The NRA Rifleman magazine shows results from testing several new rifles every month with factory ammo. The groups are usually a little bigger than 1". I put Kreiger barrels on my rifles. They always shoot small groups in my GH hunting rifles. I would never expect a factory barrel to shoot 1/2" groups. Don't understand guys wanting short barrels.
What’s a realistic accuracy expectation from a factory barrel?
- Thread starter McHaggis
- Start date
The NRA Rifleman magazine shows results from testing several new rifles every month with factory ammo. The groups are usually a little bigger than 1". I put Kreiger barrels on my rifles. They always shoot small groups in my GH hunting rifles. I would never expect a factory barrel to shoot 1/2" groups. Don't understand guys wanting short barrels.
jackson1
Silver $$ Contributor
While I have a couple of high end custom target rifles, my greatest joy has come from making my big game and varmint rifles shoot the best that I can. Like to believe I have been successful with most of my guns. Took learning, time, and patience. Have one I just can't teach to fly; a Remington 721 with all tricks in 25-06. Yes an aftermarket barrel, but I have no idea who made it or smithed it. I can get good but not great hunting accuracy from it, but always wanted a little more. To be honest, it is one of my favorite rifles, (probably because it is my problem child) it has good bones, but just can make it shoot boringly well. Ready soon to rebarrel. I have one rifle where the stars briefly aligned, a 700 Remington Classic in 17 Remington. The rifle has been free floated, glass and pillar bedded, with an aftermarket trigger and 6.5 x 20 Leupold. With 30 grain Berger's at 100 yards, it is the only rifle I have ever shot in the zeros. Sadly Berger stopped making the bullet and the barrel is now toast. On the other end of the spectrum, my Wheeler built 6BRA shoots better than I have any right to expect.
I agree 100% with those who say that if you have a factory rifle that will shoot half-MOA 5-shot groups at 100 more or less consistently, you have a good one. Note I say, 'more or less' as getting a 5-group half-MOA average is much harder than many people think. We fool ourselves too often, sometimes deliberately by people who quote groups that omit the flier 'that I pulled' or where 'the wind rose and I didn't see it', but also just memory providing a battery of rose-hued lenses on the past. The first 'decent' rifle I had many years ago was one of the first Remington 700VSs to be made in 223 Rem. In later years I thought of it as 'half-MOA capable' even though I knew groups of this size were a minority and that a series average would be higher. However, when I went back to my shooting records for this rifle, I could hardly find a half-inch group. In reality, it was three-quarters MOA capable and averaged somewhere between 0.75 and 1.0 at short range. Still very good for its era, and for my limited experience, but not half-MOA.
Amongst the few truly half-MOA capable or better factory rifles I've either had personal experience with or via people I shoot with, have been early Savage Model 12 Precision Series models. Some 6.5-284 calibre 12 F-Class rifles were unbeatable in UK Factory Rifle Class 600 and 1,000 yard benchrest and sometimes shamed the people with custom 'Light Guns'. Other individual rifles from the Savage factory didn't live up to the best of the genre though, in fact some were real 'dogs' including the 12 F-Class I bought new. Conversely, I also bought a 12 LRPV in 204 Ruger around the same time and it was a star performer giving me the 100 yard UKBRA Factory Class championship some years ago. It would 'agg' in the low to mid 4s on a range that rarely sees screamer groups thanks to circulating and rebounding crosswinds that can (and often do) see the flags point in 180-degree different directions simultaneously and anything in between with snap switches between directions. Its best single 'official' group was 0.207" and my 'agg' for that day was in the high threes for all six groups including thye 'warm-up'. My best single group ever from this rifle was in load development at 0.15". An absolute fluke as replicating the load never again produced anything near that, in fact rarely got much below half-inch.
The same thing was seen in FTR with the best of the 308 Win 12 FTRs just able to hold their own with custom builds at least in club, if rarely national, matches. Team Savage USA really did perform wonders with these rifles too even in international competition such as the F-Class World Championships in 2009 at Bisley, UK. As far as I can see now, recent Savage 12s rarely if ever shoot as well and consistently as the best of the breed of 10 years ago, as well as costing a great deal more money in real terms over here in the UK.
The new best of the factory jobs that I see these days seem to be mostly Tikka T3s in 308 Win and 6.5X55mm. A good T3 HB Varmint in 6.5X55 is a really impressive performer even in 1,000 yard BR. Ironically, few seem to notice this over here and everybody now wants a chassis stocked Blackticool usually in 6.5 Creedmoor not the older Scandinavian 6.5mm design.
Going back to my early point about 'fooling ourselves' either inadvertently or through a form of intellectual dishonesty, if you really want to be both objective and to know what the rifle / ammunition combination achieves, there are two essentials - 'honesty' (accurate measurement, no fiddling results or omitting groups because it was a bad day or whatever); and secondly accurate record keeping of all groups, competition results or whatever.
