693precision.com. I believe Steve is a site sponsor? Great guy to deal with and stocks lots of Tab Gear and SAP products.
My first precision rifle
- Thread starter rugbydave
- Start date
693precision.com. I believe Steve is a site sponsor? Great guy to deal with and stocks lots of Tab Gear and SAP products.
RangerPark
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Near Edmonton, AB
Very nice setup you have going. I'm a 700 fan myself. You'll get to fine tune certain things such as scope height and cheek weld as you go along. You're definitely on the right track with the way you're handling your reloads. Ladders are nice but only one group per charge might not be enough. Averaging 5 groups of 3 or 5 rounds per charge will give you a better indication.
As for shooting with a bipod you'll get better results if you load the bipod a bit. Very hard to do on a bench. I myself use a 2x5 feet mat, rubber on one side and carpet on the other, and put a small dowel underneath in front, like from a plunger, all held together with clamps or screws. This way you can lean into your bipod without your whole setup sliding forward. I get much better groups this way but it also introduces one more variable to your shooting. Inconsistent shoulder pressure will widen your groups, sometimes causing flyers and inducing vertical. It's a skill worth learning though as when you're shooting prone you'll be leaning into your rifle to load the bipod.
As for shooting with a bipod you'll get better results if you load the bipod a bit. Very hard to do on a bench. I myself use a 2x5 feet mat, rubber on one side and carpet on the other, and put a small dowel underneath in front, like from a plunger, all held together with clamps or screws. This way you can lean into your bipod without your whole setup sliding forward. I get much better groups this way but it also introduces one more variable to your shooting. Inconsistent shoulder pressure will widen your groups, sometimes causing flyers and inducing vertical. It's a skill worth learning though as when you're shooting prone you'll be leaning into your rifle to load the bipod.
So I decided that yesterday was a good day to get up to the range and zero my rifle with this new load and to check out the chomps that JBM had come up with. Figured I'd shoot a bunch of groups at 100 yards while zeroing it and get a good bunch of muzzle velocity data at the same time. The one round on it's own on the first target was the first round that I fired (zeroed at 200) then I fired 3x groups of 5. The first 5 rounds I shot I hadn't put the charged cases on my vibratory tumbler prior to pressing the bullet in and the COAL was a lil too long for magazine feeding. The ES and SD also sucked for that group. The rest of the rounds were all the correct COAl as I placed them on my tumbler for a while before pressing them. The numbers were also a lot better for them (ES's of 38 and 23) Guess I need that drop tube, haha. All shot prone with a bipod and rear bag. Accuracy is acceptable as far as I'm concerned.
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0.810 MOA
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0.761 MOA
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0.777 MOA
Then I shot some 3 round groups at 200, 300, 400 yards to verify the come ups.
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200 yards 0.708 MOA
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300 yards 0.894 MOA
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400 yards 1.034 MOA ( I pulled that one and the bullet hole was just touching the paper so I marked it with a sharpie, haha)
All in all I'm pretty happy with this. Should be ordering some new glass for it this week so I can stop swapping my scope back and forth and have a nice cheek pad, drag bag and mat coming from Triad Tactical. I figure between a cheek pad and new scope/proper height rings, my cheek weld will be much better, helping with consistency. I'm gonna build myself a barricade and practice some positional shooting and set up a gong somewhere further than the 475 yards our range has!
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0.810 MOA
0.761 MOA
0.777 MOA
Then I shot some 3 round groups at 200, 300, 400 yards to verify the come ups.
200 yards 0.708 MOA
300 yards 0.894 MOA
400 yards 1.034 MOA ( I pulled that one and the bullet hole was just touching the paper so I marked it with a sharpie, haha)
All in all I'm pretty happy with this. Should be ordering some new glass for it this week so I can stop swapping my scope back and forth and have a nice cheek pad, drag bag and mat coming from Triad Tactical. I figure between a cheek pad and new scope/proper height rings, my cheek weld will be much better, helping with consistency. I'm gonna build myself a barricade and practice some positional shooting and set up a gong somewhere further than the 475 yards our range has!
Oldsmobiler
CGN Regular
- Location
- Coquitlam, BC
Grab some 168 or 175 Federal Gold Medal Match and see how that shoots inyour rifle. Its a good measure to see what it can do. If it doesnt group well something is up. Have yet to see a rifle not like that stuff. I use it as a benchmark test for a new rifle / barrel setup
Ante
Ante
Thanks Ante. I probably shoud've done that right from the get go to establish a baseline.
