The gun just arrived and I am in the airport headed to San Antonio.

Larry, cheer up! If you didn't have bad luck, you'd have no luck at all :-)

So it seems!

Larry,
Had you known, you could have sent it to me instead - to test fire it for you

Safe trip and it will be there upon your return - I hope ...

I just got back from my trip to Texas. I opened up the box and put the gun together. I dropped in 2 cartridges. The gun closed perfectly.

I am going to try and shoot it tomorrow.

Well gentlemen, I am just back from the range. All I can say is WOW! The gun shoots incredibly well. It fits me perfectly.

I am not one to shoot paper targets except for zeroing. I shot a variety of things at the range today at 25 and 50 yards. Beer cans, clay pigeons, grapefruit, etc.on what is called the plinking range. I fired the gun 26 times. These consisted of both target loads and full loads. The first shot sent a beer can sailing about 50 feet in the air. Most impressive. By far the most spectacular thing was a full beer can someone left at 50 yards. I did shoot off sticks for that one. It was quite a spectacle to see it explode.

If I had to go shoot an elephant tomorrow, I would be confident.

Miscellaneous observations, questions and comments are as follows:

1- Recoil is mild compared to the Heym 500 NE I once had. Does it kick? Oh for sure, but it is entirely manageable.

2- I did almost all of my shooting with the night bead. I could hardly see the regular bead.

3- It seems the front trigger is a little stiff. Is that common? A couple of times, I pulled the trigger so hard I was wondering if I had the safety on. This was the front trigger only.

4- I seemed to have no trouble shifting from the front to the back trigger.

5- I hooked the Doktor Optik up today and took a look. I think that may be the ticket for my old eyes.

Thanks for all of your comments and encouragement.

Glad you have the bugs worked out of it. Really glad it shoots well for you. Go kill something and stop wasteing beer.

A few extra pounds and it makes a big difference.
Congratulations on fine shooting. Take down some of those Florida hogs. Wish I was closer.
You can have the triggers adjusted to your specs. Both of mine are three pounds.

Mike

Larry,

I can tell you had a good time

And that is how I enjoy shooting a double.

I am no expert, but on my rifle the front trigger(right barrel) is just slightly lighter in pull weight than the left barrel rear trigger.

Great to hear it is all coming together.

Brett

I agree about the recoil. I sold my two Heym .500's and ordered the V-C. The V-C triggers have been too heavy for my liking as well. My V-C .577 is currently having the triggers lightened by Mark Beasland at Mark's Born Again Bird Guns in Wisconsin. You might contact Mark in advance to arrange a very quick turnaround with advanced planning. Lastly, I agree with Sam. Don't shoot full beer cans. That's alcohol abuse!!

Interesting about the triggers. It may be me but I think the rear trigger is notably lighter than the front. I will contact these people.

At our range, the "plinking" range has berms where one is able to put out all kinds of stuff to shoot at as long as it isn't glass. Normally, people clean up after themselves. However, in this case, it was pouring rain. I spotted several beer cans someone left. I shot one with a 17 HMR. That was spectacular in and of itself. Then, I thought to myself that if it looked like that with a 17 HMR, what would it look like with a 500 NE? It was amazing to see that.

Well glad you finale got your rifle working. I know it has been a long time coming but I will bet the smile on your face when you hit that beer can made the wait and earlier problems disappear.
Bill

Larry, the front trigger should be lighter than the rear, mine are 4 and 4.75 lbs respectively, you shouldn´t be having to pull the front trigger that hard BUT if you can can shoot with it who cares, good luck on that safari, best, Mike

Gents, slightly related but a good friend just took delivery of a VC 500NE and he allowed me to "pop" it's cherry. Off the bags at 50 yards I cut dead center. The rifle is absolutely gorgeous with side plates and CCH. Recoil was not bad at all and now it has me wishing I would have gotten a 500! jorge

quote:

Originally posted by jorge:
Gents, slightly related but a good friend just took delivery of a VC 500NE and he allowed me to "pop" it's cherry. Off the bags at 50 yards I cut dead center. The rifle is absolutely gorgeous with side plates and CCH. Recoil was not bad at all and now it has me wishing I would have gotten a 500! jorge

And so you should ...

