Slightly long post, mainly because I am restless between waiting for renders.
I have been invited out midweek on a mixed brief, so yesterday I thought I would check both rifles from sticks at 100m before the trip. I always zero from sticks, as that is how I use my rifles in the field, but it also avoids the neck ache from lying prone behind a rifle for extended sessions. On this occasion it had the added benefit of keeping me out of the dirt in a field that had recently been sprayed with slurry and ploughed in.
My stalking rifles are generally set around 1" high at 100m, which is usually a fairly hassle-free zero. I followed suit with my vermin calibres. The problem is that a slightly longer-range zero can become less forgiving for precision at ordinary field distances, particularly for head shooting when range is being estimated rather than measured. With the HMR, I had also added 6 clicks at ¼ MOA before the last outing, which is roughly 1.5 MOA, or about 1.7" at 100m. That helped me reach some longer pots, but after then missing a couple high at mid-range, around 75m, I felt I had probably overdone it.
I do not have a laser rangefinder on either the Pard, Schmidt & Bender or Hawke setups. I use a golf rangefinder in daylight, but that obviously does not help in the same way at night. In that context, a flatter-looking long zero proved less useful than a more forgiving point-blank setup for the ranges I actually shoot most frequently.
The point I will meander to eventually is less about zero range, or even which calibre grouped best, and more about the gap between mechanical accuracy and usable field accuracy. What became particularly noticeable was how quickly external factors began to affect results with my beloved HMR.
The wind was roughly 11 to 14mph with intermittent gusts over 20mph across an exposed field. I was shooting SSW into a NW wind, which in practice meant the bullets were dealing with something close to a full-value right-to-left crosswind.
First up was the .308 Win, a second-hand Tikka T3 shooting 130gr Sako Super Hammerheads. The first 3-shot group, on the centre bull, measured 0.613" / 0.535 MOA and was sitting approximately an inch high and right at 100m. With no real science involved, I eyeballed it that expected wind drift on the .308 at 100m in that wind would have been very small, so I came 2 clicks left and 2 clicks down on the 8x56 Klassic and shot the right-hand bull, which measured 0.469" / 0.410 MOA.
Shot from sticks, the rifle felt true and I was happy with both groups, so packed her away. Yes, the second group still sat fractionally left of POA, but given the wind crossing that felt about right rather than something worth chasing, certainly not at roughly £3 a cartridge.
Checking once home, the wind angle was giving something like a 10 to 13mph effective crosswind from the right. A typical .308 load might only move around 0.3 to 0.6" at 100m, even allowing for gusts. That broadly matched the final right-hand bull, which sat slightly left but not enough to justify correcting.
The HMR is my CZ 455, which I have had from new for about 10 years and generally use with a Pard add-on. The rifle itself still shoots very well. But not with me behind it yesterday.
Very roughly speaking, a 17gr V-Max in a full-value 10mph crosswind at 100m can drift around 1.5 to 2". With gusts getting towards an effective 18mph crosswind, drift could easily move beyond 2 to 3". More importantly, the shot-to-shot variance becomes significant. That seemed to show quite clearly in the spread and shifting point of impact.
The lowest bull HMR group showed it printing high and left. I adjusted slightly right but did not want to chase the wind. The following group, which was the middle target, had opened up vertically as well as horizontally.
The horizontal spread broadly made sense given the wind, but the vertical displacement was probably a combination of slightly inconsistent hold from sticks in gusting weather, a dirty barrel and me simply not shooting particularly well. Once the group starts opening in both axes, what initially looks like a tidy wind allowance quickly turns into more of a pattern plate for a scattergun.
The top bull was the final group. A few individual clicks on the turrets whilst shooting, but I left the general POI slightly left of the bull and roughly level.
I should also say that I surprised myself with how poorly I shot the HMR on the day. I have confidence in the rifle, but I clearly was not getting the best out of it in that weather. The shots felt good, but the results were poor.
That is partly the point: the rifle may be mechanically sound, but the combination of wind, position, range judgement and the shooter on the day can produce a very different result.
The interesting part was not really the group size, but how differently the two cartridges behaved in the wind. The .308 barely seemed to acknowledge the wind, whilst the HMR, at roughly one-eighth of the bullet weight, is so much more sensitive to gusts and small range or hold errors.
Rimfires are easier to shoot well in many respects: no recoil, little noise, and generally less disturbance to the view through the shot cycle.
The problem is that field reality can create a big gap between peak performance and actual results. Wind, range estimation, trajectory choice and small hold errors all matter more than they appear to on a calm paper target.
That is particularly relevant with rabbit head shooting. A rabbit’s brain is a very small target, and once wind starts moving a lightweight rimfire bullet by a couple of inches at 100m, margins disappear very quickly. It is not just about average drift, but unpredictable variance between shots as gusts rise and fall. A rifle that is mechanically accurate on a calm range can become a very different proposition in exposed real-world shooting from sticks.
For context, I have head-shot hundreds and hundreds of rabbits yet have only head-shot one deer, under explicit instruction. That was a calm Chinese Water Deer from sticks at about 60m, lying down with its head raised. It felt like a very controlled situation and required no follow up. However I have in the past had to finish off a badly head shot rabbits. I mention it only because I am learning that the same principle applies to respect no matter what your quarry: the shot has to suit the situation, not just the capability of the rifle.
