Thumbing through my copy of Graeme Wright's new edition tonight. In it he talks about the Lead Sled:

"When I first starting using the rest I assumed that it would affect the regulation of a double rifle. To my pleasant surprice this had not turned out to the be case. . . In the majority of cases the rifles regulated the same with or without the rest."

Interesting contrast with all the prior comments about the pitfalls and dangers of using a lead sled with a double.

I have used a regular rifle rest and bag for all three of my doubles and not found any difference in regulation. No hand under the forend or any of that stuff. I have also found no noticeable difference in my K gun's regulation (500/416) with or without scope. Just my personal observation and I have no desire to convince anyone else of the veracity of my observations.
Peter.

quote:

Just my personal observation and I have no desire to convince anyone else of the veracity of my observations.

I have also found that the "regulation" of the Krieghoff is very forgiving. If you look at one compared to other DR's you can see why (at least my speculation).

In other words, my 470 just shoots to the same POA regardless of what I put in it.

Lead Sleds are great, IMHO. Just don't load them up with tons of weight. 50 lbs seems to take any load I use, and allows the gun/sled to move with the recoil.

quote:

Originally posted by Peter:

I have used a regular rifle rest and bag for all three of my doubles and not found any difference in regulation. No hand under the forend or any of that stuff. I have also found no noticeable difference in my K gun's regulation (500/416) with or without scope. Just my personal observation and I have no desire to convince anyone else of the veracity of my observations.
Peter.

Yea, but Peter you have a .500/.416, the greatest double rifle caliber of all time!. It's just not fair to compare it to all these other lesser calibers.

Aw Shucks, he said modestly!!!!! Actually my MK Owen in 450x 3 1/4 also seems to behave the same way off the rest as it does off hand. I have not tried it without the scope or from sticks, however, so this may not be a valid observation. In any case, if I make it to Africa this year, it will be with the K gun!
Peter

I used my lead sled to work up loads for both my Chapuis .470 and .375 H&H bolt rifle using 50lbs of shot. I also didn't notice any difference in shot placement between off hand and the sled. I find the sled to be a great shoulder saver. I do have the first version and have twice broken off the rear screw leg.

A few months ago, a few of us had a DR shoot in So Cal. Just as an experiment, I put my Heym 470 on the lead sled. My rifle doubled!

Thinking operator error may have been the cause, I loaded the right barrel hot, and put a cap in the other. Doubled again.

New Guy couldn't really explain how or why.

Hopefully, it is just one of those things, a freak combo. But I don't think I will be sledding in the future.

Here's to hoping it doesn't double on Jumbo!

Stand on your hind feet (standing supported if you wish) and shoot it like a man.

We don't squat to pee do we???

Seems to me I saw a posting awhile back about someone cracking a stock using a Lead Sled with a big bore double. Sure would make life easier for load development.

quote:

Originally posted by Marty:
Seems to me I saw a posting awhile back about someone cracking a stock using a Lead Sled with a big bore double. Sure would make life easier for load development.

More than one stock has been cracked using the lead sled.

If you set up a good shooting bench / rest where you can lean into it (like they use to regulate DR's with), no need to use a lead sled.

It doesn't need to be flash, even plastic milk crates with Sand bags in them are good enough and give plenty of height / enough height to shoot standing supported.