To Dry Fire Or Not..

[rvb]

However, I personally do not feel it has the training value I once believed it had and rarely do it now, for the reason most often cited. Many times instructors will prescribe dry practice to someone who has a flinch in an effort to get over the recoil anticipation. I've found this works very little. Once a student KNOWS the gun will not go bang, they hold rock steady. Once they go back to live fire and the gun starts moving around, the brain switches from dry practice to live fire and the recoil anticipation is back. I've seen it help very few times in the 20 years I've been training. At least for recoil anticipation problems, which is pretty much, most of the shooting problems. Same with ball and dummy. It DEMONSTRATES the problem, but it doesn't help correct the problem.

It is not the right drill for overcoming a flinch. "Ball and dummy" drill is what's needed for that.

I won't expound as there are a dozen threads already on flinching, but through dryfire, you should be training your vision, not just your finger muscles. As you learn to "look the shot off" you will cure that flinch. Once you've learned to really watch the FS through the shot (and learned to call the shot!) you will no longer flinch. It's just not possible to both call your shot and flinch. So if someone's not seeing improvements from dryfire for their flinching, they probably aren't putting their focus/attention where they should. People who aren't told this eventually figure it out, like Grelber did. But in my experience that curve can really be shortened by getting their mental focus away from the trigger and finger and on to the front sight and vision. The ball/dummy drill is just a demo of the problem, not a solution. Solution is in the vision.

2c


https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/handguns/296037-shooting-problems-any-ideas.html#post4205123
https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/shooting-sports/62950-unexpected-pitfalls-dryfiring-4.html
https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/tactics-training/239915-will-dry-fire-help-me-4.html
https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/handguns/378984-flinching-2.html


-rvb

 

[rvb]

quoting vs re-typing:

The solution is the easiest thing in the world. You have to 1) discover a grip and trigger finger position that allows you to break the shot w/o disturbing the sights and 2) keep the sights aligned throughout the firing process, until the bullet has left the barrel.

actually doing that is the hard part.

Some good suggestions above.

You have to SEE. What do you SEE the sights do when you dryfire?

Once you start to see improvement/consistency in your dryfire, try the dime trick... balance a dime on top of the front site, then pull the trigger, without causing the dime to fall. Then, when you can do it, try to see how many in a row you can do it... 5 times? 10 times? 50 times?

SEEING is critical if your problem is a flinch. You HAVE to "look the shot off" (keep the sights aligned until the front sight lifts in recoil). If you are not seeing it lift, then you are probably flinching.

Are you familiar with "shot calling?" that is the ability to know where the bullet went based on the alignment of the sights at the time the sights lift in recoil. You can score your hits w/o looking at the targets by shot calling. experiment with scoring based on your sight picture. Since a "flinch" is usually accompanied with closing the eyes, you can help avoid a flinch by calling the shot.

Also, don't fight the recoil. Let it recoil. Flinches also come from the desire to stop the recoil, or fear of recoil. Don't take too long to break the shot. If you take all day to break the shot, building anticipation, you're more likely to flinch as you get close to breaking the shot. If you're currently shooting better shooting fast, then do that; dont use all the time given in the slow fire strings if it doesn't help you.

Once you get passed the flinching, and start to produce consistent groups, then look to mechanical improvements (sights, lighter triggers, etc).

as said above, it's hard to diagnose via internet. Hopefully that input helps or at least gives you ideas to consider.

-rvb

ps. a trick I have done that has helped some students cure a bad flinch... first use both plugs and muffs. take aim at the target, then completely close your eyes. fire the shot, let the gun recoil, and focus only on how the gun feels in your hands. notice how little it really moves, how little it moves you, how little it hurt. Get comfortable with the recoil. removing the visual and audible inputs as much as possible helps realize there's nothing significant to flinch from or to have to control. Then go back to aiming, trying to call the shot as best as possible.

 

[sweendogie]

I dry fire my guns. I've always wondered if it actually matters but I've never had any problems with my guns cause by dry firing.

