100-yd practice targets for F-class

[dolek]

I found that putting 8.5 x 11 paper over 2" rigid foam leaves perfect holes with no tears. My friend accidentally put a 12 gauge slug through it today, and it was virtually unharmed. Why spend a ton of money on fancy targets?

Some of us prefer nice targets , gets very important the smaller you get . It also helps for the folks that save targets/groups for load development and remembering those magical days at the range .

 

[clunker]

Some of us prefer nice targets , gets very important the smaller you get . It also helps for the folks that save targets/groups for load development and remembering those magical days at the range .

I see your point. I like the nice targets too, especially the ones that leave a colored ring around your bullet holes, so you can see them from your scope. However, I have nearly 100 used target papers laying around the house, and that would be pretty expensive if they were all the nice targets instead of printer paper. So far, I haven't really had any magical days at the range, so no big loss for me there.

While we're on the subject of F-class targets, can someone direct me to more specific information about scoring. I can find numerous sources for F-class rules, but I don't see any info discussing things like how a shot is scored when the hole is riding the line between the 9 and 10 rings. Does the X ring count any different than anything else inside the 10 ring?

 

[memilanuk]

While we're on the subject of F-class targets, can someone direct me to more specific information about scoring. I can find numerous sources for F-class rules, but I don't see any info discussing things like how a shot is scored when the hole is riding the line between the 9 and 10 rings. Does the X ring count any different than anything else inside the 10 ring?

The rules cover everything in some detail - including literally pictures of exactly what you just asked. Section 14 "Scoring and Marking".

 

[clunker]

The rules cover everything in some detail - including literally pictures of exactly what you just asked. Section 14 "Scoring and Marking".

Thanks for the tip. I finally found it. For some reason, all the links I was finding were for an abbreviated version that was only about 6 pages. If all you have to do is touch the line to get the higher score, then I did pretty well yesterday at the range. Seems that rule would give .308 shooters a slight advantage over .223 shooters.

 

[memilanuk]

Seems that rule would give .308 shooters a slight advantage over .223 shooters.

Just like it would .30 cal vs 7mm and 6mm in F-Open... in practice, it's not that big of a deal. The smaller calibers have less recoil, and are easier to shoot (in general). Most HP matches *start* at 300yds, and the wind become enough of a factor that nobody really cares about the maybes and what-ifs of whether it might have touched the line with a bigger bullet.

That said, there used to be a literal ".30 cal rule" back when AR-15s were fairly new on the HP Rifle circuit (long, long before F-class). Back then, 55-60gn was about all you could find in 'match' bullets... and the poor little mouse-gun shooters *needed* all the help they could get, so every shot near the line was marked with a .30 cal plug to see if it would have touched/broken the line. There's a reason the Sierra 69 Match King was such a hot new thing, once upon a time...

Nowadays... M1/M1As are vanishingly rare on the firing line in HP matches, and AR service rifles pretty much rule the roost with 75/77 gn bullets for the short yard lines, and 75-90 gn bullets for the 'long' yard lines, and the .30 cal rule went the way of the dodo.

In score Benchrest though, like NBRSA Hunter and Varmint-for-Score classes, there's a reason for the near dominance of the .30 BR - for those guys, the scores are close enough (most matches are 100-200 yds, and very occasionally 300) that a .30 cal *does* have a distinct, proven scoring advantage over the much-vaunted 6mms. Then again, their 'X' at 100yds is literally a 1/16" dot...

Something else that I don't think got mentioned earlier during the discussion of the ring size reduction as the targets get smaller... part of it is that the wind effect is much less at shorter distances. Another part of it is that the bullet touching the line adds just a little extra bit to the effective 'size' of the scoring ring - not a real significant percentage when you're looking at a 5" X-ring @ 1000yds. But when you shrink that X-ring down to 300 yds or less... suddenly that percentage added by the bullet just touching starts to make a big difference. So the ring size goes down somewhat to compensate.

 

[chkunz]

Thanks for the tip. I finally found it. For some reason, all the links I was finding were for an abbreviated version that was only about 6 pages. If all you have to do is touch the line to get the higher score, then I did pretty well yesterday at the range. Seems that rule would give .308 shooters a slight advantage over .223 shooters.

By NRA rules you get the size hole that you shoot.

At one time by NRA rules everyone was required to shoot the 30 06 cartridge. Scoring plugs were 30 cal. Then with the adoption of the M14 they allowed the 308 to compete. Scoring plugs were still 30 cal obviously. Then the 30 caliber rule was changed and the "sub calibers" were allowed and the scoring plugs were changed to accommodate the "sub calibers". By NRA rules you got a scoring plug that was the size of your bullet, complicated. The "sub caliber" shooters then argued that they should get the 30 cal scoring plug also and that was the rule for a period of time. We 30 cal shooters then said that if you want a 30 cal plug you should shot a 30 cal bullet so eventually the rule was changed again. Today you get the plug that matches the bullet you shoot, again complicated but fair.

