Range Report--2 Underwoods

I took the twins to the range last weekend and thought I'd share the results of a 50-yard sight-in for each. I ran 30 rounds through each off the bench, measured to the center of the group from the point of aim. Both resulted in about a 4" group at 50 yards, and impacted high, which I expected. The ammo was a mixed-bag. I was trying to use up several partial boxes, so there was no consistency to the ammo.
Both are 1943 Underwoods, from the same serial number block. One is factory-original as near as I can tell, with all early features, and the other is a classic post-war rebuild, with all late features.

Factory-Original: Center of group was 3" above the point-of-aim, and 12" to the right. No horizontal sight adjustment possible, and I used the "150 Yard" aperture on the sight.

Post-War Rebuild: Center of group was 3" above the point of aim, and pretty much spot-on horizontally after the first few rounds. I had to adjust the sight pretty far to the right to move the point of impact to be above the point of aim, and used the lowest/150-yard setting vertically.

I managed to delete the photos of the targets, but overall--not too too bad. Not target rifles by any means, but fun to shoot. Except for the horrible-to-the-right impact of the first one, they were remarkably consistent, to the point that the brass was scattered in a pretty consistent pattern as well.
As a contrast, I also fired my pre-war "Mauser" .22 training rifle, and managed about a 1" diameter group at 50 yards pretty much right on the point of aim.

It's all fun and good. I'll keep working with the post-war rebuild for practice and accuracy. I really really do not like "aiming off" at all, so don't plan on shooting the factory-original too much!!!

Thanks for posting. Both my carbines shoot right and the rear sight has to be left. Pretty far. It's annoying, but I'm finding out might be somewhat of a regular thing.

Gotta love accurate .22's.

Mine shoots about 8 inches right at 50 yds also

Do many of the Underwoods shoot like that or what?

I would love to figure out what causes this and get it corrected, its annoying as hell.
My others shoot dead on, but they are not Underwoods either

Well it appears this is a common phenomenon, my NPM shoots ~6 inches right at 100 yards

Interesting--I have fired other carbines as well, and they have all shot pretty far to the right as well. I know that the rifle is a fairly "unbalanced" design, meaning that there is more metal/weight involved in recoil to the right of the centerline of the bore which affects the recoil.

After each shot, the rifles were pointing about a foot or two to the right of where they had been aimed...................

Next time I take them to the range, I'll make sure to take better notes and to NOT delete the photos.

By coincedence, I shot two Underwoods yesterday also, one with a rear flip, the other also being(type 2 milled) adjustable. Interestingly enough, both guns had about the same accuracy from the first shot to the last. I made some adjustments with the milled one, but the difference was almost non existent. I did better with point of aim adjustments, but it was only slight better to be honest. I wasn't shooting at the distances you guys were though. The to the right issue with me was only a couple of inches away at best.

I have targeted 4 carbines Underwood, Quality Hardware, Inland, & IBM. The Quality is orig. flip sight, and the IBM is a salvaged receiver, repro flip and repro folding stock. None of them required rear sight to be far from dead center. When I set up the IBM, which has a new commercial barrel, I centered the rear as close as I could and took it to the range (25 yds on sight adjustment target followed by 100 yds.). Right and left were dead on.

My bottom line is: apparently not all carbines shoot to one side.

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Originally Posted by us019255

apparently not all carbines shoot to one side.

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Agreed--once I adjusted the rear sight on the rebuild, it hit pretty much right where I expected.

Yeah, but it's evident by this thread alone, that quite a few of them do. If you just looked at this thread a lone, I'd call it a majority. Though I doubt that is indicative of the issue in totality.

If you take a carbine and hold it away from your body and look over the sights about 1' over where you would be when sighting, on most carbines, not much lines up. Most barrels are cocked off to one side or the other, even the handguard is off somewhat. That is why you'll have the sight off to one side. Consider that many barrels were bent and saved by arbor press and lead hammer, and index marks were off by a lot. All of these manufacturing errors the result of pushing the limits of production and farming out many parts. The M1 rifle had the same issues but had a dovetail mounted front sight to get around the issues.
The companies who weren't in the gun business were no different than Winchester and some made a better gun simply by attention to detail. Imagine if you were NPM and trying your best to build a quality carbine and a batch of junk barrels from Buffalo, Marlin, or Rockola showed up and you absolutely had to use them. "Good enough" describes a lot of carbines.

