What is acceptable accuracy out of a 3.2 inch 9mm barrel?

Agsalaska said:

The patterns were much wider than my hand no matter what I fed it.

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Did you shoot from a good rest, both strong hand and weak? If so were the groups similar, or similar but opposite? For instance one group low left and one group low right.

Agsalaska said:

I have come to expect a five shot group at 15 yards to be covered by my hand with the occasional Paul Harrel 'its just me' flyer.

But not today with the HK. The patterns were much wider than my hand no matter what I fed it.

Thanks

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I think your expectation is reasonable for a reasonably talented shooter.

HK's have an excellent reputation for accuracy, though their triggers don't have as good of a reputation. My guess is the gun is fine, it's just a gun you aren't used to, and with practice you'll get to where you want to be.

Though it is possible you may have a bad gun. It's always best to shoot the gun rested if you are trying to figure out accuracy rather than shooting free hand. Also, having another known good shooter give it a go is another option to make sure it isn't just you.

What type of trigger do you have on the HK? DA/SA or LEM? Maybe you are not already used to your new HK trigger even if revolver guys shoot pretty well with everything you put in their hands.
HK has polygonal rifling. My suggestion is to try some "european load" 123gr. or 124gr. FMJ-RN or FMJ-TC and see if accuracy improves.

My opinion (worth what you pay for it) is a palm or fist sized group at 15 yds should be attainable. Definitely if you shoot of a rest. Possibly even 2 handed standing.

The short barrel is not an impediment if you have good technique.

A reasonable expectation would be up to you and the scenario you envision where you would be shooting said gun at 15 yards.

Agsalaska said:

I was disappointed with my groups today. I have come to expect a five shot group at 15 yards to be covered by my hand with the occasional Paul Harrel 'its just me' flyer. I couldn't get that today with four different flavors of ammo. I can do it with 147 gr ammo out of my Kahr. I can also pretty easily do it single action in some snub nose revolvers with the right ammo. But not today with the HK. The patterns were much wider than my hand no matter what I fed it.

So, the question, is that an unreasonable expectation at 15 yards with a 3.2 inch barrel? I walked back from the range with a guy who thought my expectations were unrealistic. . If so, what do you consider a reasonable accuracy expectation at 15 yards?

Thanks

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It would be reasonable to expect the pistol to be capable of much better accuracy than a hand-sized group at 15 yards, and I’m kind of amazed that anyone would say differently. A good mass-production service pistol should be capable of ~2.5-inch groups at 15 yards at the very worst (and I’d personally be disappointed with any pistol that wasn’t capable of significantly better performance).

What the individual shooter is capable of is another matter. If you’re typically shooting hand-sized groups at 15 yards with other pistols, I’m going to guess you’re struggling with the typically lousy HK trigger, as another poster suggested. Try shooting it from a rest and/or asking someone capable of two-inch-or-better groups at 15 yards to shoot it to confirm that the pistol’s mechanical accuracy is not the issue.

Plan2Live said:

A reasonable expectation would be up to you and the scenario you envision where you would be shooting said gun at 15 yards.

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He has already presented the scenario — target shooting.

Kleanbore said:

Where did he do that?

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In the OP. He was attempting to shoot for accuracy at a range (i.e., target shooting), was unsatisfied with the outcome, and now wishes to know whether his expectations were/are reasonable for that scenario.

9mmepiphany said:

The H&K P30 family is fully capable of better accuracy than you're experiencing. At 15 yards, I'd expect groups closer to 1.5"...because I'd expect 2" groups at 25 yards

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Absolutely.

I think this was 15yds rested.

Agsalaska said:

So, a little background. For the first 20 years of my adult shooting/collecting handgun life I almost exclusively bought and shot revolvers. I had one Glock 19 which served its obvious purpose but other than some safe queen collectables the rest of my guns were revolvers.

As we all go through phases I kind of hit a revolver peak and in the last three years or so have focuses mostly on semis. I have or have had several Glocks, two Kahr Arms, Sigs, a couple of XDs, and maybe a couple I'm not remembering.

Anyway I just bought my first HK-an HK P30SK. With its 3.26 inch barrel it is the shortest barreled 9mm I own. The previous shortest is a Kahr K9 at 3.5 inches, a gun that I carry often.

I was disappointed with my groups today. I have come to expect a five shot group at 15 yards to be covered by my hand with the occasional Paul Harrel 'its just me' flyer. I couldn't get that today with four different flavors of ammo. I can do it with 147 gr ammo out of my Kahr. I can also pretty easily do it single action in some snub nose revolvers with the right ammo. But not today with the HK. The patterns were much wider than my hand no matter what I fed it.

So, the question, is that an unreasonable expectation at 15 yards with a 3.2 inch barrel? I walked back from the range with a guy who thought my expectations were unrealistic. . If so, what do you consider a reasonable accuracy expectation at 15 yards?