 

[kzin]

Something else that I don't think got mentioned earlier during the discussion of the ring size reduction as the targets get smaller... part of it is that the wind effect is much less at shorter distances. Another part of it is that the bullet touching the line adds just a little extra bit to the effective 'size' of the scoring ring - not a real significant percentage when you're looking at a 5" X-ring @ 1000yds. But when you shrink that X-ring down to 300 yds or less... suddenly that percentage added by the bullet just touching starts to make a big difference. So the ring size goes down somewhat to compensate.

I believe the algorithm for greater-than-linear reduction of the NRA highpower targets is ALL about the relative bullet size. Relative wind effect is just something that people assume.

 

[clunker]

I think that a slight advantage for larger calibers is totally fair. It requires more skill to shoot a .308 accurately than it does a .223. The greater the distance, the more that rule is reversed, but I can shoot my .223 much more accurately than my friend's .308 at any distance, so he is welcome to take the .018" advantage.

Unfortunately, I just started looking at trajectory for the .223. Ouch! Looks great out to 300 yards, then it falls like a brick. The Lapua Scenar-L ammo that I just ordered drops almost 7 feet between 300 and 600 yards. Now I understand why people are so determined to get more than 3,000 f/s behind a 70 grain (or larger) pill.

 

[chkunz]

Unfortunately, I just started looking at trajectory for the .223. Ouch! Looks great out to 300 yards, then it falls like a brick. The Lapua Scenar-L ammo that I just ordered drops almost 7 feet between 300 and 600 yards. Now I understand why people are so determined to get more than 3,000 f/s behind a 70 grain (or larger) pill.

The 80 SMK and the 75 A MAX do well at 600 in the 223. With RE 15, AA2520 or N140 you can get greater than 2800 fps and great accuracy without overloading the cartridge. If you would like a copy of my load development report for the 223, send me an email at chkunz@bellsouth.net and I will send you a copy.

 

[clunker]

The 80 SMK and the 75 A MAX do well at 600 in the 223. With RE 15, AA2520 or N140 you can get greater than 2800 fps and great accuracy without overloading the cartridge. If you would like a copy of my load development report for the 223, send me an email at chkunz@bellsouth.net and I will send you a copy.

I would love to hear about your load development, but my rifle only has a 1/10" twist. It stabilized 69-grain Sierra match bullets effortlessly, but I'd seriously doubt it could handle 75 or 80 grain bullets. It is kind of a double-edged sword. I have a remarkably accurate factory barrel that isn't designed for long range target shooting. I'm not sure where it fits, other than spectacular varmint shooting. For now, it's the only rifle I own that qualifies for F-class TR, and I can't afford to re-barrel it, and I'm not sure I would want to if I could.

I don't see a single bullet manufacturer that offers anything match grade in the 65 to 68 grain range that I want. They all seem to jump from 55 to 70 grain without anything in between.

 

[chkunz]

I would love to hear about your load development, but my rifle only has a 1/10" twist. It stabilized 69-grain Sierra match bullets effortlessly, but I'd seriously doubt it could handle 75 or 80 grain bullets. It is kind of a double-edged sword. I have a remarkably accurate factory barrel that isn't designed for long range target shooting. I'm not sure where it fits, other than spectacular varmint shooting. For now, it's the only rifle I own that qualifies for F-class TR, and I can't afford to re-barrel it, and I'm not sure I would want to if I could.

I don't see a single bullet manufacturer that offers anything match grade in the 65 to 68 grain range that I want. They all seem to jump from 55 to 70 grain without anything in between.

I understand completely. Appreciate the rifle for what it is. If you would like to pursue F/TR then you will need something appropriate for that application. Watch and learn and when you have the time and money you will be ready to enjoy the sport.

Best wishes,
Clyde

 

[Ned Ludd]

I believe the algorithm for greater-than-linear reduction of the NRA highpower targets is ALL about the relative bullet size. Relative wind effect is just something that people assume.

I find your and Monte's comments regarding scoring rings and bullet diameter very interesting and something I never considered previously. In F-Class, only the 300 yd target has a reduced scoring ring diameter. The 500, 600, and 1000 yd target rings are all comparable, each having 10-rings that are effectively 1 inch per hundred yards.