I was back at the range yesterday to re-zero my rifle because I had to remove my muzzle brake (Insite Heathen) in order to be able to participate in next weekend's long range competition down in Chilliwack. The shift in POI was quite remarkable. It was 5 3/4 MOA down and 2 3/4 MOA to the right. I was chrony-ing every round as I went through the zeroing process. Here are the last 2x 3 round groups as I got the zero dialled (the right one is the last one).
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0.437 MOA and 0.241 MOA, pretty decent even though, yeah, I know, 3 round groups. It was more for zeroing purposes. Here's what has me mystified: over the 14 rounds I fired to zero the rifle (the first few weren't even on paper!) here is the chrony data:
first 5 rounds:
Avg: 2503
ES: 159.0
SD: 68.16
last 9 rounds:
Avg: 2486
ES: 79.65
SD: 31.90
within those last 9 rounds, the last 2x 3 round groups had, respectively ES's of 71 and 53!
I nonetheless went and shot some groups at 300, 400, 475 (all 3 round groups)
300 yards: 0.898 MOA
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400 yards: 0.97 MOA
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475 yards (I put this target vertically as I hadn't yet verified my dope at that range): 0.878 MOA
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All 3 round groups and not stellar accuracy but pretty decent, I'd say, shot prone from a bipod and rear bag. I'm just kind of stumped as to what has caused the crazy MV variations. This is all once fired brass that has been neck-sized only. I have a bunch of twice fired, body-sized and neck sized pressed up that I'm going to go and try to see if that makes things more consistent. I can't help but think that if the ES comes down I'll lose some of the vertical dispersion. I'm half tempted to go back to a load that shot quite similar (43.0 gr instead of 42.8) but that had much better numbers? The thing is that the 42.8gr had less vertical when tested so I dunno...
I was back at the range yesterday to re-zero my rifle because I had to remove my muzzle brake (Insite Heathen) in order to be able to participate in next weekend's long range competition down in Chilliwack. The shift in POI was quite remarkable. It was 5 3/4 MOA down and 2 3/4 MOA to the right. I was chrony-ing every round as I went through the zeroing process. Here are the last 2x 3 round groups as I got the zero dialled (the right one is the last one).
0.437 MOA and 0.241 MOA, pretty decent even though, yeah, I know, 3 round groups. It was more for zeroing purposes. Here's what has me mystified: over the 14 rounds I fired to zero the rifle (the first few weren't even on paper!) here is the chrony data:
first 5 rounds:
Avg: 2503
ES: 159.0
SD: 68.16
last 9 rounds:
Avg: 2486
ES: 79.65
SD: 31.90
within those last 9 rounds, the last 2x 3 round groups had, respectively ES's of 71 and 53!
I nonetheless went and shot some groups at 300, 400, 475 (all 3 round groups)
300 yards: 0.898 MOA
400 yards: 0.97 MOA
475 yards (I put this target vertically as I hadn't yet verified my dope at that range): 0.878 MOA
All 3 round groups and not stellar accuracy but pretty decent, I'd say, shot prone from a bipod and rear bag. I'm just kind of stumped as to what has caused the crazy MV variations. This is all once fired brass that has been neck-sized only. I have a bunch of twice fired, body-sized and neck sized pressed up that I'm going to go and try to see if that makes things more consistent. I can't help but think that if the ES comes down I'll lose some of the vertical dispersion. I'm half tempted to go back to a load that shot quite similar (43.0 gr instead of 42.8) but that had much better numbers? The thing is that the 42.8gr had less vertical when tested so I dunno...
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So went back out again today to retest 42.8gr and 43.0gr loads at 200 yards:
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Groups weren't fantastic but the wind did act up a little. 2x5round groups of each load 42.8gr= 1.041 and 1.482MOA 43.0gr=1.283 and 1.065MOA
Slightly better average for the heavier load and less vertical as well as much more stable velocity, ES, SD... I think I'll be switching loads, for now. Have some bottom metal coming which will let me run a longer COAL so I'll be experimenting again after this weekend (or whenever it arrives, haha)
In more interesting news, I was building my gf a vegggie planter yesterday and had some extra lumber so I built myself a few things:
I made 3 of these, one each for the 200, 300, 400 yard lines. I should make another for the 475. We only have steal at 400 and 475 so I figured clays would make good reactive targets. They work out to about 2 moa at 200 yards, 1.33moa at 300y and 1moa at 400.
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Also made this from the design in the PRS tie breaker stages:
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Here I am testing it out:
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I was surprised and quite stoked to make 2 out of 3 hits standing against the barricade on a 10" gong at 400 yards and the same on a 2/3 IPSC gong at 475 as well as hitting 1/2 clays at 200 yards kneeling against the barricade!
