Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Long Range Hunting Wind!

You have a no-wind zero for 1000,
or it's compensated for in your ballistics program?

Smokepole,

Even if there is zero wind from 500 to 1,000 yards, it still has a .8 mil error. It can't pull itself back into line.

I donot use spin drift with the 300 grain SMK out of my 338 Lapua or the 180 Accubond out of my 300 win, I am not the only one that does not use spin drift. I use Exbal and it has a spin drift feature but you have to determine the spin drift needed it does not automatically adjust for it.

Meaning, the .8 mils it was already deflected on the way to the 500 yard line?

IMHO, yes

Smokepole,


Correct.

Not sure if you mean you're amazed at the honesty of the posters or you thought everyone who posts here never misjudges the wind?




Doping the wind is the toughest thing in Long Range shooting.


The best rifle shooters in the world can't do it every time either in matches where only first round hits count. Since the Sporting Rifle Match's inception over 10 years ago, 80 matches have been held with an average of about 50 shooters per match. That's around 4000 attempts to engage the 60 target course with one shot per target. No one has hit more than 58 targets at a match and there's only been about 8 scores of 58 shot out of the 4000. David Tubb has been there and shot 56 if I recall.

At the Steel Safari, widely considered the toughest practical Rifle Match in the United States, the winning score is usually on the order of 110 to 120 out of the 162 targets possible

The Cold Bore Stage at any Precision Match always has a bunch of really good shooters that zero it...



I don't care what method a shooter uses to calculate how much his bullet drifts at each wind speed and angle and at which distance, he will still see plenty of missing or shots out of his kill zone simply because it's impossible to perfectly dope the wind 100% of the time.

The answer is to put yourself and your abilities to dope the wind in the top percentile by practicing; shooting matches, shooting in wind.

No spin drift used

At 1000 with that bullet, you should have had about 9" of spin drift right. Since you held straight up, you must have had a touch of wind from the right. If You were shooting directly East or directly West, your drop data will differ.

If you were shooting directly North or South, there would be a tad of Coriolis to factor in.

This has been my contention since day one around here on this subject. I watch Tubb shoot occasionally up in the TX Panhandle where he lives, as well as Hodnett's "trainees", so I wasn't exactly making this stuff up. It sure doesn't stop long range wannabes from launching bullets at game though.

Have you ever missed? If so how many times?

I have asked several top shooters about this and I found many use no spin drift with the 300 SMK. Exbal ignores coriolis, because the bullet from a shoulder fired weapon isn't in the air long enough. Has worked for me for a long time, I have talked to Brian Letz about this and he believe their are factors that can cancel out spin drift. I know what works for me.

I have. None have been because of bad wind calls. I'd say most misses don't involve bad wind calls, they involve people taking shots they shouldn't be taking. For whatever reason, no one seems to get worked up about those kinds of misses, they're just misses. I saw a guy hunting antelope hop out of a truck and take a 400 yard shot off-hand in a 25 mph wind. The wind wasn't what made him miss.

It'd be telling to put an 8-inch paper plate up at 150 at any public range during "sight-in days" and see how many can hit it consistently unsupported. But come opening day they'll be blazin' away.

LOL

Glad you liked it.

Tell you what....get a 200 yard NWZ and go back to 1000 yards and use that same windage zero under same condition and see where you hit!!

Couldn't agree more smokepole. I've never seen anybody miss a critter due to a poor wind call but have seen plenty of misses due to lack of proficiency with their rifle, also.

Tanner

I watch these aforementioned snipers shoot out to 1500m many times in the wind, and have seen lots of first shot misses because of it, and it's not a rifle proficiency problem whatsoever. I'm sure both can be a problem at times for some people though, as you say.

BTDT

What does shooting steel and missing the first shot at 1500 meters have to do with missing shots at game, other than those who shoot to 1500 in the wind regularly will tend to miss fewer shots at game?