 

[rhino]

I won't expound as there are a dozen threads already on flinching, but through dryfire, you should be training your vision, not just your finger muscles. As you learn to "look the shot off" you will cure that flinch. Once you've learned to really watch the FS through the shot (and learned to call the shot!) you will no longer flinch. It's just not possible to both call your shot and flinch. So if someone's not seeing improvements from dryfire for their flinching, they probably aren't putting their focus/attention where they should. People who aren't told this eventually figure it out, like Grelber did. But in my experience that curve can really be shortened by getting their mental focus away from the trigger and finger and on to the front sight and vision. The ball/dummy drill is just a demo of the problem, not a solution. Solution is in the vision.

2c


https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/handguns/296037-shooting-problems-any-ideas.html#post4205123
https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/shooting-sports/62950-unexpected-pitfalls-dryfiring-4.html
https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/tactics-training/239915-will-dry-fire-help-me-4.html
https://www.indianagunowners.com/forums/handguns/378984-flinching-2.html


-rvb

I think a persistent problem is that no matter how many time we explain that dry practice is much more than just dry firing the gun, people's brains just shut down and can't accept that it goes beyond a trigger press and a striker/hammer falling on an empty chamber. If you can't see past that, the concept of training your eyes to see more quickly and to follow the front sight (eventually through recoil) so you can call your shots won't make any sense.

 

[Twangbanger]

I won't expound as there are a dozen threads already on flinching, but through dryfire, you should be training your vision, not just your finger muscles...-rvb

This is so true. People are told dry firing is to drill trigger press and sight alignment. Which is true enough, but the visual attention aspect is huge. I am not good at running the trigger fast. On classifiers where you just hose down a target or two with 5 or 6 shots (ie, Can You Count, Roscoe rattle), there is just a limit to how fast I can run the gun and it's substantially slower than the good shooters. So to work on this weakness, I got one of the Glock dryfiring triggers. In one of my dryfire sessions each week, I will do the newspaper-crumpling exercise, then alternate with simply running the trigger to exhaustion...picking out objects around the garage and double-tapping them, moving around the room, doing reloads, dryfiring and transitioning, rinse, lather, repeat. I thought what I was doing was training my trigger finger to get stronger/faster. Which maybe I am. But what I really noticed, and I mean it jumped out at me, is how I lose visual focus when I start to get tired. I will find my eyes drifting off the sight and looking for the next "target," before the trigger has clicked for the second shot on the previous target. It's like you are jumping ahead and trying to get it over with. So I just (try to) stare that sight into the target on every shot, and try not to let it move on too soon, even though I'm shooting really fast. It takes some degree of fatigue for this error to set in. I think it would take a really, long time of live firing before I would have become aware of this issue, which became immediately apparent doing DF drills.

 

[AA&E]

I've done LOTS of draw/dry fire practice, and have never had a problem with my pistols. I probably wouldn't do that with a rim fire though.

Came to say the same thing. Rim fires, it can break the firing pin. Center fire, I'd not be overly concerned with dry fire.

 

[rvb]

the newspaper-crumpling exercise

I'm not familiar w/ this, do please explain

then alternate with simply running the trigger to exhaustion...picking out objects around the garage and double-tapping them

don't just two-round everything. pick one target and work the trigger as fast as you can 10, 20, maybe 50 times. the more you do and build strength and isolate the trigger finger from the rest, the less the sights will move as you reset and the easier it becomes to follow the FS w/ your eyes.

also, imo, slapping is critical to machine-gunning on drills like Can you Count... so work on it... try to hold the sights rock steady while slapping, not just while doing the traditional trigger prreeessssss. you can work your way up to a slap by increasing speed through the prressss.

another key to really going fast is being relaxed. Work on that relaxed feeling in dryfire so it's what feels normal vs having a bunch of tension on match day.

a lot of the real fast shooting needs to be learned w/ live ammo, imo, but those are some things I found to help in dry fire...

-rvb

 

[rvb]

perhaps inspired by this thread, I put my belt/holster on last night and actually dryfired for 20 minutes. First time in probably 6 months. My hands were a bit sore after haha....

the phrase "use it or loose it" applies to more than my vacation.... index wasn't horrible, but reloads were.

