Q: I really hope you can help me. I am tired of getting a bruised cheek from a shotgun. I am a regular clayshooter but find it very uncomfortable to shoot any more than 50 clay targets due to a very sore face. I have tried lots of different cartridge…
Recoil
What’s the right shotgun bore for you?
What should you do if you want to buy a shotgun which will be used mainly for vermin control (pigeons, crows, magpies and rats), together with rough shooting and the occasional crack at clays. A reader asked me a question about choosing shotgun bore a while back, recalling that a…
Gun recoil – what causes it and how to avoid it
Unfortunately many people are put off shooting early in their career due to having a bad experience with gun recoil. That is a shame, because gun recoil is definitely manageable so that it doesn’t present a problem to the shooter. The trick is to fit the gun and the shooter…
Do 20-bore guns recoil less than 12-bores?
Q: Over the last three seasons, more of our syndicate members have switched from 12-to 20-bore guns. They’re nice and light and I’m thinking of following suit. Or does the 12-bore still have advantages? Do 20-bore guns recoil less? A: My word, you’ve opened a can of worms here! Entire…
Second-hand small-bore shotguns – what to buy?
A second-hand 28-bore or a .410? With more than £1,000 to spend on a small-bore shotgun, either a 28-bore or a .410, our reader has plenty of scope. In fact, he could buy a new gun if he so wished, particularly if he looked at the Turkish market. If he…
Struggling with recoil using a 12-bore?
Q: I’ve started struggling with recoil using a 12-bore: what can I do to reduce it? Is it time to change to a 16-bore? It’s really strange as my 12-bore fits me well. A: I come across many people who suffer with this and usually it’s a combination of factors…
A look at three second-hand, low recoil guns
It surprises me that sensitivity to recoil seems to have little to do with physical build. I’ve met guys built like Jack who find recoil painful, and also skinny guys like me who don’t seem to suffer at all. It’s not that I don’t bruise when shooting heavy loads, but…
Recoil bruises my face!
I have a Browning B325. It's a big improvement on the Spanish over-under I had, except I'm constantly getting bruised on my face and lower shoulder. I've never suffered from this in ten years of shooting!
How to reduce recoil
DTL and Olympic skeet champion Jim Sheffield has had great results with the Gracoil recoil reducing system
Should I start my son shooting with a 28-bore?
Starting shooting: I would like to teach my 12 year-old son to shoot clays and wondered if I could get him started with a 28-bore O/U.
How to set a recoil operated semi-auto for different loads
Some of the older recoil operated semi-automatic shotguns based on the Browning A5 have a simple method of friction ring adjustment to allow for different amounts of recoil.