THE SUB-TARGET RIFLE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2700, 13 December 1905, Page 32

THE SUB-TARGET RIFLE.

MARKMANSHIP WITH ECONOMY. Captain Collins, of the Commonwealth Defence Department, is much impressed (says the Age) with the results which several of the English regular and volunteer regiments are now obtaining in shooting practice with the sub-target rifle machine, and he intends, on his return to Australia, to ad\'ise its adoption in the drill-rooms. Clear proof of its value exists in reports from officers of the Coldstreams, Ist Life Guards, 2nd Scots Guards, Ist Dragoon Guards, and Royal Engineers, and from naval commanders and Bisley marksmen, the latter including Sergeants Perry and Comber, winners of the King's Prize of 1904 and 1905 respectively.The Admiralty has acopted the machine, and is using it in the training of recruits. "The results we have produced with the St. Vincent boys," says Commander Christian, " are quite extraordinary, and I should imagine that the army will 'go for it ' for all they are worth directly they see it at work."' The army is more than willing, so far as it has had an opportunity to study the machine ; but the War Office, with its habitual reluctance in such matters, hesitates to set its seal on the invention. A number of the commanding officers are not waiting for the War Office to make up its mind. In order to raise the average of marksmanship in their regiments, and at the same time to diminish the labour of instructing recruits, they are getting some of the machines (which cost £50 each) at their own expense. An instructor of the Coldstreams. who has been supplied with one, says it has produced a " wonderful improvement " in the shooting of parties of recruits under his direction. The men find the machine interesting, and it has produced keen rivalry among them, ■with the result that "it is seldom idle for a second from morning till night." Of 91 men of the 17th Field Company of Royal Engineers who were officially tested after practice with the sub-target rifle a few months ago. 54 were adjudged marksmen and 36 first-class shots, leaving only one in the second class. Five of the marksmen ranked only as thirdclass shots in the previous annual competitions, and 12 were recruits, while 16 of the first-class shots were third-class men in 1904. " 1 earnestly hope," says the officer who makes this report, " that the public school authorities may be induced to purchase these machines. It would mean. I believe, a distinct advance in the cause which Lord Roberts is advocating, while adoption, of the invention by the army would. I feel confident, be followed by a tery marked improvement in the standard of shooting all round."' The sub-larget rifles have been extensively adopted by the army and the military academies of the United States, and several hundreds of them are now used in Canada, where within the next few weeks Captain Collins will have opportunities of obtaining further information of the work done with them among ihe military forces and rifle clubs. To tke principal Canadian militia centres alone 200 machines were distributed in April last (this number has since been increased), and 150 have been supplies to the schools in Ontario. The advantages of the machine may be summarised from various authentic English reports as follows : — 1. It can be used indoors. Ammunition is dispensed with during the greater part of the practice, and an important economy is thus effected. Some blank cartridges are fired to accustom the u»er of the rifle to recoil and the shock of the explosion, but no ball cartridges. The expenditure of ammunition afterwards necessary to complete the efficiency of the marksman when he undertakes additional practice at field targets is only about a fifth or a sixth of the amount required under the ordinary system of training. 2. The mechanism brought into operation when the new gun is used indicates faithfully and minutely individual peculiarities of eyesight and errors in aiming, which can thus be understood at once and corrected by the instructor. While the recruit or, Volunteer is taking aim at, say, 20 yards from a target reduced to one-tenth of the size of an ordinary 200 yards target, the instructor stands behind him and watches the movements of a little steel scoring needle in the sub-target to which the rifle (one of cidinary service pattern) is attached. This shows with absolute accuracy how the aim is being made. Every movement of the point of the rifle is reproduced by the point of the needle, and as the trigger is pulled the sub-target receives an electrical impulse and (ho needle makes a record upon it showing where the other target would have been struck had a bullet been fired. 3. The machine rifle (to quote a naval report) "is of especial value in showing up any individual who 'pulls' or ' bobs.' And it is particularly noteworthy that the superioiity of the training given by the machine is shown in vanishing target practice and snap shooting." A similar report comes from Eton College, where one of the rifles has lately been brought into use.