Groups weren't fantastic but the wind did act up a little. 2x5round groups of each load 42.8gr= 1.041 and 1.482MOA 43.0gr=1.283 and 1.065MOA
Slightly better average for the heavier load and less vertical as well as much more stable velocity, ES, SD... I think I'll be switching loads, for now. Have some bottom metal coming which will let me run a longer COAL so I'll be experimenting again after this weekend (or whenever it arrives, haha)
In more interesting news, I was building my gf a vegggie planter yesterday and had some extra lumber so I built myself a few things:
I made 3 of these, one each for the 200, 300, 400 yard lines. I should make another for the 475. We only have steal at 400 and 475 so I figured clays would make good reactive targets. They work out to about 2 moa at 200 yards, 1.33moa at 300y and 1moa at 400.
Also made this from the design in the PRS tie breaker stages:
Here I am testing it out:
I was surprised and quite stoked to make 2 out of 3 hits standing against the barricade on a 10" gong at 400 yards and the same on a 2/3 IPSC gong at 475 as well as hitting 1/2 clays at 200 yards kneeling against the barricade!
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So my bolt gun has kinda languished since after the BC precision champs as I was waiting on a DBM from PTG and a new scope. PTG was a disaster to deal with, when the promised 2-4 weeks for delivery turned to 7, I cancelled the order. They sent me an email acknowledging that the order was cancelled, then sent the DBM the next week anyways. I'm dealing with getting a refund now, a real pain in the ass. Ended up buying a nice Stiller DBM from a great guy on the EE. I'm still waiting on a new scope as Nightforce are behind on a shipment that has the scope I ordered. I'm not having much luck, haha.
In any case, I decided to go down and shoot a match in the States in a couple weeks, so took my Mark 4 off my M14 and put it in the rings I got for the NF and have been going about developing a new load for this rifle. This is what she looks like now:
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The main reason that I let her languish for a while was that I wanted to run a longer COAL with the DBM setup than I could with the internal box. With a 178 gr Amax, I'd have to seat it at 2.890 to be 10 thou off the lands. The internal capacity of Magpul AICS mags I got is about 2.880 but I can't seem to run anything longer than 2.845 with 10 rounds in the mag without the tip of the first round snagging under the feed ramp in the receiver. So I set my length at 2.845 and made up a few loads. I started at 43.0 grains of Varget and worked up to 45.0 in 0.5 gr increments. I shot a 4 round group of 43.0 gr at 2.825" (old load I had) as a benchmark and then 2x 3 round groups of 43.0 through 45.0 at the new seating depth of 2.845 all at 200 yards.
1x4 rounds of 43.0 gr @ 2.825: 0.895 moa
2x3 rounds of 43.0 gr @ 2.845 (as all others after): 0.478 moa
2x3 rounds of 43.5gr : 0.955 moa
2x3 rounds of 44.0gr: 1.612 moa
2x3 rounds of 44.5 gr: 1.671 moa
2x3 rounds of 45.0 gr: 0.597 moa
Since I already knew there was a low accuracy node around 43 gr, I concentrated on 45.0 retesting 2x5 round groups of 43.0 (again as a benchmark),44.8, 45.0 and 45.2 @ 200 yards.
43.0: 0.837 moa
44.8: 1.076 moa
45.0: 0.709 moa
45.2: 0.832 moa
Now here's where I'm hoping people are still reading. In the course of firing the 30 rounds between 44.8-45.2, I had a couple of heavy bolt lifts, maybe 3, I can't quite recall. A small enough number that I was willing to overlook it. The next day (yesterday) I went back to zero the rifle with the new load and verify my dope out to 475 yards. I had maybe 3 or 4 heavy bolts. It got me thinking. Today I went back and in the process of verifying my zero I had4 out of 5 heavy lifts so I fired a few more rounds, to a total of 15 and at least 2/3 were heavy lifts. Obviously I've got an issue with too hot a load. I highly doubt that seating the bullets deeper would lower the pressure so am I pretty much left with going back down to the 43 gr node? I had high hopes for the 45 gr load as it's a lil over 2600 fps out of my 20" barrel instead of the 43 gr load's 2500fps. Any thoughts?
In any case, I decided to go down and shoot a match in the States in a couple weeks, so took my Mark 4 off my M14 and put it in the rings I got for the NF and have been going about developing a new load for this rifle. This is what she looks like now:
The main reason that I let her languish for a while was that I wanted to run a longer COAL with the DBM setup than I could with the internal box. With a 178 gr Amax, I'd have to seat it at 2.890 to be 10 thou off the lands. The internal capacity of Magpul AICS mags I got is about 2.880 but I can't seem to run anything longer than 2.845 with 10 rounds in the mag without the tip of the first round snagging under the feed ramp in the receiver. So I set my length at 2.845 and made up a few loads. I started at 43.0 grains of Varget and worked up to 45.0 in 0.5 gr increments. I shot a 4 round group of 43.0 gr at 2.825" (old load I had) as a benchmark and then 2x 3 round groups of 43.0 through 45.0 at the new seating depth of 2.845 all at 200 yards.
