Ammo Testing Temps

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Dahsira

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TL;DR - What temperature threshold should be met for ammo testing for summer matches? 5 degrees high enough? What about 10 degrees?

We are all aware to some degree or another that 22lr ammo is notoriously temperature sensitive. Is there a generally accepted temperature where above that temp your results are not significantly impacted by the temperature regardless of the ammo used?

Specifically I'm looking at the CRPS matches I'll be attending in Late June, July and August. And I'm wondering how "early" I can reasonably start ammo testing.

There are many many problems with ammo testing 22lr in any scientifically accurate and statistically significant manner. I've decided that within the confines of reality on the following ammo testing plan.

1. Start every trip to the range with a clean firearm. Fire 10 rounds of my normal bulk ammo to verify zero or simply just to zero the scope if I've messed with it. This is absolutely repeatable and will produce a consistent starting point for ammo testing that will produce a starting point where I'll be "closest" to before a match.

2. After the first 10 "fouling" shots with my bulk practice ammo, my wife will have 50 rounds that she has loaded into 5 magazines. She will load the mags into the rifle and I will attempt not to look at the spent casings. This is to keep the test as a "blind test" if I know I'm shooting Eley Tenex vs Eley Action it will influence my performance when firing the shot. This should minimize that effect.

3. I will do five, 5 round groups at 50 meters and five, 5 round groups at 100 meters using the 5 aim points on a larger poster board that is moved from 50 meters to 100 meters after 25 rounds. Shots will be fired at a rate of 1 shot every 20 seconds to produce consistent barrel temps. This is will be shot off a bench with a Caswell "The Rock" Benchrest front shooting rest and a rear support bag.

4. After 50 rounds ammo testing for the day will be done and I'll do my normal practice for the day. I think after 50 rounds it will be hard to maintain a high level of focus trying to break the perfect shot.

5. Each lot of ammo will be shot on two different days and the final results will be a combination of both days. I will only do ammo testing in relatively calm wind conditions. Doesn't need to be perfect since I am gonna need to have a number of good wind days to get through the testing regime and I'll have to take what I can get. But if it's not relatively close to other ammo testing days conditions then I won't ammo test that day.

TL;DR - What temperature threshold should be met for ammo testing for summer matches? 5 degrees high enough? What about 10 degrees?
 
Your wife loads your mags at the range, she is a keeper. If you are changing ammo that fast your results are already skewed, different lubes will not work well together.
Best advice for temperature is do your best to match it with the day you are shooting. Good luck
 
Dahsira said:
TL;DR - What temperature threshold should be met for ammo testing for summer matches? 5 degrees high enough? What about 10 degrees?
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At the risk of being too long so that people don't read, it's difficult to pin a temperature at which testing in winter weather can produce reliable results for summer shooting. That's not to say that it can't be done; rather it's that it's hard to know if the testing is reliable until the results are actually compared. Why? There are a lot of things that affect rimfire accuracy, even when it comes to using one or two particular ammos -- which is the purpose of testing. In other words, if a couple of good ammos are identified, it's not always possible to know how they will shoot at different times of the year, not just winter vs. summer.

This is one of the main reasons serious bench rest shooters do so much testing. To elaborate, an ammo that shoots well in the spring may perform less well in the heat of summer. Similarly an ammo that shoots well in the middle of the summer may not shoot as well in the fall. What causes these differences? Temperature may be one important factor. Others may include humidity (autumn weather can often be wetter and more humid than mid-summer, so too with spring). How much either or both affect ammo performance is impossible to tell until the testing is done. And the trouble is the testing is rarely "done" -- at least in terms of a longer period of time. Testing in the spring may reveal more readily what works especially well in the spring, with similar results at other times of the year. For use this weekend, test this week or last weekend.

And to add another monkey wrench to the testing, the results for one variety of ammo at one time of the year may not always be transferable to other lots of the same variety for that time of year. The problem is that rules for .22LR ammo are not necessarily always fast and permanently defined.

At the same time, it is understood that most .22 rimfire shooters are not testing for bench rest shooting accuracy and that's likely the thrust of the OP's question. Many shooters simply want to know if testing when it's cold is valid for when it's not. Generally speaking, cold weather is not conducive to the shooter's comfort, which militates against the best, most reliable results. It can also affect ignition which in turn can make itself felt with the results down range. Lower temperatures themselves can result in greater bullet drop, which is a concern for long distance shooting with .22LR. Colder air is denser which slows down a bullet. How much? Testing can yield data, but it's not always easy to identify the particular causes for changing results. Was it the change in air density, or a difference in ignition, or a combination of each?

