Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Has the cause of flyer shots ever been really figured out?

I've learned a lot from the forum but this one thing remains a mystery. I can see where being off a little bit of powder from thrown charges, or some runout in the bullet seating could reasonably be a cause for say 2 MOA.
But I'm thinking of loads that are grouping OK except every once in a while there is a flyer of say 4 MOA in hand loads or factory?

4MOA?!!! That sounds like Parkinsons syndrome

Read "The Bullet's Flight From Powder to Target" by Dr. F.W.Mann. It's available in Google Books. It remains probably the most in-depth investigation into this phenomenon, and it was written a hundred years ago.

It's strange that most people who have a passion for this stuff have never read this book.

Or too much caffeine.

If you're saying it never has happened to you, I don't believe it.

I've owned rifles that I wish would have shot 4 MOA!

Funny

Ouch, instead of stray dog they should have named you stray bullit . That sounds like something you are doing. You may want to have someone watch you when you shoot and get down to the bottom of it. May be a jerk of the trigger, flinch, etc. I'm not thinking this drastic of a flyer could be relating to any mechanical issues of the rifle or the load.

Sure I've had flyers but not 4MOA out of an established load that shoots good.

FWIW I've never had a speeding ticket either.....

Harold Vaughn put forth a plausible theory in his book, Rifle Accuracy Facts.

He explains that it is surprisingly difficult to get a really rigid threaded joint, such as the joint between barrel and receiver. He proposes a couple of cures, the most extreme of which is a different thread design that distributes the load over all the threads rather than two threads taking all the load, as is common in barrel/receiver joints. He claims to have cured his rifle of flyers.

Harold knew his stuff. You have to admire a guy that had a huge old Tektronix 555 oscilloscope and a generator to power it in the back of his pickup. I had a 555 at one time, so I guess I feel some kinship with him.

In Vaughn 'Accuracy Facts" he showed that the barrel is actually loose from the action, if it returns t a different position the next shot will be a flyer. This is another must read
book.

You can also have a gravitational anomaly occur during a shooting string that will produce a flyer.

These are caused by electronic radio wave interference (ERI) with the earth's gravitational field.

Studies indicate this interference is brought on by Rap music or rednecks with CB's.

That's the excuse I use when a flyer screws up a good group.

JM

I thought thats what foil hats were for.....

The foil will only work if you have both your gun and head wrapped up.

Note to self: Bring more foil...

Correction. There is no suck thing as "Rap music". (Even if there were, the term would be an oxymoron, with emphasis on the last two syllables of the latter.) One can either listen to Crap music, or one can go Rap shooting. (This is where one assembles Rap CDs and then attempts to knock them to bits with #9 shot as they sail through the airwaves [sky]. Escapees which make it through unscathed are known as fliers. The cause seems pretty obvious. Rules for Rap shooting, however, allow no fliers so they make be flung repeatedly until they are no longer fliers.)

My apologies for getting this thread back on track...

StrayDog, could you give more details from your observations and perhaps quantify what you mean by "every once in a while"?

What distance are we talking about here?

What firearm? Pistol, Revolver, Rifle? If rifle are we talking bolt, lever, auto, single shot?

How many shots in a string? For example, are we talking a 10 shot group and #10 goes astray? Was the barrel warm? Hot? Cold?

Your question is extremely general and thus difficult to answer.

I don't remember ever experiencing such bad flyers since I got rid of a Mini-14 about 8 years ago. Its first few shots were ok and then it went shotgun on the target. None of my other firearms display that problem spontaneously. If there is a flyer, it's all me.

I have at least one flyer in all of my groups. Seriously. I only measure the best 4 out of 5, or the best 8 out of 10.

I give myself a half-MOA handicap.

I'm talking about when load testing bolt action rifles. I usually shoot 5 shot groups at 200 yards, if all is well 5 shots @ 300 yards.
Usually load testing an un-tried load will produce a random pattern of various sizes. But then you can get a load that will put several close together then one way out, that's what I'm talking about.

Prezactly what I was thinking as I was reading