Large Frame vs Small Frame Shooting Technique

[simonp]

Having seen some comments, or similiar comments really, on several different threads about shooting a large frame AR it occurred to me to ask the question, what differences in techniques are you employing when you go from a small frame to a large frame?

I will be honest, I shoot small frame primarily but I have a couple large frames that from time to time I take out for load development & havent really moved much beyond there as to be honest I just havent found the large to be as much of a pleasure to shoot, havent gotten either shooting as well as the small & so they tend to sit in the back of the safe in frustration. However if its a matter of adjusting a couple of things in how I shoot when I switch frame size it would be nice to know and perhaps get the joy out of the guns I was hoping for.

TIA

 

[mettee]

I think fundamentally they are the same approach, but that the large frame takes more effort, longer follow through/focus, and a firmer hand.

 

[Rudy Gonsior]

Gas technique (large or small) is the same. The larger frame guns just have more recoil and will exploit you inefficiencies more comparatively to a small frame.

 

[LRRPF52]

I think it also depends on what cartridge you’re shooting in either frame size.

I’ve been shooting the AR-15/M16/M4 very regularly since 1987. For heavier 5.56 and even 6mm ARs, I feel like I can shoot more relaxed, although I still employ "gas gun fundamentals". Same with lighter weight bullets in Grendel.

Once I start shooting a little heavier weight bullets from lightweight ARs, or the large frame in .308, .260 Rem, 6.5CM, I really have to apply more rearward pressure and a great cheek-to-stock weld to prevent the blaster from disturbing my position, so I don’t have to re-build position as much between each shot.

This is still true with a rear bag. I take my time building my rear bag position and trouble-shoot it make sure it doesn’t fall apart or cave-in when the first shot breaks.

Ideally, the rifle or carbine will not move at all and the reticle will just stay on-target.

With .223, 6mm, and 85-95gr 6.5 Grendel, it almost stays perfectly-on with very minimal recovery of the position needed.

With 6.5CM, .260 Rem, and .308 in the AR-10, the initial recoil and reciprocating mass movement really like to break your position apart if you let them.

After shooting a lot of .308 and .260 gas guns, it feels like cheating when I get on a bolt gun. You can’t free-recoil the large frames and expect good groups or tighter cone of error downrange. At least I can’t. I have good upper body mass and am taller in stature, so I’m relatively recoil-insensitive.

One of the better things you can do if you’re having trouble with this is get with a coach who has decades of formal or competitive shooting experience in this space, who can observe you and provide feedback to quickly lift you over a lot of lessons-learned. I see a lot of shooters who have bad position, bad sight alignment, bad eye relief, bad breathing control, bad trigger control, reactive finger-jerk follow-through, with immediate lifting of the head position to try to see what happened downrange instead of staying steady in the optic and applying follow-through.

A lot of younger guys just throw the rear bag down and expect miracles to happen as well. Modern triggers and inherently-accurate rifles can camouflage bad fundamentals and still give you relatively-good results on-target just because of how good the rifle might be. Proper fundamentals will shrink all of that down and make you a better shooter.