But keep the 450 NE as well, of course

quote:

Originally posted by CCMDoc:

quote:

Originally posted by jorge:
Gents, slightly related but a good friend just took delivery of a VC 500NE and he allowed me to "pop" it's cherry. Off the bags at 50 yards I cut dead center. The rifle is absolutely gorgeous with side plates and CCH. Recoil was not bad at all and now it has me wishing I would have gotten a 500! jorge

And so you should ...

But keep the 450 NE as well, of course

Yep, you can never have too many 500NEs! Or DRs in general. I just bought a 28ga SxS double shotgun Friday. Does that count as a double?

Todd,
Just shoot slugs.
Bill

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Cooley:
Todd,
Just shoot slugs.
Bill

Now there's a thinking man!

quote:

Originally posted by CCMDoc:

quote:

Originally posted by jorge:
Gents, slightly related but a good friend just took delivery of a VC 500NE and he allowed me to "pop" it's cherry. Off the bags at 50 yards I cut dead center. The rifle is absolutely gorgeous with side plates and CCH. Recoil was not bad at all and now it has me wishing I would have gotten a 500! jorge

And so you should ...

But keep the 450 NE as well, of course

Life is full of choices, and an issue for us mere mortals of not enough lucre. So, it's eithet a hunt in Tz or Zim next and use the 450 or buy another double and stay home!

quote:

Originally posted by jorge:

quote:

Originally posted by CCMDoc:

quote:

Originally posted by jorge:
Gents, slightly related but a good friend just took delivery of a VC 500NE and he allowed me to "pop" it's cherry. Off the bags at 50 yards I cut dead center. The rifle is absolutely gorgeous with side plates and CCH. Recoil was not bad at all and now it has me wishing I would have gotten a 500! jorge

And so you should ...

But keep the 450 NE as well, of course

Life is full of choices, and an issue for us mere mortals of not enough lucre. So, it's eithet a hunt in Tz or Zim next and use the 450 or buy another double and stay home!

If TZ is a real option, I'd say buy the additional double in 500N and go to Zim twice!

We shot it about 50 times today. These were a mixture of full loads and reduced loads.

Miscellaneous observations are as follows:

1- Unless I use the night sight, I can't see the front sight at all. My problem, not the guns.

2- We were shooting at clay pigeons and Ritz crackers. While we actually hit less than 25% of them at 50 yards, we were coming pretty darn close. Certainly close enough to kill a buff. I did have to wonder about a brain shot on an elephant.

3- The night sight is fantastic. However, due to the size, I would imagine it significantly impairs the ability to make a precise shot.

4-Both myself and my son think the front trigger is a bit stiff.

5- We shot a gong at 100 yards off hand. I an guessing it is 12 inches wide and 18 inches long. I probably hit it 80% of the time using the night sight.

6- The gun certainly kicks. However, it is not bad at all. Certainly not what many would describe as brutal.

7- A left glove is necessary to not burn your hands. Thanks Retreever for the warning a year or so back.

8- The design of the night sight is very clever. I really like it.

9- The gun did not properly close and lock a couple of times for my son. I am convinced that he didn't close it hard enough. I will pay attention to this in the coming weeks.

I hope to go again tomorrow.

Guys,

I just want to publicly say thanks to Larry Shores. He graciously sent some of his brass to me and I just received it today.

Larry, I very much appreciate your generosity. I'm glad your rifle is shooting properly and wish you the best of luck on your upcoming trip.

Cheers,

Todd

You are very welcome Todd.

I mailed out 120 total cases. I should be getting more reduced power loads next week. I can shoot in much higher quantity that the full power loads. I will be sending more out soon.

I am going to attempt to christen the 500NE on a hog this weekend.

I just read all 5 pages of this thread. I must admit it had me in suspense like a good mystery novel. And, like a good book, this had a happy ending. Good luck on your hunt. I've usually heard good things about VC so I was curious how this would turn out.