"Sniper Rifles"

[snake284]

What these guys said. Hathcock usually used the Model 70 30-06 which was highly regarded at the time. Also he made some long range kills or at least one, with the 50 BMG. He shot another sniper through the sniper's scope with his Model 70 30-06. He saw the scope of the enemy sniper reflect off the objective lense an he shot right through that scope and killed his advesary. That was an unbelieveable shot. This guy more so than his rifles was phenomenol. He must have had the eyes of a hawk.

 

[Tirod]

Hathcock did not use a custom anything to hold up the M2, he just dialed in the T&E to make the shot. That was a daytime exercise sighting in where Charlie was known to refill his canteen on a river bank. Actually a no brainer with the issue M2 tripod, it's that good.

Exactly. This is why taking an old Mosin Nagant and claiming because it will shoot within 2.5" at 100 yards, it will shoot within 20" at 800 yards is wishful thinking. Group sizes tend to expand as distance increases, not only because of shooter and environment related issues, but also because of bullet issues. MOA does EXACTLY that, explains things in Minutes of Angle, which will increase at longer ranges, creating a larger group size precisely because it's describing a cone of dispersion.

Aside from the anomaly of "sleeping bullets," most firearms will always have an increasingly larger group size as distance increases. A firearm posting a 1.5 MOA group at 100 yard cannot possibly shoot 800 and get a smaller group. If the dispersion gives you flyers out at the inch and a half mark, it will be 3 inches at 200, 6 inches at 400, etc. Bullets cannot magically return to the center of a group just because they flew further and somehow lost dynamic wobble. Consider just the lower shots in the group, and explain how a bullet traveling under the center can rise and meet the target point 800 yards further, when the high shots wouldn't rise and move the shot group higher.

I think we need to leave "sleeping bullets" lie and just treat MOA for what it is, a gradually increasing cone of dispersion as distance increases. If your gun is 1MOA at 100 yards, that's a 1" group, and a 10" group at 1000 - which could be done in a Texas warehouse on weekends.

Outdoors, good luck with that, it's the whole point of the challenge. Wind, mirage, and other factors may influence shots differently, but fire a burst of rounds and the cone of dispersion will be affected largely by the same influences and fall in the MOA. As any MG gunner knows.

It's those pesky single shots that suffer variables more, walk a belt of ammo in and no problem. Then, the MOA ensures coverage and you will get a hit. Takes a lot less time, too.

Just some of that professional instruction I was paid to learn, using ballistics as an effective tool, not an academic debate.

 

[USSR]

If your gun is 1MOA at 100 yards, that's a 1" group, and a 10" group at 1000 - which could be done in a Texas warehouse on weekends.

Um, the Houston warehouse was only 325 yard shots. This is one of those things that sounds good and makes perfect sense on paper, but anyone who has any experience at LR shooting (defined as 800 yards and beyond), knows that the MOA of accuracy found at 100 yards does not carry over to LR shooting. Rather than type it all again: "Group sizes tend to expand as distance increases, not only because of shooter and environment related issues, but also because of bullet issues. Imperfections in bullets start impacting the flight characteristics of bullets when velocity and spin undergo changes over a great distance". To elaborate on the velocity/spin factor, one of the aspects of a bullet in flight is the relationship of the revolutions per second to the velocity of the bullet. This relationship undergoes a change over distance which has an impact on the stability of the bullet in flight, that is compounded by bullet imperfections. Now, if every bullet was "perfect" then it wouldn't matter. But, the plain fact is, no bullet is perfect. An example of a bullet imperfection is the variance of meplats from one bullet to the next. Another is the variance in ogive location from one bullet to the next. Even the high quality Sierra MatchKing bullets will vary by as much as 0.010" in ogive location between bullets. While these imperfections have little to no effect at close range and midrange, once the bullet velocity and spin slows down (as they do at LR), they do have a deleterious effect on bullets. So, while it seems nice and easy to extrapolate the data from 100 yard groups and apply it to 1,000 yard shooting, there are other factors that come into play at LR.

Don

 

[d2wing]

I know from experience that shooting someone at 800 yards is not easy. Some uinknown communist with unknown equipment shot at me from about that range, missed me and my Jeep. After returning fire with an M60, I didn't get shot at anymore. Since it was a single shot, I assume a NVA sniper but my outfit had to move on. Out of 5 of us that were close to the jeep, no one was hit.

 

[george d dennis]

thanks everyone for the information on hathcock. its been a long time since i
read his book.

 

[FC]

Hathcock did not use a custom anything to hold up the M2, he just dialed in the T&E to make the shot.

You're right, I forgot what it was that he had that was supposed to be custom. It was the scope mount that he used on an M2.

 

[dprice3844444]

savage buildss some good rifles,howa has some nice heavy barrells(legacy sports),that you can purchase with/without stocks,and install a nice bell and carlson on.plenty out there.natchez shooting supply has some nice cheap prices on scopes also.

 

[ghostwriter]

@USSR: In addition to your very nice detailed analysis of the Sierra brand bullets, I bought 2 boxes of SMK 200 gr bullets for my 300 win mag. I then took ever one of those 200 bullets and mic'ed them and weighed them... what I found was disturbing but expected since I was looking for Long Range bullets to build consistent loads to use.
About 10% were below 199.6 gr. weight, 40% were around the 199.7 gr weight and 25% were at the 199.8 gr weight. Put about 15% at the 199.9 gr figure and 10% were actually 200.0 gr.
I would think with the lable of Sierra Match King on the box, they'd be closer to the 200.0 weight but that was not the case with the 2 boxes I bought. (I'm next working the loads for the 168 gr Bergers VLD rounds and after that I'll do some work in the neighborhood of the 208 gr A-Max from Hornady)

 

[USSR]

Yeah, it's kind of shocking when you find that much variance in match bullets. Personally, I don't worry that much about the weight variance, I tend to sort them by base-to-ogive dimensions. Just use the bullets that fall outside the curve for fouling or sighter shots.

Don