So, if you have borne with me through the ramble, I suppose the only sensible conclusion is that, for ethical reasons, the .308 is now my rabbit gun
I have been invited out midweek on a mixed brief, so yesterday I thought I would check both rifles from sticks at 100m before the trip. I always zero from sticks, as that is how I use my rifles in the field, but it also avoids the neck ache from lying prone behind a rifle for extended sessions. On this occasion it had the added benefit of keeping me out of the dirt in a field that had recently been sprayed with slurry and ploughed in.
My stalking rifles are generally set around 1" high at 100m, which is usually a fairly hassle-free zero. I followed suit with my vermin calibres. The problem is that a slightly longer-range zero can become less forgiving for precision at ordinary field distances, particularly for head shooting when range is being estimated rather than measured. With the HMR, I had also added 6 clicks at ¼ MOA before the last outing, which is roughly 1.5 MOA, or about 1.7" at 100m. That helped me reach some longer pots, but after then missing a couple high at mid-range, around 75m, I felt I had probably overdone it.
I do not have a laser rangefinder on either the Pard, Schmidt & Bender or Hawke setups. I use a golf rangefinder in daylight, but that obviously does not help in the same way at night. In that context, a flatter-looking long zero proved less useful than a more forgiving point-blank setup for the ranges I actually shoot most frequently.
The point I will meander to eventually is less about zero range, or even which calibre grouped best, and more about the gap between mechanical accuracy and usable field accuracy. What became particularly noticeable was how quickly external factors began to affect results with my beloved HMR.
The wind was roughly 11 to 14mph with intermittent gusts over 20mph across an exposed field. I was shooting SSW into a NW wind, which in practice meant the bullets were dealing with something close to a full-value right-to-left crosswind.
First up was the .308 Win, a second-hand Tikka T3 shooting 130gr Sako Super Hammerheads. The first 3-shot group, on the centre bull, measured 0.613" / 0.535 MOA and was sitting approximately an inch high and right at 100m. With no real science involved, I eyeballed it that expected wind drift on the .308 at 100m in that wind would have been very small, so I came 2 clicks left and 2 clicks down on the 8x56 Klassic and shot the right-hand bull, which measured 0.469" / 0.410 MOA.
Shot from sticks, the rifle felt true and I was happy with both groups, so packed her away. Yes, the second group still sat fractionally left of POA, but given the wind crossing that felt about right rather than something worth chasing, certainly not at roughly £3 a cartridge.
Checking once home, the wind angle was giving something like a 10 to 13mph effective crosswind from the right. A typical .308 load might only move around 0.3 to 0.6" at 100m, even allowing for gusts. That broadly matched the final right-hand bull, which sat slightly left but not enough to justify correcting.
The HMR is my CZ 455, which I have had from new for about 10 years and generally use with a Pard add-on. The rifle itself still shoots very well. But not with me behind it yesterday.
Very roughly speaking, a 17gr V-Max in a full-value 10mph crosswind at 100m can drift around 1.5 to 2". With gusts getting towards an effective 18mph crosswind, drift could easily move beyond 2 to 3". More importantly, the shot-to-shot variance becomes significant. That seemed to show quite clearly in the spread and shifting point of impact.
The lowest bull HMR group showed it printing high and left. I adjusted slightly right but did not want to chase the wind. The following group, which was the middle target, had opened up vertically as well as horizontally.
The horizontal spread broadly made sense given the wind, but the vertical displacement was probably a combination of slightly inconsistent hold from sticks in gusting weather, a dirty barrel and me simply not shooting particularly well. Once the group starts opening in both axes, what initially looks like a tidy wind allowance quickly turns into more of a pattern plate for a scattergun.
The top bull was the final group. A few individual clicks on the turrets whilst shooting, but I left the general POI slightly left of the bull and roughly level.
I should also say that I surprised myself with how poorly I shot the HMR on the day. I have confidence in the rifle, but I clearly was not getting the best out of it in that weather. The shots felt good, but the results were poor.
That is partly the point: the rifle may be mechanically sound, but the combination of wind, position, range judgement and the shooter on the day can produce a very different result.
The interesting part was not really the group size, but how differently the two cartridges behaved in the wind. The .308 barely seemed to acknowledge the wind, whilst the HMR, at roughly one-eighth of the bullet weight, is so much more sensitive to gusts and small range or hold errors.
Rimfires are easier to shoot well in many respects: no recoil, little noise, and generally less disturbance to the view through the shot cycle.
The problem is that field reality can create a big gap between peak performance and actual results. Wind, range estimation, trajectory choice and small hold errors all matter more than they appear to on a calm paper target.
That is particularly relevant with rabbit head shooting. A rabbit’s brain is a very small target, and once wind starts moving a lightweight rimfire bullet by a couple of inches at 100m, margins disappear very quickly. It is not just about average drift, but unpredictable variance between shots as gusts rise and fall. A rifle that is mechanically accurate on a calm range can become a very different proposition in exposed real-world shooting from sticks.
For context, I have head-shot hundreds and hundreds of rabbits yet have only head-shot one deer, under explicit instruction. That was a calm Chinese Water Deer from sticks at about 60m, lying down with its head raised. It felt like a very controlled situation and required no follow up. However I have in the past had to finish off a badly head shot rabbits. I mention it only because I am learning that the same principle applies to respect no matter what your quarry: the shot has to suit the situation, not just the capability of the rifle.
So, if you have borne with me through the ramble, I suppose the only sensible conclusion is that, for ethical reasons, the .308 is now my rabbit gun
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