Accuracy - What happens when it rains?

[Still Shooting]

For a lot of years, I have wondered about rain and rifle accuracy....
-Does rain impact accuracy (does it deflect bullets)?

-If yes, how heavy a rainfall does it take to make a noticeable difference?

-Does velocity affect performance in rain; i.e., does the shock wave in front of a bullet deflect rain?

-What about snow?

Has anyone on the forum "played" with this enough to have some good info? I have never shot in a controlled situation (range, long range) to reach any conclusions myself, but I'm pretty curious about it.

 

[TonyAngel]

I really don't have an answer for you, but I'm curious about this as well. I went to shoot a rimfire match this past Saturday and the weather was so bad with the wind and rain that a few guys didn't even shoot. We, die hards, did it anyway. Funny this was that my point of impact didn't change at all. All I did was hold for wind the way that I usually do.

 

[taliv]

if a drop of rain actually hit your bullet, yes, it would deflect it but the odds of that are extremely low. think about a "heavy" rain is maybe 1" per hour. the drops are really spread out.

i shoot (long range) in the rain every chance i get and can't remember ever having a bullet deflected that i could tell.

the two biggest differences is that if you get water in your chamber, it can raise pressures significantly, and it's easy to "see" the wind when it's raining

 

[Smokey Joe]

Bullets in the rain...

This question has been around for quite a while. I understand that it's covered in Hatcher's Notebook, and that the answer is that a bullet travels inside a bubble of its own making, and the raindrops never penetrate that. What happens to a bullet IF it (and its bubble) should hit a much-slower-moving raindrop, especially at an angle instead of exactly head-on, I can imagine but can't prove.

According to Hatcher, at any rate, as I undestand it, the rain has no effect on the bullet.

Even in a tropical downpour, there's an awful lot of air in between each raindrop, so I suppose raindrop vs. bullet collisions are rather rare in any case.

And even a subsonic bullet is traveling far faster than a falling raindrop.

 

[k soze]

I have shot in very heavy rain. I was not doing series target shooting but with the .22 WMR at 100 yards I could heat be bullet hitting the rain as it went down range.

 

[Smokey Joe]

HUH???

Whaaa?

 

[LeonCarr]

Once upon a time I shot a deer in the pouring rain with a Ruger Redhawk .44 Magnum. The muzzle blast literally blew/vaporized the raindrops out of the way for a split second...it was pretty neat .

I guess accuracy was not affected...the buck was DRT.

Just my .02,
LeonCarr

 

[goon]

I've shot some in the rain but usually I try to avoid it. One time I was out with a FAL and it started to pour. Since the rifle and loaded magazines (and myself) were already soaked, I figured why the hell not?
So I locked and loaded and shot a few groups at 100 yards. They were their normal 2" or so variety. Then I fired a 20 round rapid fire group as fast as I could reacquire the sights and send it. The group was only about the size of my fist.
My conclusion: The rain affected me more than it did the rifle.

BTW - I thoroughly cleaned and slathered her with a heavy coat of oil when I got home.

 

[Walkalong]

I have shot Benchrest in the rain and for all intents and purposes, the groups being shot remained consistent.

On occasion folks would talk about a round not reaching (or hitting anyway) the target. We always figured it was a bullet hitting a rain drop dead on.

Basically the rain seemed not to matter. I have shot in rain so bad we could hardly see the targets, and many small groups were still shot.

 

[rcmodel]

+1

We shot Army Basic training Trainfire to 300 meters in the pouring rain.
Later later we shot Army AMU long range rifle matches in the rain too.

Scores went down a little because of poor visibility and water in the sights and your eyes.
Not because the bullets were hitting raindrops.

rc

 

[loose noose]

I shot my Ruger 10" bull barrel MkII in a small bore steel silhouette contest about 15 years ago and the best I could figure, the rain did get in my eyes, and on the sights, and I shot my usual terrible shoot. Now that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

 

[LTR shooter]

I've actually shot some pretty good groups in the rain so I have to side on the others that say it does not seem to hurt accuracy.

 

[chrome_austex]

Back when I shot a lot of smallbore, we'd look forward to rain.

When it rained, the wind usually died down.

 

[Driftertank]

So i once went shooting with a friend and his Weatherby .22-250 out in Laramie WY. We had soda cans set up at about 200 yards. It started raining hard on us partway through. I lined up one shot and pulled the trigger, and saw 3 impact points, about 4 inches apart. My friend saw it too. We were fairly baffled. I figured the bullet, a PMC Starfire, must have struck a large raindrop and fragmented in midair.

Reading other posts here, sounds like the odds against that happening are astronomical.

Anyone ever have bullet failure/seperation with Starfires at really high velocities? Or did i manage the equivalent of the MLB pitcher who accidentally nailed the pigeon with a fastball on national TV?

 

[xmanpike]

I'm curious as well, b/c I have actually heard really fast rounds, e.g. 220 swift moving >4400 ft/sec would actually hit raindrops and blow apart because of the impact. Could there be truth to this?

 

[Driftertank]

The only reason i think it's plausible in my case is the construction of those particular bullets: they have a big cavity and very thin, almost delicate jackets (gilding-metal?) crimped into 5 petals at the nose. At the velocity of a .22-250, i imagine anything coming in contact with it would cause almost explosive expansion or fragmentation.

 

[Vaarok]

In a heavy rain you'll see a shockwave trail following your bullets, but they create a cavitating bubble that blows the water out of their path.

 

[osprey176]

Drifter,a bullet with a microscopic flaw could break apart in midair from centrifigal force alone.Some of the lighter bullets designed for the Hornet velocities won't stay together at .22-250 speeds.Or you hit a raindrop and it just broke up.As far as rain affecting accurracy,of course it does.It rained last friday,thats why I missed those prairie dogs this morning!

 

[Driftertank]

That's why i wondered if anyone had ever had issues with separation or fragmenting with those rounds....i'm perfectly willing to consider those possibilities. But then, i would expect an inherent flaw to manifest at or just beyond the muzzle, where it first meets clear air, and therefore give an impact spread much larger than 4" @ 200yd.

Either way, it was a fluke, lol.

BTW, apologies for threadjacking...

 

[beatledog7]

The targets get wet.

 

[mortablunt]

Shooting in heavy rain looks just plain cool. It doesn't hurt accuracy either. The only projectiles deflected by raindrops were those flechette rounds that the Army was testing for a 12 gauge shotgun, which were extremely tiny, travelling quickly, and very narrow.