Field Accuracy

[Muir]

Ah.... but that is a 3 MOA shooter, not a 3 MOA rifle
Plenty 3 MOA shooters out there, and I for one have been one of them on occasion, including with some open sighted rifles.
(shot a nice 303 a few weeks back)
Off hand tests the shooter not the rifle though doesn't it?

don't have any reference on the 30-30 but this chap seems to be pretty handy with one! he has several videos out to 400-500yds

this one is a 6x7" target at 300yds

Thanks for the interesting and somewhat dubious video. I have owned and shot lever action rifles for many decades. One year I placed fourth in the NRA Lever Action Rifle Silhouette Championships at the NRA National range in Raton, New Mexico. I own, and have owned, many accurate lever action rifles. But it has been my experience that as they ship, they are pretty much 3 MOA rifles due to the sights. They are about 6 minute sights. And that was all I was saying.

Yes, the rifles might be very accurate but the sights make them less so with regard to practical usage. (See Gixer's posts) The shooter might be world class, and the rifle 1.5 MOA accurate, but the crude sights reduce his and the rifles capability to hit distant objects with any precision. Oh yes, you can scope them. That's fine, but the argument is whether or not deer are routinely killed with 3 MOA rifles. And considering the proliferation of iron sighted thutty-thutties, and the volume of deer they kill in the US, I'd say that yes: Deer are killed with 3 MOA rifles.~Muir

 

[Selous]

Surely the reality is that if you combine a 3moa shooter with a 3 moa rifle then you will end up with a 6 moa group. Therefore on average everyone will benefit from a more accurate rifle. Or have I missed something??

 

[Muir]

Surely the reality is that if you combine a 3moa shooter with a 3 moa rifle then you will end up with a 6 moa group. Therefore on average everyone will benefit from a more accurate rifle. Or have I missed something??

The question seemed to morph into a discussion about 3 MOA rifles and their use in taking deer -and using that as a reflection on the need for half MOA rifles for deer hunting. The case being made that 1/2 MOA is not needed and that many, many deer are taken with less accurate rifles. (3 MOA being the extreme example) ~Muir

 

[Southern]

Surely the reality is that if you combine a 3moa shooter with a 3 moa rifle then you will end up with a 6 moa group. Therefore on average everyone will benefit from a more accurate rifle. Or have I missed something??

My thinking is that, no, most people will not benefit in the field from a rifle which shoots any better than 1 inch groups, for several reasons. Most deer is shot at ranges close enough that even with a 2 MOA rifle, a good shot can take them easily. A really good shot can take them at 300 yards, but he probably wouldn't try. Second, to my thinking, you have to be good enough to benefit from really top equipment in any sport. A new golfer is not going to benefit from a $400 putter. An ordinary shotgunner is not going to improve his scores by jumping to a DT-10 or Perarzzi If you are not good enough to tell the difference, and see the difference, when shooting a 10 shot group with a 1.5 MOA rifle and a 1/2 MOA rifle offhand, then you don't need the 1/2 MOA rifle; you need more practice.

 

[Dalua]

It seems we're heading to a conclusion that there is a law of diminishing returns in rifle accuracy which kicks in big-stylee, with most folks' field accuracy at sensible stalking ranges, at 1MOA for the rifle.
Sounds good to me!

 

[Klenchblaize]

You are flirting with disaster (I'm being polite) if attempting neck shots with a 3 MOA rifle.

K

 

[JeffYoung]

Surely the reality is that if you combine a 3moa shooter with a 3 moa rifle then you will end up with a 6 moa group. Therefore on average everyone will benefit from a more accurate rifle. Or have I missed something??

That's not really how probability works. Some of the time the 3moa rifle will improve the 3moa shooter, not make them worse. When you superimpose the two bell curves you get a flatter bell curve, but not one twice as flat.

Cheers,
Jeff.

 

[tackb]

That's not really how probability works. Some of the time the 3moa rifle will improve the 3moa shooter, not make them worse. When you superimpose the two bell curves you get a flatter bell curve, but not one twice as flat.