Amongst the few truly half-MOA capable or better factory rifles I've either had personal experience with or via people I shoot with, have been early Savage Model 12 Precision Series models. Some 6.5-284 calibre 12 F-Class rifles were unbeatable in UK Factory Rifle Class 600 and 1,000 yard benchrest and sometimes shamed the people with custom 'Light Guns'. Other individual rifles from the Savage factory didn't live up to the best of the genre though, in fact some were real 'dogs' including the 12 F-Class I bought new. Conversely, I also bought a 12 LRPV in 204 Ruger around the same time and it was a star performer giving me the 100 yard UKBRA Factory Class championship some years ago. It would 'agg' in the low to mid 4s on a range that rarely sees screamer groups thanks to circulating and rebounding crosswinds that can (and often do) see the flags point in 180-degree different directions simultaneously and anything in between with snap switches between directions. Its best single 'official' group was 0.207" and my 'agg' for that day was in the high threes for all six groups including thye 'warm-up'. My best single group ever from this rifle was in load development at 0.15". An absolute fluke as replicating the load never again produced anything near that, in fact rarely got much below half-inch.
The same thing was seen in FTR with the best of the 308 Win 12 FTRs just able to hold their own with custom builds at least in club, if rarely national, matches. Team Savage USA really did perform wonders with these rifles too even in international competition such as the F-Class World Championships in 2009 at Bisley, UK. As far as I can see now, recent Savage 12s rarely if ever shoot as well and consistently as the best of the breed of 10 years ago, as well as costing a great deal more money in real terms over here in the UK.
The new best of the factory jobs that I see these days seem to be mostly Tikka T3s in 308 Win and 6.5X55mm. A good T3 HB Varmint in 6.5X55 is a really impressive performer even in 1,000 yard BR. Ironically, few seem to notice this over here and everybody now wants a chassis stocked Blackticool usually in 6.5 Creedmoor not the older Scandinavian 6.5mm design.
Going back to my early point about 'fooling ourselves' either inadvertently or through a form of intellectual dishonesty, if you really want to be both objective and to know what the rifle / ammunition combination achieves, there are two essentials - 'honesty' (accurate measurement, no fiddling results or omitting groups because it was a bad day or whatever); and secondly accurate record keeping of all groups, competition results or whatever.
There are so many more variables that go into the mix. Stock, action, bedding, torque, front and rear rests, wind, wind flags, reading the flags, trigger, bullet, case, load, and a lot more than the ones I have listed off the top of my head in this sentence.
That being said, I had a drop in Savage 30" seven twist as original equipment on my .223 F/TR which finally got shot out and I replaced it with a Shilen super duper match barrel. The Savage shot better.
That being said, I had a drop in Savage 30" seven twist as original equipment on my .223 F/TR which finally got shot out and I replaced it with a Shilen super duper match barrel. The Savage shot better.
JEFFPPC
Gold $$ Contributor
Short barrels are stiffer, may support better accuracy while giving up a small amount of velocity. This might be a good trade off.
whenever i have a exceptional group or two, show off to my significant other, she invariably says... well, you were resting on a bench, right???
i have (ahem) a few model 12's in various states of tweaking, reassembly and barrel swapping and it is almost maddening how many of them are stuck around 5/8" on a day to day basis.
THE ARMY is basically shooting at an 18" target at most "field applications", no matter the distance.
what rifle was that 1 moa for ?
they have 5.56, 7.62x51, and 300 win mag.
I believe that ammo for the 300 and 308 are required to be 7" at 600 yards.
what rifle was that 1 moa for ?
they have 5.56, 7.62x51, and 300 win mag.
I believe that ammo for the 300 and 308 are required to be 7" at 600 yards.
dmoran
Donovan Moran
Have no clue what any of that has to do with me or what I posted here.
Especially Damon's annealing write..... what of it?
What I posted is field results of a customer of mine's factory hunting rifle.
Nothing of the load work up. Nothing about brass prep, etc.. Just field results after the fact.
Think your barking up a wrong tree....
And to top it off, you replied within a quote....lol
Do you not know how to edit?
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since the question is unqualified buy cost of a factory rifle, I do not believe you can provide a "qualified" answer.
Some how a brass annealing write up wound up in my post. That's why I deleted it
I was referring to the amount of vertical in the load work up that was preformed by a ladder test at 450 yards.
Question was ,was it not possible to tune out the vertical?
I understand the point trying to be made as to a factory rifles accuracy or lack thereof.
Maybe I've been blessed with some Accurate factory rifles, where others have not been as fortunate.
Not trying to bark up anybody's tree.
This was shot December 1st 2019
after changing lots of powder and primers.
44.8 was probably me and not the rifle.
Shot with ruger American predator 6.5CM
SWFA 3x15
sorry about all the naysayers and factory rifle inaccuracies but this baby just hammers.
dmoran
Donovan Moran
What ladder test are you referring to?
I did not post any ladder test results. I showed nothing of the actual load development.
If some how you think your load development results and method are better then mine... good for you, more power to ya !.!.!
But the fact is, you are not seeing any load development of mine in this thread.
I'm moving on..... no need to hijack this thread with further irrelevance.