More generally, the greater the similarity of the conditions of testing with the conditions in which a match is shot , the more reliable the testing will be. At what temperature is shooting more likely to be more reliable than less reliable? It's hard to know for sure, but in my own experience I've not often got the best results when it's cold. When the temperatures are 10 degrees Celsius and better, results seem to improve. If anecdotal reports have any validity, many shooters report getting much better results when temperatures are 10 C (or 50 F) than when they are colder.

Some ammos are made for use in cold weather. These are the biathlon ammos, such as SK Biathlon Sport and Lapua Polar Biathlon. These ammos are a little faster than other match ammos. But they don't offer a guarantee to be especially accurate simply by virtue of the fact that they are made for performing in winter conditions. They will vary in performance lot by lot, just like any other .22LR match ammo. And there's no reason why they can't shoot very well in warmer weather. It must be kept in mind, however, that they aren't a magic solution. A shooter might find a lot or two of biathlon ammo that performs very well in his rifle when it's cold, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it will perform equally well when it's warm.

One final observation about testing in colder weather. If someone is interested in finding ammo that will perform very well at 100 yards and more in colder temperatures, it's reasonable to test first at 50 yards to find out whether or not an ammo has good potential for even longer range shooting. If it won't produce good results at 50 yards, there's no reason to expect it to perform well at 100 yards or more. In any case, results in colder temperatures are rarely better than they are in warmer times of the year.

For those that found the above comments too lengthy to read, here's the nub. For more reliable results, test and shoot when it's 10 C (50 F) or more.
 
Maybe this can save you a bunch of work... and the method I use to narrow down my options.

Test above 15C... test at a min of 250yds with 275 to 300yds better. Use a berm or sandy backstop so you have large clear area to spot shots. At 250yds, mark a 10" square/circle.. .at 300yds, use a 12" square/circle in the berm.

Start with high grade ammo. My preference is Lapua Center X.

10rds to foul... which includes 5 into the dirt... 5 to confirm your zero. Take a breather for a min... load 10rds and fire those rds at the center of the target under 90secs. If your wife can help you spot, mark on a paper where the shots land. hopefully, all 10rds land in or very close to your target.

If the ammo is not compatible, you will have a massive group with zingers way off. If that happends, just put that ammo aside and move to the next one.

SK and Lapua lube/powders are fairly compatible so I dump 5rds into the dirt when changing types. If going to Eley or CCI, I would run a dry patch through the bore to wipe out the excess gunk... 10shots into the dirt, then 5 to confirm zero... then 10 for 'score'.

Testing close will not tell you what your LR results are. If the ammo shoots well far away, it will shoot well close up.

If the upper grades don't work, hopefully, you can find something in the SK or equivalent... but then you are going to have to sort that ammo which is a pain.

If all fails, then consider a match barrel speced for this game... and I have a variety of options that are working well.

A large percentage of points in CRPS are way out there so you may as well know now if the ammo/barrel is going to work.

Good luck.

Jerry
 
Mystic Precision said:
Maybe this can save you a bunch of work... and the method I use to narrow down my options.

Test above 15C... test at a min of 250yds with 275 to 300yds better. Use a berm or sandy backstop so you have large clear area to spot shots. At 250yds, mark a 10" square/circle.. .at 300yds, use a 12" square/circle in the berm.

Start with high grade ammo. My preference is Lapua Center X.
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You recommend testing with .22LR to begin at no less than 250 yards, better still further out to 300 yards. As a corollary, what minimum range would you recommend testing a centerfire like the .308 with which the .22LR is frequently compared at long ranges? Obviously that's a rhetorical question, but it should raise a point.

Shooters should be reminded of several very important considerations when shooting at such long distances.

Unlike handloaded centerfire rounds, which can presumably be loaded to have a fairly consistent MV, .22LR ammo is well-known (or should be well-known) for having extreme spreads that are relatively large -- even Center X, which can easily have an ES in the high 30s and low 40s. Only chrony testing ammo can confirm any ammo's ES, neither the price tag northe name on the box will.