Thanks

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I don't think it's unreasonable at all. I don't keep inaccurate guns, sometimes a gun just isn't terribly accurate. That said, general HKs are pretty accurate in my experience, so I would rule out user error. Do you have some shooting buddies who can also give it a whirl? If you shoot at a range, maybe a range officer?

Did you try shooting it off a rest, or braced?

If I starting at 15 yards and wasn't grouping, I'd take it back to 7 yards or even 5 just so I see point of aim/ vs point of impact. Once you figure and can put them where you want them you can edge it out farther.

just go shoot it a few more times

I have a P30SK with the LEM trigger. I could not get to grips with the HK and really struggled with it. Eventually, I did the Gray Guns short reset mod and added the Grey Guns flat trigger and it changed the gun completely and it now shoots the way I expected it to. Compared to most semi-autos the HK triggers leave much to be desired. I think your basic, garden-variety Sig P320 is better than 80% of HK’s pistols - striker or hammer fired.

In my experience, it's not usually that the handgun itself is inaccurate. If you put them in a Ransom Rest, most of them will make nice tight groups.

The grips and trigger and overall size/shape of the handgun have to work well with your particular hands and shooting methods.

If it's a poor fit, it won't be accurate for you. Even shooting from a rest it won't be as accurate as a handgun that fits you better.

On a good day with a handgun that fits me well, I can get occasional palm-sized groups offhand at 15 yards. It helps that my palms are very large.

Since you carry a Kahr, you'll understand...

My 2 basic carry pieces are the Kahr CW9 or, alternately, a CM or PM9. Same basic pistol, just 1 round shorter, and .5" less barrel with the 'M's.' If I rest them, I get the same basic accuracy with either pistol... maybe the edge to the CW9, but not by much, at equivalent distances... say 7, 12, and 15yds. After that, the edge definitely goes to the longer CW9. Anyway... shooting offhand, just for fun, I'm always better with the CW9 because of the longer grip, even given the exact same trigger pull between pistols, etc. It simply fits my hand better. It is harder to manage the smaller-framed pistol... for me. Moving to draw-and-shoot drills, or even just offhand shooting between multiple targets, the CW9 wins every time. Because of that, I have gone to carrying only the CW9... demoting the M's to BOB/Backup duty, or unless I just have to have absolute concealment.

I have shot other small-framed automatics... most recently a Hellcat Micro. It was brought to me by a friend for me to shoot. He said the accuracy was so bad he thought there was something wrong. The combination of the short grip and gawd-awful trigger made this pistol an absolute handful to shoot well. I even hunkered down and shot it off an improvised rest, where it did better... but still not even as 'bad' as I shoot with my CM9. It was horrible! I don't think the pistol was inherently inaccurate, I just think the combination of small grip and odd trigger went against it. I have shot other smaller pistols... revolvers and autos... and have done well, but every once in a while you will get a combination that shakes you off. I test drove an HK USP once... a full-sized pistol I really wanted to like... and had issues. At the end of the day, the pistol was just not for me, and I moved on.

I would probably have someone else test drive it for you... just to see what their impressions and results are like. You might try some 115grn ammos, that sounds like the only weight you didn't try, and see if things iron out. Or you just may have a bad example of a reasonable pistol... HK is good, but they are not perfect.

The first thing I would do now is gather up some different brands of ammo in the price range I wanted to use and sit down at a good steady table and shoot off sand bags at 15 yards. The gun might surprise you. I can usually still do a hand sized group at 15 yards standing providing my shaky pills are doing their job and the hand is a large one. I am not embarrassed to admit most of my accuracy problems are now me and not the gun I am shooting.

The gun is accurate. You are getting old. Been there…am there….doing it (slower these days)…LOL!

Buy an optic ready pistol, put a decent dot on it, and don’t look back!

How well do you shoot handguns ... I have a buddy that cant hit the barn from the inside ...
His handgun targets are patterns . I sight his handgun in for him .
For the 9mm semi-auto I like to shoot 15 rounds , from a rest, at 15 yards and if they don't group in a 2 inch circle ... it's a bad day ... or my reloads are the problem

Another +1 on short barrels should be plenty accurate. I remember a 1990s test of a whole pile of 9mm pistols, in a Ransom rest with quite a lot of ammo shot, and there was no correlation between barrel length and accuracy. In fact for this test it was confoundingly that the shorter barrels were slightly MORE accurate.

Anecdotally and adding the human factor to it, my Kahr used to be a conversational distance gun, but when I got into RDS on every gun, it became a head-shots at 25, body shots at 50. And I mean reliably, pretty much Every Single Time. If I shoot it at IDPA, my only question is score not hits at any range, going pretty fast. Tiny, light, DAO and cover the group with your hand at 25 yds if I do my part, and others can shoot such guns much better than me.

Mechanical accuracy is way above what most of us can do.

dry-fire the gun and see if you can get comfortable with that grip/trigger setup. it may never happen if your hand doesn't fit.

caution: no ammo in the room when dry-firing!!

luck,

murf