So why would reducing the scoring rings be about bullet diameter? What would the reasoning be? Having shot a few 9s in 300 yd matches with my .223 that were out of the 10-ring "by the width of a red blood cell" according to the match director, I understand that it would increase the level of difficulty for the smaller diameter bullet. However, because at least half, and probably the majority of F-TR shooters are using .308 cal, and F-Open shooters are largely using 6mm, 6.5mm, and .284, I don't see where reducing the scoring rings really makes any sense as far as affecting the degree of difficulty due to various and different bullet diameters.

IIRC, a couple years ago (2015 or 2016?), there was a temporary change in the Highpower Rules while a longer term revision was being worked on. The temporary change was that a .30 cal scoring plug could be used for all bullet holes, as had been done years before, as opposed to caliber-specific scoring plugs. The change lasted about one season before reverting to caliber-specific scoring plugs. Personally, I don't think the bullet diameter is the most important criteria for target shooting, being more concerned with where the center of the bullet impact is located, but I understand that edge-based scoring is generally more amenable to our typical competition scoring parameters. Nonetheless, reducing scoring diameter really would actually have the effect of penalizing the smaller calibers, which are already penalized to some extent, because the ballistic efficiencies of the smaller diameter bullets are typically noticeably less than their heavier counterparts. Just trying to wrap my head around the reasoning for smaller scoring rings based on bullet diameters. Thanks.

 

[kzin]

I find your and Monte's comments regarding scoring rings and bullet diameter very interesting and something I never considered previously. In F-Class, only the 300 yd target has a reduced scoring ring diameter. The 500, 600, and 1000 yd target rings are all comparable, each having 10-rings that are effectively 1 inch per hundred yards.

So why would reducing the scoring rings be about bullet diameter? What would the reasoning be? Having shot a few 9s in 300 yd matches with my .223 that were out of the 10-ring "by the width of a red blood cell" according to the match director, I understand that it would increase the level of difficulty for the smaller diameter bullet. However, because at least half, and probably the majority of F-TR shooters are using .308 cal, and F-Open shooters are largely using 6mm, 6.5mm, and .284, I don't see where reducing the scoring rings really makes any sense as far as affecting the degree of difficulty due to various and different bullet diameters.

IIRC, a couple years ago (2015 or 2016?), there was a temporary change in the Highpower Rules while a longer term revision was being worked on. The temporary change was that a .30 cal scoring plug could be used for all bullet holes, as had been done years before, as opposed to caliber-specific scoring plugs. The change lasted about one season before reverting to caliber-specific scoring plugs. Personally, I don't think the bullet diameter is the most important criteria for target shooting, being more concerned with where the center of the bullet impact is located, but I understand that edge-based scoring is generally more amenable to our typical competition scoring parameters. Nonetheless, reducing scoring diameter really would actually have the effect of penalizing the smaller calibers, which are already penalized to some extent, because the ballistic efficiencies of the smaller diameter bullets are typically noticeably less than their heavier counterparts. Just trying to wrap my head around the reasoning for smaller scoring rings based on bullet diameters. Thanks.

Not relative bullet size across calibers. Bullet hole size relative to the reduced size target using .30 as the assumption. A 30 cal hole is relatively six times as big on a 100yd target as a 600 yard target. This effects best edge scoring so shrink the rings a little more. That's the basic idea. The exact algorithm never made sense to me but I verified that it accounted for the published size of the targets. Now I can't find the spreadsheet I made with the formula in it

Some practice reductions on the internet do have a factor for changing from 30 cal to 22 but the official NRA highpower series does not.

I'm talking about:
600yd MR
300yd MR63
200yd MR52
100yd MR31
sling targets
and the f-class versions for 600 and 300
also the 300yd - 200yd - 100 yd 'rapid fires'
and the 200yd - 100yd offhand

I thought the 500 was part of the series but you're right. The 500 is specified as a target of it's own where these others are reductions of the MR the SR and the SR-3 for ranges that don't have room for the full course.

Long range 1000-900-800 is a whole different system where the one target gets easier as it moves in.
Mini-palma targets simulate that at a single range with 3 targets

found the formula, at least-

size = OS*RD/OD - .308*(1-RD/OD)

OS is original size
RD is reduced distance
OD is original distance

 

[Ned Ludd]

I see - the target ring diameter reductions are consistent with the increasing effect of bullet diameter as the targets get smaller. Thanks for the clarification!

IMO - the effect of bullet diameter on scoring is almost negligible as compared to the effect of wind as the range increases. Nonetheless, anyone that competes for any length of time will doubtless encounter a shot that falls just barely outside a particular scoring ring, so it cannot truly be said that the effect of bullet diameter is zero.