Rifle weight balance

[6.5 forever]

I see references made stating the importance of balance. I understand why for shooting practical off of barricades. But is it important for bipod shooting prone and off a bench?

 

[David Milisock]

Rifle balance is always important but you won't notice until it's screwed up.

 

[nmkid]

I have a heavy barreled 243 AI in a chassis and it's heavy on the front. I thought about getting some weights for the back to balance things up. However, shooting it from a bench, free recoil it comes straight back. So, I left it alone. Anyway, the rifle shoots great. But, I notice that my groups always seem to stack "up". Never toward the bottom or side of the group.

 

[Krogen]

I just replaced a 30" barrel with a 25" barrel. The 30" was "tippy" you might say. Little weight on the buttstock. It was prone to vertical stringing and took downward pressure with my thumb to manage it. The new shorter barrel puts the center of mass back further. I'm very happy with the improvement.

 

[David Milisock]

I have a few rifles, my 6mm Remington in a Remington 700 action with a 26" varmint barrel balances at the lockup of the chamber. It is designed for mostly prone (via bipod) field shooting but is reasonablefor offhand and supported positions. The same for my Howa 1500 in 223 Remington with ac22" varmint barrel. Both rifles are scoped.

My 98 Mauser in 8x57JS with a military barrel cut to 21.5", it balances at the rear of the magazine, it swings fast and is a great field rifle, it is designed for off hand and supported field positions. I have a Model 17 Remington in 30-06 with a 22" military barrel, is set up the same way. Both are iron sighted (peep) designed for medium game up to 300 yards. These rifles are whybI don't have a 308.

My 98 Mauser in 450 Marlin is a dangerous game rifle, (custom cut for 500 grain projectiles) with a 22" medium weight barrel, iron sights, (semi-buckhorn). This rifle balances at the rear of the magazine, even at 9 pounds it swings very fast due to lead weight added to the interior of the synthetic stock keeping the weight back. It is designed for off hand and supported field shooting, when 1,000 pounds of SHTF (coming to eat you) from the end of the muzzle to 100 yards.

My Remington 03 in 358 Norma has a 30" zero taper barrel, at 13 pounds it balances about 4 inches in front of the lockup, it is designed for bipod prone shooting and has been tested out to 800 yards. Being front heavy from the bipod it swings fast, has reasonable recoil and is easy to aquire targets. This rifles is scoped.

Every rifle I have if necessary has had work to make sure it handles. My latest addition is still in the thought process mode as it will function with iron sights and a quick detachable LPVO, so I concerned about the compromises I'll have to make.

 

[Rocketvapor]

I guess the maximum weight limit for your intended class comes into play.

 

[D-4297]

Is balance important ? It is to me in TR . After changing to a New stock , my score dropped by ten points , and I thought it was just getting used to the different "feel" of the new stock . After the third time shooting it , I went to pick it up to put it away after shooting , and it seemed a lot lighter in the barrel end of the rifle . I marked where the Bi-pod was at on the Rail , and having another box of ammo loaded , I started moving the Bi-pod back , a 1/4" at a time till the rifle started to re-act correctly . Within twenty shots , I was back to solid 10's and some X's , but a consistent Group again . YES !......... Balance is Important ! Now ; I'm just nudging the Bi-pod back and forth , trying to find that Sweet spot !

 

[BoydAllen]

The importance of balance is directly connected to how you shoot the rifle. The closer to actual free recoil you are, the more important it is. A lot of shooters have never gotten to be as good holding their rifles (from bench or ground) as they are shooting free or near to free. For these shooters balance is very important.

The one mistake that we have inherited on this subject is evaluating balance by where rifles actually balance, when supported. The important thing is having enough of a rifle's weight on the rear support, usually a bag. Let me explain. Recently we have seen the advent of stocks with long forends. Placing the front bag as far forward as these stocks allow puts a lot more of a rifle's weight on the rear bag, even though the extra weight of the longer forend will make the rifle's balance point farther forward than it would be with the same barrel and a shorter stock. Years ago, I used an accurate package scale to study this. After weighing the rifle, I put the rear bag on the scale and zeroed out the weight, then I raised the front rest by the thickness of the scale to level the rifle. With this setup I was able to move the front and rear bag on the rifle and record the weight on each, rear directly from the scale and front by subtracting that from the rifle's weight. Moving the front bag forward as far as you can is the most effective way to raise the percentage of a rifle's weight onto the rear bag.

 

[Rocketvapor]

Joystick Bipods and Rests allow a more forward position and still reach controls.
The wife and I shoot AR's in F-Open, 22.2lb weight limit.
Just got her started on a rest. It took a 2.5 pound bag rider and a lead slug in the dead space of the adjustable stock. All up weight is 19.1 lbs with a sled magazine. About 60/40 with 11.6 on the center of the front bag and 7.5 on the rear bag. Measured with hooks and a digital baggage scale. Still have some weight margin left. Without the weight of the bag rider I guess rifle weight on the bags would be 9.1/7.5, 55%/45%.




Held to the tube with a drilled and tapped strip of steel on the inside.