Whether you are looking for shotgun, trap, target, rifle or clay shooting accessories you are bound to find what you are looking for in the market today. This article provides a little background on these exciting extras (and go way beyond gun safes) for the avid enthusiast.
Shotgun Shooting Accessories:
As with most firearms, accessories for shotguns are vast and varied but don’t get overwhelmed. Accessories for shotguns in general can be broken down into a handful of categories such as sites, stocks, barrels, chokes, chamber, trigger or magazine components, cleaning tools and solutions and straps or slings.
Of course, there are a variety of smaller accessories that don’t really fit into a category such as ergonomic coverings for rifle stocks. A personal favorite is the pistol grip forend, which offers greater firing stability and faster pump action. Extras exist for virtually any use you have for your shotgun.
Trap Shooting Accessories
These extras are used heavily for shotgun ranges and recreational shotgun firing and are also known as clay shooting accessories. For those of us that don’t know what a trap shooter is it is a device used to fling clay disks into the air for shotgun target practice. Traps come in many different styles and designs and can be manually operated with a pull cord or they can be electric.
Some of the most basic traps retail for under 100 dollars and must be mounted to a sturdy object. They are manually operated and can hold about 2-3 clay disks or pigeons at a time. Even though the trap can hold this many clay disks, it will throw them all at once and not one at a time. The most sophisticated traps can retail for thousands of dollars and can hold 70 or more clay disks that they are able to fling one at a time. These models are usually mounted on factory carts with air filled tires and batteries.
Some even come with remote controls, sweet! Other models may have chairs for the operator attached to them and other more extravagant features. For the fair weather shooter, a decent thrower that flings disks one pull at a time should suffice.
Target Shooting Accessories:
Image via Wikipedia
If stationary target firing is your thing, there are many options out there for you. Of course, there are the basic paper targets with silhouettes or other graphics on them and the classical bulls-eye target. More targets that are fun are hanging targets or stands that make shift targets can be mounted to such as tin cans. Targets on hanging stands can be made of metal and different shapes can be purchased such as common circles with targets on them to birds and other animal silhouettes.
Bowling pins are also popular target shooting items. Some manufacturers will even sell them with pictures of notorious public figures such as the former president of Iraq Saddam Hussein. Other accessories commonly associated with target shooting but that should be used when ever using a fire arm are safety glasses, which come in a variety of stylish designs, ear protectors to keep out the loud noise, or more discrete ear plugs.
Rifle Shooting Accessories:
Many categories of rifle shooting accessories are similar to that of shotguns because they are both long guns. Stocks, sites, magazine and trigger components all relate to accessories for rifles. The main differences lay in the types of ammunition and corresponding components that can be fired from rifles or shotguns. Rifles primarily fire bullets while shotguns primarily fire buckshot, which is a bundle of small ball bearings.
Shotguns do fire bullet type projectiles however; they are called slugs and are not typically similar to bullets in their design. Some of the cooler accessories for rifles include conversion kits to turn a semi-automatic weapon into a fully automatic weapon, high powered scopes that allow shooters to hit targets hundreds of yards away and stylish or ergonomic stocks to ease shooting and make your rifle one of a kind.
In today’s market, a person can find almost anything to increase the accuracy, appearance and performance of their weapon. Accessories can be fun to put on your firearm and help you learn about how your firearm works. Various designs for target and trap have made sport gun firing more enjoyable and creative as well as easy to do. No matter what your need a wide range of shooting accessories exist for your trigger happy pleasures. Happy shooting and remember to shoot safely!