Even with perfect shot execution and no air movement and ammo as good as Center X typically is, a shooter faces quite a challenge at 300 yards. An ES of 30 fps for Center X should be considered better than average, while an ES of 40 is not uncommon. A 30 fps difference between one round and the next will result in an almost 7" vertical spread. A 40 fps difference between rounds will result in over 9" of vertical. That's a large potential spread when shooting at a target 12" X 12". In fact, it would be easy and not unusual to miss such a target completely.

There's almost no room for error, hardly conceivable when testing ammo. Even if it can be imagined that every shooter executes his shot perfectly in perfect conditions with no air movement, that leaves any inconsistency in the rifle to be considered. A perfect rifle, with a perfect bore with no inconsistencies in chamber, rifling, or bore diameter, could theoretically consistently put quality ammo in a very small one hole group at a mere 50 yards.

Unfortunately in real life there are few such rifles, especially among shooters regularly posting on these pages. This means that imperfect rifles will add to the problems of ammo inconsistency. Rifle imperfection will exacerbate the difficulty of keeping rounds on a 12" target at 300 yards with ammo that has an ES of 30 to 40 fps.

And in real life there are few shooters posting here who consistently, shot after shot, execute perfect shots. Some shooter error is unavoidable and it, too, makes worse the results down range. It can be challenging to shoot consistently at 100 yards, and the difficulties are magnified by more than geometry alone at 300 yards. In short, the further out the target, the more difficult it is for a .22LR shooter to remain consistent.

In the end, testing ammo at 300 yards at a 12" target is not something to be taken lightly. It's not easy to find ammo with a sufficiently low ES to make hitting a 12" target consistently at that range reliable. That begs the question, of course, as to what a reliable standard is for 300 yards and a 12" target.

Nevertheless, perhaps some shooters have easy access to .22LR ammo that has a very good ES. Perhaps some shooters have rifles that shoot ammo with near perfection, so that any rifle-induced inconsistencies are kept to a minimum as far as reasonably possible. Perhaps some shooters shoot with near perfection time and time again.

Testing ammo is a process of trial and error to identify how ammo responds with a particular rifle, in particular conditions. Testing at very long ranges to determine how an ammo shoots is not necessarily the best way to test. There are simply too many things to go wrong to be able to identify what is going wrong. Even taking the conditions out of the equation, the tester may not reliably know if shortcomings down range are the fault of the ammo or the rifle or the shooter.

Shooters have easier access to test at shorter ranges. These can reliably reveal how an ammo shoots. At 250 or 300 yards, with the ammo that's available and the rifles that are often used, there's too much room for error, even with testing on a target as large as 12" X 12".
 
I think you are missing the point....

No matter......

Those that compete in CRPS and other forms of LR rimfire PRS will likely understand what I am suggesting.... sorts through alot of ammo options in a big hurry.

Jerry
 
This is a really good discussion. In addition to the others, both Jerry and Grauhanen have very valid points and from what little skill and knowledge I have, they are both right.

The incredible number of variables with doing proper ammo testing on 22lr has led me to a decision paralysis situation. So in order to resolve this, I need to isolate whatever variables I can and recognize that the variables that the results are and always will be "qualified". The further I get down this rabbit hole, the more I recognize the value of Eley Ammo testing provided by the Korth Group. Maybe for the 2021 season if they have the mount for my rifle.

I think that given reality I need to use ammo testing to find "classes" of ammo.

If it doesn't group well at 50 meters then it doesn't matter. Stop testing this batch.

If it groups well at 50 meters and doesn't at 100 then stop testing this batch and maybe have another look at it with significantly different weather conditions.

If it groups well at 50 meters and at 100 meters then it passes muster and is worth getting a refined dope figured out and then splitting hairs and seeing what it will do at 300 meters at the specific match temps/weather expected to make a final match ammo decision. And even then, I don't expect a "Ammo A gives me 1.20" at 100 yards and ammo B gives me 1.29" at 100 yards therefore Ammo A is better." This isn't reality.

I'm looking for Ammo A and B get groups of less than 1.5" and Ammo B seems to be slightly more consistent at 300 meters but really either or will work for match ammo

This is honestly what makes CRPS so entertaining and infuriating I think.
 
