pistol shot placement at 25 yards

[pat701]

I got my SIG P220 45 cal. I have put 450 rounds thru it so far. I am right handed and a CHGO police officer for 27years(i am 50) my eye's are old and my hands are also arthritic.I Shot two handed as i was taught in the police academy long ago. I was never a great shot but could qualify. I am still carring a wheel gun as my service revolver. My question is this, I was shooting 230gr FMJ rounds at 25 yards outdoors. 90% of my 2 handed unsupported shots landed LOW/LEFTon my target. When i suported my SIG P220 on sand bags my POI was the same as my POA. Around 2" groups right where i aimed. I can't blame the pistol but the shooter. What did i do wrong i am sure it must be my grip? I shot weak leg forward legs spread combat style. Please advise my how i can improve my free handed shot placement. I will post this question on afew other boards i subscribe to. Thanks in advance.

[fire for effect]

Tell me about your grip. It is in fact how you are holding the gun and squeezing the trigger. I have a great flyer about this from the NRA. Unfortunatly I have it posted at our range club house!!

[Sgt_Gold]

Low and to the left is classic recoil anticipation and failure to follow through. It is most common with large caliber handguns. If you're shooting weaver stance, your non trigger hand may be pulling the front sight to the left. I shoot bullseye and when I start to see hits to the left of the bull, I know it's my fault. Another name for putting shots to the left is 'pushing' or 'palming'. Having too much finger on the trigger can also have an effect on your POI. Since you were able to verify POA POI by shooting off a rest, all you need is practice.

[BearNAM]

Steady increase in pull with the trigger finger, straight back, until the shot breaks. Follow through. Don't make the shot break. You know how when you make that perfect sight picture and your mind says "NOW" and you jerk the trigger to get the shot off? Don't do that. Focus on the front sight, accept that your sight picture has some movement, and LET the shot break.

[shootist87122]

Lots and lots of Dry Fire practice at home, (plus at the range - before, during and after live fire) will help more than anything. You are likely pulling the shot, which is very common.

Same procedure as with the wheel gun: work on holding the gun steady until the shot breaks. Focus on the front sight and "call" each shot before you look at the target.

It also helps to do most of your practice with reduced loads, especially if you have arthritis. A 200 grain load at about 750 to 800 fps would be fairly light recoil, although it might not have the same POI as your duty load.

Use the Weaver stance - left (weak side) elbow bent down; right (strong side) elbow bent only slightly. Push with the right hand and pull with the left.

If all else fails, you might consider going to a 9mm. The 9mm SIG is a wonderful pistol and very pleasant to shoot.

[larphred]

My most effective practice drill is to have a friend hand me the pistol before each shot. The friend may or may not have chambered a round. If there is no round in the chamber, and the firing pin goes "click", is the sight alignment still intact? Drills where you don't know whether the gun is loaded or not have helped me as well as my sons over the years.

[pat701]

Thanks guys, you are the best with the advise. An other thing i had head about was puting a coin on the barrel and dry firing the pistol to see if the coin jumps or falls off. I guess i will have to get some snap caps and practice slowly and evevtully build up speed. I still carry a wheel gun at work and i still work the street, a Ruger police six in 357 but the city makes us use 38 speical +p's 158gran lead hollow points in our revolvers. The younger guys carry 9mm's. But i wasan't to keen on semi auto's But here i am getting into it at the VERY END of my career. See i was trained to point and fire 3 fast shots in the main body area at 7 yards. Hard to break old way's i guess, but i will slow down.

[Graziani]

Glocks have the infamous "safety action" which is a sort of weak double action only. Try to pull slowly--it's all about the fingertip. And dry firing works.

But since you are used to revolvers, it should be a piece of cake.

[AKsrule]

Originally posted by pat701
Thanks guys, you are the best with the advise. An other thing i had head about was puting a coin on the barrel and dry firing the pistol to see if the coin jumps or falls off. I guess i will have to get some snap caps and practice slowly and evevtully build up speed. I still carry a wheel gun at work and i still work the street, a Ruger police six in 357 but the city makes us use 38 speical +p's 158gran lead hollow points in our revolvers. The younger guys carry 9mm's. But i wasan't to keen on semi auto's But here i am getting into it at the VERY END of my career. See i was trained to point and fire 3 fast shots in the main body area at 7 yards. Hard to break old way's i guess, but i will slow down.

Triple Tap on point at close range? - Nothin wrong with that if You're
GOOD at it.

I see News stories all the time where LEOs EMPTY 13+ shots from
their wonder pistols - Wonder how many hit the badguy

I can tell from your attitude you'll make that Sig work for ya

[FAL guy]

Originally posted by Graziani
Glocks have the infamous "safety action" which is a sort of weak double action only

Uuuuhhhhhh. He is shooting a Sig P220.

[Deltaten]

Hi Pat<

SOunds like a revoler/auto transition problem. My AMU tutorial chart sez that yer either jerking the trigger or tightening the fingers. I vote tightening the fingers; prolly from all those years of squeezing a DA revolver to make it go BANG! I've done/do the same thing.

Concentrate on moving ONLY the trigger finger. As an indicator, try using the off-hand, first three fingers as a "grip", Hold them palm in and extended verticaly; squeeze the trigger finger while holding the "grip" You should feel NO tightening on the off hand fingers.
Pulling the trigger on a DA wep is a different set of muscles and oddly different movement. Depressing the trigger on a SA auto is from the mid joint only, with no movement of the balance of the finger..

ANd BTW...
The is NO "jerking the trigger"! It is ALL hand squeeze, transmitted to the trigger. I've seen a demo of the effect. The shooter preps to fire, finger on trigger. Coach places a fingertip over the shooter's and proceeds to slap the back of his finger as fast as possible. All the shooter does is align sights and recover from recoil. ALL shots on target. I've also seen it reproduced by others, later. SO IMHO, it's ALL squeezing the grip.

HTH,
P{aul

[Bruce Allen]

Originally posted by pat701
Thanks guys, you are the best with the advise. An other thing i had head about was puting a coin on the barrel and dry firing the pistol to see if the coin jumps or falls off. I guess i will have to get some snap caps and practice slowly and evevtully build up speed. ........

I am an "old retired vet" of police work with 27 years experience, also, and have been a firearms instructor.

The coin idea is a good way for true dry fire at home while sitting infront of the TV - if the wife and kids don't freak out!!!!
Sure enough if you do anything other than a smooth pull it will jump off.

The snap caps are better for the range with someone else loading them so you don't know where they are.

Sgt Gold called it exactly: Low and to the left is classic recoil anticipation and failure to follow through. It is most common with large caliber handguns.

When a chronic problem like this comes up the best course of action is go back to the basics, for you are violating one of them:
Sight alignment
Trigger Squeeze
Grip.

Always
Always
Always.

You also may be "following the shots" downrange. One of the other posters called it "not following thru with the shot".
When I drop a round low and right I have tried to look away from the sights to the target to see where the shot has hit.
This was a problem I had when PPC shooting. It took me 4 months to figure it out by having somebody spot for me.
I was consistantly dropping one shot from the 25 yard line low and right. The spotter quickly found it was the last shot from a standing strong arm position. I was not "following thru with the shot" and looked away from the sights at the target at the last second.

[pat701]

I repeat you guy's are the BEST!!!! Just bought snap caps, and get this, put on my glasses. You know i can see the front sight real good with glasses on. I will practice and practice hard, this is something i will master. As i have always said "theres no fool like and old fool".