Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Reasonable accuracy expectations from a 16" WOA barrel?

I built an AR some time back to use for coyote hunting. It was built using a VLTOR MUR upper, 1/7 16" WOA stainless barrel, Seekins MCSR V2 free float handguard, ADM QD scope mount, Burris XTR II 1.5-8, and a Geissele SSA-E trigger.

I'm shooting Nosler 77gr Custom Competition bullets using 23.2 gr of IMR XBR 8208. This seems to be the most accurate load and my groups are hovering right around 1 MOA at 100 yards. I shot it this past weekend at 250 yards and groups were around 2 MOA.

What should I expect from an accuracy standpoint with this setup? I understand follow-through on an AR is imperative.

I would say that setup should be capable of 3/4 MOA easy. The Nosler 77gr CC didn't show excellent accuracy for me either, I had better luck with the 77gr. Sierra's and even the 75gr Hornady's.

Keep trying, Im sure you can find a load that works.

First there is a lot of difference in 1 inch at 100 and 2.5 inches at 250 yards. Lots of things can open the groups at longer distances.

That being said, I'm assumign you have a Wilson tube from them, and those are generally .75 moa barrels and with a lot of work, sometimes close to .5moa

As noted the heavier bullets have never quite been as accurate as the lighter ones in my ARs. But the 77 SMK non tipped was better than all the others in that wieght range.

75 hornady BTHP are notorious for not liking a lot of pressure behind em either....

As always a go to load that generally works for seeing if the barrel is any good or the gun is any good, Federal GMM 69s. HSM 69s about teh same. Black Hills often the same too.
Or 69 smk, LC case, CCI BR4 and 25 to 26 grains for Varget. Generally 25.0 just flat worked. Some guns could take a bit more powder.
If I ran the above load at 25.0 in a barrel and it sucked, I'd be thinking gun problems rathere than ammo issues.

I have a Rock River arms Lar 15 with a 1 in 9 twist inch barrel, with 25 gr Benchmark and the Sierra 52 gr BTHP match bullet I shot a group that measured 1.9 inch at 400 yards. Same load shot a 100 yrd group that measured .290, I don't know if is true but I was told that Rock river uses Wilson barrels.

Also a higher magnification scope would probably shrink the groups at 200 and out.

With my eyes, I'd have a hard time shooting bug holes with 8x.

I couldn't get the 77gr Noslers to shoot well either.

Try a different bullet.

Here's a link to an extensive evaluation on the 77 gr Nosler Custom Competition bullet with some 10 shot group evaluations.

Starts about halfway down the page.

Draw your own conclusions............

Don't have any Wilson barrels, but I don't think I'd put them in a Top Tier grouping either.

MM

Nosler 77 gr CC Evaluation

My 16" Northtech barrel shoots both the 69 SMK and 75 Hornady around .75 MOA with boring regularity and hits .5 MOA quite often. For shooting groups i use a 3-15 SWFA on it but planning to swap to a 2.5-10 long term

MM,

Thanks for the link, interesting study for sure. I've read through most of Molon's post which is why I'm a believer in 10 shot groups. However, all barrels are different. The Noveske barrel I had wouldn't shoot the 75's less than 1.25" at 100 yards. My Douglas barrel loves them but hasn't grouped well with the Noslers so far, around MOA but not much better. I've still got 600-700 NCC 77's to get rid of so I'll keep playing with them or save them for the next barrel.

Well, there's no question that some barrels just don't do well with some bullets...........

But in my experience, especially with bolt guns, really good barrels are not finicky & shoot most stuff very well.

OTOH, there are some issues with some bullets or some batches of bullets.

There's been enough discussion in various places on the Nosler bullets to cause a little concern in spite of MOLON's data.

I really think the safer bet is SMK or TMK.

At any rate, when the weather improves enough to get excited about serious shooting, I'm going to find out as I have 500 of the Noslers to try in a Kreiger barrel with test loads already made up.

Even if they aren't < MOA. they'll still work for most of my needs in various guns.

MM

I think the Nosler's do better in tighter bores, like Kreiger. Just my impression.

I've got 5 White Oak's, 3-.223 & 2-.204, and get sub 1/2 MOA from all. My .223's are all 1-12 twist shooting up to 64 grain bullets but mostly 50's & 55's. I've got a few others with 1-8 twist. Give the Berger 73 grain match target a try, awesome in mine with 8208. I know it's a match bullet but it will expand very well in a coyote. Just my 2 pennies worth.
Jim D

All my WOA barrel's shoot great also.

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