Yes it can drive you nuts. I have burned so many different ammo boxes and thousands of dollars on ammo that is incompatible for what I am shooting, even when you think you find that magic batch you probably only have 500 rounds of it and you will never see that lot number again. Start over, weather changes, start over.
I always try my best to check my numbers the day before but that doesn’t always work either as environment changes.
Made the mistake of taking a combination that performed well up to 100 yards to a match, turns out it would not group past 150 and most of my targets were 150 to 300 yards, drove me nuts all day
 
In the winter I place all my rounds of ammunition in the heated pockets of my Milwaukee jacket. On high.
The ammo temp in the boxes never dips below 13c which helps a great deal. The other heated pocket is for loaded mags. Heat transfer keeps them at a nice toasty 15c.
When dropping a used mag it goes back into the ammo pocket to keep warm.
 
Mystic Precision said:
I think you are missing the point....

No matter......

Those that compete in CRPS and other forms of LR rimfire PRS will likely understand what I am suggesting.... sorts through alot of ammo options in a big hurry.
Click to expand...

Clearly, someone has missed the point.

You recommend ammo testing to begin at long range, 250 yards at a minimum, better still at 300.

On the other hand, I've explained why testing at such long distances has too much room for error to make them useful and reliable.

Perhaps you have ammo testing confused with practising for shooting a competition. There's a big difference between the two. One is for evaluating ammo performance in order to assess what may be good for use when it matters. The other is improving, developing, or maintaining one's shooting skills. Whether its for 50 yard bench shooting or long range steel targets, testing ammo and practising shooting are distinct. To be sure, testing can also be practise, but unless a shooter already knows what to expect from his ammo, the results can be confusing.

You claim that only someone who competes in LR competition understands reasonable limits for testing .22LR ammo. That simply doesn't hold water. It's doubtful that many experienced .22LR shooters, whether LR competitors or not, would endorse the view that ammo testing for LR shooting should begin at 250 or 300 yards. There are too many factors militating against consistent results for testing at those distances.

Someone described shooting at 200 yards as "lobbing" shots downrange. Even if that was too pejorative a term, shooting at further distances could be aptly described with similar words. Bullet drop at 300 yards is 14.5 feet. Consider the more cautious words describing long distance shooting below:

for many platforms, holding 10" at 300yds in calm air is very challenging. Getting 12" consistent hits at distance beyond? So far, it has been more luck then design... NOTE, I am not talking about the hero group but on demand taking wind into account.... take the shot and hit the target every time.... no mulligans, count every shot.
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The only thing I'd change with it is the second word. I'd change the word "many" with "any". If a shooter can't hold 10" reliably at 300 yards, it seems an exercise in futility to test at 300 yards to find out if an ammo is good or not.

It seems the missed point is the idea that ammo testing with .22LR for LR shooting is best done at 300 yards. There is the potential for so many misses that testing ammo at that distance would be a fool's errand.

In the end it seems fair to ask the following question about testing .22LR ammo for long range shooting. If you insist that testing .22LR ammo should begin at 250 yards at a minimum, and is even better at 300, at what range would you recommend centerfire 308 shooters to begin testing their ammo?

Mystic Precision said:
WRT to accuracy at LR, I take the position that rimfire is like shooting centerfire at much further distances. It has been suggested that 100, 200 and 300 yds with a 22lr is equivalent to a 308 at 300, 600 and 1000yds respectively.

A 308 shooting 'factory match ammo' would do very well at 1/2 MOA 300, 3/4 MOA at 600 and MOA at 1000. If you agree with that analogy, the performance we are getting with 22lr is pretty darn close to the same.
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By analogy, if 100 yards for .22LR is comparable to 300 for 308, is 900 or 1000 yards for ammo testing with a 308 comparable to 300 yards with a .22LR? Further, by extrapolation this suggests you would advise someone who is testing 308 ammo to begin at ranges such 750 yards as a minimum, with 900 to 1000 yards better still.
 
Try it and you will understand....

Or not....no matter.

Given the variations in rimfire ammo and set ups, AND the increased distance of this game, may as well get the bad news sorted out as early as possible. Your combo will let you deliver hits on a suitably sized target, or it doesn't. All the typing and thinking isn't going to change that reality.

so 10rds downrange... good or not good, you will have an answer... and if not good, time to start thinking about solutions.

Just sharing some ideas that have helped me get on a number of podiums.

Jerry

PS, Yes, I do alot of testing with my FTR at 800 to 1000yds. Seems to help me get on the podium... but then tune as you see fit.
 
grauhanen said:
Clearly, someone has missed the point.

You recommend ammo testing to begin at long range, 250 yards at a minimum, better still at 300.

