wimms

IPSC shooter gave me a very rough rule of thumb to start thinking along these lines - if you score below 80% of stage points, you're going too fast; if you score over 90%, you're wasting some time and should push yourself faster. Of course, exact percentage is meaningless. It's just the gist of the approach - you don't win stages with 100% alphas and you need to learn to let go of being perfect while not letting yourself become too careless. For beginners though, he would insist bringing 100% alphas until they reached 60-70% of local match scores, claiming that speed comes with experience while discipline and focus needs to be conciously trained.

The shake passes in few stages. But I would point out two things. It has been said before that it is your body getting ready for fight-or-flight mode by dumping adrenalin into your blood. This is your body's way to help you to become faster and tougher. You shouldn't dread it nor fight it but welcome instead. It will pass faster if you understand it. On the other hand, if you ever get into situation when you need to defend yourself, the shake will be very real and much much worse. And you will have to perform under this to survive. Being in sports it is too easy to get rid of this shake as unwanted, but it will freeze you in real life scenario. So I would rather welcome this shake as a slimmest chance to train under its influence to perform despite of it. Thats about closest we range guys get to real life stressful situation, so why not make good use of it. Train not to get rid of it, train to shoot well despite of it.

It is simply to maximize probability of hitting the A zone. When doing shots quickly or under stress right handed there is tendency to push left and down, thats the 7-8 o'clock zone. Aim point is at the shoulders, so if you cant then error zone moves to 6, thats better for scoring.

Good point. Another aspect to consider when chosing powder. Volume of required powder depends not only on its geometry but also on the chemistry used. Some powders take less volume than others. Something to look for.

You probably fixed your issue by seating bullets alittle deeper. FN bullets due to their different ogive shape and relatively sharp radius at the edge may bounce violently off the ramp if slide velocity is high enough. I got this when I tried to load longest OAL I could get away with, coated 147 minor loads. Seated a bit deeper and problem was gone.

Speaking not from experience but from analytical mind, it takes more time to accelerate the heavier bullet in the barrel so fast powder reaches its peak pressure in smaller volume causing the pressure signs and then it is not enough to push the bullet to desired velocity. So I would also go for slower powder. I am loading my 152 coated with VV N320, so I'd go for N330 or N340. You might also try seating the bullets a tad deeper. This would allow them to engage rifling with more authority. Be cautious though.

I got just the dropper die. Very convenient. No need to look at it and can place the bullet on top of it just by feel. Thats as fast and least work as it gets without the full thing.

Jake, ok, I can see you POV now. You seem partial to how one learns to manage recoil, coming from how you yourself mastered it. Please note that in my initial posting I said: I did not rule out your approach. My conjecture that your spread may be high if you actively try to precompensate recoil was given in the context of bill drill. In my mind there are simply too many variables to put rounds consistently into small group while trying to compensate for anticipated recoil. Of course I may be wrong but I never tried to generalize this to absolutes. With sufficient training and consistent ammo, this can be done. Perhaps I have also projected my own deficiency onto you, I apologize. Perhaps you are right. I have yet to master this. But I would like you to understand that I am not coming in here to preach something radically new, I am merely saying what have been said by much better shooters to beginners, in my own words of understanding. Perhaps the flinch will never disappear being such a natural body reaction and stemming from our inertia. What must disappear is a flinch before the shot is made. As I see it, there is a difference between trying to pre-compensate the recoil and managing recoil. Of course I am not meaning that you do not manage recoil at all, I only mean that you can learn it with different approach. You can start learning in two ways: start slow with recoil handling after the shot and then increase the speed until you are just right, or start as fast as you can and then practice until you are not too early anymore and the spread disappears. I just merely point at the slow option that depends more on a grip technique and suppressing the initial urge to compensate for recoil. In the end you'd get to the same place, being fast and timing just right. I just believe that the slow approach will take less time, frustration and ammo. See Jerry Miculek talk to see example of what my thinking is inspired by:

Jake, I don't quite see where your disagreement is. I have not claimed that one cannot shoot well while anticipating recoil. With enough practice certainly can. It seems that you have mastered your gun and body and do well with anticipating the recoil. But it is also quite clear that you are not just reacting to recoil after it happens, your subconsious is anticipating it and reacting to it whether recoil happens or not. You have enough experience that you can time it right for your needs. But for many people timing it right, consistently, is hard. There are many ways to shoot well. Many shooters try hard to get rid of this natural body reaction, they have a drill for that. To what purpose? Actually, this body reaction is not really related to recoil at all. It happens subconciously and is deeply ingrained in us. It is just natural reaction to perceived recurrent "incoming". You can test it easily with a partner. Take unloaded gun, take your stance and aim at the target. Let your friend stand besides your gun and with smooth wide swing bring his open hand to your barrel and hit it slightly so that you feel some weak resemblance of recoil. Let him do that random number of times and then once - he will stop his hand just before touching the barrel and remove his hand from your sight. You will dip just like with the dud. Thats natural. To get rid of this takes work, and it tends to come back over time. And you don't even need a gun or stance to test it, could also stand straight and be pushed on your forehead rythmically until faking it - same overreaction occurs. Some people learn to live with it, some people learn to suppress it, whatever makes you good. There is always more than one way to shoot well. I just tried to explain where this natural reaction comes from and how it may affect accuracy. I certainly am still affected by this. I don't know if I am right or wrong in my understanding, but I cannot see my error yet.

