Long Range Rifle/Scope/PRS question(s)
- Thread starter Walkalong
- Start date
On this stage we had to shoot three targets one shot each from the first rail, then drop the mag, run (or not) to the second rail
and shoot three targets two times each, all targets were different yardages. I was a split second away from cleaning it, but was
a hair late with the last impact.
and shoot three targets two times each, all targets were different yardages. I was a split second away from cleaning it, but was
a hair late with the last impact.
From their Facebook page, getting ready to shoot a stage, gun and bag in hand. It was an up and
down day for me, did clean one tough stage. 46 out of 80. Jeff was 24th, he shot pretty well.
Edit: The Nighforce performed very well, I'm very happy with it.
down day for me, did clean one tough stage. 46 out of 80. Jeff was 24th, he shot pretty well.
Edit: The Nighforce performed very well, I'm very happy with it.
rdnktrkr
Member
Do you prefer the rimfire or centerfire PRS/NRL? What is the closest match to me you go to?
Stage 3:
15" and 12" square targets at 686 yards. I lost track and was dropping my mag when I realized I had rounds left,
and they hollered at me that I had one more position/two more shots to go. They gave us two minutes thankfully.
Cleaned it.
www.youtube.com
15" and 12" square targets at 686 yards. I lost track and was dropping my mag when I realized I had rounds left,
and they hollered at me that I had one more position/two more shots to go. They gave us two minutes thankfully.
Cleaned it.
PRS Stage 3 15 & 12 Inch Targets at 686 Yards Alabama Precision 2 17 2024
PRS Match Alabama Precision 2-17-2024
www.youtube.com
rdnktrkr
Member
looks like about 3hrs to Alabama Precision and 4.5hrs to Altus, I might look into Alabama Precision, thanks for the info.
Good shooting and moving, Does the gravel hurt your knees? Looks like it could be painful and mess up your trigger control a little.
Good shooting and moving, Does the gravel hurt your knees? Looks like it could be painful and mess up your trigger control a little.
Varminterror
Member
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2016
- Messages
- 14,893
I wear knee pads in my pants. I took a gravel rock just wrong on my patellar tendon during a stage in my first season and yeah, I thought more about “holy &@#% that sucked,” than I did about targets for a few seconds and I’ve worn knee pads ever since.
Varminterror
Member
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2016
- Messages
- 14,893
I neglected to mention, a few of our Oklahoma ranges are in competition with eachother for Goathead capital of the world, so between gravel and goatheads, knee pads are nice.
A buddy DID convince me this year to shoot some matches in shorts, and a few of our shooters do wear construction or skater type knee pads with shorts - but I’m not quite decided that it’s a good look. Lol
A buddy DID convince me this year to shoot some matches in shorts, and a few of our shooters do wear construction or skater type knee pads with shorts - but I’m not quite decided that it’s a good look. Lol
Any chance there are pictures of that Rat Rod Ruger American laying around? That sounds like a rifle I'd like to see.
It’s the internet warrior look… urban camo completes the ensemble.
haha I’m curious about the rat rod myself.
Varminterror
Member
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2016
- Messages
- 14,893
It’s the internet warrior look… urban camo completes the ensemble.
Eh, call it what you will. I wore “carpenter jeans” for a lot of years because they had a hammer hook which would hold my fencing pliers while I worked. I wear cargo pants - I guess we call them “tactical pants” now? - to matches because they hold knee pads and my match book.
But we shoot a lot of matches well over 100 degrees all summer long, and cargo shorts sure would be cooler than long cotton/poly pants.
I’ve not met the dude personally, but he was sent my way by a fellow ELR shooter last year, and I’ve tried to help guide him through the process of prepping for PRS remotely. He’s on a shoestring budget, and he already had this Ruger American Predator, so he added weights inside and out, the rail, cheek riser, etc. to get it balancing where it should. He had his first match last weekend, and it seems to have went maybe a little rougher than we’d hoped but maybe not so surprisingly - he timed out on ~1/4 of the rounds and hit about 1/4 of his shots. I asked Phil Cashin, owner of Masterpiece Arms to babysit him for the match, and another pro shooter was on squad with him to coach and give corrections - it sounds like he was struggling with building stable positions behind the rifle and he did mention he was not doing a good job either of trigger control or recoil management to see where he was hitting.
He’s squirreling away extra cash now to get into an MPA built rifle. He said he was only a few points behind one of his buddies who had shot a few matches last year, and who has a Savage Elite Precision - and whom he is actively hunting to surpass in the rankings. He mentioned that his buddy has been kinda dismissive, but after the match, he said this Ruger had shot a lot better than he’d expected, and that his buddy said he might be too busy to go shoot the March match they’d been planning to shoot together. Small victories, I guess!
