Please e-mail address changes, unsubscribe requests, or submissions to me. In this issue: Re: machine rest Re: Failure of Gehmann irises Re: target talk BBS / Munich WC requests Re: Failure of Gehmann irises Spanish shooting site Physical vs mental sighting ******************************************************************** Dear Michael I was seeing the Machine Resr of Eitan, and I read that you have purchased you a, you had time of proving it, that opinion you have. I make you these questions because am very interested in making me an or to purchase it. Best regard and Happy Holidays Osvaldo Paez Rosario Argentina [Editor - I haven't had time to test it with a good bench yet. I'll let you know when I do.] ******************************************************************** Re: Failure of Gehmann irises > Is anyone else having similar problems with adjustable irises? Here's another experience with an adjustable iris. Not adding random error to the results as Newt Engle described, but rather a systemetical offset. I'm using a Centra, no filters or anything, just a 0.5 - 3.0 mm adjustable aperture. I shoot at 2 separate air rifle ranges more or less regularly. On one, I use a 1.2 mm aperture. On the other one (rather dark), I enlarge it to 1.8 mm. But when switching from one to the other, I have to adjust height about 6 clicks (on a standard FWB diopter, i.e. 1.5 rings on the target). Why??? Could this be an iris malfunctioning (how can I check this), or is there another explanation? Jeroen Hogema, jhogema@worldonline.nl ******************************************************************** I don't know if someone has run it on your UIT mailing list, but if not, you might mention the Target Talk BBS that I host http://www.midcoast.com/~pilkguns/bbs/ Also I am planning on interviewing and photgrahping technique of some of the World top shooters, when I go to Munich in couple of weeks, got any questions you would like to pose? thanks Scott ******************************************************************** Would you happen to have any more info on the Gehmann iris fiasco? Unfortunately I ordered a Gehmann iris (5 color filter w/ polarization) after I received the mailing about them failing. I ordered it from Champion's Choice and it was put on backorder. I finally received it on Wednesday and I don't know if it is part of the bad shipment, or if the problem has been corrected or what. Also, unfortunately I don't have the ability to bench test with that iris vs. my fixed iris. Just wondering if you have any info on which serial #'s (do they even have serial #'s) have the problem or anything else about these irises. Thanks much in advance. Erik Hahn President, Competition Rifle Team of Michigan Tech [Editor - my guess is it was an isolated incident. Newt's irises were purchased last summer.] ******************************************************************** After one year out Me return again,with a new and very interesting we b about shooting ,lovely sport, specially dedicated to spanish shooters in special to spanish Air Force Shooters . http://personal2.iddeo.es/diopter Thanks for your helps,and it is interested, publish my URL on next issue. Tnx Diopter (kako) ******************************************************************** Mr. Ray I have been reading some of the debate on the UIT-mailing list going on about physical Vs mental sighting techniques. Some of my experiences in this context are expressed below. Perhaps somebody can get something out of it. Regards Morten Chet, For some time I have been aware of the importance of a perfect alignment of the rear sight in relation to the foresight. I have experienced that also a marginal deviation will cause the shot to be a 10,3 instead of a 10,9, everything else cet par. But my problem has been how to use the precision of the non-dominant mental entity (NDME) in this alignment. Up to this point I have done the alignment by use of dominant forces so to say, and I have often observed that although the alignment was very good at step 4, the sights were out of alignment at 4e. I have not made use of the NDME in this respect. During yesterdays practice an idea fell into my head (I guess what happened was NDME communication to me). I have experienced that the NDME will insure a perfect alignment of the front sight in relation the perfect bull's-eye (PBE) when I put the mental pictorial representation (MPR) of the PBE on the mental screen. What I did was rest my physical eye on the light circle between the iris and the foresight, and called up the MPR of the perfect alignment of the rear- and front sight. I did not stare at the light circle, but just rested my eye on it, so that the NDME was provided with the necessary information. This maneuver made it possible for me to run the check list in the prone position with Quiet Zone and non dominant trigger pull in what I have to describe as the most efficient manner so far since I started shooting the book. I put the last five shots of the string on top of each other, and the ten ring was still intact. I had some kind of mental reaction after doing this, as it was the first time I have been able to implement the mental check list to this extent in prone. So I simply stopped firing to preserve the Kinesthetic responses and procedure. Time will show whether I just was lucky or if the procedure is good enough to consistently fire PBEs with total control of what is going on. I hope perhaps this discovering of how to insure a perfect rear sight alignment will be the factor that enables my NDME to generate the Cone for me. I do not posses professional competence on how the physical eye works. But this example supports your hypothesis. I do some photographing now and then. I often use a tele-lenses with autofocus. When focusing on items that are very close to me, say one yard, the image that I see through the lens is close to what I see with my physical eye. But when I focus on object that are located with a greater distance, this might be from 10 to 100 yards, what I see through the lens is much sharper than what I perceive while looking at the object without the help of any devices. I