Adjustable comb

Hi all have just been watching BH fitting an under over shotgun to a 15 year old boy Ben does all the usual adjustments but when he comes to adjusting the guns adjustable comb he recommends setting the rear spacer one notch. Higher than the front in order to make for a level comb is this a good idea for all shooters like myself or not.

thanks in advance 

I would think it's better than the other way around, as in you don't want the front higher due to the recoil is my take on it

This is not an exact science and certainly not one I fully understand however . . .

The actual comb height will vary slightly depending upon the angle of the gun - your eye will move forwards and backward along the comb to some degree as the gun barrels are pointed up and down. Also as the gun is moved up and down there is a tendency to raise the cheek from the gun when it is pointed up, and (much less so) to push it into the stock when looking below eye level (not often encountered at most grounds). The comb's slope is responsible for this to some extent. Ideally the head height in respect to the barrels should change as little as possible.

Generally the combs drop from the front to rear does not need to be much - maybe at most 10mm - it is more than it needs to be on standard gun stock to allow for variety of buyers/users.

If you want to assess all of this yourself get a piece of tape or paper and mark on it 1cm wide marks. Tape it loosely to the open side of your stock so it can be easily seen when mounting. Get a friend to photograph you when the gun is mounted and you are looking down (say 30 degrees), directly in front (0 degrees), and up with the gun at 75 degrees. If, when looking up, your head is lifting slightly when the gun is raised then you could lift the comb at the rear if it encourages you to retain contact with it and thus retain the same sight plane. Ideally the photos or video should be done when actually shooting clays so you are not consciously adopting a different mount than you would normally.

Hope that helps.

The above post pretty much contains the standard propaganda and simply constitutes fitting the person to the gun approach which I have never seen as a productive activity.  Even considering that I have never been able to comprehend the continuing use of sloopy comb stocks.  Seems as tho the trend has been to "parallel" combs in recent times and  monte carlo and straight (parallel) comb stocks are found even on skeet guns, aside from sporting and the age old practice in trap.  As a recoil remedy at least here in the US the MC stock with a lower front has been in use for many decades but never found it's way to shotguns with a different sorta recoil  

Propaganda - "information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a political cause or point of view."

Better avoid that then !!!

Spoke to one of the Italian coaches (Trap and Double Trap) and he was an advocate of the parallel comb.  Maybe oversimplification, but my take on what he said was if you move your head back and forward for any reason, a parallel comb keeps the same point of impact height wise.  Your eye does not move relative to the height of the rib.

Seemed sensible to me, but the effect must be very small.  Every little helps I guess.

Just FYI my 725 sporter has some slope, and my 525 Trap is parallel.

In my experience of having a Miroku 3800 Trap gun with a Monte Carlo or parallel stock as a 'club gun', virtually anyone that picked up that gun could shoot reasonably well with it. Those that could not  should probably have taken up golf anyway  !

I’ve long since come to a similar conclusion in that doing so not only helps for reasons mentioned by the Italian coach, it also often helps iron out cheek slap recoil - obviously it’s not as simple as “one notch” rather a process of micro movements and live firing to arrive at the right equation for a given shooter. 

Having said all this I also don’t believe you can “fit” a gun to a shooter by making dry adjustments to the comb, yes you can get a pretty good set of measurements but just because a gun is made to “fit” or “throw” a desirable poi/poa, it does not follow that the shooter will necessarily go onto score heavily with said gun. 

On the subject of gun fit I have a Westley Richards side by side straight hand stock 12 bore which I use solely for game shooting. I bought the gun in the mid 1970's and it was cast for a left hander, although the triggers remained set for a right hander. After a local gunsmith altered the cast to right handed, it would creep back over a 12 month period. After the second attempt failed, I took the gun to Westley's in Birmingham. Their one armed gun stock fitter took me out to their 'range' at the rear of the building. I was a bit apprehensive about shooting at a pattern plate whilst a college rugby match was taking place some 40 yards to my left, however, I was assured that since the factory had been there since 1812 and the college came later, they were quite used to all of the guns going off on the touch line (almost). As they also tested 500 Express rifles on the same range, I thought that it must be OK.  I fired 2 shots at the plate, 1 left and 1 right barrel. We walked down to look at the plate, re painted it and came back to the 16 yards marker. A few adjustments to the 'try gun' 2 more shots with that, and it was coffee time. It took Westley's 4 weeks to 'bend' the stock and make sure it stayed bent, but I have NEVER  shot so well with any gun, before or after. Mind you, I have never had any other gun fitted to me and as that stockfitter at Westley's is long gone, I probably never will. 

don currie has a old video on youtube  regarding comb fit etc    ,     I think it covers most  points .

the super-adjusto anatomical stocks are obviously nothing more than everyman's try stock.  

Hamster said:

Having said all this I also don’t believe you can “fit” a gun to a shooter by making dry adjustments to the comb, yes you can get a pretty good set of measurements but just because a gun is made to “fit” or “throw” a desirable poi/poa, it does not follow that the shooter will necessarily go onto score heavily with said gun. 

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Yes.  Even tho I can set the stocks to something like +/-1mm it still takes a live fire to verify.  

Thanks all of you your input is very helpful