are three leg's made from 1 1/4" black pipe I mounted a pipe flange for the legs. 1x4 hardwood cit into 3 1/2' length' and cut top corner the bottom corned with a band saw. That makes the legs go out of the table at an angle. Bottom of each leg has a 1 1/4" pipe cap screwed on and the top screws into the pipe flanges. Use a 5gal bucket for a seat but looking for something better. Only thing I like about the bucket is it's handy for carrying the rifle rest and sand bags.

My sand bags are made from the legs of old jeans and filled with sand. Gonna up grade them pretty soon, Have a problem with sand bags that get wet then freeze. No longer a sand bag but frozen it become a rock. Gonna make some new one's and this next time put the sand into plastic storage bags.

This is the bench.

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