doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com bruising of second finger on grip hand?

My friend recently bought a 12g I.J. Skeeter double trigger gun. He complained several times about his second finger being smacked by the triggerguard. I don't recall ever having this problem so I can't solve it for him.

Questions:
What causes it?
What are the solutions available?
What about those rubber bumpers for the TG? Who's is best?

I've had it happen in cold weather on a 12ga. gun that is straight grip and has an especially smooth grip areas due to years of use, etc. The gun just slides back on recoil and your finger gets whacked.

The bottom line is you just need to grip the gun more tightly.

Very often this is an indicator that the stock L.o.P. is too short.
Try using a slip on stock extension and see how he fares.

I had a friend that had this happen when he first shot his new Parker VH (his first double). I told him to grip the gun harder with his trigger hand so that the gun wouldn't slip and his hand would travel with the gun on recoil. That was two years ago and he has since acquired two Lefevers to go with his Parker - never had it happen again. We shoot clays together weekly.

It happens to my father when he shoots my Parker DHE trap model and it's got nearly a 15 inch LOP so that's not always the problem. I think it's just how you hold the gun a lot of the time. Ed Muderlak has a GH that he uses for ducks and it bangs his finger, so he's got a rubber bumper installed. None of his other Parkers do that to him, and he's never been able to figure out why this particular gun does.


Destry

Generally, it may have to do with distance between various points (triggers, triggers and trigger guard, LOP, diameter of grip, length of grip, etc. -- varies by individual) which can be solved by a tighter grip and/or having the back hand go completely around the grip with thumb over. If the stock is too short, the rubber bumper at the back of the trigger guard may help.

I have had a recent fairly serious hand injury, then elbow surgery for a torn and detached tendon in June, and these events have changed my shooting pretty drastically for the worse. I have hunted upland birds for years, and have always been a pretty good shooter, somewhere in the 90% range pretty consistently over the years (67 now.) In November of 2006 I caught my hand in a bandsaw and severed the flexor tendons to the little and ring fingers of my right hand. I am right handed. The surgery that followed rejoined the tendons, but the hand will not close up completely anymore at the right side of the hand where those two fingers are. The elbow surgery required drilling three holes in the bone to reattach the tendon, and there was a fairly routine rejoining of the severed portion of the tendon as well. This was caused by using those little hand-held clay target throwers, I am sure you have all seen and/or used them. It caused a basic hyper extension of the elbow with pretty serious damage. I don't recommend you use them anymore.

The bottom line is that even after several months of rehab therapy to regain strength in the hand and elbow, both are weaker than they formerly were, and both are now changed in the way they move and operate.

I just got back yesterday from a nice hunt at Heartland Lodge, complete with 10" of snow on the ground. The dogs were able to find plenty of pheasant hunkered down under sheltering blow-downs and/or bent over milo, so we had good success in general. I found my guns that I have been using for several years now smacking my second finger just as described above, where they never did that before. I am inclined to agree that it's caused by a too loose grip on the gun. When I had full strength in my hand and arm, (the elbow surgery changed the forearm strength as well) I had no problem, now with reduced strength I do get smacked.

I'll continue to try and regain strength with the therapy routines they gave me to do, but I plan on installing the rubber thingamabobs on the trigger guards of my favorite guns. It's very unpleasant after six or eight smacks in a row, particularly in 20 degree weather. My length of pull requirement has not changed, so I am pretty sure it's a loose grip that is the main culprit.

Whatever the cause, here is the solution:

Galazan sells a rubber piece that addresses the problem. You can make a temporary one out of a foam ear plug and some electrical tape.
Link

Or a cigarette filter...

Nothing gets bye my friend "Markethunter." He's right about the GH, which has a Miller SST. One rationale is that the rear location of the single trigger causes the problem. But my VHE Skeet has a SST and produces no sore middle finger. One other Parker that I no longer own, a Trojan 20-bore with double triggers, banged up my middle finger sufficently that I didn't like to shoot it. I was never able to relate the problem to pull or other stock dimensions so I did the cheap fix...

Tony Galazan sells a rubber bumper--screw attach or snap attach, both $19.00 @ p. 26 of the new CSM catalog. The screw attach works best on my Parker trigger guard and has resolved two problems: First the sore middle finger and secondly, it looks so much better than the ethafoam I had black-taped to the trigger guard for umpteen years. S&H is $10 but if you sweet talk Carol, maybe she'll take pity and charge something more in line with the size and weight. EDM