On the other hand, I've explained why testing at such long distances has too much room for error to make them useful and reliable.

Perhaps you have ammo testing confused with practising for shooting a competition. There's a big difference between the two. One is for evaluating ammo performance in order to assess what may be good for use when it matters. The other is improving, developing, or maintaining one's shooting skills. Whether its for 50 yard bench shooting or long range steel targets, testing ammo and practising shooting are distinct. To be sure, testing can also be practise, but unless a shooter already knows what to expect from his ammo, the results can be confusing.

You claim that only someone who competes in LR competition understands reasonable limits for testing .22LR ammo. That simply doesn't hold water. It's doubtful that many experienced .22LR shooters, whether LR competitors or not, would endorse the view that ammo testing for LR shooting should begin at 250 or 300 yards. There are too many factors militating against consistent results for testing at those distances.

Someone described shooting at 200 yards as "lobbing" shots downrange. Even if that was too pejorative a term, shooting at further distances could be aptly described with similar words. Bullet drop at 300 yards is 14.5 feet. Consider the more cautious words describing long distance shooting below:



The only thing I'd change with it is the second word. I'd change the word "many" with "any". If a shooter can't hold 10" reliably at 300 yards, it seems an exercise in futility to test at 300 yards to find out if an ammo is good or not.

It seems the missed point is the idea that ammo testing with .22LR for LR shooting is best done at 300 yards. There is the potential for so many misses that testing ammo at that distance would be a fool's errand.

In the end it seems fair to ask the following question about testing .22LR ammo for long range shooting. If you insist that testing .22LR ammo should begin at 250 yards at a minimum, and is even better at 300, at what range would you recommend centerfire 308 shooters to begin testing their ammo?



By analogy, if 100 yards for .22LR is comparable to 300 for 308, is 900 or 1000 yards for ammo testing with a 308 comparable to 300 yards with a .22LR? Further, by extrapolation this suggests you would advise someone who is testing 308 ammo to begin at ranges such 750 yards as a minimum, with 900 to 1000 yards better still.
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I think what he is getting at is that many 22 rounds fall apart around 150. In crps and such events most of the points that really separate wins and losses are 200 plus yards. Most ammo can hold sub 2moa to 150. This is where his thought separates from yours. the o.p. Is asking for crps, which means to me that he wants to know what to use for this type of range. Yes most people only shoot 22 to a max of 100yards, which in this case you are right. In his question Jerry is correct. Look at my Bergara results, the eley tenex was around .1 inch group at 50 yards then at 100 yards was 1.25. Not the tightest group, was very consistent and tight group still but not the best of the day. So I chose the cheaper sk rifle match for crps as it grouped tighter at 100 yards and was still around .25 at 50.
So I guess what I am saying is some ammo shoots better at distance, and you should pick the ammo best suited to what you are doing. Not saying the ammo comes back together or groups tighter at farther distance as that is not true. But some ammo holds together better, I believe there is more to it than es and sd, more a bullet design that corresponds to distance better
 
The problem with keeping ammo in a heated environment during a match environment is it introduces a time variable. Your are told to load and make ready then the command to engage is delayed for some reason. Spotter not ready, or other common such event and the temp of your ammo is starting to rapidly drop. IMHO this temp change introduces a very real dope change in addition to opening the groups up. Obviously the warmer the environment the less of an impact this will be but it's something outside your control during a match so I'd rather keep my dope stable even if it opens up my group size.

Having said that... outside a match where you have full control of the timong... Like during practice sessions this works very well. But I don't think it translates into when it really matters in a reliable manner
 
And when was the last time temps dropped below 15C in the middle of June, July or August? If you are going to compete in the shoulder seasons, there are solutions for that too. Scroll down my FB page....

As you mentioned before... paralysis by analysis.

There is SO much more to focus on....

But pick your poison and have at it.

Jerry
 
Gruahanen isn't wrong but it's kinda pedantic. Absolutely you need to have some familiarity with your own skill-set, the basics of what the ammo will do at shorter ranges before you start ammo testing for CRPS. Generally speaking someone looking at competing seriously in a CRPS has already done that.

I think the point Jerry is making is that there isn't much point of doing extensive ammo testing at 100 meters if you are trying to find ammo that will work at 300 meters as some ammo just falls apart after 150-200 meters and the results do not translate. No point in pulling out your calipers and comparing 1.20" groups to 1.29" groups at 100 meters when you really wanna know what it will do at 300.
 
