Realistic Expectations

[drgoose]

I am a relative newbie to target shooting. I have been shooting for about 8 months now. I recently acquired a Remington 700 Police in .223 and a Remington 700 5R in .308. I have been both of them have standard Remington triggers with about 1.5 lbs. I have been shooting them off the bench using Harris Bipods and a rear bag and currently both have cheap Barska scopes with 24x.

My question is what kind of accuracy can I expect from these rifles if I do my part. I am handloading my .308 using 42.0 gr of IMR 4895 using 168 gr SMK seated 0.010 off the lands and the .223 are SMK 55 gr on top of 25.5 gr of varget.

Below are some .223 groups





Below are some .308 groups

 

[G27RR]

To me, it looks like your rifle has potential to be sub 0.5MOA if you work a little more on consistency. Since you're hand loading, I assume your ammo is consistent. I would say you may have slight variances in trigger pull, stock position, cheek weld, or your barrel may be heating up. If you haven't checked for free float, do that, even though they should be okay in those models.

I would also ditch the Barskas and go with something like a Bushnell 3200 Elite Tactical 10x40 mil/mil fixed power for $200 or a Weaver Tactical Grand Slam 3-10x40 mil/mil for $300 at Midway. Either of those would be a big improvement despite the magnification difference. If you can spend more, that's even better.

Nice shooting by the way, those are already nice groups.

 

[joed]

Those are pretty decent groups. I have to agree with G27RR on ways to improve. My .223 did it's best with the 69 gr MK and 26.0 gr of Varget, gave one ragged hole. Not sure what twist your rifle is though.

I know nothing about Barska scopes so can't comment on that. All my scopes are Leupold or Weaver Target models, never a problem and the glass is clear and bright. My only comment on scopes is buy quality or you'll be buying again.

How did you get the triggers down to 1.5 lbs? My new Remington breaks at 6 lbs so I replaced it with Timney.

 

[X-Rap]

Try a bag in front instead of the bipod.