Jake, strangely you've heard something else than what I said. I described the problem that plagues beginners - hitting low and flinching low when there is a dud. I tried to explain where this comes from, not that this is a good way to deal with recoil. You are not precompensating for recoil, you are maintaining/correcting your stance and holding steady. I bet you will record no flinch if your string of shots were interrupted by an empty chamber. If not then I bet your hits are all over the place. The solution I propose is exactly to stop trying to anticipate the recoil and deal with it differently.

When I was taught by instructor, he said that I should not stop aiming all the way throughout the shot, up until the sights are back, as if the shot hasn't happened yet, and the reason for that was to suppress early recoil compensation. Another one was that the shot must come as a surprise to you, or rather, you shouldn't try to be in control of exact instant when the shot breaks. These both are ways to avoid the muzzle flinch. The 10s I've shot at 25m were all executed both as aiming throughout the shot process and the bang happened before I expected. I've been mulling on this teaching and found that it has to do with the way our brain and neural paths are wired. It's not possible for our brain to react in time for recoil control, so it does the next best thing - it tries to anticipate the recoil exactly after it sends a command to the trigger finger. So it tries to immediately send the signal to wrist muscles to start compensating for recoil. The problem is that brain does not have good enough time resolution at that level of short durations, and it is aggravated by the fact that our brain is multitasking, as is our neural network. So what happens for a beginner is that signals to trigger finger and to wrist muscles are launched at about the same time, and sometimes in wrong order. Now if we wrongly assumed that next thou movement of trigger finger would break the hammer and it takes actually alittle bit more time, then wrist muscles would begin recoil compensation before the shot is fired. Another thing is that neural signals are pretty slow, in the range of 5-120m/sec, and trigger finger has separate neural pathways from wrist muscles. So the command from brain to fire and compensate actually take 15-100ms to reach the wrists, and it is not even certain whether ordering of these commands is maintained while in transit - path to trigger finger is separate and tiny bit longer, so perhaps takes more time. With practice, brain learns to do the timing right, but it takes enourmous amount of live ammo. Dry fire does not help it here. Another solution is to disable the recoil compensation altogether. That becomes possible after you learn to have a firm grip that allows the muzzle to come back without any active effort on your part. At that point you start to feel that you are doing your part of the job and the gun is doing its part, and that you need not interfere with what the gun is doing. So it recoils, and you let it do it all it wants. During that time you focus on the only thing that matters - aiming. You do not think about when the bang happens or should happen - thats not your task, its the task of the gun. Your only task is to track the sights through all the shot process. Eventually its not that the bang happens as a surprise to you, it's more like you do not care when it exactly happens.

