50 bmg advise

[Fiftydriver]

The ballistic advantage of the 50 BMG is certainly not in bullet drop. In fact, a 50 BMG will have a trajectory nearly identical to a 300 Win Mag. Not bad but nothing special either. Where they do shine is in wind drift and kenetic energy payload. With the right bullets you get into the .9 to 1.0 BC class and the better loads will carry 6000 ft/lbs of energy out to 1000 yards or close to it.

That said, compared to some of our more modern magnums of smaller caliber, there really no comparision as far as drop or drift numbers. Consider using an aluminum tipped bullet in something like my 338 Allen Magnum. Then you have a .9 BC bullet at +3500 fps!!! Kenetic energy loads are much less but in every other catagory, they make the 50 BMG look rather silly ballistically.

But, as has been mentioned, the 50 BMG just has that fun AWE factor as they are so big, so loud and just all around impressive.

Barrel life, A 50 BMG on a bolt action has a very long barrel life. I have seen some that had well over 3000 rounds still shooting very well. At least thats what the owners said theyhad through them. Consider this however, for those 3000 rounds, you would have nearly $10,000 in loading componants if you used Hornady 750 gr A-Max bullets, H-50BMG powder and CCI-35 primers.

Simply put, most will not put a high volume of shooting through a 50 BMG unless they have alot of money. You can certainly lower cost with surplus componants but generally accuracy and consistancy drops off as well.

Keep the barrel cool and you will never have much of a barrel problem.

 

[LouBoyd]

Sure everyone likes gun porn. I'm surprised to hear a 50 MOA base is needed on one of these. I guess they just lob those big bullets out there? How long do the barrels last on these cannons? Also in your opinion is the A-Max the best bullet choice for shooting into the dirt?

A 50 MOA base on any rifle is useful if the scope has at least +/- 50 MOA of vertical adjustment and you need to handle more than 50 MOA of drop. At it's maximum supersonic range a 50 BMG will likely have more than 50 MOA of drop, especially if shooting heavy alloy solids lke the Barnes 800s. A Leupold 16x40 scope is a good choice for a 50 BMG as it has 140 MOA of vertical adjustment. and could use a 50 MOA base. I have a 40 MOA base on mine allowing it to be used to 110 MOA of drop. On my heavy 50 that's about 2500 yards and transonic. I've not tried to shoot it at that range.

The A-Max bullet (and the Barnes 750 and 800) is likely to be too long to fit repeater magazines but should work in most single shots.

I have two very different 50 BMGs. One is a Pauza P50 Carbine (24" 5 shot semi-auto). It shoots standard 50 machine gun ammo from a 5 round magazine. At 25 Lbs it's fun to shoot offhand standing, but I can only do two shots rapid fire from the shoulder without losing balance. It's not fun to carry any significant distance. The recoil is not painful but the muzzle blast gets to my chest and sinuses with just a few shots. It's the best adrenaline generator I own.
http://www.freshourmfg.com/gunbuild/p50/pauza.wmv

The other is a McBros "Johnson action" single shot with a 40" K&P barrel. Just the barreled action weights 50 pounds It has no brake. It's well supersonic at 2000 yards shooting 800 grain Barnes bore riders. Surplus ammo won't even chamber. Its muzzle velocity is only 2675 fps (90% SAAMI load) but it delivers over 3000 ft-lbs at 2000 yards with a drop of 71 MOA (200 yard zero). It's accuracy is wind and velocity dispersion limited but a 7mm STW will shoot that far with a lot less fuss. Its not much fun to shoot mostly because bullet holes aren't visible at 2000 yards. There's just too much to set up for shooting session. I built it for ballistics experiments about 15 years ago.

My recommendation for the OP? I think the LAR Grizzly "Big Boar" bullpup is a practical design. The trouble with most 50 BMG light rifles is that they're either too long and heavy to handle comfortably or they have short barrels and waste the performance of the cartridge. Rapid fire is not much of a virtue in a shoulder fired 50 BMG. Repeaters are faster but do you really want to carry the extra ammo in a magazine?
largrizzly.com - Grizzly Big Boar

A long barrel makes more efficient use of the energy of the slow powder used in the 50 cartridges and reduces muzzle blast, which can easily be worse than the recoil. Pistol length 50 BMGs exist but they have low muzzle velocity. The muzzle brake can then use most of the propellant's momentum to make them nearly recoilless, but the muzzle blast is very unpleasant. ( I fired one shot from a Maadi Griffin pistol and I don't want one). The M2HB machine gun has a 45" barrel. I'd suggest 36" as a good tradeoff for a light (25-30lb)rifle You will want a brake on any 50BMG rifle unless it transfers it's momentum directly to the ground. (like the M2HB). Barrel life is about the same as for a 7mm Rem Mag but you're a lot less likely to shoot it enough to wear it out.

