Rifle Rest?
 

Looking to buy a rifle rest for the range.

What do most of you prefer?:

1) Front and rear sand bag style rests with a stand

or

2) All in one rifle rest, similar to Desert Mountain' s Rifle Rest.

Any recommendations?

Thanks
340

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I prefer just basic sandbags. Normally I don' t even use any sort of stands. I just use a several inexpensive sandbags. I' ve got a few of the more expensive benchrest style bags made with a " u" shape to them, but usually I don' t even haul them to the range. We' ve got a number of the bags that shotgun shot comes in stuffed with river sand. You can pile up as many as you need to adjust for heigth.

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

340,I have tryed a lot of different rest over the years and the best I found is Uncle Bud' s Bull Bags! Check out Midway,they sell them...;)

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

Sand bags, I just cut the legs off old jeans or covey' s and tie wrap the ends. I can tailor make them and less to carry to the range, not to mention reasonable!

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

Thanks guys, I' m a little surprised that regular sand bags is preferred to a front stand with a rabbit ear rear bag. I also would have thought a proper rifle rest would have been preferred even more since there would be less to carry at the range.

Any other opinions out there?

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I also like the Uncle Buds Bull bag

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I had a bulls bag and it worked great but was a bit much lugging around at the range...I then bought a conventional bench rest with rear sandbag....After shooting this way for a year I may end up using the bulls bag again.

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I had a Outers Varminter Rifle Rest with all the fine tuning gizmos. I now use sand bags made from old shot bags.

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I like the adjustable front rest with a rabbit eared bag for the rear. I bought the Varminter but couldn' t get shed of it quick enough. I traded the new Varminter for the OLD setup that I still have now.:D When I hunt a certain field I just use regular sand bags on the hood of the truck.

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

340

I' m not a big fan a spending too much time " benching" shots except for long range/varmit shooting or sighting in scopes. For the later, one wants a rock solid rest that minimizes the problem with " shooter caused " drift" in the sight in process. To that end I prefer sand bags also -- front and back.

THEY ARE HEAVY AND SOLID -- you just can' t get that " feel and touch" with a stand. The gun sits there by itself -- solidly craddled, just snug it up to your shoulder and fire it with out disturbing things.

With that said, the key is to have lots of sandbags (as many as you want like 8 to 12) and having some difference in size helps in building your " piles" . Nothing worse than getting to the range and being limited to a whopping two bags per location.

Side Note: With medium bores (starting at 338 or so) and big bores you need a shooting set up that will let you shoot with a vertical posture with your back straight and your belly nudging the bench -- this means a taller piles of bags -- but your results will be superior.

I love sandbags, if you could just teach them to pull the trigger, then you could eliminate the " human problem" altogether.

Never Go Undergunned,
EKM

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

ELK makes a really good point about sitting up straight when shooting heavy recoiling rifles off the bench. If you are leaning into the stock, your body is not as free to move with the recoil. Too many first time shooters of newly purchased big magnums never are told this and develop a nasty flinch the first time at the range.

I' ve used a Hoppes stand and a rabbit ears rear bag for years with good results. Although the bulk of my shooting is with really accurate varmit rifles, this set-up has worked fine with larger bore hunting rifles. I usually put a sandbag under the rabbit ears to get the height needed to ease the recoil.

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I also recomend Uncle Buds Bulls Bag. Good Shooting!!

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

Thanks for the replys guys,

Elk your absolutely right, we went up to the range yesterday to sight in and adjust some medium bores. Our posture sucked and it was definitely not a pleasent shoot.

Going to look into the Bull Bag and sand bags for now. Most guys at the range were recommending a hoppes steel front rest with the front and rear bags.

340

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

Another one for Uncle Bud' s Bull Bags. I' ve had a Hoppes bench rest stand for
many years. Once I tried the Bull Bag I was sold.It is heavy to lug around,but it' s worth the effort once you get to the bench.
Ruger Redhawk

RE: Rifle Rest?
 

I bought the Uncle Bud' s bull bag several years ago. Now I have a hard time keeping up with it. Seems all my buddies want to borrow it after they saw how it works. As far as getting the height set up tall enough, I usually take a couple of old quilts with me. A little pricey but really worth it.