Hey guys, quick introduction before I get started. My name is Mitchell Fitzpatrick and I am a Member of the US FTR rifle team for the 2017 Cycle. The past 2 summers I have been working for/interning at Applied Ballistics LLC with Bryan Litz. And yes, I'm only 18. I do most all of my own gunsmithing work and have built 9 rifles, two of them on actions of my own design. I hope this gives me some credibility. 
Ok, now for the fun stuff. In the last few weeks I have finally been able to get out and do some ELR shooting with a couple of my big guns. A .338 Lapua and .300 Win Mag. I have been having some issues getting the .338 to group consistently under half minute so I haven't done a whole lot of ELR shooting with it. The .300 is a different story...
My .300 is a full custom, by that I mean it started as a Bartlein barrel blank (26", 1-9 twist, Heavy Palma contour), McMillan Flat top stock (old A4 style), and an aluminum/steel hybrid action of my own design.
It shoots lights out with 215gr Berger Hybrids, RL-26, CCI-200's and once fired ABM brass from their loaded ammo. MV is 2995 FPS, SD is 6-7. When I say lights out, I mean...
.052 MOA tall by .237 MOA wide at 655 yards. Now I don't expect this on a regular basis, but my point is that it is shooting dang good. Solid sub half minute rifle/load. I've shot this rifle at 1700 yards and gotten sub minute groups, around 13", unfortunately, I don't have pictures of them.
Now, getting back to 2,000 yards. Two days ago I went out to my ELR location (tough to find in Michigan) and set up a handgun silhouette as a target (all the local store had for large paper targets). Then we hoped in the truck and kept driving till the GPS said I was over 2,000 yards. It ended up being 2,025 according to the GPS. Now to get this distance, I had to shoot off the cab of the truck to get high enough to see the target. Not the most stable platform to begin with.
When I first got set up and ready to shoot, the wind was 4-6 MPH according to the Kestrel, at my location. Watching leaves and such down range, I decided to go with 5 MPH at 10-11 O'clock, with Coriolis and spin drift, this was a 1.5 MIL hold. First shot landed a half MIL farther right, mid range wind must have been stronger than I anticipated, perfect elevation though. At least I knew the AB Kestrel was giving me good data. I took a few more shots trying to dial in on the wind, and after a bit, the wind settled into a consistent 1.6 MIL hold.
At this point, I shot 5 shots for a group. On shots 1 through 3, I could easily tell that the dust was being kicked up directly behind the target, definitely a good sign on the 4th shot, I barely seen any dust, I thought to my self, "that must have been low compared to the first 3". On 5th shot, I watched as the dust kicked up 6 inches off the right side of the target, right inline with the silhouette's shoulders. So I knew I had at least one miss for the group, elevation looked good on it though. We packed everything up and took off to go check out the target, really excited to see what we had.
Keep in mind, we are at about 800 feet here, and our air is quite thick, Barometric Pressures are typically north of 29.0 and quit often are around 30.0. Impact velocity for the 215's was 1050 FPS, we were really exercising the transonic/subsonic transitioning abilities of this bullet.
The target:
Shots 1-3 printed an amazing 11" group (.518 MOA!!!), Shot 4 dropped low opening the group to 25.375" (1.16 MOA). There is no way to be certain, but I highly suspect had the wind not caught me on the 5th shot, that it would have been very close too, if not in, the 11" group. All of the holes are perfectly round, showing that the 215's handled the transition really well out of the 1-9" twist.
I am beyond happy with this rifles performance along with the Berger 215's and the Applied Ballistics Kestrel. If I could do my part on the wind, a first round hit would have been possible. I have no trouble saying this equipment is sub minute capable at 2,000 yards, as I am most likely the weak link. Berger Bullets, Applied ballistics, Bartlein barrels, McMillan stocks, etc. all are top quality as far as I am concerned. And its hard to argue with 1 MOA 5 shot performance at 2,000 yards with a .300 Win Mag.
Thanks for reading!
Ok, now for the fun stuff. In the last few weeks I have finally been able to get out and do some ELR shooting with a couple of my big guns. A .338 Lapua and .300 Win Mag. I have been having some issues getting the .338 to group consistently under half minute so I haven't done a whole lot of ELR shooting with it. The .300 is a different story...
My .300 is a full custom, by that I mean it started as a Bartlein barrel blank (26", 1-9 twist, Heavy Palma contour), McMillan Flat top stock (old A4 style), and an aluminum/steel hybrid action of my own design.
It shoots lights out with 215gr Berger Hybrids, RL-26, CCI-200's and once fired ABM brass from their loaded ammo. MV is 2995 FPS, SD is 6-7. When I say lights out, I mean...
.052 MOA tall by .237 MOA wide at 655 yards. Now I don't expect this on a regular basis, but my point is that it is shooting dang good.
Solid sub half minute rifle/load. I've shot this rifle at 1700 yards and gotten sub minute groups, around 13", unfortunately, I don't have pictures of them.Now, getting back to 2,000 yards. Two days ago I went out to my ELR location (tough to find in Michigan
) and set up a handgun silhouette as a target (all the local store had for large paper targets). Then we hoped in the truck and kept driving till the GPS said I was over 2,000 yards. It ended up being 2,025 according to the GPS. Now to get this distance, I had to shoot off the cab of the truck to get high enough to see the target. Not the most stable platform to begin with.
When I first got set up and ready to shoot, the wind was 4-6 MPH according to the Kestrel, at my location. Watching leaves and such down range, I decided to go with 5 MPH at 10-11 O'clock, with Coriolis and spin drift, this was a 1.5 MIL hold. First shot landed a half MIL farther right, mid range wind must have been stronger than I anticipated, perfect elevation though. At least I knew the AB Kestrel was giving me good data. I took a few more shots trying to dial in on the wind, and after a bit, the wind settled into a consistent 1.6 MIL hold.
At this point, I shot 5 shots for a group. On shots 1 through 3, I could easily tell that the dust was being kicked up directly behind the target, definitely a good sign
on the 4th shot, I barely seen any dust, I thought to my self, "that must have been low compared to the first 3". On 5th shot, I watched as the dust kicked up 6 inches off the right side of the target, right inline with the silhouette's shoulders. So I knew I had at least one miss for the group, elevation looked good on it though. We packed everything up and took off to go check out the target, really excited to see what we had.Keep in mind, we are at about 800 feet here, and our air is quite thick, Barometric Pressures are typically north of 29.0 and quit often are around 30.0. Impact velocity for the 215's was 1050 FPS, we were really exercising the transonic/subsonic transitioning abilities of this bullet.
The target:
Shots 1-3 printed an amazing 11" group (.518 MOA!!!), Shot 4 dropped low opening the group to 25.375" (1.16 MOA). There is no way to be certain, but I highly suspect had the wind not caught me on the 5th shot, that it would have been very close too, if not in, the 11" group. All of the holes are perfectly round, showing that the 215's handled the transition really well out of the 1-9" twist.
I am beyond happy with this rifles performance along with the Berger 215's and the Applied Ballistics Kestrel. If I could do my part on the wind, a first round hit would have been possible. I have no trouble saying this equipment is sub minute capable at 2,000 yards, as I am most likely the weak link. Berger Bullets, Applied ballistics, Bartlein barrels, McMillan stocks, etc. all are top quality as far as I am concerned. And its hard to argue with 1 MOA 5 shot performance at 2,000 yards with a .300 Win Mag.
Thanks for reading!