Cheers,
Jeff.

aim at a spot fire a group , a 3moa rifle will land it's shot within 1.5" of the aim point in any direction , then add shooter error which means he/she can only get within 1.5 inches of that spot in any direction , compound the errors and you end up with a 6moa system , you can improve your ability and the rifles ability , why wouldn't you?

 

[Selous]

That's not really how probability works. Some of the time the 3moa rifle will improve the 3moa shooter, not make them worse. When you superimpose the two bell curves you get a flatter bell curve, but not one twice as flat.

Cheers,
Jeff.

I appreciate that an inaccurate rifle may at times flatter a bad shot, after all even a stopped clock is right twice daily, however I would expect that assessing parameters such as a 95% confidence interval between bad shot and inaccurate rifle would be significantly different to the data set from a bad shot with accurate rifle. When this is transposed to the practicalities of shooting live game I fail to see how a less accurate rifle can make no difference, although I concede the differences may not be as large as we may think. I suspect that measuring the differences would be difficult in the field (whilst hunting) and therefore it would be hard to quantify and if differences are small then a large data set may be necessary. It would need therefore to be a range based test with rifles of documented accuracy potential. Has anyone got a 3 moa rifle I can borrow??

 

[Dalua]

Has anyone got a 3 moa rifle I can borrow??

The first loads I made last week in .38Sp turned my underlever carbine into a 40MOA rifle. I could make a few more like that if it would help?

 

[Selous]

Awesome, sounds perfick!!

 

[Yoda]

I believe most normal bolt action Deer rifles in the UK can shot far more accurately than the person pulling the trigger
In the UK why shoot Deer at 400 yards? It's not big and it's not clever. Enjoy the stalk out in the countryside get as close as you can and humanely dispatch the animal you are hunting, and keep all the accuracy and long range crap on the range.

 

[JeffYoung]

aim at a spot fire a group , a 3moa rifle will land it's shot within 1.5" of the aim point in any direction , then add shooter error which means he/she can only get within 1.5 inches of that spot in any direction , compound the errors and you end up with a 6moa system , you can improve your ability and the rifles ability , why wouldn't you?

OK, let me try again. A 3moa rifle does not produce 3moa groups. It just "usually" produces them, given some probability envelope. Statisticians often use 95%, so let's say that a 3moa rifle produces 3moa groups 95% of the time. (A 10 shot group would therefore usually be within 3moa, while a 20 shot group would usually show a single flyer outside of 3moa).

A 3moa rifle with a 3moa shooter will produce a 6moa group 99.75% of the time. But that's not the same as the 95% as we used earlier. If we keep to the 95% yardstick, then a 3moa rifle and a 3moa shooter yields something on the order of a 4.25moa group. (I've simplified the math to the square root of the squares of the group size. It's possible that's an over-simplification which produces misleading numbers, but I'm pretty sure it's closer than just adding the errors.)

Now, you could easily say that's still a good bit larger than our 3moa shooter on his own, and that they would indeed benefit from a more accurate rifle.

But let's look at the numbers when they're not quite as similar. A 3moa shooter and a 1moa rifle yields something like a 3.16moa group. Improve the rifle to 0.5moa and you improve the group to something like 3.04moa. That's a 1/2 moa improvement in the rifle, but the group size has only dropped by about 1/8 moa, which isn't a great return on your investment.

Improving the shooter by 1/2 moa (2.5 moa shooter with 1moa rifle) would prove far better, with 2.7moa groups.

Note: I'm no statistician. If someone wants to do the "real" math here and correct my numbers, that would be great.

Cheers,
Jeff.

 

[willie_gunn]

In the UK why shoot Deer at 400 yards? It's not big and it's not clever. Enjoy the stalk out in the countryside get as close as you can and humanely dispatch the animal you are hunting, and keep all the accuracy and long range crap on the range.

I'm surprised not to have heard the whistle of incoming already!

