Hey y'all, As I mentioned in another thread, my recently acquired first Auto-5 was made in 1947, and came with a factory issue (Apparently special order) 20.5" bbl. I test fired it for function and banging away at sporting clays the other day, and had a blast with it, although I was a bit chagrined at how many I managed to miss. Today, I decided to see how it did with slugs, and pattern it with buckshot at 25 yards. Much to my chagrin everything fired from that barrel hit about 14" high at 25 yards when fired from both receivers. Going over to my 26" bbl. it stacked the slugs right on top of the intended target. What can I do to rectify this? try a taller bead? Install some kind of rifle sights? I've heard of at least one instance of a peep sight being installed on an A5 from the back of the receiver? Right now the best I'm coming up with is to order one of those snap on fiber optic front bead replacements, as I know those are a bit taller than a factory bead. Anyone got any suggestions? Thanks in advance for any input you may be able to add!
Before you start drilling and tapping your receiver for sights, you might try a different brand of slug. Something a little slower may be closer to the point of aim. Also, how does it shoot at 50 yards? 25 seems a little close to me. In the service we sighted our rifles in at 250 meters and remembered the "adjusted point of aim" at other ranges. It always felt strange to aim high at the really close ones.
The results were repeated with four different brands and types each of slugs and buckshot. Ironically, I was able to get the magnum slugs couple inches lower, but was still way high. I didn't have time to try 50 yards, ans I honestly was not as concerned at that distance. If I ever run slugs out of my shotgun, it will most likely be to protect against a charging moose or bear, which is usually more of a close range, surprise type situation. There are plenty of other brands of slugs to try though, and honestly, I'm gonna try again and play with my "sight picture"- Ensure I'm not too high on the bead, etc. now that I've cooled down, I have come to consider that a taller bead would be the best change to start with, and rifle sights would be more of a desperate and expensive last resort
