What is the group size you are happy with?

[43.6N]

19 rounds 22 Creed.
Shot over 2 strings of fire because the mirage was a little thick.
I had fallen on a snowy/muddy scree slope earlier in the day elk hunting, and needed to confirm zero once I was back at the truck.
Which 3 should I have zeroed my scope with?

 

[Packmansion]

View attachment 979707
19 rounds 22 Creed.
Shot over 2 strings of fire because the mirage was a little thick.
I had fallen on a snowy/muddy scree slope earlier in the day elk hunting, and needed to confirm zero once I was back at the truck.
Which 3 should I have zeroed my scope with?

There are some 0.25 inch 3 shot groups in there for sure. You've got a .25 gun buddy lol!

 

[dårlig jeger]

View attachment 979707
19 rounds 22 Creed.
Shot over 2 strings of fire because the mirage was a little thick.
I had fallen on a snowy/muddy scree slope earlier in the day elk hunting, and needed to confirm zero once I was back at the truck.
Which 3 should I have zeroed my scope with?

I think that's the wrong gun/group to be making the point about larger shot number group sizes.

That group is so small and so centered, you'd have a hard time picking three that would need 1/10 of adjustment. I think you could pick any three and have the same functional result. If anything, you're burning barrel life and ammo for little to no gain.

I think once you get over 1.5 moa for 10, it becomes more and more important to use larger group sizes by round count for zeroing.

That's darn good shooting in two strings with mirage. What is your scope/rings setup?

 

[43.6N]

I think that's the wrong gun/group to be making the point about larger shot number group sizes.

That group is so small and so centered, you'd have a hard time picking three that would need 1/10 of adjustment. I think you could pick any three and have the same functional result. If anything, you're burning barrel life and ammo for little to no gain.

I think once you get over 1.5 moa for 10, it becomes more and more important to use larger group sizes by round count for zeroing.

That's darn good shooting in two strings with mirage. What is your scope/rings setup?

Most of the time I would agree.
I originally only shot 3 to check zero. But they were favoring right and low (you can probably see the ones I’m talking about).
The impact from the fall was on the right objective bell, and would have given a right and low group. So I was more worried than usual about a trend. Thus I kept shooting until I felt confident I wasn’t seeing random dispersion.

Definitely not out here burning barrels to make points on the internet.

 

[43.6N]

That's darn good shooting in two strings with mirage. What is your scope/rings setup?

Thanks man.
It’s a tikka project I’ve been working on for a minute.
Older T3 action
0.75 taper less barrel. 16”.
Nx8 in NF rings.
SRS Rail screwed and glued to the action with loctite 380.

At the moment it shot this group, it was wearing a walnut stock I was working on.

 

[KenLee]

Good Lord that axis burned my eyes. I bought a few for kids, but they aren't sniper rifles...except when compared to tikkas

 

[gbflyer]

Man there are some all day long tack drivers on this post. You guys are good!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Hondo64d]

Three 3-shot groups provide 9 data points collected under conditions similar to how the rifle might be used in the field. I could care less what the cone of fire will be after three shots. For a target or varmint rifle 10 shots make perfect sense.

If you shot those 3-shot groups at the same POA, then you’d have a much better picture of what you can count on the rifle to do.

John

 

[BigGrinner]

I am still quite new with reloading rifles.
I am starting to figure some things out finally after a ton of reading and asking questions.
The Thread Form has was a huge eye opener.
Still have some work to do with another rifle using Forms method.

With that said what I have been doing is OCW load dev.
The rifle I picked to do this with is my Savage Axis 6.5CM.
I use it hunting here at home for whitetail.
Factory rounds I have used in it for the last couple of years is the Hornady Precision Hunter 143 ELD-x.
Now I will say with the factory rounds I have only ever shot 3 round groups to zero. It will hold a .750 group. But I have never shot the factory stuff for 10 rounds to see how it will hold that way.

So with my current reloads I started as I said earlier doing OCW.
Started at .050 off the lands. The charge weight I ended up at was 40.9 of H4350 with Hornady Cases CCI primers and a 143 ELDx
As it stands now my 10 shot group with this setup netted me the below group.
View attachment 883723

The 2 outliers were shot 9 & 10. So I think the barrel was starting to move a bit maybe.

So being the person to get bored last night I decided to do some testing with seating depths.
So I loaded 5 each running the same charge and components at .010,.020,.030 & .040 off the lands.
I have the mag length so I wanted to give them a try seated out longer.

So my question to you all experienced guys. When are you happy with a hunting rifle group wise?
I am not a 1000 yard shooter by any means. Maybe at best most shots I would ever have with this rifle in the field is maybe 400.
I have 550 to shoot at my gun club. Which I haven't done yet. But hope to go this weekend.

Would you be happy with the group above for a hunting rifle?

10 shot groups are a lot of shooting for a hunting rifle when chasing tiny groups as the heat tends to build up quickly depending on how fast the follow ups were.
I'd be happy all day with an out of the box rifle with those groups.