Akai Live Fire Day 1

Akai Live Fire Day 1



Spent a couple of hours this morning on live fire, so I was extra excited to get out and do some live fire this afternoon, and go get a feel for the gun. I continued to work on draw during dry fire, but live fire showed me that I need to focus on a few other items while in dry fire.

Draw/Grip: So I tend to not put a ton of focus on my draw in dry fire. I figure that if I get it into a "competent" area, like a consistent 1.5 second draw, then I'm not going to hurt myself too badly. I was hitting that mark in dry fire, but evidently I was getting an inconsistent grip. Short version, to utilize the thumb rest I had to move turn my hand a bit further forward than I normally have done. In live fire, if I got a good grip, the dot moved a lot less, and I had far better control over the gun, if I got a bad grip, dot bounced all over, and my hits or my time suffered. While I may only draw once a stage, if I don't get a good grip, it impacts everything that I do. Can't cheat myself, need to do this right, and focus on it.

Reloads: Same thing here as in the draw. Sure I need to go faster, I was hitting a 1.3-1.5 in dry fire, but I was 1.9-2.1 in live fire. Sure, I don't have to reload often in Open, but I will have to reload on Standards stages, and it's a basic skill. I need to look at the video, but I suspect I'm slow off the gun to get moving. In addition, getting that grip is going to be key. Foundation type of fundamental, and if it's not right, I'll struggle with everything else.

So what did I do? Well, I spent time just shooting at a few black pasters from different distances, so I could learn what to expect from the dot, and how I need to adjust my aiming point based on distance. It was a learning process, but a good one. I'll improve because of it. We went back and ran a few El Pres drills, and I just wanted to benchmark myself. I was running consistently in the 6.5 seconds to 7.0 second area, with solid hits. Huge room to improve the turn and draw and reload, (2.1 seconds on turn and draw, and the 2-2.1 range on reloads). I see an easy 1 second improvement just on those two things possible. Splits were in the .21-.23 area, and transitions in the .31-.33 area. Again, I'm sure that in time I'll be able to run the gun faster, but I felt comfortable at that speed, and I called my shots effectively.

Oh, it was a sub 1 lb trigger!

Lastly, based on a suggestion from Les, we set up a "mini-stage". We started about 18 yards to a card board target, then to a mini-popper, break and run to three open targets at 10 yards, followed by a finish on steel. The goal was to run it for the highest Hit Factor possible, so it wasn't just about running it fast, you needed to get hits as well. This was fun, because it made practice a little competitive for Linda and I, and in order to "win" we realized there was a lot going into it, draw, transitions, and how you left the first position, and entered the second position, not to mention getting hits.

Damn, I'm excited to shoot, my hands feel torn up from gripping the gun so hard, but I want to get back out there. I'm anxious to clean up my mistakes. I realize that I may have set my goals too high for next weekend, and I'll like "downgrade" it during the week. This is not going to be an easy transition, it'll all start with grip. The other part is that I just need to put rounds thru the gun, the more I shoot the better I'll get. Sure, in some ways I was frustrated because I wanted to drill Alpha's all day long, but I'm so excited to be out there, and I appreciate that if I invest the time I'll get there.

Akai V6: The Open Journey Has Begun

Akai V6: The Open Journey Has Begun



Today is the day that I've been waiting for, my new Akai V6 has arrived, and now I'm firmly on the path of shooting Open, and making good on what I want to accomplish. It's been a few months since I've done a blog, but my time has not been "wasted", nor have I forgotten about what I wanted to do. Up until now, all I've really been able to accomplish is the prequel type of work, but it's things that I needed to do in order to be prepared to work, and fortunately, those things are done, and I have my ducks in a row.

Early on I identified ammo as something that "could" hold me back. Running Open, I have to reload, I can't buy any factory ammo, and frankly reloading is something I considered a chore in the past. Buying a 1050 was supposed to make things easier, but so far what I've found is that it's not just made things easier, it's also reduced my "error" rate substantially. In the past it would not be uncommon for me to have 1-2 rounds per 100 that would not case gauge for a variety of reasons. In the last 500 rounds I've put thru the 1050, I had one round that did not case gauge, that's it. I need to go Chrono the the gun, but looking at 8.3 grains of HS-6 with an OAL of 1.140-1.149. Kozy says this should put me around a 170-173 Power Factor, which gives me enough room to safely make major. While Les was in town this past week he made a few relatively small adjustments for me, and I'll run another few thousand rounds by hand before I install the Mark 7, and go fully automated. Both Les and Kozy impressed upon me that I need to know and have the 1050 running at tip top form before I go automated. Since Kozy learned it the hard way, I've committed to learn from his mistake, and wait just a little bit longer. In the picture? That's 20,000 Precision Delta 124 grain JHP bullets ready to be loaded. There are 64 lbs of HS-6 Powder, and 30k CCI Primers as well, so I've done all the basic things that I need to in order to be prepared to start. The good news is that there isn't anything standing between myself and my goals than me. Now it's up to me to put the work in, and get it done.

