Outshooting a rifle?

[DoubleTapDrew]

This might be a weird thread, but how do you know when you are outshooting your rifle?
There are countless threads about "it's more accurate than I am" but what about the opposite? If everything seems perfect (sight picture, trigger control, breathing) when you break the shot and you have decent follow-through but your groups aren't all in the same hole even though you think you did everything the same is it fair to say you are outshooting the rifle?
I don't consider myself a great marksman but there are range trips with my RRA LAR-8 where I think I'm doing everything right and break the trigger right when I want but end up with 1.5 MOA or 2 MOA groups at 100yds (with match ammo like FGMM 168gr) even though it looks like it should be right in the bullseye.
I ran that Tubbs 2000 process through it and the groups shrank to about 1/2-3/4 MOA but at what point do you figure you can do better and start looking to a better platform? Am I missing anything?
I suppose the best way would be to build some sort of vise that is absolutely consistent from shot to shot, but if you are consistent with the sight picture, trigger control, and call flyers if there is an issue, how do you determine if it's the rifle or the shooter?
I don't have access to some megabucks M24 that will shoot the wings off a gnat.

 

[rb85cj7]

I would say you need to prove to yourself that you shoot better with a better rifle. You also need to try out different ammo because that is just as much as anything else.

If you can borrow a gun that consistently produces .25" groups and you shoot 1" groups then you know where you stand. If you can only borrow a 1" gun and you shoot 1" group you have accomplished the same thing.

 

[animator]

I have an AK that I built from an unfired romanian kit. It can hold 3-4" at 100 yards with steel ammo when I'm not trying.


I have a yugoslavian AK that I built from the civil war that has seen it's fair share of action and abuse. It can hold 6-8" at 50 yards.


It is safe to say that I can outshoot the yugo.

 

[tarosean]

Do you reload??
If not IMO you need to rule out your bullets. So start reloading so you know there is a consistent quality.

 

[marksman13]

I had the same issue with a DPMS LR-308. The gun just would not get below 1 1/2 MOA with any ammo I ran through it. I would suggest getting your hands on a more accurate rifle as suggested above, and seeing where you really stand.

 

[Matthew Courtney]

A more accurate rifle is not needed, just an ammo/ rifle combo that is a proven known quantity. How a given person shoots a gun/ammo combo is not to the better or worse of his or the equipments potential. Usually group variation is nearly the shooters variation plus the equipments variation and the more shots per group the less likely chance will let one variation cancel another out.

 

[BCRider]

The barrel and bullet don't lie. You can THINK you did everything right but the barrel and bullet will know if you missed something.

The definitive answer is to bench rest shoot the rifle with a good scope on it or clamp it into a "sled" and see what the gun itself is capable of doing. If you can't match what it does when benched or from a "sled" then you've still got a ways to go. If you find you are matching the gun's performance then either pat yourself on the back or if the groups still are not tight enough then play with matching the ammo to the gun for better group sizes.

 

[Matthew Courtney]

Let's look at it another way. When you write,"when the shot breaks, everything seems perfect", what moment are you referencing - the moment that you feel the trigger break, the moment you hear the blast, the moment you feel the recoil, or the moment you see the new hole in your target? How much do you see your sights moving on the target during the rest of the process?

 

[Chris-bob]

I don't think you can "outshoot" a rifle. Either you can shoot the rifle to it's full accuracy, or you can't. You cannot shoot a rifle better than it is capable of. You can 'smith' a rifle to make it better. But if you already do everything perfect(according to you) and the rifle doesn't perform as you would hope, then there is either a problem with the rifle or the shooter. Have you asked someone else to shoot the rifle and see? If another shooter duplicates your results, then you can look at the rifle. But if they shoot better, then it is the shooter(if they shoot worse, then find another shooter).

 

[madcratebuilder]

You need to group the rifle while in a fixture (leadsled). If you can shoot it as well as the holding fixture them I would say you're out shooting your rifle.

 

[Sav .250]

"but your groups aren`t all in the same hole..............." There are times you have to except the fact your only human.

 

[MrBorland]

The definitive answer is to bench rest shoot the rifle with a good scope on it or clamp it into a "sled" and see what the gun itself is capable of doing. If you can't match what it does when benched or from a "sled" then you've still got a ways to go.

