I just made a trip to Colorado to deliver 2 rifles I had built for my Grandson. He is only 4 1/2 years old, so some may think I'm jumping the gun. I don't know how long I'll be around, so I didn't want to miss this.
#1 rifle is 6.5 Grendel Howa mini with 22" light barrel in 12-1/2 LOP. Yeah it's Tupperware, but I took him a good 13 1/2 LOP when he grows a bit. Loaded a node at 25 grs of 8208 xbr for starters, with 107 TMK. It shoots mid .2s @ 100 yards.
He has never shot a scoped rifle, so we spent Saturday going thru all the safety rules, all the parts of the rifle and how to position his body and the rear bag. We decided a bipod and rear bag was his comfort zone. We spent 3-4 hours having him moving the rifle to put crosshairs on various targets and dry firing dummy rounds, to learning how to sqeeze trigger. He caught on quickly to snug the stock butt into his shoulder and place cheek on the stock pack (I put on to get his eye in line with scope).
Sunday, we went to shoot on a friend's ranch. It was fairly windy, so we put up a 8x14 steel plate at 100 with a couple 3" pasters for targets.
He went thru his preparation like a pro and loaded a single round, put the crosshairs on target and reminded me to put on my earmuffs, sqeezed the trigger and PING, to my relieve.
Of course, he wanted to see his target, so he cleared his rifle and beat me to the target. He wanted to know if it was a good shot. I just hugged him and told him it was fantastic and it was better than his Dad's first shot. He hit a paster or was on the edge for every shot. He never flinched or jerked the trigger on the little Grendel.
He was ready to breakout the 6.5 Creedmoor (2,980 fps loads), but we convinced him to grow a bit more and save those rounds for his first hunt.
My 1,500 mile round-trip was worth every mile to see my only Grandson take his first step to being a shooter. It is great to see the continuation of 5 generations of gun lovers in my family. Yep, a perfect day! Being a Grandpa has it's rewards!
#1 rifle is 6.5 Grendel Howa mini with 22" light barrel in 12-1/2 LOP. Yeah it's Tupperware, but I took him a good 13 1/2 LOP when he grows a bit. Loaded a node at 25 grs of 8208 xbr for starters, with 107 TMK. It shoots mid .2s @ 100 yards.
He has never shot a scoped rifle, so we spent Saturday going thru all the safety rules, all the parts of the rifle and how to position his body and the rear bag. We decided a bipod and rear bag was his comfort zone. We spent 3-4 hours having him moving the rifle to put crosshairs on various targets and dry firing dummy rounds, to learning how to sqeeze trigger. He caught on quickly to snug the stock butt into his shoulder and place cheek on the stock pack (I put on to get his eye in line with scope).
Sunday, we went to shoot on a friend's ranch. It was fairly windy, so we put up a 8x14 steel plate at 100 with a couple 3" pasters for targets.
He went thru his preparation like a pro and loaded a single round, put the crosshairs on target and reminded me to put on my earmuffs, sqeezed the trigger and PING, to my relieve.
Of course, he wanted to see his target, so he cleared his rifle and beat me to the target. He wanted to know if it was a good shot. I just hugged him and told him it was fantastic and it was better than his Dad's first shot. He hit a paster or was on the edge for every shot. He never flinched or jerked the trigger on the little Grendel.
He was ready to breakout the 6.5 Creedmoor (2,980 fps loads), but we convinced him to grow a bit more and save those rounds for his first hunt.
My 1,500 mile round-trip was worth every mile to see my only Grandson take his first step to being a shooter. It is great to see the continuation of 5 generations of gun lovers in my family. Yep, a perfect day! Being a Grandpa has it's rewards!
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