Very good Miranda Sorry for such a long post, but I figured it may be good to have it all outlined in one post. Usual disclaimer - this is all just my undestanding. Lets go over the whole process of progressive reloader for reference and better understanding. First few "facts" that have effect on the die requirements. 9mm is a case that is tapered on outside so it is larger dia at the base than at the neck. 9mm is a case that is tapered on INside so it is smaller dia near the base than at the neck. These two are important to keep in mind - the case wall thickness increases with the seating depth. 9mm round holds the bullet only and purely by the neck tension. This means that the bullet is seated with interference fit. 1. Sizer station. The sizer die is shaping the OUTside of the case, but the purpose of sizer is to shape the INside of the case neck to be undersize for the bullet. Its purpose is NOT to shape the whole length of the 9mm case, only the neck area where the bullet will be fit. This might be different for revolver cases, but for 9mm due to its taper it just is so. So when you decap and resize the case, you are establishing the neck tension and interference fit for the bullet later on. If your die is aggressive, say ideal for .355 FMJ bullets, it will become undersized too much for the 357 lead bullets. If you push the sizer die much too down the case, you are shaping the area below the bullet base out of specs, and because the case wall thickness is growing with depth, you are shaping the inside dia to way below bullet dia. This is where the coke bottle shape is caused and base swaging during seating. Most sizer dies are overdoing the neck shaping just to be sure because part of this will be undone with expander/funnel. This overdoing establishes some "reserve" ability to "spring back" after going through expander die. 2. Expander/funnel. Purpose of this is to tune the interference fit dia of the neck INside for the bullet to get seated tight, and of course to open the flare for the bullet to get in without shavings. This step undoes some of the shaping done in the sizer die, but because it is shaping the INside dia of the neck, it is canceling out case wall thickness variations. Now it is relied on the case springing back to create just right interference for the bullet. 3. Seating die. The sole purpose of this die is to push the bullet into the interference fit neck dia to its correct depth. Nothing else. 4. Crimp die. 9mm must never be roll crimped. The case walls must be straight following the 9mm taper. Together with right neck tension the increasing case wall thickness holding cylindrical shank of the bullet will produce perfect taper. So the only work that this die really needs to do is to remove the flare so as to achieve that goal. All else is just attempts to fix something else along the way. Removing flare will slightly increase the tension around the bullet below the flare, but see caution below. Now lets look at the problems. 1. Sizer done too deep. You are reducing the case volume, but also the inside dia of the neck at the base of the bullet, and do that already at the point where case wall thickness is substantial. Expander die does not reach there to undo this, which means that the bullet has to do that. Well, soft lead bullet is not equipped to do brass shaping, and thats when you swage your bullet base during the seating. So - don't overdo in sizer die. Good indication is imo the coke bottle shape. If you have it - you are overdoing it. 2. Sizer not deep enough. Here you prep the neck tension only at the mouth end of the case and insufficient tension remains at the bullet base. As the expander die is undoing this, you end up with insufficient tension to hold the bullet and the setback test fails. 3. Expander too large. If the expander is just right for your bullet, the case will spring back after it and still provide neck tension for the bullet. If it is too large for your bullet, the bullet will have loose fit. If it is too small for your bullet, your bullet will have to do the expander work. Again, soft lead is not equipped to do that while FMJ is more robust. 4. Crimp die too tight. So after seating the case outside dia is the sum of bullet dia and case wall thickness. These both are variable. If your crimp die attempts to squeeze the round into set diameter, you are trying to create neck tension around already seated bullet. This is not possible. Brass is springy, the lead is not. If you squeeze resize the brass around lead, you end up _loosing_ neck tension. More so as the case wall thickness is larger. So if you use the FCD to shape the round "into specs" and remove the coke bottle shape, you are actually swaging the bullet that does not spring back, and you end up with a loose bullet in your round. Attempts to roll crimp so the bullet just doesn't fall out is the very wrong way to fix this. 5. When you create a trompet instead of a flare, you work harden the case neck, and when you remove the flare, the case pivots over the contact point(ring) with the bullet and actually relieves the tension below that point. That can't be undone in the FCD as can't be undone loss of tension due to excessive flare, and you loose the main tension area around the bullet base. Again you end up with rather loose bullet in the round held only by the pivot circle. So you want the flare to be just barely enough for your bullet go in loosely at the very mouth and not loose any tension further down. So to recap. 1. Sizer die must work the case neck enough to leave sufficient residue tension around the bullet after expander die. 2. Expander die must shape the inside of the case so that the interference fit is right for your bullet size. 3. Crimp die must just remove the flare and NOT try to shape the brass around the seated bullet. Based on the above, I make some conclusions. All of the dies work in harmony that is mainly revolving around the size of your bullets. Reloading is quite forgiving process, but you want to work from the size of your bullets to figure out the right dies and setup. You can't undo mistakes in former stages, FCD can do no magic to fix it. One of the most important diameters is your expander/funnel dia that mainly defines the tension for the bullet, all the rest is to compensate for this mismatch. I hope this also answers your standing question Miranda, and why I prefer the FCD Mak die in the crimp station.

Coke bottle effect is caused already in station 1. If FCD is removing it, it is most likely that you are swagging the base of the bullet.

That's the carbide sizing ring? Is it easy to swap them out? I've never taken the FCD apart. That is an interesting solution. Tempted to order, but since I'm not actually have any issues with my FCD I don't really want to pay $8 shipping for that little part No, carbide ring is not replaceable. It is the insert that moves inside the die and is stopped by the upper adjusting knob. If you are loading FMJ it should be fine. FMJ bullets are .355 or even less to ensure fit into all kinds of barrels including those made on blue monday. Thats what factory ammo uses and perhaps that is where the F in FCD comes from - use bullets they use in factory and you will get same results as factory ammo. I can vaguely remember now that I had problems with FCD when I switched to .3565 coated 152gr bullets from previously used .3555. It was then I was struggling to adjust the dies for all variance of cases and OALs. I must caution on my own advise I guess. When I switched to Makarvo insert I also switched to Makarov die, so I haven't actually tried Mak insert with FCD in the press. It fits into the die fine, same outer dimensions. But now thinking of it, FCD carbide insert is quite long, so if you have a problem with FCD carbide ring being too tight, this might not solve your problem because by raising the die at some point the insert will not even reach down enough to engage. Makarov FCD has worked nicely for me. YMMV.

The entry flare of carbide ring is too steep. If you set it up like this you can find a case for which it will work fine, but then some other case will either roll crimp or not close the case flare. Inconsistent. What we really want here is long tapered cone that after adjustment is forgiving the case height variance. But not too long and not exactly like luger taper, becasue then we'd get case sticking I guess. In fact, FCD carbide ring is tapered too and should work like a charm if adjusted right. It's baffling that it works for some and doesn't work for others.