Dahsira said:
The problem with keeping ammo in a heated environment during a match environment is it introduces a time variable. Your are told to load and make ready then the command to engage is delayed for some reason. Spotter not ready, or other common such event and the temp of your ammo is starting to rapidly drop. IMHO this temp change introduces a very real dope change in addition to opening the groups up. Obviously the warmer the environment the less of an impact this will be but it's something outside your control during a match so I'd rather keep my dope stable even if it opens up my group size.

Having said that... outside a match where you have full control of the timong... Like during practice sessions this works very well. But I don't think it translates into when it really matters in a reliable manner
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Do what you have to in order to win. If waiting on the line for too long, simply grab another mag. Or ask to be reset It's not rocket surgery.
 
Dahsira said:
Gruahanen isn't wrong but it's kinda pedantic. Absolutely you need to have some familiarity with your own skill-set, the basics of what the ammo will do at shorter ranges before you start ammo testing for CRPS. Generally speaking someone looking at competing seriously in a CRPS has already done that.

I think the point Jerry is making is that there isn't much point of doing extensive ammo testing at 100 meters if you are trying to find ammo that will work at 300 meters as some ammo just falls apart after 150-200 meters and the results do not translate. No point in pulling out your calipers and comparing 1.20" groups to 1.29" groups at 100 meters when you really wanna know what it will do at 300.
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Every time there's a new match posted or even a new thread on some aspect of long range shooting there are a lot of new shooters thinking that they might want to try it out. Many of these new shooters are no more experienced with .22LR in general than some of those posting on threads relating to LR shooting. Every time there is misleading information posted there's the very real possibility of screwing up some of those new shooters.

While many long range .22LR shooters do have experience at shorter ranges, a lot of those new-to-LR shooting may not have absorbed lessons of .22LR shooting at any range. It appears that many of them are prepared to skip over shooting at the distances for which .22LR ammo was designed -- 50 and 100 yards-- and go directly to long range shooting. Ignorance can carry risks.

Shooters preferring long range shooting may have a number of reasons for it. Perhaps they are drawn by the relative newness of .22LR long range shooting; perhaps it's viewed as an economical substitute for long range centerfire shooting; perhaps hitting a 12" target with some regularity is seen as less boring as shooting small groups at 50 or 100 yards; perhaps it's a little more sniper-like, more "tactical" or more ruggedly appealing than sit-down-at-the-bench BR shooting; perhaps it's because there are few other .22LR shooting disciplines; perhaps it's because it has a relatively low cost entry threshold, especially in the Production Class of PRS, when compared to the often sophisticated needs of serious BR competition. (Who wants to have to lot test expensive ammo any way?)

But it doesn't matter why so many shooters want to do long distance .22LR shooting. What's important is only that it's drawing newer shooters faster than any other discipline of .22LR shooting across the country. These shooters need reliable information, not the suggestion that when they test ammo, it's best to test it at 250 to 300 yards. That's just dumb.

To be sure, there are some very knowledgeable folks posting. But when misguided suggestions and misleading information are posted without challenge, they risk misguiding and misinforming those who don't know better.

To illustrate, there was a recent thread about a new bullet design that was supposed to revolutionize long range shooting. Some posters naturally enthused about this new bullet as the long-awaited solution to difficulties related to long range .22LR shooting. Unfortunately, but understandably, they were not aware of the limitations on what was possible and what was not with .22LR ammo. At the same time, some long range enthusiasts who ought to have known better thought that centerfire bullets could replace .22LR bullets. For example, it was suggested that the only obstacle to customizing .22LR ammo was the absence of a couple of things, because existing centerfire bullets would do the job and were already here:

If we had access to quality primed brass, dies and suitable powder, bullets will not be an issue

Plenty to choose from....
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The fact is that centerfire bullets are not interchangeable with .22LR bullets because they are of necessity differently designed. This should not be a surprise to anyone knowledgeable and experienced with .22LR ammo.

The reasons for such thinking can only be guessed at, but a sound knowledge of .22LR ammo should have prevented such an obviously wrong-headed idea. Perhaps a basic understanding would have prevented that too. Enthusiasm should never be mistaken for comprehension.

