What Did You Shoot Today?

[Ian]

Not shooting into somebody else's property.

Colorado is mostly national forest, i.e. public property. There are regulations of course that vary from forest to forest and time of year, but in many cases you can just pull off the road over there in that safe spot and shoot a few rounds. Our place is in Ouray in the middle of the Grand Mesa, Gunnison, and Uncompahgre forest areas, and these are the regs specific to those areas:

"While we encourage persons participating in target shooting to practice on the Forest’s target ranges, it is possible to target shoot in areas of the Forest (outside of shooting ranges) with some restrictions.

The following are prohibited on the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest

1. Discharging a firearm within 50 yards of an open public road as well as on or across a forest system road.
2. Discharging a firearm within 150 yards of a residence, building, campsite, developed recreation site, or occupied area.
3. Discharging a firearm on or across a body of water except when engaged in legal hunting, such as duck hunting.
4. Discharging a firearm from a motor vehicle.
5. Discharging a firearm into or within a cave.
6. Discharging a firearm in a manner or place whereby any person or property is exposed to injury or damage (provide for safe bullet impact area).
7. Transporting a loaded long gun in a motor vehicle.
8. Possession of a firearm in any Federal building or facility (prohibited even with a state concealed carry permit) {18 USC 930}.
9. Littering (remove all trash including targets and spent shell casings)"

 

[462]

Range idiots are why I don't shoot on weekends. The range is open 0900 to 1530 Friday through Monday, and I get to the range about 0930 Friday and Monday mornings. Even then, the range office will occasionally call out some idiot for not observing the safety rules.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

The hammer only has under 100 down its pipe. I have fried a few bullets but exhausting the CFE BLK powder. It has not been stellar. But everything shot to date was plenty "enough" accurate. Its hinting it can be a MOA shooter.
130 Sierras that shoot under MOA in blk where 2".
125 Sierras shot well none over 1.25/1.30"

125 Sierra Game changers shot 1.5".

130Speer also about 1.3/1.5".

All with CFE BLK. Gonna try 1680 & 296.

Darn FF load for brass I made shooting Sierra 125 FPHP bullets shoots almost 1.25" @ 2450 fps. I wont use these on deer again, but Id smack a Coyote!!

I cleaned bbl and am gonna load more and try next trip.

 

[Snakeoil]

Safest public range I'd ever been to was in Monroe, LA. Was on a job down there very early in my career. It was actually a training assignment. I was there with another engineering trainee. We were wanting to buy a pistol so we could shoot on the weekend. He was from CA and me NY and being in a state where you can just walk in a buy a pistol was something new for us. Well, turns out you can unless you are a resident of the state. We were whining about it in the site shack one day and the crane operator said he'd fix us up. Next day brought in a Ruger .22 Auto and told us to give it back when we were done.

We bought ammo and looked for a range. Found a public range outside of town. Very nice place, well kept, covered shooting point, mowed lawn. really nice. Went to the "office" and behind a desk was a Deputy, a very old Deputy. I'm guessing he was pushing 70. His first name was Shirley and we just called him Deputy Shirley. Really nice old guy. He told us to pick a bench. We asked about targets and he said he'd take care of that. We are sitting there waiting when a guy about 30 in a striped suit comes out and posts two targets for us and then jogs back to spot in the shade by the office. We shoot and when it's time to check our target, he jogs out, pulls the targets, puts up two more, brings us the targets and jogs back to his spot in the shade. He was a trustee from the local jail.

We went there often and after a few trips the Deputy, who was a really friendly guy comes out to talk to us. He sees that all we have is that Ruger .22 and asks if that is all we have. We tell him our story about being from other states in in LA on a job. He walks back to the office and comes out with a box of cartridges. Then he pulls his .38 out of his holster, puts it on the bench and says, "Here, shoot a real gun.". And boy, did we.

 

[462]

Yesterday, was my inaugural Bret Martin "Fit Is King" Memorial Shoot.

Being the patriot he was, I hope he didn't mind that the rifles weren't real Winchester Models of 1866 and 1892 chambered for any of their original cartridges, but Italian and Brazilian copies of .38 Special and .357 Magnum.

