Oak Ridge...Wild Life and Wild Winds

[broncman]

Shot my first 1000 yard FT/R finally today at Oak Ridge. Really great group of guys and very friendly and helpful.

The conditions.... ....First the wildlife. About half dozen turkeys, three deer, an oppusum running for his life at the bottom of the 1000 berm, and a skunk or something in the creek we thought was somebody... Added some great comic relief.

The wind...every flag was flying in a different direction at times. A 308 REALLY gets blown around when you start chasing the spotter and quit watching the flags..

I did manage some x's...and one miss..

Had a GREAT time and looking forward to tomorrow!

 

[Immike]

Sounds like a great place to cut your teeth on long range. You watch those flags from the minute you get there until you leave. You will need that information next time you shoot there. Good luck tomorrow!

 

[Cody Richardson]

Glad you enjoyed it! Wish we could have stayed for the palma tomorrow but couldn't get off work tomorrow. Hope to see you down there soon, if you come up near Louisille, KY 2 weeks from now our club is having a midrange match literally right across the brindge in Indiana.

http://www.southernindianarifleandpistolclub.com/home/2013-f-class-midrange-prone-matches

 

[broncman]

It was nice to meet you guys from Kentucky! Hope to see you guys in the future.

I was scoring for the last match and the guy beside me was shooting an older gentlemans 7 RSAUM in a Barnard action....MOST impressive!

I believe that rifle was about as wind proof as you get! Very nice.

Ken

 

[XTR]

Brutal way to start. ORSA has a reputation for "invisible" or unreadable shifts. There are a lot of things that combine to make it very hard to read, from the elevated firing position to the trees that make the flags less than responsive, but today was the hardest I've seen it in 3 yrs. If there is wind you usually loose a point here or there to something that you just can't figure out or read, but today I was seeing Open shooters with black spotters on the targets. Part of it was that we had a pretty good fishtailing wind, probably a full 5MOA swing when it really came around and solid 2MOA shifts that were just not readable. Seriously, I hate to admit this, but I couldn't break 180. I've seen the 3rd match go sideways, or one in the middle of the day when a little tiny rain cloud blew over that ate everyone up , but today it wasn't just wow, how did that 8 get there, it was how did that 7 get there? Or I don't see that, *bang*, well, it's still there in the 8 ring, guess i better dial for it, nothing changes that you can read and *bang* out the other side. A friend who usually out shoots me was there, I commented on getting my ass handed to me and he said, I'm shooting an RSAUM, and I shot a 180!

I definitely have some load problems. This was my first time at 1000 since about October and I was getting 8s and 9s on vertical. I never have that kind of vertical, I think I know what I did there(I'm certain it is brass prep) , but w/o that my scores would still have been in the low 180s. I've never seen it like that for every match on every relay.

 

[devin_hor]

I didn't think the wind was that bad... my bullets sure did though, ha ha. I think I need some wind reading classes!

 

[Rtheurer]

ORSA is famous for creating elevation shots at the 1000 yard line with a head or tailwind. Could be a full MOA or more at times.

Reading Flags at Oak Ridge is an excercise is fustration if that is all you know to look at. It took me two years to figure out what was going on, being I had to travel across the state to shoot there and maybe three times a year at that. The key might be not so much when to shoot a round, but when NOT to shoot.... Ha!

RT

 

[PRECISIONWELDING01]

Well said Russ

 

[LongRanger]

ORSA bites. Always fun, but usually very humbling. Have heard that even AMU hates to shoot here.

As usual, we had more Kentucky F shooters than 10ac F'rs.

Harold Cowley, ORSA member from Kentucky, got the wind figured out just before he lay down to shoot his last string. He noticed the time NOT to fire was when the flags at 200 and 300 were not doing the same thing. He got his 6BRX centered up when those flags were tailing away. If he shot when they showed anything else it was an 8 or 9. Scoring him, I could predict when he was going to shoot an x or 10. Too bad he forgot he was shooting some old reloads that contained a mix of Berger and Sierras or he would have had high score for the day.

With Harold's formula to guide him, my grandson-in-law shot a mix of 9's, 10's and x's for a 188 with my Barnard/7RSAUM/180 VLD F/O combo---and he had never before shot anything further away than 200 yards or a target rifle or anything with a scope or anything with less than 10 pounds trigger pull. That capped off a great day for him, me and my son and DIL.

Frank B.

 

[broncman]

Had another great day shooting with all the palma shootera today. 800 and 900 were very low visibility due to the dew burnoff and sun shining in your face.

1000 was not as windy as yesterday, but still switchy. I did notice that with the elevated range and the huge arch of the 308, your bullet is above the flags for a good portion. I could feel a steady breeze in my face and nothing on the flags at all at times. This was the layer of wind that was hard to read. I had real string of x's and tens,and 9 going on my 900, then boom a 7!