-rvb

 

[rvb]

I think a persistent problem is that no matter how many time we explain that dry practice is much more than just dry firing the gun, people's brains just shut down and can't accept that it goes beyond a trigger press and a striker/hammer falling on an empty chamber. If you can't see past that, the concept of training your eyes to see more quickly and to follow the front sight (eventually through recoil) so you can call your shots won't make any sense.

very true. even the old dime trick looses some benefit if you aren't watching the dime closely the whole time. ok, congrats it didn't fall off.... did it wobble at all? did you see it bounce slightly from the hammer/striker impact? were the sights aligned correctly? etc.

-rvb

 

[Twangbanger]

I'm not familiar w/ this, do please explain



don't just two-round everything. pick one target and work the trigger as fast as you can 10, 20, maybe 50 times. the more you do and build strength and isolate the trigger finger from the rest, the less the sights will move as you reset and the easier it becomes to follow the FS w/ your eyes.

also, imo, slapping is critical to machine-gunning on drills like Can you Count... so work on it... try to hold the sights rock steady while slapping, not just while doing the traditional trigger prreeessssss. you can work your way up to a slap by increasing speed through the prressss.

another key to really going fast is being relaxed. Work on that relaxed feeling in dryfire so it's what feels normal vs having a bunch of tension on match day.

a lot of the real fast shooting needs to be learned w/ live ammo, imo, but those are some things I found to help in dry fire...

-rvb

I meant the exercise where you get 2 big sheets of plastic, newspaper, etc., hold them in each hand at arms' length and roll them up into a tight ball as fast as you can. It would seem to be something that can help with general hand strength and gun manipulations. I'm trying to figure out how much of this is pure muscle conditioning, and how much is technique. So, I figure I'll cover both in the same session. We'll see how much it helps. Having real trouble with reloads though. When the targets are close and the focus is "out there," I have trouble bringing it back up close to the gun while switching mags. It works fine in the living room, but that's because I'm being gun-focused there, watching the sights since there's no "real" target. When I live fire fast ones up close, and the eyes are farther out, I get hung up on this. My first indication that the mag is slamming into the side of the well is when I feel it...the eyes catch up a fraction of a second later. In the living room, the eyes are on the gun almost all the time, "shooting" or loading. Then at the range, focus is genuinely going back and forth, and reloads are right back to square one again: gun too low, mag slamming into the side of a well that I never saw. I think reloads are actually easier when the targets are farther away, and it's more precision shooting.

There is a lot to this sport!

 

[You'll shoot your eye out]

You guys are feeding the troll.

The two professional gunslingers (LEOs) aren't sharing their professional expertise and patiently trying to correct my misguided opinion with their real world experience, they are feeding a troll.

&^@& you running Grelber, calling me a troll. Aren't you as intelligent and professional as BehindBlueIs and phylodog? Unlike the guys mentioned you can't refute me with facts or experience but rather have to start out first thing with emotional name-calling such as the unimaginative, even if ubiquitous moniker "TROLL". Interesting that you immediately recognize Mr. Natural, did you see him a lot in your formative years? Perhaps on little stamp-like slips of paper? That would explain your rather dull and uninspired attempt at witty repartee, such as "um....derr.....TROLL!" So take these free insults and put them into your little red mailbox. Come back with credible facts or even with acid commentary, something worthy of the great INGO flame machine's reputation. Don't embarrass yourself and us by advertising free insults and then dropping a lame "TROLL". We want QUALITY POSTS man, QUALITY!

BlueI's, phylodog, thank you for responding with your credible and rational opinions. I do consider the things both of you say..... Unlike things like Grelber says (neither informative or bitingly entertaining). I have little experience with people who use and train with a gun professionally. Mostly I am surrounded by tatcicool nerds and hillbillys, such as are often found in a trailer court snapping away at their Tv with a beer in their left hand and a Hi-Point in their right. I see that pretty often and it both offends and frightens me.

 

[phylodog]

Mostly I am surrounded by tatcicool nerds and hillbillys, such as are often found in a trailer court snapping away at their Tv with a beer in their left hand and a Hi-Point in their right. I see that pretty often and it both offends and frightens me.

I can certainly see where that might raise some concerns.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

Mostly I am surrounded by tatcicool nerds and hillbillys, such as are often found in a trailer court snapping away at their Tv with a beer in their left hand and a Hi-Point in their right. I see that pretty often and it both offends and frightens me.

