Hi all
I bought this on a whim last week. I had no plan to buy a 17 HMR, buy why let reason get in the way of buying a gun. I finally got a couple of hours to get to the range today - because the sky was blue and there was no wind to speak of. I had a Nikon buckmaster 6-18 that was not on a gun, so I mounted that and off I went.
I was shocked that after sighting in at 50 yards (about 10 rounds) that this rifle was popping out the middle of the target quite consistently. When I raised the rifle to the 100 yard line the groups opened up quite a bit. I attributed this to the barrel being new and me getting used to the gun. I started shooting Federal 17gr. hp, which was good at 50, and opened up to about 3 inches at 100. The rangemaster was helping me out, and happened to have a few boxes of the Hornady Varmint 17 gr. so I gave that a try. Off the bat, the holes were popping on the threads of the scope. Little to no recoil from this round makes for really sharp consistency.
I found a few spots at the very back of the range where there were pockets if sand that looked to be around 1 - 2 inches across. This would be about 220-230 yards from my spot. Incredible, the rifle was consistently landing a round into these spots without a lot of drop. Shocking.
I was planning to buy a larger centerfire rifle for some target/varmint work, but this may do for at least half that battle. This is a hoot to shoot at distances that make me smile.
The target below is the best of a string 7 shots. There were flyers for sure, but when I concentrated and did my bit, these were the results. The target was at the 100 yard line.
I bought this on a whim last week. I had no plan to buy a 17 HMR, buy why let reason get in the way of buying a gun. I finally got a couple of hours to get to the range today - because the sky was blue and there was no wind to speak of. I had a Nikon buckmaster 6-18 that was not on a gun, so I mounted that and off I went.
I was shocked that after sighting in at 50 yards (about 10 rounds) that this rifle was popping out the middle of the target quite consistently. When I raised the rifle to the 100 yard line the groups opened up quite a bit. I attributed this to the barrel being new and me getting used to the gun. I started shooting Federal 17gr. hp, which was good at 50, and opened up to about 3 inches at 100. The rangemaster was helping me out, and happened to have a few boxes of the Hornady Varmint 17 gr. so I gave that a try. Off the bat, the holes were popping on the threads of the scope. Little to no recoil from this round makes for really sharp consistency.
I found a few spots at the very back of the range where there were pockets if sand that looked to be around 1 - 2 inches across. This would be about 220-230 yards from my spot. Incredible, the rifle was consistently landing a round into these spots without a lot of drop. Shocking.
I was planning to buy a larger centerfire rifle for some target/varmint work, but this may do for at least half that battle. This is a hoot to shoot at distances that make me smile.
The target below is the best of a string 7 shots. There were flyers for sure, but when I concentrated and did my bit, these were the results. The target was at the 100 yard line.
The holdover was decent. It was hard to see where you were shooting at other targets as the little bullet buries right in on impact. I'm liking this gun a lot.
