Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Garmin first time out

I’ve never had that many issues with the model 33.
Lighting issues are easily solved.
On heavy overcast days if it starts acting up . You just take the tops off the screens.
Black magic marker on the bullets works wonders.
As I said above. If it’s too dark to register. It’s just to dark. That being said I have gained minutes of shooting time at the end of the day by removing the tops off of my screens.
Alignment of the screens is a snap.
See the pic of my laser up top. Takes no time at all to set up this way.
Cheep magnetic bore sight laser.
If you notice I run my screens with a 10 foot spacing.
Doubles the accuracy of the measurement taken. It’s in the book.
I bought mine in 1987 after I had Nelson Berger build me a 22cheetah and I wanted to know just how fast it actually was.
Anytime I’ve had an issue,very few and far between.Ohler was never a problem to get support
The Garmin is going to make my testing more streamlined, no dought at all.
I’m still going to be testing the Garmin against my 33 for accuracy.
Time will tell.

dave

I’m still going to be testing the Garmin against my 33 for accuracy.

Ah, but how can you be really sure which one is giving you the straight poop?

😜Just messing with you. For me, any of them are gonna be close enough. Heading out tomorrow to sight in a couple and see if I’ve been living in a fantasy world regarding some of my handloads at he same time. Just packed up some stuff and still can’t believe how tiny the case holding the Garmin is.

You're not wrong. Just because two screens are used to make two measurements that agree within a given measurement uncertainty, that doesn't mean that they don't have the same calibration error.

I've had my 35P for 30 years. Loved their service.
When I checked my new Garmin against the 35P I noted the Garmin always read higher velocities than the Oehler - some significantly higher. Tested the Garmin against another Garmin, a Labradar, and a Magnetospeed. My Garmin was spot on with all three of those. Getting the screens perfectly spaced is obviously the long pole in the tent with an Oehler and it's looking like mine's been off for three decades, and I just never knew. Maybe that's why it's almost always taken a little more powder than shown in the books to reach the "correct" velocity? I'm probably lucky to be alive...LOL.

Cheers,
Rex

Another advantage of the Garmin is just placing it on the bench next too you, then shooting at 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, or more yards and it picks up all the shots if its aimed in a general direction. With my Ohler, I could shoot at any of those ranges but if the targets were not perfectly aligned in the window/triangles, I couldn't shoot through it, so I couldn't continue to measure velocity, etc.
So, I can zero at 100 and then move the barrel of the rifle in different directions downrange to shoot targets, steel, etc at extended ranges and it still picks up shots, so I get a greater number of shots to average velocity, SD/ES.

I see this as being one of the Garmin's biggest advantages. A lot of folks don't want to "waste" 10 rounds over the chronograph. Now you can clock every shot and get a much clearer idea of actual speeds.


Okie John

For sure. It is nice just to turn it on and let it run then collect the data.

The Garmin is a better mouse trap. I have owned several screen type chronos (ProChrony & a Folding one -forgot name) and a Magnetospeed. The Garmin is so much handier that I sold all the others and have zero inclination to replace them. The Garmins are expensive but worth it for me.

Did you say you needed an app on your phone to make this thing work?

No, it'll store and display on the unit. The phone is just a way to look at the data later on if you want. It'll work fine without a phone.



Not a great picture but the readings are displayed on the unit.

If you're curios to just how small it is, here it is next to a Zippo...

No reason to not chronograph everything now.
dave

Really good stuff, super easy to use! Reinforces the phrase, "good things come in small packages!"

When I first started my 1000 competitions.
I was pretty anal about getting my drops right.
Had a bench gun that in good conditions would routinely shoot under 1.5 at 500 yards.
Wanted my drops to be "good".
I measured everything.
Used the Berger program .
Carefully chronographed the load.
My drops from 850 to a grand with the PMII were so close that no other adjustments were necessary.
I kinda figured my chronograph numbers had to be pretty darn close,.
Will see how good the Garmin is.
These days I don't worrie about drops much at all.
For what we are doing.
20 at 850
22 at 900
24 at 950
And 26 at 1000 is close enough that your in the ball park .
Good enough to see your hit close to the swinger and click to the hit from there.
Non issue from 6mm to 30 cal...



Dave

Like to know what case that is????

After reading all these threads about the Garmin all I can say:
“There goes another $600!”
I’ll pick one up sometime later this year.

Got it from Amazon. It is an Evergreen brand case.

Thanks!

Found this one on eBay, guy laser cuts the foam for it too.



As pointed out in this thread, and others, the Garmin is a great tool. Take care of it!