Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 2 Shots Tight & One Flyer Theories?

I know this could invoke a rather lengthy thread with all types of responses, BUT, I have wondered about this for years.
Virtually all of my center fire rifles will shoot a 3-shot group with 2 shots almost touching and one off a fair ways.Sometimes that fair ways is only a quarter inch while the other two are nearly in the same hole but it is definitely off. And, Sometimes it’s the first shot that flys off, sometimes it’s the second, sometimes it’s the third. Sometimes it’s vertical, sometimes it’s horizontal, sometimes it’s diagonal. YES, I have gotten nice, tight triangular clusters, but those are only about 25% or less of the time with most rifles. I have this same result with custom barreled rifles from barrel makers everyone here has heard of and I have it happen with factory. Here is the kicker though, I almost never have it happen with my three Savage bolt action rifles but maybe a few times out of 50 groups....
Since I have the convenience of loading ammo only 30’ from my shooting table at my home, I have many times went back in my office and reloaded 2, 3 or more of the same exact rounds, with nearly identical results more often than not.
I would like to hear what other’s have to theorize on this subject.

My own personal thoughts are this:
I do not believe there is any way possible to get the initial bore “perfectly straight and true” through the center of any barrel. I see this problem being compounded with smaller diameter bores. In my mind it is physically impossible. I do believe that maybe “hammer forged barrels might be more immune to this since the barrel is hammer forged around an already existing and assumed straight machined mandrel but to me, this process is also suspect.
On a conventional barrel, it is physically impossible to insure that the initial bore is perfectly straight. We are only talking thousandth of an inch here. There are hard/spots spots in all steel and I see no way to physically insure the hole inside the barrel is straight and true without cutting the barrel into pieces and measuring. Again, the smaller the bore and longer the barrel, the harder it has to be.
Yes the external portion of the barrel can be measured but not the inside and YES there have been many more barrels than one that have made it out the door with the bore straight and true, but in my mind these are more of a coincidence than anything else. The inside can be measured for uniformity in dimensions but not for straightness by any method that I am aware of.
If the barrel is not straight and true inside, then it has to heat up and vibrate differently with each shot thus causing the shots to deviate.
These are my thoughts. I am curious to see what others think.

IMO, 3 shots does not make a group. Shoot at least 5 or more to see the true potential of the barrel/load combo. Just getting lucky that two are touching in the 3 shot group.

The bullet has to leave the barrel at the same point in the vibration. The barrel is piece of steel that should vibrate the same way given the same conditions. All else being equal, I can't see a nonconcentric borehole causing a non-repeatable vibration pattern, something would have to be loose in the system to cause variable vibration.

As I have stated in my OP, I have shot more than 3 shots following those 3 shot groups many times. The results, more often than not were pretty much the same with sometimes the flyer just being closer or farther away or even in a different direction. I have often followed up with another 3 shot group following the first 3 shot group, which would make it a 6 shot group (just at another target on the same piece of paper) Same results quite often.

Mauser9mm; If the bore is thinner at any point inside the barrel, then it would heat up faster at the thinnest part, which would shift the barrel slightly in the other direction, even mid-way.. Have that same problem throughout the barrel and it could significantly change the harmonics, not to mention the direction of the muzzle slightly. Yes, it is splitting hairs but a very possible explanation I would think.

With 3-shot groups, odds are that two of the three shots will land closer together. The same thing occurs when you gently drop three pennies on a soft surface.

Which is why 5-shot groups are far more indicative of the load's actual average accuracy.

I get that MD, but why almost the same pattern on follow up groups many times, almost the size? As i stated, I have shot followups immediately afterwards and get almost the same thing, Not always but often and not all that many good triangular groups except with the Savages..... which are more often than not.

Temperature would be a factor anyway with a concentric barrel - changing the length slightly. Maybe there is something in what you are saying except wouldn't the thinner section also cool off quicker (metal is an excellent thermal conductor) and reach the same temp as the rest of it?

I think that you have good thoughts.

SoTexCurdog,

I still don't think you've done enough shooting to prove anything, or groups with enough shots.

There are a bunch of possible reasons that might have happened, including barrel attachment, bedding, scopes, etc. But I would have to try 5-shot groups before guessing Savages have some magic quality that results in "good triangular groups."

You also might want to read my recent article on rifle-barrel heat treating in RIFLE magazine.

Sorry MD, but I never said that the Savages had magic qualities. Just said they shot more uniform and “tend” not to have the 2 close, one flyer thing going on.
And again, this is not always true with them either..... just more often than not.
I also shoot a lot and have said that I often shoot a follow-up group of 3 shots, which would make it 6 shot groups, not just 5 as you suggest. Again, often the same results occur. FYI, many of my rifles have been bedded by 2 of the best. I have upper middle class to moderate optics, i.e. Zeiss Conquest, Leupold Vari-X, Meopta to the lowly Burris and Bushnell and Nikon Monarch.
I know that I don’t have near as many rifles as many of you guys do as I only have somewhere between 40-50 centerfires.
I am NOT trying to promote the Savages nor any other brand or barrel maker but just trying to figure out why these barrels react the way they do.
I am not trying to put down custom barrel makers or high end rifle makers.

I may be a simpleton but there’s enough variables between barrels, components, weather conditions and operator error that unless a rifle doesn’t shoot minute of animal or shoots significantly worse than it usually does I don’t worry about it. To do otherwise is like the old philosophers arguing about how many angels could fit the n the head of a pin. Some folks may like dealing with that but I’d rather just shoot and hunt

Turn your seating stem in 1/4 turn and try another group. Keep turning the stem in 1/4 turn at a time and see if the flyers move to the other two.

I dont reload, just shoot factory stuff...but this mirrors my attitude. When I see 2 bullets have literally made one hole and a third has hit an inch out.....i'm thinking my hold and trigger pull were consistent on 2 of the 3 attempts. There are instances where 3 shots are touching and a 4th has wandered. I'm making scope adjustments on the 3 shot cluster and blaming myself on the wild one. It's not an awful problem to have in my humble opinion which may be influenced this evening by Henry McKenna.

Could be right but you might be selling yourself short. I've sometimes thought the same thing and thought I have lost it, but then shoot one of my "reliable accuracy" rifles and they show that my technique is okay.

If you super imposed each target over the others do the two shots close to each other without the "flier" always land in the same point of impact repeatedly. In other words if you stacked ten of your 3 shot group targets together would 20 shots land in the same spot with 10 random flyers outside the main group?

Thin barrels that heat up quickly will typically shoot two touching, then fliers, each subsequent shot further than the one before as the barrel gets warmer/hotter. I have an old sporterized Model 96 that I turned down similar to a Win FW and it does that with every load I've tried over the years, and in three different stocks.

The OPs original post said that it could be any of the three shots, not necessarily getter hotter but different temperatures.

SoTexCurdog, does that mean if you let the barrel cool sufficiently between all 3 shots that they all group together?

I still think the goal is for the first shot, cold, to hit where the scope says it should.

Sounds like your loads or your abilities are lacking to me... I'll go even further and suggest shooting 10 shot groups for an even better evaluation. You likely don't really know the full potential of said loads and rifles, if you are not holding your rifles in a ransom rest, if you do not have the skill to properly shoot a tight group.