Saturday, August 17, 2013

Stupid rookie mistake.

I need to do some emergency shotgun work here in the hotel room and also catch a nap between now and when the bus leaves for the range at 5:00 local.

Let's just say that if it wouldn't have gotten me DQ'ed for breaking the 180, I might very well have busted the last several clays on stage five by flinging the 870 downrange at them. Instead, I just said "That's it. Call it." to the RO and ate the ton of Failure To Engages, then muttered "For you, ze var iz over," at my gauge.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

I laid off the shotgun for awhile and at the last side match I suddenly decided I didn't need to work the slide completely. I followed this up by failing to fully insert the shells into the magazine when loading.

I up to that point I had thought I was pretty fool proof with an 870.

Gerry

Roberta X said...

WTH, Tam? Did you let Shootin' Buddy touch your 870?

JD Rush said...

I learned I forgot how to pump mine this week as well. Darn, I need more range time. What a horrible punishment for me...

staghounds said...

As you reminded me when I threw my broken .45 at the target during my last qualification, even Superman ducks a thrown gun.

Uno Mas said...

Hoo boy.

If you're in a hate-hate relationship with your 870, I wouldn't recommend ever trying Cowboy Action Shooting.

In CAS, you can use a Winchester 1897 shottie. Even though the gun sprung fully formed from the forehead of John Moses Browning, it is a fragile, over-engineeered, ancient, finicky, cantankerous, black-hearted, treacherous, son-of-a-beastie. Ask Michael (Wolf) Bane: he was threatening several very creative forms of '97 destruction when he gave up and started using a Side-By.

I haven't reached that point yet, but I'm starting to tire of the '97's habit of going TU in major matches when I improbably put together a good run. Never fails.



mustanger said...

As simple as an 870 is, SxS's are much straighter-up, but even those can break down on the line. I had to run two stages of a CAS match on one barrel once. It's a long ride home.

Scott J said...

Misery loves company. I shot my first 100 yard benchrest since 2011 today.

The best of my 5 groups was a pathetic .809. I had three groups go over one inch.

I even had made a special batch of .30-06 where I'd weighed the cases and kept them all within a 1 grain window.

My average with this rifle is .5 MOA or better. It was doing that when I last had it out on 6/20. Did that all the way to 500 yards.

Dunno what my deal was today.

Joe in PNG said...

Are bayonet charges allowed in 3 gun?

Anonymous said...

Lordy I know that feeling.

For background, I normally run an open class Saiga 12. After getting two free restarts with a stage required 20ga pump (that everyone else had no trouble with), I take two steps from the starting box and put a load of shot into the dirt a yard from my feet.

I just stopped right there and asked the RO to DQ me. Sigh.

-K

Anonymous said...

What was the prob with the 870? Failure to extract with the hull stuck in the chamber when using the walmart 100 packs plagued the two 870 Expresses I bought in 2007.Both worked fine with more expensive buckshot, slugs, and game loads but the cheap fodder required either assistance via slamming butt to ground or a cleaning rod down the barrel to get the forearm moving back with some stuck so hard that the extractor ripped through the rim.Mine was cured by using a flexhone chamber hone, but the one I gave to my nieces husband needed burrs removed from the rim recess also.They both work with the cheap stuff now.A friend's Maverick 88 bought around the same time had the same probs til he used my flexhone to smooth the chamber.

Tam said...

"What was the prob with the 870?"

Check the two posts above this one.

tl;dr version: New non-MIM extractor had burrs on it that caused it to bind at random points in its arc of travel, variously refusing to tun loose of the extracted shell or, alternatively, not extract it at all.