meshugunner

The hands respond well to high rep training which is also less injury prone. High reps do tend to build mass and IMO this is desireable for shooting skills since it increases the muscle's ability to stabilize shock. Gripping a handgun is basicaly an isometric exercise, so I do clamp and hold exercises. The basic gripper exercise, squeeze and release develops a crushing or squeezing grip, the sort of action used to work a pair wire cutters. None of these effects can be completely isolated and any of these forms of exercise will improve all around hand strength. It's a matter of what you want to emphasize. The knurling will toughen your skin soon enough but if it bothers you, you can wrap the handles with sports tape or even give them a light rub down with 320 grit paper to knock off the sharp points. And what's wrong with looking like Popeye - so long as you have all your teeth?

Grip strength training pays off big in all sorts of ways not just shooting. Even small gains will bring big benefits. If your muscles are working near their limit it's very hard to have good form. These days, most people, men and women, have underdeveloped hand strength. Not saying that this alone will make anyone into an ace but it's an easy thing to improve and well worth it. I highly recommend reading the grip strength/ recoil control thread.

Everybody's hand and coordination is a bit different. It doesn't make sense to me that there is a one size fits all for finger placement nor that it is necessarily the same for each gun. I think that for every hand there is the equivalent of a natural POA, one position where you get the best results without a struggle just like there is with your stance. I think what the OP was asking was how to consistently place his finger on the trigger under stress of rapid fire. There are ways to train for this but perhaps if the hand naturally gravitates to a certain position, it's not smart to fight it, rather work with it and learn how to press the trigger that way. I shoot revolvers mostly and for tactical fire, that means DA. I only use SA for target shooting and for that I always put the center of the pad on the trigger. At this point anything else just feels wrong. But for DA, I use different positions for different guns. For some it's the pad and for others, usually small guns like my j frame, it's close to the crease of the first joint. I learn my guns so that when I pick up a particular finger placement and pull method comes to mind. I also have a sort of mental target that I aim for on the web of my hand. I feel that position and pull the trigger back to that point. This may not be exactly dead center on the back strap and again, varies with each gun. IMO,for best results you have to know your hand and your gun. Something I notice for myself is that as I speed up and recoil control becomes an issue, finger isolation is the real problem. When more is demanded of the grip, it's hard to stop the other fingers from 'helping'. Just my experience. I am no hotshot.

I do that. In shooting and in many other situations you need a 'clamping' grip (static constant pressure) rather than a crushing grip. I take a gripper that I cannot fully close and hold it at max pressure for 30 secs. Sometimes I use both hands to close a gripper and try and hold it closed for as long as I can. Be careful with this kind of exercise. It involves a lot of strain. The muscles should be warmed up and if you are just starting out, stay within your comfort zone. A strain will set your training program back for a long time.

Get one of those cheap laser boresights that wedge in the barrel and dry fire. You will see the spot bounce shift and wobble reflecting any flaws in your trigger press. Cheaper and easier than burning up ammo and, IMO, in some ways more effective.

I just got one of these, the 7" version in medium. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005K26Y30/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 I bought it for finger extensions and finger spreading . It works very well, though I think a lighter model would have been better for extensions. The medium is stiff enough to be useful for finger closing exercises if I work with the finger tips. The shape offers a lot of variety in exercises. The 7" is very convenient to take with me and use while driving etc. I might get the extra stiff, black one also but that is only available in 14" which is the size of a dinner plate. I like to work the grippers inverted. I find the difficulty about the same as right way up. Everyone's hands are different. I also like to take a light gripper and close it w/o the middle finger. The middle finger is the strongest and is always used as an assist to power one's grip, which may be why it's hard to suppress milking action with that finger. IMO, rather than further developing that finger, it pays to bring the others up to strength. The pinky in particular is a real slacker.

Fitzghan, ( in Afghanistan ? ). Those are just benchmarks. If you can do those two then you have good gripstrength to body wt ratio. You can probably close a 200lb gripper quite easily. If you want tougher, hang from your finger tips. Push ups with fewer fingers. Some can do them just with their thumbs. Climbers can hang from one hand with an open handed grip, palm and fingers press down onto a rocky shelf, but they are built like monkeys. Plate curls: Much like regular wrist curls but done with a plate held in the hand. Grasp the plate from the edge, thumb on one side, palm and fingers on the other and flex your wrist just like wrist curls. These can be done palm up, palm down, seated with forearms horizontal or standing with the arms vertical. This is more demanding than regular barbell curls because it requires maintaining a strong grip even when the wrist is fully flexed or extended. Also, it requires a lot more effort to stabilize the plate as compared to a barbell. Try two 10's stacked or a 25lb plate two handed. If you can do the 25lb plate single handed your hand strength is truly exceptional. These can also be done with the wrist locked and flexing the elbow as a regular bicep curl. Pinch grip: This is a thumb work out. Pick up a plate on the edge by pinching between thumb and fingers and do the farmer's walk. You can try two plates together, swinging the plate front & back or side to side. The weight you need depends a lot on the shape of the plate and the slickness of the surface. There are a lot of muscles in the forearms and the attachments vary from person to person. IIRC I read that the exact formation is random and some of it happens in early infancy. IMO one should make a point of doing a variety of exercises to supplement a core strength routine with grippers. PS: I appreciate your service. Come home safe