Now if you could have found a way to get Deer Stalking Certificates, head shooting, Blasers and Land Rovers into those three sentences then this thread could have run forever

 

[tackb]

OK, let me try again. A 3moa rifle does not produce 3moa groups. It just "usually" produces them, given some probability envelope. Statisticians often use 95%, so let's say that a 3moa rifle produces 3moa groups 95% of the time. (A 10 shot group would therefore usually be within 3moa, while a 20 shot group would usually show a single flyer outside of 3moa).

A 3moa rifle with a 3moa shooter will produce a 6moa group 99.75% of the time. But that's not the same as the 95% as we used earlier. If we keep to the 95% yardstick, then a 3moa rifle and a 3moa shooter yields something on the order of a 4.25moa group. (I've simplified the math to the square root of the squares of the group size. It's possible that's an over-simplification which produces misleading numbers, but I'm pretty sure it's closer than just adding the errors.)

Now, you could easily say that's still a good bit larger than our 3moa shooter on his own, and that they would indeed benefit from a more accurate rifle.

But let's look at the numbers when they're not quite as similar. A 3moa shooter and a 1moa rifle yields something like a 3.16moa group. Improve the rifle to 0.5moa and you improve the group to something like 3.04moa. That's a 1/2 moa improvement in the rifle, but the group size has only dropped by about 1/8 moa, which isn't a great return on your investment.

Improving the shooter by 1/2 moa (2.5 moa shooter with 1moa rifle) would prove far better, with 2.7moa groups.

Note: I'm no statistician. If someone wants to do the "real" math here and correct my numbers, that would be great.

Cheers,
Jeff.

lots of assumptions with your figures , and I'm not the person to dispute them but in my experience (practical) they are miles off.

what I do read into them though and I might be wrong is that any improvement to shooter or rifle improves the overall system?

 

[sharkey]

I reckon my old 30 30 win 94 would be lucky to be 6 moa if I was sighting in on paper. Yet it would kill many more pigs, goats, dogs, etc than my accurate 400m shooting 270 wby. Simply because most days its bouncing around on the passenger side of my ute with the spare rounds & empties rolling around in the dust on the floor. It's an ugly gun which performs it role in life perfectly, a farm gun for general work. On paper it may only be 6 moa but in the real world I'm more accurate/successful on mobs of pigs with this rifle than any other. I can still put nice holes in foxes at 50m or have several quick kills on pigs & goats to 100m. I don't even worry if its loaded with different brands or a 130 or a 170 grn in the chamber, it doesn't matter.

I usually take it with me if I'm hunting chital with others hunters. Its the best gun for dispatching a wounded stag of this species which has made it back to the mob & is hiding amongst 20 or 30 other deer. I push them out of their cover pick the wounded deer from its gait, give it the right amount of lead & hit it on the run. I personally couldn't do this with a super accurate scoped rifle.

Sharkey

 

[Yoda]

I'm surprised not to have heard the whistle of incoming already!

Now if you could have found a way to get Deer Stalking Certificates, head shooting, Blasers and Land Rovers into those three sentences then this thread could have run forever

Very true I should have tried harder

 

[Selous]

lots of assumptions with your figures , and I'm not the person to dispute them but in my experience (practical) they are miles off.

what I do read into them though and I might be wrong is that any improvement to shooter or rifle improves the overall system?

Exactly!!!

 

[JeffYoung]

... what I do read into them though and I might be wrong is that any improvement to shooter or rifle improves the overall system?

Hi Tackb,

Yes, that's certainly true. However, a more nuanced read is that a reduction of X in the larger number is worth more than a reduction of X in the smaller one.

Cheers,
Jeff.

 

[tackb]

Hi Tackb,

Yes, that's certainly true. However, a more nuanced read is that a reduction of X in the larger number is worth more than a reduction of X in the smaller one.

Cheers,
Jeff.

way over my head

I'll continue to improve my ability by practice and good kit , not had much call for nuances crawling in a wet ditch full of nettles and ice to get into a good position to shoot some unsuspecting deer........