Time to move out to 200 yards?

[adk hunter]

With all the great shooters and custom rifles is it time to walk a little further and leave the standard 1'' at 100 behind? So many <.5 moa claims or less has become the norm not exception seems like. I really enjoy those who nut up and post several pics of increasing distance shots. Maybe bugholes and beyond should be a thing... For me this is a better testament to a rifles real abilities. Then the whole rifle system gets tested too. Rifle, scope and driver. My son's .308 Kimber adirondack will put 5 shots under a dime but at 200 yards the little 2-7 firedot can't keep up further out. Thoughts??

 

[WildRose]

With all the great shooters and custom rifles is it time to walk a little further and leave the standard 1'' at 100 behind? So many <.5 moa claims or less has become the norm not exception seems like. I really enjoy those who nut up and post several pics of increasing distance shots. Maybe bugholes and beyond should be a thing... For me this is a better testament to a rifles real abilities. Then the whole rifle system gets tested too. Rifle, scope and driver. My son's .308 Kimber adirondack will put 5 shots under a dime but at 200 yards the little 2-7 firedot can't keep up further out. Thoughts??

Time to step up to the 3-18x50 with the TMOA reticle and he'll be ready to stretch it well on out.

 

[jpfrog]

For this forum, 200 yards seems like a better gauge of performance probably. However, outside of this forum, 100 is still much more common, and even closer ranges are the norm the further east you go (especially in timber). 100 yards will probably remain the standard for a while simply because it's the bar, and has been for just about as long as a bar has been around. It's also easier to find 100 yard ranges where you can go and shoot relatively easily. Longer distance ranges are generally accessible through private memberships or at least more expensive for a day pass, at least around where I live.

Now, on this forum and on LR competition focused forums, I think you'll probably start to see more of a trend where 200-300 yard groups are posted as well as hits on steel out around 700-1200.

 

[gohring3006]

100 yards is great for measuring a rifles capabilities. 200 yards won't show anything that 100 won't. With that said, you can shoot as far or as close ss you want. If a rifle is 1 to 1/2 Moa out to 1000 yards, then it becomes a measurement of shooter ability. If we want to really get technical, why not 500 yard groups? It's because wind and parallax becomes a influence and you can't determine a rifles ability with doubt introduced into the equation.

 

[slas]

I practice and target shoot at 200 yards minimum these days and have all my rifles zero'd there also. My main deer hunting spot gives me just over 300 yard shots, most of them being in the 200 yard range, so works perfect for me. I also feel like I'm getting more of a challenge trying to get my reloads to 1 moa from there.

 

[memtb]

With all the great shooters and custom rifles is it time to walk a little further and leave the standard 1'' at 100 behind? So many <.5 moa claims or less has become the norm not exception seems like. I really enjoy those who nut up and post several pics of increasing distance shots. Maybe bugholes and beyond should be a thing... For me this is a better testament to a rifles real abilities. Then the whole rifle system gets tested too. Rifle, scope and driver. My son's .308 Kimber adirondack will put 5 shots under a dime but at 200 yards the little 2-7 firedot can't keep up further out. Thoughts??

Having access to a 300 yard range in the backyard, is a huge plus. We develop a potential load at 100....then prove or disprove at 300 yards. As these are hunting rifles, and 600 to 800 yards is our absolute maximum range we would consider shooting game....a 10x is adequate, but maybe a little low on power at the longer distances. If tiny groups or longer distances on game is on the menu.....then greater than 10x would be very desirable! As we hunt in various conditions (timber to open country), we need to keep our low-end power, fairly low. We're using 3.5-10 Leupolds on our hunting rifles. On our longer range "plinker".....we're running a 5-25!
With our 10x's, on our "sporter weight" rifles....we can go .75 to 1.0 moa, fairly regularly. This is from a bench, with 9.0 pound, unbraked, fairly high recoil rifles (338. WM and a .375AI). memtb

 

[WildBillG]

I think moving out from 100yds starts to show the shooters ability. I have found often that my groups more than double when I move from 100 to 200yds. It is my belief that is me not the guns ability. This summer I finally stretched my range out to 200yds and will now shoot more at that distance. My goal is to be able to get to 400 somehow on my range. In the end I goess what I am saying is that the farther we practibe at the more we learn how good of shooters we are.

 

[Plinker147]

100 yard testing does and always will have its place. To say its not useful would be incorrect. I have never had a load that had low ES and SD that shot good at 100yds change at distance.

When developing loads I shoot my .5 gr increase ladder loads in groups of 3's with targets on same horizontal line at 100 yards to compare nodes. I probably shoot a few more test rounds this way but in one trip to the range I test pressure, nodes, and groups all at the same time.

If you don't have a chrono, testing at further distance 300+ will show with vertical spread which usually means your ES and SD are having too much variation.