I lift weights 2 or 3 times a week. Regular weight training doesn't do a whole lot for grip strength, it helps some but it's not that effective. I find weight trainers generally have a grip that is underdeveloped compared to their lower body strength unless they do specific grip training. A 1" bar allows the fingers to curl tight and also the thumb to wrap over the middle finger and lock which greatly reduces the gripping power needed. Dead lifts done w/o a strap, w/o the over under grip to prevent rolling and even w/o the thumb hook are effective. I have pieces of 1.5" dia pipe that I slip over barbells and dumbells which greatly increases the demand on the grip. 2" dia bars are a common technique among grip trainers. I've also wrapped a towel around the bar to good effect. You might try wrapping a towel around those kettle bell handles. One and two handed plate curls from the wrist and also from the elbow are great and pinch grip lifts with a pair of plates in each hand are very good for the thumb. A couple of general benchmarks for finger strength/body weight ratio are being able to do pushups on your fingertips and to hang from a chinup bar with one hand. If you can find somewhere safe, tossing a kettle bell or some other heavy weight into the air and catching it is also very useful and fun.

I use rubber bands for the extensor muscles. CoC stuff seems overpriced to me but if people think it's cool it helps to motivate exercise. I get bored easily so I have a variety of grip training toys. Small nerf balls, tennis balls ( puncture a tennis ball and it makes a nice thumb squeezer ). I was in the supermarket today and found a doggie chew toy made of a heavy piece of rope and works as variation of my towel twisting exercise. I do wrist curls with weightlifting plates. Holding them palm down will work the extensor muscles. I also pick up an unloaded barbell off center and rotate it in various directions. A roller bar that winds up a weight on the end of a piece of cord is easy to make and very effective. You probably know this but CoC style grippers have a flat side and a round side on the legs of the spring. They are a bit easier to close with the flat side in the web of the hand. I use them upside down as well. When they get a bit too easy for the reps I want to do, I shift my fingers up higher so I have less leverage. I also work lighter grippers without the middle finger and sometimes with just the last two fingers. The little spring clips used to retain weights on 1" barbells make nice mini grippers for the thumb or individual fingers. Clamping grip is important too, this is what one uses for shooting. I take a gripper that I cant close completely and hold it as closed as I can for 30 secs. Like I said, I need variety otherwise I lose interest.

I'm sorry to hear about you guys with carpal tunnel. Sux. You might consider using grip putty as a supplement. It's harder to overstress the hand with that stuff, partly because the motion is slower and resistance remains constant. It's available in various grades of stiffness. Google Theraputty. It's inexpensive.

My guess is that it will start easing in about a month but probably take 6 mos to return to normal. At this point the hoarders are near saturated. They've spent their money and their wives have seen the CC bills There is some knock on effect. I'm not a panic hoarder but right now if I find .22lr at sane prices I will buy 4 bricks instead of two. But this too will subside. Eventually the market will be glutted and most people will have enough ammo to last for some time and buying levels will dip to below normal. Despite all the Black Helicopter/Tinfoil Hat conspiracy theories, this is a free market situation where false shortages with high prices are not sustainable in the long term. There are foreign ammo mfrs as well as domestic and if this goes on too long, some of them are going to give in to the temptation to make some money by increasing their capacity or perhaps by selling inventory to the US that would have gone to some other country. The hoarders themselves have been reselling their inventory at jacked up prices. All this limits the possible duration and severity of the shortage. This has been something of a 'perfect storm' with Obama's reelection ( he got my vote ) followed shortly by the Newtown atrocity and these combined with ignorance, stupidity and rank cowardice. What ticks me off most is that the gun community, having done this to themselves now wants to blame the gubmint for their problems. That's my guess. But if I was smart, I would have seen this coming and stocked up on Small Pistol Primers before the election. I reload and I do have some inventory but until things calm down, I am sticking to slow target shooting backed up by a lot of dry fire practice. None of that tactical - bang bang bang - stuff until I can buy primers again. As others suggested, this may be a good thing overall for my skills.