I read this a bunch, but it essentially says if the shooter is anything less than perfect, they're not as accurate as their rifle.

Look, if a rifle itself is capable of 0.5 MOA, the shooter is as accurate if they are independently capable of 0.5 MOA too. The final group will be 0.7 MOA, not the 0.5 MOA of the rifle*.

As to the OP's question, then, to find out of you're more accurate than your rifle, you'll have to shoot your rifle from a solid rest or sled to determine it's accuracy. You'd then shoot the rifle from the relevant position, measure the net group, and calculate your accuracy to see if it's better than the rifle's.



* Shooter and rifle accuracies are independent of each other, so the net group size is the Root Mean Square (not the sum, btw) of the shooter and the rifle:

Net^2 = shooter^2 + rifle^2

Net = SQRT[shooter^2 + rifle^2]

Net = SQRT[0.5^2 + 0.5^2]

Net = 0.7

 

[sugarmaker]

If the errors are random, the correct way to add them is RMS or root mean square. basicly take how you group under the contition you are interested in (say, offhand). If the gun can be made to group in under 1/3 of that size, there will be no significant benefit to your offhand group even if the gun becomes absolutely perfect. If we cheat and just use the group diameter it's not exactly correct but it is close enough for this purpose. For our offhand case, lets say we shoot 10 rounds of highpower and shoot 4MOA 2ooy standing. That's probably well into master territory in highpower, shooting high 90's. Now we put the gun on bags with a scope and shoot 200 yards and find it shoots 1.3MOA. How much gain if it were perfect?

Overall MOA = square root(you^2+gun^2)

rearranging:
You = square root(overall MOA^2-gun^2)

in this case you = square root (16-1.7) = 3.78 MOA

so a perfect gun would reduce your 200 yard offhand group from 8 inches to 7.56 inches and maybe gain you a point.

If it's a benchrest competition, it becomes much harder to place the gun into a condition where all other error factors are removed - now we see 1.3 MOA from our sandbag rest and maybe we put the gun onto a sled with a remote trigger etc. and find the best shooter in the club gets it to shoot .75MOA. At this point our group could shrink to 1.06" from our sandbags if the gun were perfect. in both of these cases the best approach would be to work on technique.

 

[Art Eatman]

I have decades of history in shooting sub-MOA groups from my benchrest. If I try a new rifle and cannot get sub-MOA groups with it, I have to figure that there is some problem with the rifle and the ammo, not with me.

I have tweaked with the bedding and meddled with load development and more than just once have made a 2- or 2.5-MOA shooter into a one MOA or better performer.

 

[DoubleTapDrew]

I reload and have tried several different loads. We finally found one that is more accurate than the FGGM, using 168gr noslers on 48.5gr of alliant 2000MR. Using CFE 223 powder was about equal to the federal load. We'll try some other loads too but it took a while to find a handload that could outshoot the gold medal match stuff.
We do have a lead sled, so I'll try that and see if it can shoot smaller groups than I have done.

I don't think you can "outshoot" a rifle. Either you can shoot the rifle to it's full accuracy, or you can't. You cannot shoot a rifle better than it is capable of.

Good point, that's a better way of putting it.

I don't know if we have a rifle that is more accurate, except maybe my grandpa's winchester 52 that has several one hole 10 round groups on targets he shot in competition, but it's a bolt action so I don't know if it would translate into shooting a semi-auto.

I just want to try to eliminate variables (me) so I don't drop a bunch of money into a Krieger barrel or something only to find out I still am shooting the same size groups

Oh and by the way this is shooting off sandbags with a concrete shooting bench. I don't think there's any way I could consistently shoot sub MOA standing offhand at this point, no matter how accurate the rifle is!

 

[MrBorland]

Either you can shoot the rifle to it's full accuracy, or you can't. You cannot shoot a rifle better than it is capable of.

Good point, that's a better way of putting it.

No, it's not. Read my & Sugarmaker's post again. It's faulty logic that argues a shooter must be perfect to be as accurate as the rifle. It places different accuracy standards on the rifle & shooter. The shooter need not be perfect - but only as accurate as the rifle, to be as accurate as the rifle.