 

[WildBillG]

I was trying to say that when we shoot farther out our abilities truly begin to show. I still believe that 199yds shows what the gun and load can do but farther out shows more of what we can do.
When I shoot my bow I practice at long range to sharpen my ability and it truly does. Any mistake you make up close may not be noticable but farther out it will show up big time. The same with our rifles little mistakes under 100yds may go unoticed but at 200 you see it a bit but at 400 and beyond could be a miss or a wounded animal. Plinker you are right by saying that without a chrono we don't know our ES andSD but 300yds will show it to us. That is if we can shoot well enough at longer range which is a skill of its own.

 

[RevJim]

I've had several good loads, in many calibers, that did well at 100. They then fell apart at 300. Some bullets even do better at 200-300 than at 100 as they take that long to "go to sleep". You can't ignore the "yaw" that any longer bullet makes as it exits the muzzle. And, benchrest technique becomes an acquired skill, its not learned quickly.
I always enjoyed doing a lot of hunting positions at 200yds. I did it at 100yd/6 inch bull with a scoped .22 magnum a few months before my first South Africa trip. I did a lot of "off hand", standing shots, none over 150yds.
Later on, when I had access, I always shot out to 500 from hunting positions, just in case I needed to finish a wounded critter. I never shot any game over about 375, but its good to know where ones rifle hits further out. I've always been a point n shoot kinda guy, for hunting. If I was shooting over beanfields, had the time, I'd use the dial em in method and have a heavier rifle. I admire anyone who has the skill and equipment to shoot really long range, I have learned/gleaned a lot of great info from their experiences, that's why I "hang out here", ha.

 

[Wedgy]

If you want to shoot animals at 100 yards then practice at 100 yards. If you want to shoot animals at 500 yards, then you should practice at 500 yards, and so on.

 

[Hand Skills]

I've used relatively low power scopes with relatively thick reticles for many years. They can be tough to group with because the reticle covers so much of the target.

Target design plays a big role.

I've found I can shoot little groups with thick reticles with the right target. Moving from 100-200, if you double the target size the optical relationship of crosshairs to target will remain constant.

With my Leupold firedot I use WHITE electrical tape to make a 1moa square on cardboard. The crosshairs nearly cover the square, but due to the high contrast (black on white) it's easy to see if I'm centered on the aimpoint or not. Easy to scale to any distance.

Here I see a fun link;

http://www.targetz.com/targets01.htm

 

[slas]

If you want to shoot animals at 100 yards then practice at 100 yards. If you want to shoot animals at 500 yards, then you should practice at 500 yards, and so on.

Don't go bringing common sense and logic into this......

 

[memtb]

I've had several good loads, in many calibers, that did well at 100. They then fell apart at 300. Some bullets even do better at 200-300 than at 100 as they take that long to "go to sleep". You can't ignore the "yaw" that any longer bullet makes as it exits the muzzle. And, benchrest technique becomes an acquired skill, its not learned quickly.
I always enjoyed doing a lot of hunting positions at 200yds. I did it at 100yd/6 inch bull with a scoped .22 magnum a few months before my first South Africa trip. I did a lot of "off hand", standing shots, none over 150yds.
Later on, when I had access, I always shot out to 500 from hunting positions, just in case I needed to finish a wounded critter. I never shot any game over about 375, but its good to know where ones rifle hits further out. I've always been a point n shoot kinda guy, for hunting. If I was shooting over beanfields, had the time, I'd use the dial em in method and have a heavier rifle. I admire anyone who has the skill and equipment to shoot really long range, I have learned/gleaned a lot of great info from their experiences, that's why I "hang out here", ha.

I think that I "may" be experiencing a similar situation ("go to sleep") with my rifle. When I was developing the load, I wanted to use a specific bullet. I was very pleased with the velocities....but not so much with the groups. But, as this was a "hunting rifle", and "not" a dedicated long range rifle....I decided that I could live with it.
My 100 yard, 3 - shot groups averaged around .75 to 1.25"... acceptable, but barely! As we typically hunt where longer shots are the norm, we zero at 300 yards. A few days ago, when doing a zero check for the upcoming season....my 300 yard shots where almost identical to my 100 yard shots. Granted...my shots at 300 were only 2 - shots adjust the scope and shoot again. I got a group (2 shots) 7/8" ccenter to Center, adjusted the scope and shot another 2, going 1.25" center to center. With my limited knowledge, my logic suggests that the groups should triple (3x) size at 3 times the distance....especially when only using a 10x scope. Perhaps, I'm seeing some of this phenomenon!
I saw this happen many years ago, with a friend. His preferred bullet shot terribly at 100 yards, only grouping around 2". But, when stretched out to 300 yards... his groups went to 1.0 to 1.5"! The bullets " going to sleep"....was our only explanation! memtb