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In your post #33 "YOU" stated load developed @450 yards ladder method.
Customer JP
This thread is about factory rifle accuracy.
Correct??
So I dont see where its getting derailed.
So yes I inquired about the vertical in the load.
Sorry I used your post with pictures and asked the simplest of questions.
dmoran
Donovan Moran
@Bc'z
Still failing to get what your driving at....
But since your asking about the ladder tests for that rifle, I will oblige you (and since I have them in JP's file as well).
First off, the target pictures in my post #33, were when I was calibrating the scope for the custom turret, and was shooting at multiple distances across a chronograph in doing so (also shot at 780yds and 1000yds).
Here is the initial rough ladder test shot with the 190-VLD and H4350 in that rifle:
From which I picked 62.8 to 64.0 for a zone and continued on with a refined 3-shot per increment ladder test:
(which is: one aimpoint, round robin succession, assessments by vertical of each increment and vertical relation to the other increments )
So with that load development of the H4350 and 190-VLD's was a total of 18-shots.
No seating depth testing was done, and were loaded to an optimal clip length for the bullet, and for it's intended use: hunting.
Had seating been tested for as well, would of entailed more shots, and likely some more accuracy could have been had !.!.!
Also ran tests with Berger 175-VLD's for a 2nd bullet, as well as RL17 for a 2nd powder with that rifle.
But in the end, settled for the 190-VLD and 63.0gr of H4350, seated to a predetermined length optimal to the clip.
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To everyone ..... Sorry for the hijacking here.... but @Bc'z is asking, and felt I should oblige him.
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Still failing to get what your driving at....
But since your asking about the ladder tests for that rifle, I will oblige you (and since I have them in JP's file as well).
First off, the target pictures in my post #33, were when I was calibrating the scope for the custom turret, and was shooting at multiple distances across a chronograph in doing so (also shot at 780yds and 1000yds).
Here is the initial rough ladder test shot with the 190-VLD and H4350 in that rifle:
From which I picked 62.8 to 64.0 for a zone and continued on with a refined 3-shot per increment ladder test:
(which is: one aimpoint, round robin succession, assessments by vertical of each increment and vertical relation to the other increments )
So with that load development of the H4350 and 190-VLD's was a total of 18-shots.
No seating depth testing was done, and were loaded to an optimal clip length for the bullet, and for it's intended use: hunting.
Had seating been tested for as well, would of entailed more shots, and likely some more accuracy could have been had !.!.!
Also ran tests with Berger 175-VLD's for a 2nd bullet, as well as RL17 for a 2nd powder with that rifle.
But in the end, settled for the 190-VLD and 63.0gr of H4350, seated to a predetermined length optimal to the clip.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To everyone ..... Sorry for the hijacking here.... but @Bc'z is asking, and felt I should oblige him.
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I think a factory is still a factory with everything you listed above. Factory action, factory barrel, still a factory. Bedding, changing trigger, I feel most important is the barrel and action to make a accurate rifle. If you do not change that, then still a factory in my thinking.
So just to get back on track let’s, for the purpose of this discussion, consider what is a typical “optimised load” MOA for a Ruger Precision Rifle in 6.5CM, as this can be considered a “factory” setup but it’s certainly not your run-of-the-mill sporter by a long shot. Just to compare apples with apples.
And Thanks for all the replies
And Thanks for all the replies
Brians356
Gold $$ Contributor
I've got a Rem 700 Varmint Special (a 1967, the very first year for the VS) in 6mm Rem. I bought it in a pawn shop in 99% condition, original 24-in barrel, fleur-de-lis "checkering". It had a Canjar trigger and a nice period Redfield 4-12x target scope, so it likely had some rounds through it. I glass bedded and floated it and moved the Canjar to a custom rifle, so now it has a factory R700 trigger which has been tuned.
The rifle shot decently, 3/4 MOA not difficult, but it copper fouled and took some effort to de-copper. I ran a set of Tubb fire-lapping bullets through it and now it cleans much easier. Now it's easy to shoot 1/2" groups at 100 yds. Here are some 4-shot (and two 5-shot) groups I shot @100 yds in 3-12 mph switching conditions with no attempt to dope the breeze, just concentrating on holding vertical and taking dead aim. Each group is a different charge weight and/or bullet jump. I've notated only the vertical spreads. Berger 74-gr moly MEFs. Not bad for a 50+ year-old OEM barrel.
The rifle shot decently, 3/4 MOA not difficult, but it copper fouled and took some effort to de-copper. I ran a set of Tubb fire-lapping bullets through it and now it cleans much easier. Now it's easy to shoot 1/2" groups at 100 yds. Here are some 4-shot (and two 5-shot) groups I shot @100 yds in 3-12 mph switching conditions with no attempt to dope the breeze, just concentrating on holding vertical and taking dead aim. Each group is a different charge weight and/or bullet jump. I've notated only the vertical spreads. Berger 74-gr moly MEFs. Not bad for a 50+ year-old OEM barrel.
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