For the sake of closure, I went down to the range with another set of loads to try them out in my BlackHawk 6.5" bbl All numbers are in fps. Bullets cast from wheel weights. Group #1 148gn WC tumble lube 8.6gns BlueDot 1311 1295 1277 1326 1320 Group #2 148gn WC tumble lube 9.0gns BlueDot 1357 1337 1371 1349 1363 1256 Group #3 105gn SWC tumble lube 9.0gns BlueDot 1346 1359 1287 1304 1242 1097 ?? These velocities were about 200 fps faster than the load data suggested, but that was for a 4" bbl. I don't understand why the 105 SWCs weren't moving faster than the 148's with about the same powder charge. Also, even ignoring the one outlier @1097 they have a wider spread than the heavier bullets. The 148's leaded horribly on the 2nd half of the bbl. I guess tumble lube isn't up to this kind of velocity. I will switch to grease grooves. Shot some paper freehand @10yds and they all printed about 1.5" excluding fliers which I attribute to operator incompetency. Later I will try them from a rest to get a better idea of what the gun & ammo are doing. They were all very comfortable to shoot. I could have shot all day - but the BH is a big chunk of iron. Primers were flattened but still retained their dimples. Cases slid out easily but mostly didn't fall out. They showed no signs of bulging. I didn't really mean to load this hot. I selected loads near the min suggested in the manuals and the velocities seem about right allowing for the extra bbl length. I'm wondering if I should switch from small mag to small pistol primers. Anyway, this is whole different set of problems and I am much happier fiddling with load parameters than having to struggle with random powder charges. All this trial and error has used up about 1/2 my pound of Blue Dot. I think I will try 2400 or H110 when I finish this batch, but I might come back to the BD and it's nice to know I can if I want to. Again, thanks.

I'm pretty new here myself but I'll still say 'Welcome'.

I started shooting in Feb 2012. Before then, I had never shot a handgun. I made a lot of progress in that time - work has been slow so I spent my time at the range and shot about 20,000 rounds last year - mostly .22lr out of a MKIII. I live out in the boondocks and there is precious little instruction available so I am mostly self taught for WIW. These days I am shooting .38Sp & .357 mag out of S&W & Ruger revolvers. I started reloading so that I could afford to practice seriously. Brian's site was a big help in figuring out what I needed to get set up. I love all kinds of handguns but I'm a complete slut for revolvers. I'm interested in all kinds of shooting but I am fascinated by long distance target shooting with a revolver. I have a couple of rifles but I don't shoot them much. I just don't find them as interesting. My politics are liberal and I often feel very out of place among the gun enthusiast crowd but when the politics are put aside, they are a great bunch of guys. Nice to meet you all.

It's fleamarket bullshit. I know a guy in town, ex military who makes similar outrageous claims about his marksmanship. He hit a paint can at 1000yds out of his snubbie. I've never been able to get him down to the range despite the fact that it's a 3 min drive from where he hangs out. I'm not saying it's impossible. A highly skilled shooter with a highly refined gun and exquisitely loaded ammo might do it, but some guy at the flea market with a Taurus? Perhaps he did hit one, one time by mistake. 3" @100 yds? If the gun with the ammo can hold 2" @ 100 yds, he would have to hold 2.25"@100yds - about .5mm at the front sight.

Well I did all the above plus I rinsed the plastic hopper with soapy water and removed the linkage and wrapped a couple of rubber bands around the hopper and over the powder bar for a more positive return stroke. I am now getting 12.9gn +/- 1gn with an occaisonal flyer of +/- 2gn. Which is a big improvement. I should have done these refinements one at a time to see what difference each one made but I didn't feel like reassembling the whole shebang and running test measurements 10 times. I would like to eliminate the flyers but they are tolerable. This and testing took quite a bit of time. Still if it means my powders meter more reliably I'm happy. Tomorrow I will crank out some reloads and see what the spread is on the chronograph. I wasn't able to do that with the last batch since I didn't have the chronograph but judging from other evidence, I think my loads were pretty wild. Thanks for all the advice.

I took my grippers to work one day. Most guys, including some that lifted weights, struggled with the Trainer. A couple could do the 150lb, with effort. One guy only could close the 200lb gripper. My gf snapped the trainer shut. She has a horse, mucks out the stable etc.

