Saturday, May 22, 2010

Sight Picture

3 types of sight pictures, and I shamelessly stole this diagram from Ahab, so all credit to him for stealing it from Pistol-Training.com...



So. I had known of 1 and 2, but #3 never occurred to me. I tend to gravitate toward #2 (point of impact hold) in practice. And I shoot low with center fire. Should I be shooting with sight picture 3? No. And I'll tell you why. I've gotten better shooters than me to shoot my pistols and they also gravitated toward #2. They had no problem hitting the center. Plus, I don't shoot low with .22. If anything I shoot high. With ALL .22's, not just mine. And I shoot low with all centerfire pistols I try. I think my low shots are an anticipatory flinch, pushing the gun forward anticipating the shot and recoil. And I see it on the revolver when I try for a shot on an expended cartridge or slipped in snap cap.

My flinch is getting better, slowly but surely. So I'll stick with #2.

That's also how I line up for rifle shots with the Garand/M14 style aperture sights. I try to get the front sight touching the 1 inch red circle of the bull 100 yards away. Or 25/50 yards, when my eyes can't see that far... Which is most days, in most light.


3 comments:

Old NFO said...

Gotta agree with #2 also.

Anonymous said...

I like #2 for rifles and #3 for handguns. It's just what has always felt natural to me.

Hat Trick said...

I use #2 for defensive practice and hunting. Shooting bullseyes for score you'd use #1 and adjust the sights accordingly. The reason to use #1 is that you can better resolve the front sight on a white background and judge its position relative to the edge of the bull.