Pedantic or not, ammo testing is more reliably done at ranges such as 50 or 100 yards rather than at 250 or 300. Between the ammo, the rifle, and the shooter, there's so much more to go wrong at 300 yards than there is at 50 or 100. And most fundamentally if ammo doesn't shoot very well at 50 yards or 100 yards, there's absolutely no point in testing it at 300. And in a thread about what temperatures serve testing best, it seems like adding insult to injury to insist that long distance winter shooters are best served by testing at the extreme ranges of what's feasible for .22LR accuracy.

There is indeed no reason to pull out the calipers and hum and haw over 1.20" vs 1.29". Quibbling over one-tenth of an inch at 100 yards is pointless-- unless the difference was seen consistently between one ammo and another. If long distance shooters believe that differences at 100 yards between the ammos available to them will regularly come down to one-tenth of an inch they have much to learn. If ammo is very promising at 50 or 100 yards, by all means it deserves testing further out. The differences between potentially good ammo and that which is not will quite clear.

The best way to separate the wheat from the chaff is at closer ranges, not longer ones. At long ranges there's too much room for error to get reliable results. Why urge shooters to first test at long ranges? The bottom line remains that any ammo that doesn't give good results at 100 yards will not and can not give good results at three times the distance. Offering bad advice is not better than no advice at all. It's just worse. If this is being too academic, too narrow-minded, or too scrupulous about the facts, shooters should feel free to follow the advice to test ammo at 300 yards first.
 
Ever shot a LR rimfire PRS match?

If yes, ever win a LR rimfire PRS match?

As I have said, use the info I have suggested or not... entirely up to you. It is freely given so take it for what you have paid for it.

Use whatever method you want to develop your set up.... its all good.

But let's try and avoid suggesting that what I have offered is misleading or incorrect. It seems to be working very well in the real world.

You can compare match scores anytime.... CRPS match scores are listed on practiscore. And if you are sitting on top of the leader board, just send a link to the matches you have competed in.

'nuff said.

Jerry
 
Jerry, I shoot 50 yard/meter benchrest almost exclusively. Actually it's at 57 yards, the set distance at my club's range. Each year and with each of the cases of ammo I shoot during my six - seven month season, I've learned more. I'm still not done learning. It doesn't take LR shooting to understand how .22LR shooting works, what the limitations are for the ammo, what can reasonably be achieved with a rifle, and what shooters can reasonably be expected to do. That understanding comes from many hours of shooting many, many thousands of rounds of ammo -- no less than three cases last season. And it's worth remembering that the measure of understanding is not necessarily reflected in wins. It is just as easily reflected in the advice given to other shooters, such as the recommendation that testing ammo for long range shooting is best achieved at 300 yards or the claim that centerfire bullets are interchangeable with .22LR bullets.

Of course expectations and standards are specific for every discipline of .22LR shooting. I seek to shoot the smallest groups possible, that is consistent 0.5 MOA for five consecutive five-shot groups (sub-.25" groups at 50 yards). That would be considered exceptional. But that's not easy as the very small number of posters on this forum who have successfully done the full monty can attest. Three and even four groups out of five are close but still no cigar for me.

As a matter of curiosity and to help put things in perspective, if exceptional success when shooting 300 yards with .22LR at a12" steel target is a 100% strike rate, what rate is still considered successful, that is very good? Are many 300 yard shooters exceptional or only a very few?

To focus again on the question at hand in recent posts, you insist that testing .22LR ammo for long range shooting is best done at 300 yards. I think you've conflated ammo testing with practising for competition.

You've conceded that "holding 10" at 300yds in calm air is very challenging" (you're own words), yet at the same time you insist that testing ammo is best done at that range. You want to have it both ways. It's misleading and wrong to recommend testing ammo at a distance where is difficult to hole 10 inches, especially to the many newer shooters reading here who don't understand .22LR as you do.

If anyone else regularly tests .22LR ammo for long range shooting at 300 yards and shares Jerry's advocacy for it wishes to offer validation of the exercise, they are encouraged to do so. Jerry, if you wish to explain more fully why testing is better and more valid at 300 yards than it is at 100, please take the time to do so. I still have more to learn and am willing to change my views when the evidence demands it.

And while you're at it, perhaps you might reveal at what distance you suggest shooters should begin testing 308 ammo, something you've avoided. Many readers will no doubt understand if it's not at the extreme range of 308 shooting, that is at 900 or more yards. Here you may not wish to have your cake and eat it too for obvious reasons.
 
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