This is just what one should expect. Agents of the evil Soros Cabal are trying to talk us out of protecting ourselves from mind control and turn us into Zombie Robots that will pay outrageous prices for ammo without complaint. http://www.stopabductions.com/

Yah, I will give it a work over today. Some polishing, some powdered graphite is supposed to help lubricate things. There is also the possibility that static is an issue - it's extremely dry here in the desert SW USA. Dryer sheets and a ground strap might help with that. A baffle seems worth a try. I have a plan to make one out of a small plastic funnel cut to size. I'll also ensure that the slide goes from stop to stop. The Hornady powder measure is $80. I'm reluctant to spend that much although a second measure would be convenient for swapping back and forth. Does it work with the Dillon powder funnel? If not, how do I bell the cases? Thanks.

Good post. I took up grip training some years ago when I started to develop forearm problems from using a hammer. It cleared up the trouble I was having but the biggest surprise to me was that my dexterity and overall strength increased significantly. Control is part skill and part strength. If your muscles are straining at the edge of their capacity you can't employ the skill that you have. Also, lifting and moving heavy stuff requires you to get into a position where you can use the big muscles in the lower body. If your grip limits how you can position yourself, you wont be able to apply the strength you have and may risk injury to your back ( or toes if you drop it) Some comments based on my own experience. The muscles that operate the hands are small, numerous and easily damaged. Go slow, warm up and stop at any sign of strain or soreness that isn't simple fatigue/ muscle burn. I use a set of grippers like the ones the OP posted. They are very good but they only exercise a limited set of muscles, albeit these are among the most important. Also they are not as effective for the index finger unless you do some reps with them upside down. Nor do they do anything for the thumb. Theraputty, small nerf balls and the like are good supplements to the grippers. You MUST also develop the muscles on the back of the forearm that extend the fingers. These muscles are needed to stabilize your hand when you grip and if they are overmatched, they can get damaged. Another excellent exercise that will work every part of your hands and forearms is to wring out a wet towel. Fold a towel double or thick enough that your thumb doesnt contact your finger tips, soak it in warm water and wring it out working from one end to the other and then back. Concentrate on using all your fingers including the pinky and thumb. If you can do 10 reps of these I don't want to shake your hand.

Thanks for the advice guys. The scale agrees with my balance beam. What parts should I polish? Just the powder bar or should I do every surface that the powder contacts? I'll look into the Hornady powder measure. I shot my reloads today. About half the cases had flattened primers and about 1/4 were sticky to extract. These were supposed to be midrange .357 charges. I must be throwing wilder charges than I hoped. I can back off the charges but unless I get acceptable consistency I have no hope of accuracy.

Really! First we buy up all the stocks in a paranoid frenzy and then turn around and blame the govt, Soros or some other occult cabal. We done it to ourselves. Let's take responsibility for our own actions. "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity" / Hanlon's Razor.

I'm loading .357 mag with about 10gn Blue Dot and having a helluva time getting consistent charges. So far I have developed the following voodoo. 1. Make sure all your cases bell even if you dont really need it. This ensures a complete stroke of the powder bar. 2. Shake the powder holder to settle the powder. 3. Rattle the powder measure before every throw. 4. Tongue on the left side with light pressure from the molars. This gets me down to +/- .1 gn MOSTly. But it's fiddlyl tricky and not really reliable. Does anyone have tips or techniques for this? I there something I can do to improve the powder measure itself? Thanks for any help.

I believe they stopped producing the top break model because it was too expensive to produce. If you happen to have one of the limited number that were manufactured it's now worth thousands of dollars. I've fired a few cylinders full with my shooting buddy's Black Widow and had little trouble getting decent groups @7yds. If I had more practice with it, I expect I would do better. If I bought one, I would definitely get a trigger job. The one I tried was gritty and creepy. Keyholing can be caused by cylinder timing problems. You can bet Mundy's gun is highly refined. He's a topnotch gunsmith. I plan to get a Sidewinder when the frenzy abates and they have worked the bugs out of it.

I expect to pick up my new LC9 from my FFL tomorrow. $335 with a laser from GunsAmerica. This will be my first experiment with laser sights. I am hoping they will be useful for dry fire practice and point and shoot drills. I shot my buddy's SR9 the other day and it was sweet! I really can't justify buying another 9mm that size but I don't know how long that will stop me. Every mfr has problems from time. Overall Ruger guns have an excellent track record of reliability and ruggedness. I buy Ruger with the intention of paying for a trigger job. I expect I will do tha Galway upgrade on the LC9. They are having trouble getting parts and are not shipping their kit. You can mail in your OEM Ruger parts and they will modify them.