Your First Shot on a Cold Bore is the most important.

[JGRaider]

I take a cold bore shot every range trip, extremely important to me

It is THE most important shot especially as a hunter (quite obviously). I've never shot a 10 round group in my life, as I consider it a waste of ammo. I will take the same target though, and shoot several 3 shot groups over several days at it. I've never shot more than 3-4 rounds at a game animal in succession in my hunting life (52 years now).

 

[DangerRanger]

i have not had any issues with my cold bore shot not falling within my guns larger group.

Imo cold bore shots are tracking my performance not my rifles

 

[Article 4]

i have not had any issues with my cold bore shot not falling within my guns larger group.

Imo cold bore shots are tracking my performance not my rifles

It can definitely be both. One way to be sure is to take one on a vise or shooting rest...if you ever wanted to be anal about it, which no one here ever does, especially not me LOL

 

[DangerRanger]

My experience mimics the cold bore test form did on here.

The only rifle I have shot that I think may have exhibited this was a browning BAR which makes since given the forend is held in place with a sling stud directly through the handguard into the barrel and is not free floated.

None of my bolt guns or ARs toss cold bore fliers and all have had multiple 10 round groups to see if they might.

 

[JohnJohnson]

I haven't noticed any cold shooter / cold bore shots since I got serious about shooting 8-9 years ago. Since then I've only shot custom barrels though so I doubt they're likely to have any deviation at all. I think my heavy guns, small cartridges, and suppressors prevent the cold shooter part.

 

[ElPollo]

I’ve owned one gun that I had to pay attention to cold bore shots on. It was a Savage 99 built in 1971 and the POI would climb 4-5 inches high and right at 100 over a 5-10 shot string. Sold it. If any gun even hints at POI shifts due to heat, it’s going down the road or getting rebarreled.

 

[pharmfisher]

A buddy and I try to do something similar every other week throughout the summer. I have 2 targets set up about 1/2 mile behind my house; one at roughly 550 and one at roughly 680.
We load our packs to roughly 30lbs and take off from my house on foot. It’s all uphill and we make sure to push it.
Once we’re within 50 yards of the shooting area one of us will go ahead and pick a spot to shoot from and set up a spotter real quick. We try to pick a different spot every time so that the terrain you’re setting up in is slightly different, be it under a tree, or on uneven ground.
Once guy #1 gets into position, guy #2 continues up the hill at hunting speed. Not still hunting speed, but moving through deer country speed. When guy #2 has seen the target, guy #1 starts the stop watch. Obviously the quality of the shot is vastly more important than speed, but we like to get as efficient as we can at throwing our pack off, setting the rifle up, ranging the target and dialing the scope.

We take turns doing this until each of us has fired 5 rounds. We do it in the evening and be sure to put our rifles in the shade of a tree after each shot. The barrels seem to be back to ambient temperature by the time it’s your turn to shoot again.


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Sounds like a ton of fun. You are fortunate to have a buddy that's willing to practice with you like that! Makes it more enjoyable.

 

[khart_6882]

Sounds like a ton of fun. You are fortunate to have a buddy that's willing to practice with you like that! Makes it more enjoyable.

It is for sure! I’ve done it solo plenty but it’s not nearly as fun, feels more like a chore.


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[Thegman]

I agree the first shot on a cold, not clean, bore is the most important.

I don't do anything really systematic with that thought, but once I've confirmed a particular load groups well, I do like to "zero-confirm" the rifle with a single shot multiple times (I'm able to do that off my deck though, at home, so it's pretty easy to do). I mark the spot on the target where the impact should be relative to the aiming point. Really "good" rifles/loads are within 1/2" (and usually less) of the intended impact at 100 yards, year after year.

 

[roosiebull]

I never hunt with a clean bore.




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I never shoot with a clean bore… right, wrong or indifferent, I gave up on cleaning barrels a few years ago when I decided I would clean when the rifle quit shooting well… still waiting.

Can’t say I never will, but will not do it unless it’s necessary

 

[Vern400]

I think a ‘clean bore’ shot is more significant than a ‘cold bore’ shot. A lot of the historical data talking about a cold bore shot is actually a clean cold bore resulting in a more dramatic shift than simply a cold bore.

The Marine Corps finally changed its bore cleaning regimen on the M40 series after significant evidence showed that the cleaning affected the cold bore zero more than the cold bore.

That's correct. My go-to long range rifle shoots slightly high on the first 2 shots after cleaning with a little additional dispersion. That's with two passes of a dry patch tight down the bore after cleaning. Shot 3 is very close but not dead on. The next five will typically group about 0.8 sometimes better, sometimes worse but almost never 1 inch.

The group shown only has five shots, but I've done 10. I got so many stinking target pics it's hardly worth finding them . For the rockslide nitpickers, no, my rifle was not zeroed for this load. I was zeroed for 165s.

It is surprisingly consistent.

 

[chindits]

I take a cold bore shot every range trip, extremely important to me

How would someone not without an oven

 

[Jason Snyder]

I take a cold bore shot every range trip, extremely important to me

I see what you did there…