Shooting Journal: November 18
Today I went for a midmorning shoot, with one mission in mind, fire my 556 build for the first time. In my excitement to get out on the range I brought all my kit that would be required for a successful day except my toolkit. I would regret this later in the day when my sight began to wobble loose.
Fall range days are the best.
Shoot details
The weather was perfect for a sight in, temperature was mild in the mid 50s with little to no moisture in the air and a slight breeze in the south west direction. The range wasn’t very busy so I had more opportunity to manually check my target up close calling ceasefire at my own discretion.
I had a simple set of tasks for the day; Run a checklist before shooting the new build, run a few rounds through, then sight in the gun. The gun was a little gummy when I chamber the first round and prepared to shoot. I was a little nervous to fire it, since it was the first time and I built this fun but the gun fired and the mechanics performed well.
After the first 20 rounds I began to notice the sight was a little loose. Unfortunately, even though I brought my toolkit I didn’t have the right tool to tighten down the mount. Many new mounts are using torx fasteners vs hex fasteners. I swapped out my red dot for a iron sight I could atttach with the hex wrench.
Results and learnings:
This was my first time shooting a rifle 100% built by me and I admit even after a couple of times through the safety checklist and a double check of the mechanics I was a little nervous (or maybe just excited.) I wasn’t there to do proper marksmanship training but was not focused on working out any bugs with my build. The only thing I would change on the day would be to start at a shorter range to catch issues with the site sooner. Since I was not trying to go for accuracy or for a proper sight in I didn’t bring my spotting scope. I would change all of that for future builds.
In terms of my shooting I was very happy with my comfort level with the gun, my breathing and trigger pulls were solid and steady. My iron sight skills are improving and some challenges with dominant eye switching are getting less challenging. With the iron sights my groupings were tight enough 1 MOA unit on the target. I realize I need lots of practice before going for bigger precision ranges. My goal for the next practice is two spend a bit of time with my 30-06 and more with the 556 now that I have tightened it all down.