Early impression is that Shay put together a real shooter for me. The gun shipped first to Kozy so he could run it for 750-1k rounds and make sure that it was in perfect condition, and his report to me early on was that it was astoundingly good. He did some little things, like add some blue loctite to the grip screws. Below is a slow motion video of Kozy shooting the gun.

As you'd expect, the gun looks amazing, but when I picked it up we put it on the trigger gauge and the pull is a mere 1 lb. 3 oz. which is by far the lightest trigger that I've ever had, combine that with a nice reset, and short take-up, and I'm pretty impressed. This is an open gun among open guns!

A good looking gun, and lot of conveniences though don't make me a better shooter, as I said earlier, it's all up to me. As soon as I got home I started my dry fire routine. In addition to basic things like draw's and reloads, I wanted to spend time working transitions and movement, because I expect the hardest thing for me to do is to not lose the dot. Early on I think losing the dot will be the most likely thing to cost me time in a match, and that's something that I can work on in dry fire.

Admitting that my times were better three years ago in Production, you need a starting point, and that's what I got today. I was consistently hitting a draw to first shot on an open target in 1.5 seconds, I was hitting 75% of the time at 1.4 seconds, and at 1.3 seconds I was about 50-60% successful. My issue was more getting a good grip. Grip is an adjustment on this gun for me, I have to adjust my support hand a little forward to hit the thumb rest, but it's a better feeling grip. Going forward I'm going to set my par at 1.3 and work to push at that level.

My reloads started out at about 1.8 seconds, and I got them down to 1.5 seconds on a consistent basis. I did not spend as much time on reloads as I did on the draw, simply because in Open I'm just not reloading as much as I did in Production or Single Stack, and I think reloading on the move will be a bigger deal for me. Don't get me wrong, I'll spend time on reloads before Cowtown, but had to make some choices today, and keeping my eye on the dot was a big deal.

Last thing I did was more about movement, and I did not put a part time on it. Draw to an obstructed target, break grip and run, turning to an open target, breaking grip and running to another position and shooting a piece of steel, and finally breaking grip and going back to a final spot and coming in hard on a final cardboard target. My goal was to get the gun up, and have the dot right where I expected it to be so I could get on the trigger as soon as possible, and get moving again. Mission accomplished here, at first the dot was higher than expected, but the last half dozen runs were absolutely perfect, and I felt comfortable getting the dot on the steel quickly. 

I know, things will change with live rounds, but to me this is a simple exercise I need just to get comfortable with basic gun handling with the Open gun. Where does this leave me? Well, live fire practice with Linda on Thursday afternoon, and I'll dry fire Thursday morning. I'll be dry firing every day thru next Saturday's match, as long as I've got the time, I'm aiming for at least one hour every day, but if something comes up, I'll take 30 minutes. There is a match at ARC on Sunday, which I'll shoot, it's due to storm on Saturday, so we'll see, if it's too messy I won't go, but we will play that by ear. Live fire and chrono on Tuesday, and then get the gun cleaned and ready, and get my ammo loaded for the weekend. In live fire, going to spend some time checking my hold over's, that'll be fairly big for me as well.

So, what's my goal for Cowtown? There are 41 Open shooters, and 11 in "C" class, plain and simple, I want to win "C" in open, but I'd settle for a Top 2 finish. There are 5 Open GM's, so I'm hoping to finish at 70% of the top score in open, which would mean a consistent match, and really a mid-upper "B" level performance. Is that setting the bar high? Yes, it probably is, and maybe that would be a better goal for Double Tap in just over a month, but I want to set a goal that is worth achieving. 

So here we go, now I'll have to start updating the blog more frequently, and I absolutely will be on dry fire, looking forward to a class mid-summer with Les to get me going. It's not just that I'm out of excuses, but that I'm actually excited as hell again to do all of this. Reloading might be work, but the rest of it is something I'm passionate about again. Time to let it rip!