 

[LouBoyd]

deleted

 

[jorvin]

kirby, i got mine on GB new unfired from a gun shop in montana. i think he had it in stock for a long time plus i got it when the econ. was tanking (unlike now LOL). i looked for a long time to find a good deal. your $2800-3000 price you can find on a more regular basis. thanks for the bipod/screw idea i will look into that!!!

 

[jmason]

My recommendation for the OP? I think the LAR Grizzly "Big Boar" bullpup is a practical design. The trouble with most 50 BMG light rifles is that they're either too long and heavy to handle comfortably or they have short barrels and waste the performance of the cartridge. Rapid fire is not much of a virtue in a shoulder fired 50 BMG. Repeaters are faster but do you really want to carry the extra ammo in a magazine?

What kind of trigger is on the LAR? Can it be replaced?

 

[jorvin]

i got the AR-50 because it is the most acurate (i think) out of all of them. why buy a gun that looks cool but will not shoot!!! remenber this game is $5 bucks a bullet. thats alot of money not to shoot MOA.

 

[J E Custom]

i got the AR-50 because it is the most acurate (i think) out of all of them. why buy a gun that looks cool but will not shoot!!! remenber this game is $5 bucks a bullet. thats alot of money not to shoot MOA.

Don't wan't to scare people off from the big 50 so I thought I would give some perspective
to the price of ammo for the beast.

50 BMG re loads from $3.70 each to $5.18 each depending on what bullets you buy unless you
have to buy your brass up front.

I found a source for New PMC loaded ammo for $3.34 each (New brass and Boxer primed) that
was cheaper than I could reload and it is very good ammo and has good brass. so I bought
as much as I could afford at the time and will buy more in the future.

The point is that there are Lot's of calibers out there that cost more than the fifty to buy or
reload. And some of the specialty calibers are much higher in cost.

As an example=All of the 378 Weatherby cased ammo is much more (around $7.60 each).
and there are Lot's more that exceed the cost of the 50 BMG (Go Figure, It Has got to be
demand because with a case capacity of 260grs+ and 650 to 800gr bullets ) it has to cost
the manufacture more to load for the 50.

Any way I just wanted to share what I found out after getting into the 50 BMG business.

J E CUSTOM

 

[Fiftydriver]

As mentioned the LAR Grizzly is a great rifle. I cut my 50 BMG teeth with a grizzly with the match chamber and trigger. Very accurate rifle. That said, it was difficult to shoot because it was not overly steady in the bags because of its short wheel base.

Yes its more compact but its not all that much lighter then any other 50 BMG and I grew tired of the need to get off the rifle for each shot to remove the bolt to clear the rifle. It is true you can get more performance out of the 36" barrel length but I have fitted the AR-50 with 45" long straight cylinder 1.700" barrels and had no problems at all with that platform handling the barrel weight and performance!!! Chambered in my 510 AM we were able to hit 3100 fps with a 750 gr SMK in that barrel length but you needed two guys to set it up!!! LOL

Also mentioned is cost of the ammo, yes its expensive to shoot, but consider this, You can get match bullets for around $2 each. Very similiar to what we are paying for much smaller custom aluminum tipped bullets. Brass is not cheap but you can get it for around $1.50 each, still compare that to even a 338 Lapua not to mention a 338-378 Wby case!!!! Twice that much easily.

Primers are expensive, $20 to $25 per 100 so they are nearly 10 times more then standard primers but in the scheme of things still pretty reasonable.

Powder can get expensive if you use commerical powder which I generally do but if you load practice loads with surplus powders, you will cut your powder cost by 2/3s.

In the end, a loaded round for a 50 BMG is no more then a match load for many upper end big game hunting rounds with todays ultra premium bullets. If you go out and out 500 rounds through it on a weekend, it will hurt your pocket book but I do not know anyone with a 50 cal that does this.

Take the rifle out when you take the other rifles out and shoot 10-20 rounds through it here and there and its very enjoyable and not overly hard on the cash flow either.

 

[Fiftydriver]

A little 50 cal porn for you guys.

The Armalite muzzle brake was retained for one simple reason, ITS AMAZING!!!

 

[japple]

Kirby,
That is one very sexy Rifle!!!!!

BTW would like to hear some more about that Raptor action!

 

[Pdvdh]

Very impressive. Talk about a muzzle brake! Reminds me of a Cobra's head compared to it's slender body.

 

[jorvin]

sweeeeeet! kirdy

 

[Fiftydriver]

Japple,

Go down to the Barrels, Bullets and Ballistics board and there is a post telling all about the new Raptor. Just do not want to hijack this post with an of topic discussion.

Thanks.

 

[jmason]

well it's all just a pipe dream for me now boys! My wife just decided we need new furniture more than a BMG.