Tuning a Little Bastard muzzle break

As mentioned in another post, I finally picked up my 7 mm STW with a new Hart barrel. Among other adjustments, they put a Little Bastard muzzle break on the barrel. It has four side ports on either side and two rows of small ports on the top side of the brake and a bag of Allen screws.

I read the tuning instructions and started with all eight screws in place. I fired a round, and the rifle pulled left. I took out one screw on the left, the closest to the action. In the course of three shots, I settled on the third port from the action as the open port.

My question is, should I be holding on to the fore stock with my left hand to work through this process or should I have my left arm under my trigger hand and let the muzzle go where it will? The technique that I used was to hold on to the fore stock with my left hand.

Also, the rifle isn't grouping very well yet, although in the course of 10 shots the first three grouped about three MOA and the last three grouped one MOA. I stopped at 10 shots and came home and cleaned the rifle with a brass brush and hoppe's #9. My break-in instructions said to leave a coating of hoppe's in the barrel and dry patch the next time you shoot. That will be tomorrow.

Again, my question is about tuning the little bastard break. If anybody has any tips, I would appreciate it.

Shoot it the same way you'll be shooting it in the field most frequently. It'll recoil differently depending on the rest you're using. Tuning off a bipod if you'll be shooting off a bag in the field won't do much good.

biednick said:

Shoot it the same way you'll be shooting it in the field most frequently. It'll recoil differently depending on the rest you're using. Tuning off a bipod if you'll be shooting off a bag in the field won't do much good.

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This!

I tuned one from the bench. BUT when I fired offhand, the tune was off.