Weeman

Haha yeah, during stages I always mentally battle myself, saying to slow the f*ck down, then speeding up and throwing shots because I think I'm going too slow. All in time I suppose. I've watched a bunch of youtube videos on making a draw more efficient and eliminating waste movement, etc. but do you have any personal stuff that you thought worked better than other techniques? I'll have to post some videos of my draw stroke and reloads up here when I get the chance. Thanks for the hammer taping idea too, that'll definitely help. Thanks again for the replies dudes. -Kenny

Good call. For Disaster Factor I had 3A 3B 6C with a time of 10.70. 42pts in total Madness was a little better at 10A 4C with a time of 12.01. 62pts in total. Match total over 6 classifiers was 48A 5B 24C 2D and 1 Mike on a black tux target. No no-shoots which was cool. In your case, also being a Tanfo guy, do you do anything special in dry fire to simulate single action trigger work? I feel like practicing only with DA is kind of counter intuitive, but maybe it doesn't make as big of a difference as I think it does. Thanks for the idea. I'll definitely try that out asap. Not having the capacity to dry fire very much where I'm at kind of forces me to stick to basic stationary stuff, so most of my exposure to "dynamic" stuff you see at matches comes from, well.... matches. I find myself conducting a lot of trial and error on the fly. Reminds me of what I got taught back in the days I shot a lot of skeet, haha I'll have to remind myself to do that again. Thanks for the input so far fellas. -Kenny

So I caught a couple stages on GoPro video at a local classifier match today. Based on the results I wanted to post a couple of the stages up here to see what kind of focus points you guys might suggest. I find the hardest thing for me is keeping a stage plan in my head longer than the memory of a goldfish (as evidenced by the DF video). I'm not too sure how to work on this in dry fire, as I don't really have the capacity to set up a stage and run through it myself. Here's the first classifier, Disaster Factor. I only shot the first array with one shot each the first time for some reason, and had to double back and hit all three again. HF 3.92, which came out to 41.9% Here's the second classifier, Madness. This one was completely on the opposite end of the class spectrum. HF of 5.16 which came out to 58.8% I find myself not being able to carry speed through an array of targets, as seen in the video. (I have a tendency to speed up as I go) Is there something that you guys like to do training-wise to remedy that? Sorry for the long rambling post. Thanks in advance for any input you guys may have. -Kenny

Sorry for the long absence. I finally got the chance to shoot my first match with the gun yesterday, and I guess it reaffirmed just how much I love this thing. Since last time, I was able to polish and chamfer the edge of the breech face, as well as polish the middle portion of the bottom of the slide which eliminated the previous issue of the gun picking up the last two rounds in a mag simultaneously. I also installed the 14lb PD hammer spring to try out and see if it created any issues that weren't present with the 15.5. There wasn't, so I kept it, and have gotten about 500 rounds of assorted factory stuff down the tube with that spring with no issues to speak of. I still haven't gotten around to sending the barrel off to get the chamber reamed, but I haven't had any problems so far, especially only running 115's. Maybe that'll happen later, but its not a pressing issue as of now. Haven't gauged pull weight with the new spring, but I would guess it's a ballpark 7/3. Still a small amount of "zipper" in DA, but that's my own fault. Still haven't gotten the chance to polish everything as it should be, especially the plunger. At this point I'm good with the pull weights as they sit, at least until I get more rounds through the gun. Had a borderline ND at the match yesterday where I touched off a round in SA (into a no-shoot nonetheless... d'oh!) as I was extending my arms forward to engage a target. No more weight changes until i figure out just how much prep is too much for this setup. Here's what she looks like now. Henning grips plus Springer basepads make for a pretty nice combo.

