ARmed&Dangerous, two-stage triggers are very popular with bullseye pistol and highpower rifle shooters because they kind of cheat the pull weight requirements. Two-stage means that when you press the trigger, you will feel it move back a little, also called "taking up the slack," until a point where the resistance increases noticeably. Steady press on this second stage will fire the gun.
The sorta-cheat part works like this. Say you're shooting a service rifle that must have a 4.5-pound trigger pull under the highpower competition rules. You can make 4.5 pounds feel lighter by adjusting the two-stage trigger so that it takes about 3 pounds to pull it through the first stage, and 1.5 pounds to trip the second stage. In slow fire, whether standing or prone, you line up on the target and take up the trigger slack. Close your eyes for a few seconds and open them to check your natural point of aim--if NPA is on, the sights will still be lined up on the target. Now you only have 1.5 pounds of "real" trigger pull, which makes it easier to break the shot without disturbing your sight picture. During rapid fire, you just press the trigger all the way through if you're in a bit of a hurry and you don't notice the two-stage aspect.
Two-stage triggers are useful on anything other than a true hair trigger, like the ones you use for 50-meter Free Pistol. FP is an Olympic event, and THE most difficult, nerve-racking, aggravating competition event in all of shooting, with a 50mm 10-ring at which you fire 60 shots in two hours, one-handed, with iron sights. But they call it free pistol because if you can hold it in one hand and single-load it with .22LR, it's allowed. Trigger pulls tend to be about 4oz and at that level, two-staging is of no benefit.
The next most difficult event is 10m Air Pistol, where the 10-ring is the diameter of a 9mm casing, and it's great training in general marksmanship. AP trigger pulls must be at least 500 grams, or 1.1 pounds, and your best bet is to adjust the trigger so the first stage is 400g and the second is 100g. My Steyr LP-10 is set up this way. Some top shooters are just as happy with a single-stage trigger with crisp break.
1911 bullseye pistols have to have 3.5 pound pulls for regular matches, and 4 pounds for service pistols. Instead of staging, smiths usually make it a roll trigger with steady smooth increase in pressure. David Sams customizes the M9 into a tackdriving sweetheart. This one has a three-stage trigger--slack, raise the firing pin safety, fire. Four pounds is entirely manageable that way.
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Originally Posted by emsemt911
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