 

[chrome_austex]

It helps to know the gun's+ammo's potential. When in doubt, I'l break out a front and rear bag, highpower scope, and shoot from a benchrest (preferably indoors). This is also how I test handloads for accuracy.

If you don't have a good sandbag cheater setup, its nearly impossible to isolate the Indian from the bow and arrow.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

First of all, shoot several rifles from a bench rest. You will probably see some of them will make tighter groups than others. This tells you that you are "outshooting" the rifles that make the largest groups -- because you have proven you can make smaller groups with other rifles.

Next, shoot the tight-grouping rifles from field positions -- standing, sitting, improvised rests. You will probably find the groups are considerably larger. This tells you that you are not shooting up to the rifle's potential under those conditions, because you know it can shoot tighter groups under better conditions.

 

[ford8nr]

OUT SHOOTING a rifle would be shooting a rifle better then it mechanically can be. It would be taking a rifle that shoots 2" groups out of a sled and shooting 1" groups prone. If it happens it's a fluke. When I was young and shooting competition A LOT I had rifles I shot to their FULL potential. The only reason I knew this was I could take a similar rifle and shoot BETTER.

 

[MachIVshooter]

Shooter and rifle accuracies are independent of each other, so the net group size is the Root Mean Square (not the sum, btw) of the shooter and the rifle:

Net^2 = shooter^2 + rifle^2

Net = SQRT[shooter^2 + rifle^2]

Net = SQRT[0.5^2 + 0.5^2]

Net = 0.7

I disagree. The math is simpler than that.

A 1/2 MOA shooter will have his shot land within 1/4 MOA of whereever the rifle was going to put it. If the rifle was off POA by 1/4 MOA as well, you can have an error as great as 0.5 MOA from POA, with the resulting group being possibly as large as 1 MOA. With a 0.5 MOA shooter and a 0.5 MOA rifle, if we exclude all other variables, you will end up with a group between 0 and 1 MOA, completely up to chance.

 

[MrBorland]

If the rifle was off POA by 1/4 MOA as well, you can have an error as great as 0.5 MOA from POA, with the resulting group being possibly as large as 1 MOA.

In this one particular scenario, the errors are additive. In another, the errors might cancel out for 0 MOA. But in between, there are an infinite number of possible combinations. The Root Mean Square calculation takes this into account, and 0.7 MOA would be the average if enough groups were shot.

 

[MachIVshooter]

In this one particular scenario, the errors are additive. In another, the errors might cancel out for 0 MOA. But in between, there are an infinite number of possible combinations. The Root Mean Square calculation takes this into account, and 0.7 MOA would be the average if enough groups were shot.

Agreed. That's why I said the group would be anywhere from 0 to 1 MOA.

The reply I responded to came across as saying that a .5 MOA shooter + .5 MOA rifle will equal .7 MOA groups (use of the word net rather than average). Just wanted to clarify for some that the POA actually shifts up to 1/4 MOA from center(.5 MOA shooter deviation) and that the rifle's 1/4 MOA deviation from center POA can either nullify or exacerbate the shooter error to any degree.

I wanted to do an illustrative example, but tired quickly of my crappy paint program's limitations. Perhaps folks can simply envision two dots orbiting 1/2 MOA diameter patterns that are constantly in contact or overlapping to where sometimes the dots are on top of each other and other times at extreme opposites, and any other combination.

 

[DoubleTapDrew]

I didn't think this would come down to semantics and physics.
I should have said "how can you determine a rifle's mechanical accuracy regardless of the shooter" or something like that. I realize now you can't literally "outshoot" a rifle. That was a poor choice of words.
What I mean is if I shot a laser beam that hit directly in the center of the target every time, but the rifle produced a 1" group at 100yds maybe with a much better rifle I could be producing a 1/4" group at 100yds.
If I have time this weekend I'll try the lead sled but I haven't found it to be more accurate than I am in the past (not sure if the rifle is jumping or what) and hate the cheek weld it destroys with the structure behind the recoil pad.

 

[MachIVshooter]

A full mechanical rest is really the only way to truly determine the rifle's capabilities; Completely remove human error from the equation