1x4 rounds of 43.0 gr @ 2.825: 0.895 moa
2x3 rounds of 43.0 gr @ 2.845 (as all others after): 0.478 moa
2x3 rounds of 43.5gr : 0.955 moa
2x3 rounds of 44.0gr: 1.612 moa
2x3 rounds of 44.5 gr: 1.671 moa
2x3 rounds of 45.0 gr: 0.597 moa
Since I already knew there was a low accuracy node around 43 gr, I concentrated on 45.0 retesting 2x5 round groups of 43.0 (again as a benchmark),44.8, 45.0 and 45.2 @ 200 yards.
43.0: 0.837 moa
44.8: 1.076 moa
45.0: 0.709 moa
45.2: 0.832 moa
Now here's where I'm hoping people are still reading. In the course of firing the 30 rounds between 44.8-45.2, I had a couple of heavy bolt lifts, maybe 3, I can't quite recall. A small enough number that I was willing to overlook it. The next day (yesterday) I went back to zero the rifle with the new load and verify my dope out to 475 yards. I had maybe 3 or 4 heavy bolts. It got me thinking. Today I went back and in the process of verifying my zero I had4 out of 5 heavy lifts so I fired a few more rounds, to a total of 15 and at least 2/3 were heavy lifts. Obviously I've got an issue with too hot a load. I highly doubt that seating the bullets deeper would lower the pressure so am I pretty much left with going back down to the 43 gr node? I had high hopes for the 45 gr load as it's a lil over 2600 fps out of my 20" barrel instead of the 43 gr load's 2500fps. Any thoughts?
If your getting sticky bolts now, I wouldn't run it at rattlesnake.. Supposed to be 36 C!! There is minimal difference between 2550 and 2650 at 800m in terms of wind deflection according to my BC. So all you'll be doing is getting more "recoil" on the barricade for not much more gains. But then again, I'm fairly green to this all myself. My load is a 175 smk pushing around 2550 fps.
Yeah, fair enough. The match director said it's supposed to be "Africa hot" haha
TacticalTeacher
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Georgian Bay, ON
Great rig....now come on out and shoot some matches! Yahooooo 
Barney
Barney
You won't need 45g in that "African heat", but you will still want the accuracy so go with 43g and its accuracy, the velocity will be there anyway at that D.A. in that mild temperature. Heck where I come from we break out the Stanfields if it drops below 38C lol.
Seems to appear you are at the limit of powder charge/COAL @ 45g. You might gain by using a comparator rather than miking the COAL.
It would at the least consistently place the bullet ogive in the same place each seating and set the precise distance each time from the begining of the lands. Therefore you might realize some benefit in powder charge and likely some better consistency in the SD/ES.
Seems to appear you are at the limit of powder charge/COAL @ 45g. You might gain by using a comparator rather than miking the COAL.
It would at the least consistently place the bullet ogive in the same place each seating and set the precise distance each time from the begining of the lands. Therefore you might realize some benefit in powder charge and likely some better consistency in the SD/ES.
Got a nice AR500 2/3 IPSC target in the mail today and went and hung it at a spot I checked out over the weekend with my new Sig Kilo2000 (big thanks to Clay at Prophet River for bringing these in!).
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835 yards away according to the LRF. The kinda brownish looking open area in the middle of the pic.
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First round hit! Was pretty happy about that! Proceeded to put another 4 rounds out and ended up 3/5. The temp and DA were dropping so I came up another 1/4 moa and launched another 5. Ended up 5/10. Not fantastic shooting but I'm stoked to have a place where I can practice long range. I might have to get a few more targets and hang them in that area as I could easily put some at 500, 700, etc.
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Judging by where my impacts are, I coulda come up another 1/4 moa. I'll grant I was kinda rushing things. Also it's hard to laze something that size at that distance, I might do a better job of that when I put the LRF on a tripod next time. Oh and this spot is literally a 20 minute drive form my house included the 5km on the FSR
835 yards away according to the LRF. The kinda brownish looking open area in the middle of the pic.