should add that the optician, both this year and the previous year, has found that the abilities of my physical eyes are as good as they can be. The guy on the UIT mailing list has not understood what kind of information he needs to shoot the center of the center. You don't need to see the black bull or the metal front sight sharply. You need to see the white halo, put the MPR of the PBE on to your mental screen and let the NDME decide when the halo is in perfect alignment with the black bull. If you are concerned about how the black bull looks, you are concerned with an element that will not contribute positively to the shooters performance, and your focus is not on the factors that produce the outcome that the shooter wants; the PBE. If the shooter is willing to devote one practice session to mental sighting instead of physical sighting, he will receive evidence of the precision of the mental sighting technique. PART 2 During continued practice, I am glad to say I have found a major error in my check list procedure. I discovered it during a competition this weekend. Prone, which has been fairly good during practice, both yesterday and last week, wasn't working very well. I didn't understand very much, as I tried to run the check list as I did during practice. For some reason, during competition I have missed step 5 on the check list. I have not erased the MPR of the previous OSM before starting the next. This means that there has been "noise" present from the moment I started each OSM, and this has resulted in random point of impacts on the target. I had to figure out a way of dealing with this. Then I tried to commence each competition OSM as the first sighter. This means I begin from scratch; I have no PRs of historical points of impact in my mind during the OSM, I just expect to perform the procedure perfectly so that the POI will be the PBE. For some reason, this took a load off my mental shoulders. Much easier to deal with the OSM when you only deal with one OSM at a time instead of multiple. In standing, this resulted in an ascending tendency instead of a decreasing, which has been the case upto now. Scored 94-94 on my last 20 shots in standing, which is good enough to follow the current best. I will not be satisfied before I am able to produce a PBE on request, but I will enjoy the progress on the way to this goal. There is a lot of procedure refining to do yet. I have tried to find the reason for this divergence between practice and competition performance. I'm not quite sure, but I think it can be traced to an irrational attitude towards competition. At competition, I am very motivated to shoot a PBE. It is natural for me, and I think it is an advantage, to generate more mental energy in competition than in practice. I can't see anything wrong with this actually. But the problem in my case has been that this motivation during competition has been expressed in what you call random, spontaneous thoughts, and has taken the concentration away from the mental procedure on onto elements that do nothing but kill my performance. During practice I have had a more relaxed attitude towards what's on the target. I believe I have missed step 5 during practice, but the impact on the procedure has not been that significant. During competition though, I have been revealed. Had a live fire practice session yesterday. I have had Finn helping me build a fore stock raiser to use in kneeling, as the constellation left elbow/knee has not been good. It is not necessary to go into detail, but I think my position is coming along. The two first sighters were nines a little below and to the right. I clicked the rear sight. I then fired two X exactly on top of each other a little too high and to the right. I clicked one down and one to the left (one click is 1.1 mm on 50 meters). Next OSM was a 10,9. I continued in this fashion shooting X's until I started the prone tasks that I had decided for that practice session. I have never come up with this kind of precision in kneeling before, neither during practice nor competition. And then the question has to be; why? Answer: I think I have stressed myself during both practice and competition. This stress consists of inconsistent expectations about the outcome of the OSM and procedure. This is what you consequently name "match pressure". Yesterday, while I was acting with such precision, I had to stop and ask myself: What is it that you are doing now that you have not been doing before? I ran through the procedure mentally, and found two major differences. An expectation to produce the QZ and perfect sighting picture with trigger pull to the PBE. And, I relaxed the visual system during the total sighting sequence, in the same way I told you when producing the perfect rear sight alignment. I just let my physical eye rest through the metal sights, without actually looking at anything. This is good enough to provide the NDME with the information it needs. I ran the check list, the foresight stopped, trigger was pulled and I received a PBE. Thus, now I operated in the non-dominant mode, whereas I have stressed myself into the dominant mode previously. I also had a conversation with one of the top national shooters, also among the current world's best. I watched him shoot standing. He does a physical procedure, and just tires himself more and more during each shot. This guy is using his head during practice and competition analysis, and he would no doubt benefit from the mental shooting technique. Among other things he told me that shooting really becomes interesting when what is going on in your mind is what determines the results. I guess he meant when you have passed the physical obstacles. You know what to do, you just have to do it. He told me this was the feeling he had with the standard rifle 300m, and he is currently hoping to produce the same feeling with the free rifle 50m. Morten ******************************************************************** End of UIT Mailing List #10 Michael Ray - Systems Engineer Rose-Hulman Inst. of Tech. Rifle Coach UIT Shooting Page - http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/1190/index.htm