The main reason for this problem is that the carbine dove tail was made for the type 1 rear sight and not the adjustable ones. The flip sight had plenty of room in the dove tail to be moved in what ever direction it needed to be for the carbine to be sighted in. The adjustable rear sights have a much larger base that can over hang both sides of the dove tail. The sight can only move so far to the left before it hangs off the the side of the dove tail as it's so big. When the adjustable rear sights were added later on, no one sighted them in before they were staked in place so there is only a little bit of adjustment available and in some cases it's not enough. While carbines are not fragile, 60 years of use and abuse have taken a toll on many of them and they just don't shoot like they used to.

Almost every carbine I have had in the last 30+ years has had the rear sight base offset to the left, some more than others. The early Winchester with flip sight (that I thought was not cool enough at the time) I had around 1982 had the rear sight centered in the bridge, and shot dead on at 100 yards. It was an exception. My original as issued Inland, has the rear sight offset to the left, but shoots dead on. The Standard Products mix-master is actually staked just right of center, though the ramp had to be adjusted left to shoot dead on.

For what it's worth, my post war rebuild Underwood shoots on center with 1.25" to 1.50" five round groups at 50 yards with the Lake City bandolier stuff. Also got a 1.50" group with some handloads from a local guy. Generally, with new factory ammo from the current offerings the groups are not so tight, but some groups are under 2". These numbers are best groups though, and lots of my attempts are between 2 and 3 inches. I often wonder what this rifle would shoot with a fresh barrel , and someone with younger eyes behind the sights. Though I have other M1 carbines, this one shoots best and is my favorite gun to go punch holes in targets. I have modern rifles that shoot much tighter, but still love unloading a few mags through that sweet Underwood everytime I go to the range.

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Originally Posted by gayorwade

but still love unloading a few mags through that sweet Underwood everytime I go to the range.

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Ditto! I got the rebuild sighted-in better last weekend, and was managing pretty consistent 2" groups at 50 yards. About 3" above the actual point of aim, but centered right over it, so I am happy. The sight is adjusted slightly to the left of center. Need to try the 100-yard range next, and it should probably be spot-on.

The original flip-sight rifle shoots pretty consistently 12" to the RIGHT of point of aim at 50 yards, so I won't be trying to win any matches with that one......................................

I would not shoot a mixed bag of ammo and expect any meaningful results. It may be less true with a carbine than most rifles, although I am not sure of that, but just different lot numbers of many calibers of ammo in the same year can change average POI by 2 or 3 MOA. Using different manufacters of the ammo, etc., is just not gonna work well.

I have had good luck with accuracy on many of my carbines. Shooting sporting clays at 100-200 yds is not that hard to do. First time I ever shot a friends original Underwood with original flip sight, he handed me the rifle with 7 rounds in the mag. I had never even fired a carbine with the L sight before, although I had 4 originals at the time. I hit 7 straight clays at 100 yds. I got lucky and had the chance to buy it a few months later. I used to shoot clays at 200 yds with a NPM and would hit just under 50%.

Carbines can be quite accurate. Audie Murphy loved them and took out seven German snipers with one. They can not be real inaccurate and do that.

The normal variables apply with a carbine. Quality of the ammo, stock fit, bore and crown condition, etc..

Where would you typically hold your sight post in relation to the clay pigeon at 200 yds? I've hit quite a few at 50-55 yds, but never tried any at further distances. - Bob

My IBM has a repro flip sight. I positioned it as close to center as possible. It hits dead on left to right. I took it to the range recently with some longer range weapons to shoot silhouettes at 250 yds. The '96 Krag, 91/30 Nagant, '88 Springfield and '03 Springfield we all consistent and fun. The little carbine was close every time but just couldn't ring the bell. It hit all around the target and certainly would have winged somebody at that range.

How well does the carbine group at 100 yds? 50yds is the long shot for pistol matches. Does the carbine hold the black on an SR1 at 100 yds? If so, you have a good shooter. So much with rifle shooting is technique and position, the ability to repeat the same shot over and over will bring out the real potential of a carbine. I suspect that a lot of them are much better shooters than what people think.

I was pulling PM on the Winchester this week and took a good look over the top and sure enough, the front sight is cocked off to the right in relation to the whole weapon. Shoots great though.

Make that "Pigeons"....

A good carbine will do 3-4 inches at 100 . I have mine set up to basicly hit a tin can / plastic water bottle / clay pigeon with a six o'clock hold there ( basicly , 2-1/2 to 3 inches above the sight blade ) at 100 yards . At 200 yds I'm quite low , even with a 250 sight setting. To be "on" at 200 would require sighting in at close to the 12-inches high that the military sighting target allowed . That would be fine for combat , but not so much for fun . Because I shoot mine more for fun at 100 , I just don't use them at 200 , using my choice of about 2 dozen 30-06s for beyond 100.
Chris