Ballistics Baffles Brains !!!

Roebuck-308

Active Member
I Believe Honesty is the best policy, Ive only recently started getting serious about deer stalking so I'm after some advice, I want to get to grips with basic ballistics ie: formulas , loads , speeds etc.. so my question is what book / dvd / website would you recommend starting with the basics upwards ! This forum has been brilliant in providing genuinely useful information, thanks for your help ! ;)
 
My advice after looking into all this as a beginner is. Any deer legal caliber will kill a deer at upto 200 yds no sweat. So just get the rifle, practise off sticks and bag so you know your poi in relation to your poa and get out there. All that ballistic mumbo jumbo is not needed. Happy hunting.
 
I have got to agree with the previous poster, the info you are looking for is not necessary for stalking. In woodland stalking most of your shots will be less than a 100 yards if stalking on the open hill then most will be some where between 100 and 200 yards .
If you are shooting at deer further than that then it's not stalking , not going to preach on the ethics there are plenty people who can shoot well enough to kill further than that,but the sport is deer stalking, not deer shooting nor sniping the object of the exercise is to get as close that the outcome should be more or less inevitable and the shot some what of an anti climax.

Nothing wrong in studying ballistics if you so wish, but not necessary for stalking.
 
I want to get to grips with basic ballistics ie: formulas , loads , speeds etc..

Of value in relation to meat damage, by calibre or bullet construction/driven speed?

Seems a pretty simple/valid need to me.
 
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The link below is to a section on ballistics but it is a good web site to look at with lots of useful info

6mmBR.com Ballistics for 6mm BR Norma, 6BR, Dasher, Wildcat, PPC, 30BR, 308. Calculator of trajectory and windage + Software downloads for Benchrest, Varmint, Target Shooting Lapua Brass and 6mm Rifle Bullets.

The hornady website has a lot of good info on internal and external ballistics and if you search YouTube you will find a lot of good info on what happens to different bullets on impact.

You may also find this website of use

Home

I use Istrelok on my iPhone for my drop charts and from experience at the range and on live quarry I've found it to be very accurate.

Hope this helps

​Rick
 
Where's that popcorn smiley when you need it!?

Unfortunately you asked the wrong question for this forum Cornish! Apparently one isn't allowed to shoot a deer from more than 2 feet and may as well sneak up on it and try and scare it to death than actually shoot it... far too many self righteous... erm... 'self lovers' on here sometimes! :rolleyes:

Absolutely nothing wrong with working on and practicing longer range shooting and in fact it will do nothing but help with the usual range stuff. Chances are, in the UK, you will rarely have the opportunity to shoot beyond 200m in woodland and possibly 300m on the open hill but being capable of nailing a target, first shot, from a cold barrel, at ranges of 600m and beyond will do nothing but increase your confidence and skill.

Anyhoo.. from what I can see in your o/p I would guess you are more interested in internal ballistics, i.e. load development etc, something which a large number on here already do...
You could do much worse than look at the sites night stalker has suggested. There is a ridiculous amount of content on youtube.. just search for reloading or load development or even try ballistics. www.loaddata.com is VERY good value for money and gives you access to all the different reloading manuals currently available plus thousands of wildcats and experimental loads.

If it is reloading from the very beginning you are interested in then the bible would be 'the ABCs of re-loading' by C Rodney James - http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-ABCs-Re...=1370966620&sr=8-1&keywords=abcs+of+reloading if it is exterior ballistics as applied to long range shooting then you need to be looking for Bryan Litz's book 'applied ballistics for long range shooting' - http://www.appliedballisticsllc.com/Book.htm Bryan will even autograph a copy for you if you ask (mine is :cool:) but in reality that's one hell of an expensive and pretty OTT investment if you are only intending to shoot deer at UK deer shooting kind of ranges!

Other than that, one of the big bullet or powder manufacturers loading manual (or even website in some instances - Vhitavouri springs to mind) but that is only going to give you limited info in general.
 
My advice after looking into all this as a beginner is. Any deer legal caliber will kill a deer at upto 200 yds no sweat. So just get the rifle, practise off sticks and bag so you know your poi in relation to your poa and get out there. All that ballistic mumbo jumbo is not needed. Happy hunting.

haha, you ain't needin' that mumbo jumbo! :old:
Usually i hear this accompanied by a big miss or stuck case or along side requests for advice on "flattest shooting" caliber or dismissing the .308 as being "loopy". :lol:

To the OP, there a lot of books and sites to read into and indeed there are lots of elements of ballistics that are practical to stalking. Wind behaviour of bullets and shooting downhill being two that come to mind. Greenhill formula may have some interest for you, depending what caliber you're shooting.

As far as I'm concerned, understanding what your bullet is doing can only be a good thing. As you note, things are not always ideal and it is easy to misjudge distance over broken ground, add in a wind and a downward angle and suddenly misses are a possibility.
 
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Thanks Chaps, i was just really wanting to get a small amount of background knowledge in a subject that is literally a science, the web links look good, ill start there, the reloading / Ballistics book recommended by Vipa and JabaliHunter also look interesting, :lol:
 
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