My father, who is a fairly Older expericned rifle guy, and myslef got into a discussion about shooting an Encore with a .22 barrell for practice, while swithcing out a to a 30-06 Barrell for some practice and main hunting gun.
He said, in his words, was a "recipe for disaster".
I think that he doesnt understand.
It seems to make the most sense to me is, shoot the 3006 for practice a bunch, than go shoot a ton of .22 around the farm and at the range for practice, thank maybe do a couple of final shoots wiht the 30-06.
You would get the feel of the gun, the trigger pull, but not the recoil.
I just cant see the problem. Maybe its his old school ways. i dont know.
Am I missing something.
W.

Makes sense to me. Lots of rounds with the .22 lets you get a good feel for the gun. Plus, it's made to switch barrels! No disaster there. Tell the old man to lighten up!

Woodsie,
"Beware the man who hunts with only 1 gun." That is the primary advantage of the TC concept. Your Father is wrong on this one.
Thanks, Doug

You are right, and your Dad is way off base.

What did he try and substantiate his argument with?

drm,

The primary purpose of the Encore is to sell you more barrels than you actually need.

This is the same of any switch barreled gun, regardless of who it is made by.

"Beware the man" has every thing to do with one rifle in one caliber, and shooting the same ammunition and same scope off of it every day.

Changing barrels doesn't make it the same gun of your quote.

Woodsie,
As long as switching up to the larger caliber after shooting a few boxes of .22's doesnt cause you to become gunshy and flinch there's no reason it shouldnt work out.

I think it's a good idea to shoot a lot (a .22 is an inexpensive way to do that) even if your not shooting the same gun. The more you practice good shooting techniques the better you'll be with any gun.

I had a TCR 83 that I used to switch from .223 to 270. Both barrels were scoped exactly the same. I found it to be great practice to shoot prairie dogs and ground squirrels with all summer then go hunt deer with the 270 barrel in the fall. A mule deer looks huge after shooting the smaller targets. So I think its a good idea that worked in my own experience. Both of my sons became better riflemen with the same technique. DW

Hey Woodsie, I'd say it depends on how far you intend to take shots with the 30-06 and how you sight it in. Shots at distance(aka REALLLLLY long shots) require lots and lots of practice with the actual rifle intended for that purpose.

Since you are going by "Woodsie", if you are hunting inside the woods where shots are short, then a whole lot of 30-06 practice just burns components. If you are prone to Flinching, then the time is still not wasted - unless - it causes you to Flinch more. Then you need someone to help you with your position.

Shooting a lot of 22LR is always a fine idea. I do a lot of it Off-Hand at 100yds while the barrels are cooling on the centerfires. The mental discipline of holding steady on the end of a Soda Pop can at 100yds is a great benefit when it is time to do it with the larger rifles.

I can see both sides of the argument. Seems to me, it just depends on how you hunt and what kind of practice you actually need.

Good Hunting and clean 1-shot Kills.

What I found over many over 4 decades of knowing gun owners is the guys with one gun normaly don't paractice are too cheap to buy ammo and hardly shoot a lot.
I find them not to be great shots claiming most of the time I shot the thing last year or the year before "hell I've shot deer with it for more the {blank) years why would I shoot it now.

What I have found is gun nuts buy more guns shoot more ammo and are normaly better shots.

More shooting is always better than less. More shooting with a similar gun is always better than more shooting with a dissimilar gun.

My neighbor's dog is smart enough to know the answer to this question.

quote:

O

My neighbor's dog is smart enough to know the answer to this question.

Ash him what he thinks!
W

I don't have any switch barrel rifle or such but I have several 700's in different calibres that are set up in basically the same way. Same trigger pull, etc.
There's a lot more to good shooting than pulling the trigger. You've got to shoot enough so the rifle comes up and aligns the scope with the eye automatically, you've got to unconciously know where the safety is and how much pressure it takes to flip it off, you can't be wondering how much pressure is it gonna take to break the trigger and so forth. All you should be doing is concentrating on the animal; the rest should be automatic. You can't get that by pulling old trusty rusty out of the closet a couple of days before hunting season and whanging off a few at a pie plate. Tell Pop his theory sux.