I did some roofing last Sun/Mon, and actually used it for a hammer........haven't used it in a PRS match yet, but I could hang something from it, a light bag for example.
Varminterror
Member
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2016
- Messages
- 14,893
That's actually why I asked if you were shooting the match, but by the time you got back on the thread, I'd already talked to Phil and knew he'd be taken care of. Dude was drinking from the firehose. I'm hoping his March match goes a little better, he hit less than I'd hoped for him, so he's back to the drawing board.
Maybe his biggest problem - besides a shoestring budget - is the fact he's beholden to his buddy reloading for him, so he won't control how much ammo he can access to practice or be ready for matches very easily.
Yea, that might be an issue, maybe not though, depends.
He needs good numbers on that ammo, if he has that, he'd be OK.
Phil almost won the match. Was your buddy in his squad?
Varminterror
Member
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2016
- Messages
- 14,893
Yeah, I saw Phil tied to win it, just slower on the tie breaker. And yeah, he was in Phil's squad - that's actually why I reached out to him; was kinda scrounging to find someone he could squad with, but it was late enough that most squads were already full, but then I saw the only open squad had Phil and Ryan, and I knew they'd take care of a newbie.
How I prep brass and load for PRS matches.
Step 1: Tumble
I tumble the fired cases for 30 minutes give or take. Corncob with light polish (Midway/Dillon/etc). No, I don't care if the cases are shiny,
just clean, prior to annealing and sizing.
Step 2: Anneal.
Some folks like to decap first. If so, decap, then just clean primer pockets with a brush etc, or clean/uniform primer pockets with a PP
uniformer. Use a good one and don't scrape the side walls.
I don't think it really matters about annealing with primers in or out, I have tried it both ways, anneal with the primers in, and anneal
with them out. Using the Aztec Mode to analyze cases the AMP gives nearly an identical number for both, with or without. Meh. YMMV
Step 3: Size (And Decap if you didn't between tumbling and annealing).
I use a full length bushing style die. I choose a bushing to get the necks sized down enough my chosen mandrel type expander does just
a little bit of work on each and every case. So I choose a bushing to size the necks down enough for that, and an expander for neck tension.
Case neck thickness/bushing brand will determine what bushing you choose. Remember, we are talking about loading for standard necked
chambers, not tight necked ones!
Step 4: Tumble with dry corn cob (no polish) to remove lube.
Step 5: Trimming Cases
I use a Wilson right now, but am looking hard at a Henderson which would chamfer and deburr at the same time, as well as save reps
on my old hands with a manual trimmer like the Wilson. Great trimmer though.
Step 6: Chamfer & Deburr if your trimmer didn't do it. Clean primer pockets if you didn't do it after decapping prior to annealing.
I do it under power with a little hobby lathe, but any way one chooses is fine. Brush last to smooth the surface the bullet seats in.
If the cases are already deburred and chamfered, as well as primer pockets cleaned, then brushing is still done for the same reason.
Step 7: Tumble again in corn cob with a little bit of polish added.
I use corncob with polish here because I want residual polish on the cases. I also want the tumbler to work on the chamfered surface
where the bullet seats, hopefully smoothing that surface further. That's part of the reason for brushing after chamferring and deburring.
Step 1: Tumble
I tumble the fired cases for 30 minutes give or take. Corncob with light polish (Midway/Dillon/etc). No, I don't care if the cases are shiny,
just clean, prior to annealing and sizing.
Step 2: Anneal.
Some folks like to decap first. If so, decap, then just clean primer pockets with a brush etc, or clean/uniform primer pockets with a PP
uniformer. Use a good one and don't scrape the side walls.
I don't think it really matters about annealing with primers in or out, I have tried it both ways, anneal with the primers in, and anneal
with them out. Using the Aztec Mode to analyze cases the AMP gives nearly an identical number for both, with or without. Meh. YMMV
Step 3: Size (And Decap if you didn't between tumbling and annealing).
I use a full length bushing style die. I choose a bushing to get the necks sized down enough my chosen mandrel type expander does just
a little bit of work on each and every case. So I choose a bushing to size the necks down enough for that, and an expander for neck tension.
Case neck thickness/bushing brand will determine what bushing you choose. Remember, we are talking about loading for standard necked
chambers, not tight necked ones!
Step 4: Tumble with dry corn cob (no polish) to remove lube.
Step 5: Trimming Cases
I use a Wilson right now, but am looking hard at a Henderson which would chamfer and deburr at the same time, as well as save reps
on my old hands with a manual trimmer like the Wilson. Great trimmer though.
