Lead Sled

[victorcharlie]

My wife bought me one for our anniversary.  I've always used a front and rear bag which still allows for a bit of marksmanship although, not much.

I have no experience using the lead sled.

I do agree with Jeff Coopers statement that bench rests are not conducive to good marksmanship and plan to use the sled as a reloading tool.

If it works like I think it should, I'll use it for testing several different cartridges from .17HMR to 45.70.....I handload for several different rounds and hope this speeds up the process of experimentation......

Anything I should know or expect?

[Dave in WV]

I've heard or read somewhere (yeah I know ....) if you have the lead sled so heavy the rest won't move, your stock may get a crack due to taking all of the recoil and not being able to transfer any of it. The rest needs to be able to move back some during recoil. Is this info correct? I can't say but putting a rifle's or shotgun's butt on something hard and shooting it can cause the stock to crack or break.

[LaOtto222]

I have one of the newer lead sleds with all of the adjustments to it. Dave is correct, if you have a real heavy recoiling gun and you do not let it recoil any, you could crack the stock. I have not shot any heavy hitters in mine yet, but I have found that even with an eleven pound 223 and 40 or so pounds on the sled, it will move the sled some free recoiling. I have also found I can shoot tighter groups with bags. A bunny in the front and a v type in the back and free recoiling. There seems to be some differences from shot to shot with recoiling and the bounce off of the front rest? I have regulated mine to do some general sighting in and just general shooting. If I want to get real serious about tight groups, I use the bags. I have some home made bags that I made out of old blue jeans. I cut the legs off and then in two. Filled them with sand and had my sew the ends shut. It gave me four that way. I have shot some pretty good groups off of  those bags, but now I use them to shim the bunny bag and for weight on my lead sled.I plan on using it for some heavier recoiling guns in the near future. I have a 444 Marlin coming and I have to sight in a new 12 gauge for slugs.

[Luckyducker]

I had a leadsled for a while and my experience shooting off it was mixed.  The lighter caliber rifles shot okay, but with the 30/06, 300WSM, 338RUM and some other moderate recoiling rifles the groups opened up compared to shooting off bags or a tripod front rest and rabbit ear rear bag.  I sold my LS to my S-I-L for half what I paid for it, but warned him about the performance I had with it.  I will say that it did absorb the recoil as advertised.

[DalesCarpentry]

I have have thinking of one of these or something similar for a while. I just wonder if the point of impact changes from using it compared to field use. Dale

[teddy12b]

I have a lead sled and I love it.  I bought mine for a remington 700 BDL 300 RUM and 12ga slugs.  I don't use sand bags, or shot bags on mine because I don't have them.  I do have two 45pound dumbbells and I stick one on each side.  Half of the dumbbell sets on the tray and the other half is on the bench so in reality I've got about 45pounds of actual weight on the thing.  I imagine I've got more weight on that sled than it was meant for and I never cracked the stock on that rifle. 

The sled makes it easier to test heavy hitters for accuracy.  With the sled I could shoot the 300 RUM all day long letting the barrel cool and really see what ammo shot well and what ammo didn't.  I ended up selling my 300 RUM because of the massive recoil and lack of accuracy, but I still use the sled every fall to check shotgun sights with slugs before deer season.  I've fired a couple different shotguns on the sled and never cracked a stock, but they were all synthetic.  The only wood stocked rifle was the 300 RUM and that stock never cracked.

When I practice shooting for hunting I use a harris bipod, if anything.  I'm not a big fan of locking my gun into a vise and then saying I made the great shot when really the vise did.

[victorcharlie]

I have have thinking of one of these or something similar for a while. I just wonder if the point of impact changes from using it compared to field use. Dale

I'll let you know soon......as soon as the weather clears a bit and I get a day off.....

[teddy12b]

I never had an issue with mine and the point of impact changing.  Then again I only sighted it in at 200 yards.

[JustaShooter]

Two observations from my experience with my Lead Sled:

1 - Take a cushion to sit on.  If the seats are the right height for the bench you are shooting from, you'll want to be a bit higher to comfortably get a good sight picture when using the lead sled.  The cushion sure beats sitting with your leg folded up under your behind!

2 - Take a couple of boards with you of varying thicknesses to shim up the front of the rest.  Even with the adjustable front rest at max height, I needed about 3/4" more height to get on target at my range's 100 yard targets.  Seemed odd I had to do that, since the ground slopes away from the shooting position down to the target stands, but the target stands do put the targets at eye level, so...

Other than that, it seemed to work well for me and my .30-06.  I used a single 25# bag of shot, and the recoil with factory 165gr loads was barely noticeable. 

Just a Shooter

[Lloyd Smale]

My best friend broke his neck years ago and bought one figureing it would relieve some of the stress on him when working up loads for his big guns. he said when he got into the real heavy hitters like the 458 416 and 460 weatherbys that the stock would smack him in the face so hard that it was about more painful to shoot it out of the lead sled then off of bags. He thought that because the recoil couldnt go back taht it was poping up more. He ended up getting rid of it. Personaly ive never shot off of one so i cant give a personal recomendation