MOA and your rifles!

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atconner

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So I picked up a X-bolt .270 Win a little while ago. I'm starting to get more serious about shooting and am interested in learning more. The Browning website boasts the gun shoots within 1 MOA off the shelf, and the reviews I'm reading are boasting 1/2 to 3/4" at 100 yards. I think after a year or so I'm getting to be a better shot than I was. I'm starting to reload, blah blah blah, and am going to start a notebook this weekend about how I'm shooting with what loads so I can keep track of how I do.

What I'm curious about is what kind of groupings your rifles tend to shoot, and what they are, and how much the rifles cost to get where they are now; I probably spent $1,400 on my X-bolt and Bushnell 3200 Elite scope. I'm very interested in shooting accurately, rather than huge bullets and comparing wiener size through barrel length, etc.
 
my 260 is a 1/2 moa gun Rem700 Tac 21 chassis 22" 1/8 5c barrel

I push little 123gr bullets around 2980fps


cost......hmmm barrel and work 650ish stock 750ish trigger used 75ish scope 1600 mount 200is the ltr was 1200
 
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My .223 Rem 700 SPS will shoot MOA all day at 100 yards with a couple of factory loads, and well under with 69gr SMK & Benchmark. Best groups so far have been .2" at 100, .5" at 200 and 2" at 300.

I'm at about $3k on my rifle now...call it $500 for the rifle, $1000 for the glass, $900 for the chassis and $600 for the stock/grip/rings/mags etc.
 
Most factory rifles out there now are better than you might think.

All factory production offerings I have seen still need a bit of work to really perform.

Bedding the action is always a good idea. It ensures that everything stays the same even if you remove the action from the stock.

Some people will tell you to float the barrel, I believe you are better to try it first and see if it needs it. If it shoots well the first 2 or 3 shots and groups nice and tight but starts to throw fliers for shots 4 and 5, then maybe floating is the thing to do. Remember some barrels like to have a pressure point on the barrel to shoot well.

Start with your scope and mounts. Make sure you have a solid set-up and decent glass. You don't have to break the bank with your first scope, but if you spend too little you will upgrade sooner than you would have otherwise.

Make sure that you don't have any cant on the scope. That is when the scope is out of alignment with the bore of the rifle (ie not square). If you do have cant it will show up when making scope adjustments. Example; Instead of 4 clicks up it goes 2 up and 1 left or right.

Remember to as closely as possible to recreate the exact possition of the rifle on the bags from shot to shot and to try to be as consistent as possible when you are shooting strings. Get a friend who knows how to shoot watch you, hopefully stop some bad habits before they start.

If you don't feel up to reloading, try as many different brands and weights of ammo you can get your sticky fingers on to see what shoots best.

Once you have that juicy bit of info, and you want to start hand loading, start with projectiles of the same weight and try to approximate the factory velocities that your rifle liked. And/or buy up all the ammo you can find your rifle likes!

Once you do all of that you should know your rifle fairly well and should be able to start experimenting with other powders and bullet weights.

As far as costs go..... Anywhere from 1.5K to 4K invested in some of my guns...... It all depends where you are in life and what you can afford to do. If all you can afford is $800, then there is a combo out there that can get you started!

Cheers!
 
I realize there are a bunch of people that claim their guns are 1/2" or better based on one group. Maybe with some load development, that is entirely repeatable. I think it's fair to say that almost any gun will shoot that at some point in time.

I currently have 2 223REMS. Both are good shooting factory guns but the old remington 700 that I have is not fussy and shoots well with factory ammo and very well with handloads. I can honestly say it's a .5moa gun as I have seen that or better on a regualr basis with proven loads. I am not always a .5moa shooter but when I do my thing, this gun is a good shooter.

My Tikka is starting to show signs of being a good shooter too but I am just starting to explore the long range bullets like VLDs and AMAX's. I have noticed that the the brass prep with the faster twist gun seems to be a little more critical to repeatable tight groups.

Either way, handloads and bedding seem to get me my greatest increases in accuracy from the gun when I do my part to shoot well.

Total cost for the REM700 with a 3200 Elite 5x15x40 mildot tactical was around 900-950$. All parts aside from the Boyds stock came from CGN.

The Tikka with the same scope is around 1250.00.
 
To find a factory rifle that shoots ½ moa consistently is extremely rare.
If I own a factory rifle [NOT a custom] that averages under ¾ moa, it is a real treasure, and will never part from my possession.
To average ¾ moa, one has to shoot a lot of ½" groups at 100 yards.
If your X-bolt will average 1 moa, it is a hunting rifle that will be fine for 99.9% of all hunting situations.
If it does slightly better, it is a true gem, and you will definitely have spent your dollars wisely.
Regards, Eagleye.
 
After a while rifle that shoot .5 will make you real proud, but it wont satisfied you, personnaly, the more i shoot the more .25 groups or less is what make me tic, we do invest a lot a money in our rig but we should never be satisfy and level there, i guess passion for shooting never stop... JP.
 
