? on group size and yardage

[martyj]

How come if I can get my rifles to group well at 200 ( .625 3 shot group) yards Im always good the rest of the way out to 500 which is as far as the range goes. My one 300 WM will shoot under 1 inch 3 shot group out to 300 yards.
If I load to get a good group at 100 yards the further distances suffer and group spreads out from .5 at 100 to 2.00 at 200
Does it take time for the bullet to stabilize.
Both my 300 mags are like this and now my 6.5x284 is doing the same thing.
Im not really sure shooting at 100 yards is a good way to judge a load or a rifle.
I guess to sum it up why do I get smaller groups at 200 and 300 than I do at 100 yards.

 

[coyotekiller82]

How come if I can get my rifles to group well at 200 ( .625 3 shot group) yards Im always good the rest of the way out to 500 which is as far as the range goes. My one 300 WM will shoot under 1 inch 3 shot group out to 300 yards.
If I load to get a good group at 100 yards the further distances suffer and group spreads out from .5 at 100 to 2.00 at 200
Does it take time for the bullet to stabilize.
Both my 300 mags are like this and now my 6.5x284 is doing the same thing.
Im not really sure shooting at 100 yards is a good way to judge a load or a rifle.

Increasing group sizes are common when increasing the range at which one shoots.

The most important thing about shooting accurately @ long range is to have a good rest both front and back.

After you get that settled, you now have to shoot the rifle exactly the same from shot to shot to be consistent. This takes practice...lots and lots of practice.

 

[MudRunner2005]

If your group expands from ½" @ 100 to 2" @ 200 sounds like you need to rework that load and do load development at longer ranges to make sure it groups like you want it to.

 

[dragman]

How come if I can get my rifles to group well at 200 ( .625 3 shot group) yards Im always good the rest of the way out to 500 which is as far as the range goes. My one 300 WM will shoot under 1 inch 3 shot group out to 300 yards.
If I load to get a good group at 100 yards the further distances suffer and group spreads out from .5 at 100 to 2.00 at 200
Does it take time for the bullet to stabilize.
Both my 300 mags are like this and now my 6.5x284 is doing the same thing.
Im not really sure shooting at 100 yards is a good way to judge a load or a rifle.
I guess to sum it up why do I get smaller groups at 200 and 300 than I do at 100 yards.

for what it's worth what your seeing when you have a group that shoots pretty good at 200 and then continues being good on the way out it's all about the bullet not being completely stabilized until after 200 yards.
What I do:
shooting @ 100 yards until I have the gun shooting as good as I can get it target for group is always .150" or better at this distance.
Then shoot the group in premium conditions out long 800+ yards if the groups are still sub 1/2 minute then I am done if they aren't I adjust seating depth, neck tension and small things like that until it does what I want.

once in a blue moon it doesn't do either then it goes to the gun smith and gets a new barrel.

 

[FearNoWind]

I only use 100 yards to get on paper. IMO, the data of a 100 yard sample isn't reliable enough to rely upon for long ranges.
After I have it on paper and grouping fairly well (typically - .5 MOA) I move to 300 yards for ladder testing. The ladder test results gives me the most reliable data and I tune my load (including seating depth adjustments) for - 1 MOA at 300 yards. From there I take 'em out, progressively, to 1K using reliable ballistics data based on calculations from actual range results and not some standard ballistics programs.
I tested 3 loads last week, each .1 grains difference. The first 100 yard group was 1.059, the second (.1 grains heavier) was .891, and the third (another .1 grain heavier) .572. That's the starting point for the ladder test on this load.

 

[Mikecr]

for what it's worth what your seeing when you have a group that shoots pretty good at 200 and then continues being good on the way out it's all about the bullet not being completely stabilized until after 200 yards.

This is wrong for sure..
Bullet stabilization is not bullet steering.
There is no force that wills a free bullet path, once deviated from original, specifically back to original.

I consistently manage the same condition as martyj, and purposely challenge my loads at 200yds. Also like martyj, when I'm good at 200, I know I'm better beyond.

MOA-wise, atleast, I always shoot better at 300 than at 100, and 100 seems meaningless.
I don't know why it is, why it's consistent, or why it only happens to some people. But I do know I'm not the only one.
My notion of contributing is prescription glasses and/or parallax.
I typically use 25x+ scope power, with a fairly extreme eyepiece adjustment to reach reticle focus, and it seems easier for me to adjust away parallax as I get further & further out.
Well, it's a theory, and hard to prove.

 

[RHC]

The way I've always done load development at 100 has always had my guns shooting good at 300 and beyond. Send me a PM.

 

[dragman]

This is wrong for sure..
Bullet stabilization is not bullet steering.
There is no force that wills a free bullet path, once deviated from original, specifically back to original.

I consistently manage the same condition as martyj, and purposely challenge my loads at 200yds. Also like martyj, when I'm good at 200, I know I'm better beyond.

MOA-wise, atleast, I always shoot better at 300 than at 100, and 100 seems meaningless.
I don't know why it is, why it's consistent, or why it only happens to some people. But I do know I'm not the only one.
My notion of contributing is prescription glasses and/or parallax.
I typically use 25x+ scope power, with a fairly extreme eyepiece adjustment to reach reticle focus, and it seems easier for me to adjust away parallax as I get further & further out.
Well, it's a theory, and hard to prove.

If your shooting some of the HIGH bc boat tails they don't completely stabilize until around 200 yards or so. My point was a gun that shoots 1" at 200 yards may still be capable of shooting 1" at 500 yards because the bullet is stable and consistent at that point. I will find the combination that will shoot as small as possible
@ 100 then take it out long. I know most here are hunters but there is a lot to learn from bench rest shooters about reloading and some of the small things that take a gun from being a good shooter too a tac driver.

People that "always shoot better at longer ranges" have one of these issues happening:
1 - have a form of target panic (too much pressure to shoot that one hole)
2 - don't have a complete technical idea of reloading on a high or competitive level
3 - have equipment issues with parallax or something like that that they don't know how to deal with.

 

[Mikecr]

A hi-BC bullet can be completely stable as immediately released from a muzzle. Or it could jump with a barrel whip or individual bullet issue. There is no predicting this with anybody else's system, nor 'rule' about it that applies across the board. This would vary with every bullet fired.

With yawing and pitching motion as released, a bullet can present epicyclic swerve.
When the swerve damps out it's spiral radius decreases. However, the initial radius is way smaller than a caliber, and this is seen as the direction of the point of a bullet. It leads to nearly nothing for path displacement because the nose is coning 360deg way too fast as to cause any. If it did lead to measurable displacement, the further dampening out of it negates or removes any undoing of it, leading to permanence of it.
So the effect is not responsible for a tighten up of groups at further distances. The effect of it is slight dispersion(like <.03" by 300yds) that is linear beyond(not decreasing).

If your sleeping bullet notions come from bench rest buddies, you might suggest they put a gun down and pick up a book.
But here is a source of information about bullets going to sleep as attempted to apply to shrinking grouping in MOA(as done by a competitor): Epicyclic Swerve
Please read this, and learn about it, and stop spreading misconceptions about it.