[pdjplano]

I recently purchased my first handgun, the XD40 Service, and thought I'd do a mini range report. Approx 350 total rounds fired though it so far, no failures of any kind (sans my bad shooting )

put on DecalGrip for a better grip

mag with speed loader (a great thumb saver)

the view!

My Texas CHL class is November 5th, so I have been practicing on the small targets. Today I finally did the 50 shot checkout test to see how I'd score. A 175 is passing, I scored 243 (max is 250) so it looks like that part will be easy to accomplish.

Texas CHL checkout is 20 shots @ 3 yards, 20 shots @ 7 yards and 10 shots @ 15 yards in a variety of firing groupings. All the 4 point hits (7 of them) are from 15 yards, the tightest grouping was at 3 yards rapid fire.

For some reason (maybe this is typical?) I tend to be more accurate in rapid fire groupings as opposed to 'starting from scratch' each time {there has to be a better term than that...}.

For grins, here is the 7 yard small target with a full mag rapid fire (well, as rapid as I can be at this early shooting stage, which isn't all that fast)

I love the XD40, it is a hoot to shoot (excuse the bad rhyme!)

 

[40SWXDSHOOTER]

I would say it pretty looks good .
It's funny you should mention the tight groups during rapid fire, when I was teaching carry classes we had people shooting timed fire strings, all at 7yrds, and the last two strings were 6 rounds in 10 seconds, not all that hard realy, but the funny thing was most people only used about 6 seconds and shot groups you could cover with your fist in the center of the target, and the strings with the longer time limits (30 seconds) were bigger then your head :? .

Any other instructors out there that have seen this?

 

[NewXD40fun]

Great shooting with a great gun. Even with your left hand!

Tom

 

[nemesis_318]

I have found that I usually shoot better when I have less time to "think" about what I am doing. If I shoot rapid fire (within my limits) I can usually get a tighter group than if I fired slow.

When I take my time I think I overanalyze what's going on rather than just performing the task at hand. Also, the longer you hold your arms out the more fatigued they will get and the less steady you will be able to hold the gun.

 

[hobocircus]

Congrats! you are doing well

something to consider in terminology

magazine ^

clip ^

shoot safe and have more fun! :lol:

 

[pdjplano]

Congrats! you are doing well

something to consider in terminology

I edited the post, thanks. I got it right the first time, missed it the 2nd noobies, aren't we just stupid

 

[hobocircus]

Congrats! you are doing well

something to consider in terminology

I edited the post, thanks. I got it right the first time, missed it the 2nd noobies, aren't we just stupid

Hey, there isn't anything stupid about learning anything new. Just small steps to getting things in line is all. Just like the old bb gun addage about not shooting your eye out. Real firearms are something else.

Keep it up, you are doing well.

 

[pdjplano]

Thought I'd link in my mini-review/range report of the DGR I just bought/installed.

http://www.hs2000talk.com/viewtopic.php?t=26739

The other thing I bought at the same time as the DGR was the Pachmayr slip on grip with the finger ridges. I REALLY like this grip addition. I put it on right over the Decal Grips I had and it fit like a glove and didn't move at all through the 200 rounds today. It really made the gun feel better too, felt even better in my hands than before, didn't think that was possible!

One other note from today's trip was that my long range shooting sucks!!

At 15 yards, I was only 4/12 and 2/12 in hitting the red. I figured I must be doing something wrong so I tried moving my head further over to the right (I'm left-eye dominant, but right handed). That helped somewhat, as the next 20 were 5/12 and 6/12 in the red and the remainder were less spread out, but there was no such concept as a "grouping" I also found it much more difficult to focus on the front site only and allow the back to 'bleed out' like at 3 and 7 yards, it felt like I wasn't shooting at a target but watching the front site... FWIW, I tried closing my non-dominant eye to see if that helped, but it didn't seem to make a difference in the accuracy.

Any words of wisdom for 15 yard improvements or is it just loads and loads of time and learning what works for me?