I learned more today and had great time. I will be back. Good people!

 

[brxbrad]

Like the ole farmer said, "The flags at ORSA are like my sheep, they lie"

 

[vtmarmot]

I thought Oak Ridge was the least windy place in the USA. See:

http://www.chacha.com/question/what-is-the-least-windy-place-in-the-usa

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/online/ccd/avgwind.html

;D

 

[broncman]

That must be why they have a windfarm in.....WindRock...right down the road from ORSA!

392 ft windmills....HUGE....
http://www.tva.gov/greenpowerswitch/wind.htm#

 

[XTR]

So as a I walked to the truck this afternoon one of the ORSA sling and irons guys that I shoot with all the time says to me "How was that last match on an F class target?" 8)

Trust me if he's asking, he knows. :-X

And no vtmarmot, we don't typically see big winds like one would see at Perry or Raton; but for us Fr's, especially us F-TR shooters little switchy winds can be killers.

This afternoon shooting 1000. Flags are absolutely limp, I've had my 2 spotters, with limp flags I've put 2 shots in for record and I'm still shooting 9 ring left. In the spotter there is a little drift right to left, I crank on another 1/4 *bang* and it's in the 8 ring right. When I look up the flags are exactly the same as they have been for the last 4 shots, I don't see anything in my Nightforce, but in the spotting scope the mirage has rolled over to the right so that what was a 1.5 MOA left is now rolled over and added to the 1.5 or so on the scope to make a 2 point drop. It was like that for 15 shots. Gentle easy switches that just ate you up. I only got one shot in the 10 ring, and that was a pinwheel X on the last shot. (I was having vertical problems with m loads again today and probably cost me 3 or 4 points but the winds were still just

All in all, way better than yesterday in my mind anyway. Yesterday I couldn't figure anything out. Things went places for no discernible reason. Today the 3rd match from 1000 was a killer, but you could usually figure it out, albeit after the fact. The problem was it was so switchy that what ever you had figured out changed between the time you got out of the spotter and the time you got into the rifle and broke the shot.

 

[Down South]

So as a I walked to the truck this afternoon one of the ORSA sling and irons guys that I shoot with all the time says to me "How was that last match on an F class target?" 8)

Trust me if he's asking, he knows. :-X

And no vtmarmot, we don't typically see big winds like one would see at Perry or Raton; but for us Fr's, especially us F-TR shooters little switchy winds can be killers.

This afternoon shooting 1000. Flags are absolutely limp, I've had my 2 spotters, with limp flags I've put 2 shots in for record and I'm still shooting 9 ring left. In the spotter there is a little drift right to left, I crank on another 1/4 *bang* and it's in the 8 ring right. When I look up the flags are exactly the same as they have been for the last 4 shots, I don't see anything in my Nightforce, but in the spotting scope the mirage has rolled over to the right so that what was a 1.5 MOA left is now rolled over and added to the 1.5 or so on the scope to make a 2 point drop. It was like that for 15 shots. Gentle easy switches that just ate you up. I only got one shot in the 10 ring, and that was a pinwheel X on the last shot. (I was having vertical problems with m loads again today and probably cost me 3 or 4 points but the winds were still just

All in all, way better than yesterday in my mind anyway. Yesterday I couldn't figure anything out. Things went places for no discernible reason. Today the 3rd match from 1000 was a killer, but you could usually figure it out, albeit after the fact. The problem was it was so switchy that what ever you had figured out changed between the time you got out of the spotter and the time you got into the rifle and broke the shot.

Man, I know the feeling. Saturday in Texas at the match it was a VERY hard fishtailing wind that would make you say WTF just happened after you broke the shot...... .......Hit a X then the next shot was in the 6 or 7 ring left with what seemed to be the same condition of the flags. It was so cloudy there was no mirage to read, it was very humbling to say the least. The guys in F-Open still shot what i would consider great scores in those conditions. Those Texas boys aint no joke......... 8)

 

[Caliche Pit]

Harold, I thought you told me mixing Bergers and Sierras was your secret recipe to fool the ORSA wind demons......... ;D

 

[PRECISIONWELDING01]

F class target is tuff but remove legs and add sling then we will talk lol

 

[broncman]

I have allways wanted to try a palma style rifle. No one I know locally has one or the equipment to shoot sling. Gotta hand it to you guys, great shooters and no scope!

Ken

 

[Cody Richardson]

Broncoman, where are you located? I might know a few. I shot my palma rifle on Saturday and had an ok day once I finally got a zero and realized my front sight was loose...

 

[broncman]

I live near Asheville NC. I do have a buddy near Butner that I am sure I can talk into bringing his any/any 6.5x284 sling gun next time I go down to Butner.

I believe I will bring my krieger barrled midrange AR with me next time I come to ORSA and get some of you guys to show mw what I would need to get it going for iron sights.

Ken