 

[popper]

CW IIRC Wilson liked the CFE Bk and 1680. Shot the vmax and ftx Lilgun loads in BO this morning. Didn't chony but should be north of 2200 fps. Sighted the vortex on the CVA, worked good. Same in carbine AR with IR. Shot way high - darn. Still very accurate. Then banged some cast out of the CVA, couldn't hit anything. Scope rail is LOOSE! Seems can't win for loosing. Oh, didn't notice any extra heating of barrel with Lilgun vs H110.
Edit: punched the primers today, only one loose - probably 10 times fired case. Gotta try the 'flash' of Lilgun vs H110 this week. Refastened the CVA rail with red locker.

 

[L Ross]

513-T with Leupold M8 6X Target with fine cross hairs and 1 moa dot, 9 and 3/4 lbs. Auto-Match, off hand prairie dogs 80 yards, much less wind today. I hit 17 of 20, but I had three that stayed on the rail edgewise. But I am pretty darned pleased 85% hits, 70% knock downs. Way up from 50% just a couple of days ago.

 

[RicinYakima]

Shot the C. Sharps Model 1885 in 30/30. Three different bullets: NOE 180 grain FN, H&G 165 grains GC FN and the Ideal 311403 the plain base Pope bullet. Powder was 14 grains of A2400. Not good groups, all about 2 inches.

However, I am just learning how to shoot a single shot with dual aperture sights and level. A lot harder than shooting a Springfield with irons.

Any suggestions and wry humor appreciated.

 

[JWinAZ]

@RicinYakima The size of the front aperture relative to the black can have an affect. Usually a little more space is better than too little. Two "rules of thumb" I've seen are to size the front aperture so it appears to be twice the size of the black or the size of the black plus 6 MOA. I used this in smallbore prone and it worked well for me. For my Model 52 with a 28" barrel and the A51 target (4.05" dia. black) at 50 yards those work out to be .157" and .140" respectively.

 

[fiver]

switch the powder out for the plain base bullet.

 

[RicinYakima]

switch the powder out for the plain base bullet.

Name your top 3 or 4?

 

[Rushcreek]

I squinted through the old Weaver B4 and shot a couple of five shot 40yard groups with my 510 Remington and CCI Quiet (750 fps)..
No supressor needed.
Just a better trigger puller and some W&E !

 

[L Ross]

Shot the C. Sharps Model 1885 in 30/30. Three different bullets: NOE 180 grain FN, H&G 165 grains GC FN and the Ideal 311403 the plain base Pope bullet. Powder was 14 grains of A2400. Not good groups, all about 2 inches.

However, I am just learning how to shoot a single shot with dual aperture sights and level. A lot harder than shooting a Springfield with irons.

Any suggestions and wry humor appreciated.

I like 4227 with cast and have used 14.0 gr with plain based .30-30 ammo. Also used 14 grains of 4227 under 200 gr. plain base breech seating in a .32-40 for 200 yard shooting.
Not wry humor, but you have inspired me to grab something with irons next go 'round at the prairie dogs, maybe this afternoon.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

I picked up a few cans of CFE-BLK just for the HAM'r. ( aAlways keep 1680 on hand)

Its been good but truthfully the barrels probably just getting broken in. Nothing has really been outstanding and only a few actually "bad".

With all my personal experience of bullets on deer in black out last dozen years. I really like the Speer 130. Its tougher then every other in its weight class. The Pro Hunter Sierra is another thats "tougher". These two are only cup n core bullets not to come apart in BO velocities on deer. Now I do not intend to discredit any other bullets for use in deer. (Except the 125 Sierra FPHP) Many seem perfectly matched. Like Hornady the 125Vmax or is it SST? The 135G Sierra is a great choice too. Neither is great inside 50 on big bones but outta 20+ animals not a single one lost. The Nosler BT's I had and used early in where older style before the tapered jackets. I assume newer current bullets should be better on deer. I know the 150 BT is a lightning bolt in my 24" Savage 24 @ 2500+. It has always exited deer.
This new Game Changer is more tapered and long. In HAM'r requires deep seat I dont like so much. But even heavily compressed loads showed no problems and shot acceptably.
I like the 125 ProHunters profile, and of coarse the Speer 130's are perfect. Im gonna work for making these two work.