First round hit! Was pretty happy about that! Proceeded to put another 4 rounds out and ended up 3/5. The temp and DA were dropping so I came up another 1/4 moa and launched another 5. Ended up 5/10. Not fantastic shooting but I'm stoked to have a place where I can practice long range. I might have to get a few more targets and hang them in that area as I could easily put some at 500, 700, etc.
Judging by where my impacts are, I coulda come up another 1/4 moa. I'll grant I was kinda rushing things. Also it's hard to laze something that size at that distance, I might do a better job of that when I put the LRF on a tripod next time. Oh and this spot is literally a 20 minute drive form my house included the 5km on the FSR
Your heavy bolt lift, is it possible you've been neck sizing all along? Shoulders may need a bump. FWIW your lands are way closer than my 700P .308. With a Hornady 178 HPBT I'm at 2.316" base to ogive and 2.97 OAL to get .030" off my lands. I had to bend the front of my Accurate mags out a little to clear. I have to use a Berry's .30-06 ammo box cause they don't fit a .308 box.
I've been been bumping the shoulder with a redding body die and neck sizing but I did notice recently that my body die had somehow come out of adjustment and was still sizing the body but no longer pushing the shoulder back 2 thou. I might have to revisit the 45 grain load knowing that, especially with my next match going out to 1030 or so yards!
Mystic Precision
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Summerland, BC
Nice location, great target but don't discount all those wonderful rocks you have lying on the ground.
Way less money, no one want to steal them and they give a nice puff on dust on impact.... sound good too. Never have to clean them up either
Great shooting, enjoy
Jerry
Way less money, no one want to steal them and they give a nice puff on dust on impact.... sound good too. Never have to clean them up either
Great shooting, enjoy
Jerry
Mystic Precision
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Summerland, BC
Don't spray them... learn to find them against the background.
I will put them in an open patch of dirt, maybe pile them up a little so, if you know to look, you can see them. Then you can practise that whole landmarking thing....
Jerry
I will put them in an open patch of dirt, maybe pile them up a little so, if you know to look, you can see them. Then you can practise that whole landmarking thing....
Jerry
Other thing is mount the plate as close to the ground as possible. Really helps with reports and doesn't give false feedback decided if the shot was low or high.
I generally mount mine ~1-2" off the ground.
Also, time well spent working on your shooting location. Bring in a rake and shovel and level/smooth it off. I've built a platform or two which greatly increased comfort on a long day of shooting.
I generally mount mine ~1-2" off the ground.
Also, time well spent working on your shooting location. Bring in a rake and shovel and level/smooth it off. I've built a platform or two which greatly increased comfort on a long day of shooting.
That's a great idea Jerry, hadn't really thought of that.
Shibby, yeah, I mean to work on the shooting location a bit, I was chasing daylight and couldn't resist getting a few shots off, haha. Some landscaping is in order
Shibby, yeah, I mean to work on the shooting location a bit, I was chasing daylight and couldn't resist getting a few shots off, haha. Some landscaping is in order
All the parts for my tripod setup arrived today (Pig Saddle and a Sirui ball head, a good buddy gave me his old Manfrotto tripod) so I figured I'd try it out.
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I was happily surprised at how stable I could get both standing and sitting, making routine hits on both the 10" plate at 400 and a 2/3 IPSC at 465. Thought that was pretty sweet till a buddy of mine down in the States told me he got a hit on a full IPSC at 1145 yards today, haha. I didn't bother trying the tripod without the use of a sling but I tried both having the sling attached to my belt and also wrapping it around one of the tripod legs. I found stability to be pretty similar but preferred being hooked up seated and wrapped around the leg standing, go figure. It was faster to transition from target to target with the sling wrapped a round a leg though cause you could loosen or tighten it to adjust elevation. I also noticed a good amount of "jump" shooting seated although I'm sure it didn't help that I was on plywood. I'll have to work on loading the tripod some more. If it's not pissing rain tomorrow, I'll try this out at my long range spot
I was happily surprised at how stable I could get both standing and sitting, making routine hits on both the 10" plate at 400 and a 2/3 IPSC at 465. Thought that was pretty sweet till a buddy of mine down in the States told me he got a hit on a full IPSC at 1145 yards today, haha. I didn't bother trying the tripod without the use of a sling but I tried both having the sling attached to my belt and also wrapping it around one of the tripod legs. I found stability to be pretty similar but preferred being hooked up seated and wrapped around the leg standing, go figure. It was faster to transition from target to target with the sling wrapped a round a leg though cause you could loosen or tighten it to adjust elevation. I also noticed a good amount of "jump" shooting seated although I'm sure it didn't help that I was on plywood. I'll have to work on loading the tripod some more. If it's not pissing rain tomorrow, I'll try this out at my long range spot
