To follow the entire series on my custom rifle build, click here. (The most recent will at the top of the page.)
For those of you who have been following my “Building a Custom Rifle Series”, I finally ordered the final piece. Yesterday I called Robert Gradous, the gunsmith who has been kindly advising me during this rifle build. I still needed a trigger. I was down to two options, a Jewel trigger (which I have used many times, and love the crispness) or a CJ Xtreme, a highly regarded two stage trigger with several adjustments that allow you to fit the trigger to the user perfectly. I had decided with my goal of eventually competing in long range tactical competitions that I needed a two stage trigger. I came to this conclusion after talking to my trusted mentor (we’ll call my mentor $$$), and reading Sniper’s Hide day after day. (I had my own reasons for thinking I needed a two stage, but today I found out why I REALLY need a two stage.) So, I called Robert Gradous to get his thoughts on the matter. He generally agreed that a two stage trigger would be right for me, but then he took a left turn in Albuquerque. He said, “How about a Huber trigger?” He talked to me about them for a minute and suggested I do some research, he thought they might be more expensive, but said it would be worth it. I thanked Robert for his time (he is such a truly nice person!)
I looked at the Huber Concepts website and called $$$. He said had heard of these triggers before, and the website had a lot of technical data about why this could be the best trigger for my rifle. $$$ had a few questions and called Huber Concepts to ask some questions, he ended up talking to John Huber himself. After $$$ was satisfied this trigger would work for me, he gave me the go ahead to do my own research and make my own decision. I also called and talked to John Huber. John reminded me, once again, why I love the gun community – I have yet to talk to a person who wasn’t just as kind, friendly, and excited as I am about the technology in the firearms industry. John said before he sells anyone one of his triggers that he wants to make sure they understand why they are remarkable, and what they are actually doing as they pull through two stages of the trigger.
Click to see larger version on Huber Concepts Website
John let me know that the patents were just approved for this Remington 700 tactical trigger, he said there are less than 1,000 of them out there on rifles now. While he was designing the trigger for the Remington 700, he listened to what his customers were saying regarding the performance, safety, and feel of his triggers and used that feedback to design this trigger. He says his patented Anti-friction Ball Design will provide a shooter with even better feel and performance than they expect!
John calls his triggers “Staged Break” triggers and says they should not be directly compared with traditional one or two stage triggers. He says his triggers are more tactile, not just mechanical and that subjective perceptions and learned behaviors will present themselves as inconsistent form.
He told me that before he sells a trigger to someone, he really wants them to understand what is different about his trigger, and to make sure his new customer understands shot management and how that works with the Huber trigger. He went on to talk to me about the timing involved in a single pull of the trigger, and how that will affect the resultant path of the bullet and the accuracy to the target. The action of firing a rifle with accuracy requires the shooter to apply pressure to the trigger over time and distance without influencing the alignment of the sight picture on target at the moment of break. He said our hand functions as a unit and may not be equal in dexterity or coordination left to right. When we pull a single stage trigger, our hand will equal all forces acting and adjust the grip to finger pressure as opposing forces. What I believe he is saying is that, involuntarily we change our grip at same moment of break, due to the grip : finger-pressure ratio, and this will throw the shot off target. He says when we are pulling a single stage trigger, going from zero pressure to 1lb. of pressure (or more) will result in lost time and distance, which will result in a shot “Late on Target.” He said shooters anticipate the “break,” and this anticipation is not based in timing and only a guess at millisecond increments and thousandth’s of an inch.
The way the Huber trigger’s “Staged Break” design corrects these innate deficiencies is that it preloads the break grip, prior to the break, as well as closing the detectable presentation to the break in both time and distance. John has designed the trigger so that the weights for each stage are at a 30%-50% ratio. If the first stage is slack, it will not sufficiently pre-load the break grip. John has set up the triggers for a 2lb total weight, if the first stage is set at 0.5lb, then the break weight will be 1.5lb. If the first stage is set at 1lb, the break weight will be 1lb. If you had the trigger set at 1lb and 1lb, this means that for the first stage, you would start at 0lbs and transition to 1lb through the first stage, so that to pass the “break” you would have to start at the already existing 1lb and transition to 2lbs total to fire the shot.
I did not ask John one question I wish I had asked, if you remove your finger from the trigger when you are past the 1st stage, at the wall, does the trigger reset? I did not easily find the answer for this question on his website, but I did search, and on Sniper’s Hide, someone said it does not reset. They said if the first stage was 1lb, when you remove your finger, it will only take approximately 0.5lbs to get to the wall the next time until you push through the break and fire a round. Only then will the trigger completely reset. John is busy at the SHOT show this week, so I’ll call him next week and ask him some more questions, including this one.
John says when shot management is based in time; using his trigger will keep attention on target and will minimize ergonomic and other involuntary motions at the moment of the shot.
Every so often I had a long pause during our conversation, and I finally told John, “I am sorry – I have to take notes so I can remember everything you are saying!” He chuckled a little, and let me know that it was all on his website too, and that he sends A LOT of information with the trigger itself. He told me he would send the performance data for my trigger when my trigger was shipped.
My overall impression of John Huber and Huber Concepts is that this is pure expertise and technical knowledge in the form of a trigger. He is a professional, and absolutley cares about what he is doing. He wants to make sure that I (as the operator of my rifle) know exactly what I can expect from my trigger. He understands the innate human characteristics that introduce error, and he has done his best to compensate for them.
I cannot wait to get my trigger! You will hear about it when it arrives!