Update to the original thread. I finally got the gun on Monday, but had to wait for the weekend to actually shoot the damn thing. In the meantime, I polished the guts of the gun twice, and hand lapped the slide with polishing compound as well. Things I ended up adding before firing (following the advice of johnbu): -Henning Contour grips -Henning FP and Guide Rod -PD reduced power sear and trigger return springs, firing pin spring, and 15.5lb hammer spring. -Wolff extra power extractor spring -Dawson .160x.100 FO front sight -Springer Precision basepads I will note that the combination of a badly tapped factory grip screw hole and an out of spec screw from Henning resulted in me having to hold off on installing the grips right away, but one call to their shop and I had a new set of screws for free, which was awesome. Thanks guys. Shot a whopping 200 rounds of WWB but it'll have to do for now. As for function, the gun had issues with feeding the last two rounds of a mag simultaneously, causing a weird quasi-doublefeed. I'm pretty sure that can be fixed by chamfering the bottom edge of the breech face as stated in other threads. Besides that, the gun was solid. Granted, I didn't really work the gun in DA a whole lot, but light strikes were not an issue. I don't have a personal pull gauge, but using the digital one at the range I went to I measured 8.5DA and 3.5SA. pretty darn close to my original goals, but I still think I can do better on the polish. I also want to try the 14lb PD hammer spring and see if that causes any major issues with factory stuff. In dry fire practice I still find myself short stroking the trigger quite a bit and not allowing it to travel all the way to reset. Definitely is taking some getting used to. I will also note that my barrel fails the plunk test with all but the 115's I was shooting today, so I'm gonna have to deal with that eventually. Pictures and updates to follow. Thanks, Kenny

Haha you guessed it. I guess I'm in the minority when I want to know how the things that go bang work in my career field. Seriously, thanks. That post made it clear as day for me, now all I've got to wait on is patriot defense to get their site back up and running. Two weeks to go before I actually pick the gun up! It's killing me to wait like this. I'll post any more questions I have if I think of them. Thanks again, Kenny

Awesome. I'm glad this is an attainable thing. Since it sounds like I'm going to be shopping regardless, would it be a better idea to just buy all the hard parts (sear/trigger, disco) most guys buy for these guns along with the springs you mentioned, or would springs by themselves be a reasonable decision? (i.e. would I be able to run those and only those for a good amount of time without having to buy anything else?) From watching the polishing videos you mentioned, I saw MemphisMechanic is also running a heavy hammer spring, but is pulling about 6# in DA.... Is the hammer spring not as heavily correlated to pull weight as I thought? Is it possible to roll with a 15+# hammer spring and attain those numbers with a polish? It sounds like I'm going to be running the gun stock for a week or so once I get back anyway as PD's website is down for a bit, so that should spotlight anything horrific. Is there another site that carries all the parts you just mentioned? BSPS doesn't quite have everything, and I'm not sure where else to look. I know this will be a lot of writing, but can you explain a little further what each of the aftermarket springs you mentioned do over the stock ones in rock-eater terminology? or maybe direct me to another thread that does? Not doubting what you are saying, just would like a little more understanding of whats going on. Thanks, Kenny

Hey folks, I have a new Stock II waiting for me when I go home on leave here in a couple weeks, and had a couple Q's about how you guys would prefer to mod the gun while still being able to light factory ammo reliably. Current situation is pretty much a no-go for reloading, so I'm gonna be shooting matches with off-the-shelf stuff for the foreseeable future. I bought the gun from BSPS, with their "competition" kit, shown here http://benstoegerproshop.com/eaa-tanfoglio-witness-upgrade-kit-springs-guide-rod-firing-pin-sight/ Planning on installing that once I actually get the gun in hand. Concerning the reliability issues I've heard about here, do you think it would be a good idea to run the gun stock for a few hundred rounds or more just to diagnose anything? I should say I'm not too worried about having the coolest fastest lightest trigger on the planet, something in the ballpark of 8#/4# would make me happy. Is that an attainable goal to meet and still maintain reliability? Is that possible w/o the other mods I see happening to most of the guns on the board (BOLO, hammer/sear), i.e. just springs? Sorry if I'm beating a dead horse here, but my searches through here didn't really touch on these specific questions. Thanks, Kenny