Well, just like there's shooting practice and there's screwing around at the range...there's dry fire practice and there's screwing around with guns. That sounds like screwing around.

One of the resources I mentioned can be found here: pistol-training.com » Blog Archive » Dry Fire Routine

That should give you an idea of what a dry fire regimen looks like, although of course there are multiple variations and a lot of it depends on what you want to accomplish.

 

[Twinsen]

Mostly I am surrounded by tatcicool nerds and hillbillys, such as are often found in a trailer court snapping away at their Tv with a beer in their left hand and a Hi-Point in their right. I see that pretty often and it both offends and frightens me.

TV offends and frightens me too. Man... the filth that people call entertainment these days.

 

[sardonius]

Regardless of how much damage dry firing does/does not do, I like using snap caps and dummy rounds for training/familiarizing myself and others with all the actions that lead up to pulling the trigger. I bought some new snap caps recently (Wife got her first pistol!) that I really like. They weigh closer to what a regular cartridge weighs, which seems to add more to the experience.

Also, probably important to know the difference between "snap caps" and "dummy rounds." - Dummy rounds don't absorb any energy from the firing pin, so they don't make your dry fire any "safer." Snap Caps do absorb the energy, which takes the extra stress of the firing pin.

 

[Grelber]

Also, probably important to know the difference between "snap caps" and "dummy rounds."

Reminds me. Would like to have 5 mags or so worth of dummy rounds so you can practice reloads without always picking up mags in between. Anybody found a way to make a dummy round that will hold up long term? Have tried heavy crimping and even superglue but not with much success.

 

[rvb]

Reminds me. Would like to have 5 mags or so worth of dummy rounds so you can practice reloads without always picking up mags in between. Anybody found a way to make a dummy round that will hold up long term? Have tried heavy crimping and even superglue but not with much success.

I just load like normal, except no primer/powder.
I loaded a couple dozen 9mm ~10 yrs ago. they are now starting to get beat up, lose tension on the bullet, and the rims are shot.... I was planning to make some more next time I'm set up for loading 9s..
Maybe don't miss the mag well so bad you're always beating the bullet into the well?

-rvb

edit: just noticed it looks like you are using full mags? I usually just put a couple in the top to help keep the feed lips from catching on the side of the frame/well. If you're smashing mags in that are fully loaded, you probably are putting a lot more force on those top rounds when they either hit the bottom of the mag well or the bottom of the slide up in the gun. not to mention a lot more inertia when they hit the ground.

it might be good to practice w/ a full mag every once in a while, but it's not necessary ALL the time...

-rvb

 

[BehindBlueI's]

I just load like normal, except no primer/powder.

This. I've got dummies for my revolvers to practice reloads. I'm not sure what you need dummies for to practice reloads for magazine fed weapons.

 

[Relay4]

In my opinion, you can't beat dry fire practice with the M1 Garand. Draw a dot the diameter of a pencil eraser on a piece of white card stock the size of a match book. Affix this to a wall at shoulder height. Now stand a distance of about 15 ft. from your target. Your front sight should be as wide as the dot when aiming at this distance. This is how the "black" will appear to you in a match.

 

[rvb]

This. I've got dummies for my revolvers to practice reloads. I'm not sure what you need dummies for to practice reloads for magazine fed weapons.

- seating force
the mags seat much easier empty, so you don't want to be in the habit of being too gentle inserting them. (I got caught by this after years of competing in production division which limits to 10 rounds, I failed to seat the mag the first time I reloaded to a stuffed-full mag in limited division. I then made enough dummy .40s to fill my 140mm mags for practice. Carry guns I've always carried spare mags 1 less than full).

- weight
some folks like the weight of things to be about the same in practice. Not such a big deal w/ a compact carry gun; makes a difference reloading to a 28-round "big stick."

- wear/tear on the guns
If not perfectly aligned on the reload, the dummy round will hit the frame, and it can then slide into alignment easier. If mag is empty, the feed lips catch, and over time it can really eat away at the frame on a plastic gun (and bend feed lips on the mag).

- dropping slide repeatedly on empty chamber not good, I don't care what gun it is...
e.g. when practicing slide-lock reloads

-rvb