My Remington 700 VTR 243 Win with a AICS stock is a true 1/2-3/4 MOA at 200m.
I spend much of last summer trying to pry smaller than 1/2 MOA groups out of it with absolutely no results, my rifle is a 0.5 MOA rifle, end of story.

The rule of thumb seems to be:
  • Remington 700 repeater 1/2-3/4 MOA
  • custom action (Surgeon, Stiller) repeater 3/8-1/2 MOA
  • custom simple shot (Remington X40, BAT) better than 1/4 MOA

I've seen dozens of "1/4 MOA rifles" which ended up being 1/2-3/4 MOA rifles after serious testing (average of 5 groups of 5 shots) :(

Alex
 
For what i have seen (150 rounds) the Nemesis is a real .25 shooter (pics on my tread Unbackpaking the Nemesis)) out of ... the backpack... JP.
 
I have several rifles that will average ½ moa or less, but none are stock rifles by any means. They are aftermarket barrelled, highly "tweaked" units.
As for factory rifles, I have at least 5 that I can honestly call ¾ moa rifles.
Most are 700 Remingtons, and all are sporter weight rifles.
M700C in 222 Remington.
M721 in 244 Remington
M700C in 300 Savage
M700SSDM in 30-06
Tikka T3 Hunter in 338 Win Mag
Have a whole slew of centerfires that average 1 moa or so.
Couple of lever action M94 rifles that will average 1½-2 moa.
All are more than accurate enough for the hunting they will do.
Regards, Eagleye.
 
I agree with Eagleye most of my true 1/2 moa rifles are customs they have all the work done custom barrel ,bedded good trigger good glass stock etc.

My factory rifles will sometimes get a 1/2 moa group or better but they are inconsistent .
 
Out of the box, under 2" is good. Then clean up the barrel channel, bed the action. That shouldm get you in the 1.00 to 1.5" range.

Then develop a good handload for it. That should get you around 1".

Some rifles have good barrels and even bolt contact, etc. and will do better.

Don't confuse the bragging on here to the average rifle in the real world.
 
Ok for the Nemesis i agree, it is more of a custom rifle but the Icon P.H. 308 cost 900.00 and is a true sub half moa rifle out of the box, a few CGNers own them and can agree... JP.
 
My first accurate gun was a Savage Model 12 VLP in .204 topped with Leopuld VX-II 6-18x40 optics. Cost me about $1500 IIRC

The first time I had it out she printed groups in the 3/4" range with factory ammo. It was my first sub MOA rifle so I was pretty much bitten with the accuracy bug at that point. Over the next few years I shrunk those groups down until it could average in the mid .3's (though on a good day groups in the .2's would not be surprising).

However that took a lot more cash and by then it was by no means a factory rifle. It had a Shilen barrel, SAV-2 Rifle Basix trigger, bedded action and a ton of time spend load testing. The brass had been annealed, neck turned, primer pocket uniformed and neck sized using replaceable bushings. The bullets were seated "long" so it became a single feed only and each round was checked for concentricity, those that did not meet the standard became fouling rounds or ones to be used on short range gophers.

I totally agree with AlexF

I've seen dozens of "1/4 MOA rifles" which ended up being 1/2-3/4 MOA rifles after serious testing (average of 5 groups of 5 shots)
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A single 3 shot group means nothing really. Nor does it mean anything when the guy always eliminates the "flier(s)" in each group.

Still, there is nothing to be ashamed of if you have a rifle that can print 1/2-3/4 MOA consistently.
 
caramel said:
Ok for the Nemesis i agree, it is more of a custom rifle but the Icon P.H. 308 cost 900.00 and is a true sub half moa rifle out of the box, a few CGNers own them and can agree... JP.
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Just like any factory built rifle, The Icon PH varies as to accuracy as well.
However, these are fine rifles, and I would not hesitate for a moment to buy one.
A close friend and hunting partner has one, and it is a true 1 moa rifle, but not a ½ moa one.
I shot one at the Range last fall [owned by a casual acquaintance], and the first group I shot was .56", which is impressive.
Eagleye.
 
Eagleye said:
To find a factory rifle that shoots ½ moa consistently is extremely rare.
If I own a factory rifle [NOT a custom] that averages under ¾ moa, it is a real treasure, and will never part from my possession.
To average ¾ moa, one has to shoot a lot of ½" groups at 100 yards.
If your X-bolt will average 1 moa, it is a hunting rifle that will be fine for 99.9% of all hunting situations.
If it does slightly better, it is a true gem, and you will definitely have spent your dollars wisely.
Regards, Eagleye.
Click to expand...

I sure I don't have the experience you have with rifle. However your post sums up my experience.
I think a lot of people reading the internet get an unreal expectation of what a factory rifle should do. Of course there are always exceptions and they are the ones that get posted I reckon.
 
warrenb said:
I sure I don't have the experience you have with rifle. However your post sums up my experience.
I think a lot of people reading the internet get an unreal expectation of what a factory rifle should do.
Of course there are always exceptions and they are the ones that get posted I reckon.
Click to expand...

This is soooo true!!
Eagleye.
 
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