CW

 

[L Ross]

Pulled the scope off the 513-T. It had a base on the left rear for some model of Redfield Receiver sight. I looked in my parts box and sure enough there was a Redfield that was probably factory equipment and a Redfield International. I don't have the right front male/male dovetail for the International front sight. There is an globe front sight on the rifle with a pretty large aperture in it.
Out to the bench and got it centered up at the 80 yard rail. Shot the first bank of 10 offhand and got 50%. The targets had been freshly painted in the morning and when I stood them back up I found most of them were hit in the head. I dropped the receiver sight 6 clicks and shot a second bank. Ah ha, success, 7 of 10. Seemed harder without the magnification, but the percentage is almost the same. I had no hits that were not knock downs. I really had to pay attention to my sight picture, but when I did, down they went.
So happy with 70 years old eyes.

 

[RicinYakima]

I shot military benchrest matches for 20 years. "Any iron sight" results were within 5% of "scoped rifle" results. The scoped rifle is easier, but not better.

 

[Snakeoil]

I shot military benchrest matches for 20 years. "Any iron sight" results were within 5% of "scoped rifle" results. The scoped rifle is easier, but not better.

I agree. The basic difference is seeing the target. To quote my late buddy John and former member here (Sendero), "With iron sights I shoot at a target. With a scope, I shoot at a spot on a target."

This is why scope shooters normally get smaller targets at our silhoutte matches.

 

[oscarflytyer]

Star Super 9mm Largo (and a box of Blazer thru Star BM for practice). Bought theSuper on local forum for $150. It is basically a long slide 1911 9mm (long! lol!). I had 38 Super dies to load it with. Had to suck it up and buy new Starline brass. Got a bunch of freebie 50 cnt pc bullet packs from a friend; what I loaded. Gun loves the 125 grn RN with 4.8 grn Unique. Very mild user friendly load, and doesn't hammer bite with it. I am really going to enjoy paper punching with it. Experience with the Star BMs (had 3) and now the Super in 9mm Largo and I am a HUGE fan of Star autos. Nothing beats them in performance at their price point. I have ~$375 in the pair I have and wouldn't part with them at twice that!

 

[Ian]

Yesterday, was my inaugural Bret Martin "Fit Is King" Memorial Shoot.

March 4th it is then.

I worked Monday through Wednesday and took off for Brady, TX for my first muzzleloader competition. The wind howled for three days from all directions (there's a wind farm which starts directly behind the berm, we joked that the range has built-in wind flags provided by gubberment subsidies, oh the horror if they only knew!) Anyway, I signed up for a whole bunch of matches and worked my butt off getting them done. We only had 26 shooters but they were almost all mossbacks with a lot of experience shooting round balls in the wind. l managed one first place aggregate (smooth rifle) by default as I was the only shooter in that category. Still I turned in an 88/150 with two 50-yard targets and one 25 with all scoring hits so I was happy. Got bested in aggregate score by a ringer in two other popular categories: Offhand and Flintlock which are each five shot relays at 25, 50, and 100 yards. Offhand allows any metallic sight and caplocks so it's a disadvantage with an open-sighted flinter but the guy that knocked me to second place in both did it with a 40-caliber Pennsylvania longrifle so we were level equipment-wise and both beat a slough of Hawkin shooters that were using aperture sights. It all boiled down to the wind. I won a few individual relays in various categories and picked up a few more seconds and thirds, got smoked in one match by a 14-year old kid who did it with one of my guns, and only broke one of 15 birds at the short-range trap match. Overall had a great time, got wind burned, learned a lot, and am wore plumb out. I also think I'm officially hooked.

They held a BPCR match Wednesday to gauge interest and had nine shooters show up, so it's an official go for the June match, again starting the day before the muzzleloader six-day shoot which is the Texas championship match. I'm planning on shooting that one on Monday of the match week, staying for opening day of the Muzzeloader championship and shooting my favorite categories. Should be fun.


Here's the turn for the range road and the berm which carries all the way across to the highway. If you look closely you can see the windmills.

 

[462]

Excellent shooting, Ian. Now, you'll have to get a shooting jacket to show off all those patches . . . and the ones that will surely come.

If I see anything that flat round here I know I'm looking toward China.