Step 6: Chamfer & Deburr if your trimmer didn't do it. Clean primer pockets if you didn't do it after decapping prior to annealing.
I do it under power with a little hobby lathe, but any way one chooses is fine. Brush last to smooth the surface the bullet seats in.
If the cases are already deburred and chamfered, as well as primer pockets cleaned, then brushing is still done for the same reason.
Step 7: Tumble again in corn cob with a little bit of polish added.
I use corncob with polish here because I want residual polish on the cases. I also want the tumbler to work on the chamfered surface
where the bullet seats, hopefully smoothing that surface further. That's part of the reason for brushing after chamferring and deburring.
Step 8: Brush necks again.
I brush necks again here to continue to help smooth the neck entrance where the bullet pushes in, as well as to remove corn cob
dust and get the necks ready/uniform to expand prior to seating bullets.
Step 9: Expand the necks
I use a Brownells nitrided .261 expander mandrel. Others work just as well. (It's in a Sinclair Gen II mandrel holder.)
Step 10: Prime cases
I use a 21st Century hand priming tool which I love, but other methods work just fine. I do use care to uniform the primer pockets, even
on the best brass, and seat the primers to the same depth every time, which means an adjustable primer tool that will do that for you,
as well as careful measurements. My Alpha cases have deeper pockets than my Lapua 6BR fire formed cases. Instead of making my
Lapua pockets deeper, I use two different settings on the priming tool. YMMV
Step 11: Charge cases.
I use a measure to drop a charge 2/3 grains short of the desired charge, and use the FX120i with auto trickler to bring it up to what I want.
Other ways/scales/measures etc will work just as well as long as they end up with accurate charges that give small ES/SD numbers.
Step 12: Seating Bullets
I use a Wilson hand die and Arbor press. I like doing it that way, it makes straight ammo if your cases are straight, but so do other methods.
I mark loaded rounds to identify fired cases on the ground so I can retrieve them, buggers aren't cheap.
Once you have proven each step of your load procedure keeps things straight, you don't need to keep checking every round. One thing
to remember is that if your chamber throws out crooked cases, your dies won't fix it much. Assuming our fired cases are straight, we're
checking each step to make sure we don't introduce runout, and if we find it, we fix it, replace the die, etc, so we make straight ammo.
I like straight ammo, so I make it as straight as I can. I mean why not? Some folks think it doesn't matter.
I brush necks again here to continue to help smooth the neck entrance where the bullet pushes in, as well as to remove corn cob
dust and get the necks ready/uniform to expand prior to seating bullets.
Step 9: Expand the necks
I use a Brownells nitrided .261 expander mandrel. Others work just as well. (It's in a Sinclair Gen II mandrel holder.)
Step 10: Prime cases
I use a 21st Century hand priming tool which I love, but other methods work just fine. I do use care to uniform the primer pockets, even
on the best brass, and seat the primers to the same depth every time, which means an adjustable primer tool that will do that for you,
as well as careful measurements. My Alpha cases have deeper pockets than my Lapua 6BR fire formed cases. Instead of making my
Lapua pockets deeper, I use two different settings on the priming tool. YMMV
Step 11: Charge cases.
I use a measure to drop a charge 2/3 grains short of the desired charge, and use the FX120i with auto trickler to bring it up to what I want.
Other ways/scales/measures etc will work just as well as long as they end up with accurate charges that give small ES/SD numbers.
Step 12: Seating Bullets
I use a Wilson hand die and Arbor press. I like doing it that way, it makes straight ammo if your cases are straight, but so do other methods.
I mark loaded rounds to identify fired cases on the ground so I can retrieve them, buggers aren't cheap.
Once you have proven each step of your load procedure keeps things straight, you don't need to keep checking every round. One thing
to remember is that if your chamber throws out crooked cases, your dies won't fix it much. Assuming our fired cases are straight, we're
checking each step to make sure we don't introduce runout, and if we find it, we fix it, replace the die, etc, so we make straight ammo.
I like straight ammo, so I make it as straight as I can. I mean why not? Some folks think it doesn't matter.
Brutal day, something is off with my setup. 32nd. Jeff shot quite well, came in 8th.
Top two dropped 2 each, had a shoot off. Crazy thing is, one of those two was allowed a reshoot on a stage where he had a zero……get it…..because he said he read the stage brief wrong. That’s nuts, and shouldn’t have been allowed.
Top two dropped 2 each, had a shoot off. Crazy thing is, one of those two was allowed a reshoot on a stage where he had a zero……get it…..because he said he read the stage brief wrong. That’s nuts, and shouldn’t have been allowed.
