On the thread about Ruger's new Mini-14 SKU with the folding stock and bayonet lug, someone mentioned considering it if it were 2 MOA, and another person suggested 2 MOA would be the exception.
I know there are arguments from people whom I have no doubt understand accuracy and I am not going to convince them that the gun is more accurate than they believe. I don't doubt that there are AR-15's that will shoot tinier groups. On the other hand, I think there are widespread misconceptions about accuracy and that people who understand accuracy are the exception and not the rule. Here is some evidence:
Note that the video is about rifles in general and hunting rifles in particular. I don't think there is such widespread misconception among competitive benchrest shooters, F-class, PRS. I'm not educating any of those guys. On the other hand, I think there are guys who buy production AR-15's with a brand name or build one from brand-name components and believe they have a "sub-MOA" rifle.
I remember listening to Clint Smith one time griping about these guys -- I don't remember what he called them, but I would paraphrase and use the term "rifle snobs" -- and he said something like, "and they say stuff like, 'this one's sub-MOA,' but the problem is you can shoot sub-MOA." We're talking about the context of an Urban Rifle class -- that's what Clint is probably most famous for. I don't recall the Mini-14 being part of that conversation. You can hear Clint's opinion on the Mini-14 in the TFBTV episode with James Reeves. But the Mini-14 is valid in the context of Urban Rifle. It's not valid in PRS. And in the context of something like Urban Rifle, having a sub-MOA rifle just doesn't matter. It's like sorting primers by weight, or tuning seating depth, for a hunting rifle. Those things matter in a different context.
So, it's fair to ask, what kind of accuracy should a person expect from a rifle like the Mini-14 or a comparable M4 carbine? I think it's important to narrow down "the AR-15" to something that has a similar purpose to the Mini-14 because the AR can be built in to so many different types of guns. Maybe that's one of it's strengths as a category, but we can't compare a rifle like the Mini-14 to a category of rifles. To be fair, we'd have to compare it to a particular rifle. It wouldn't be fair say we're comparing the Sig P365 to hammer-fired handguns and pick a P365 to compare against a Shadow 2. So if we pick the M4 to compare, I think it's fair because similar to the Mini-14, the purpose isn't primarily to shoot small groups, nor is the purpose hunting, nor is it long-range shooting, or anything else that there are some rifles in the AR-15 category to do but which don't really compare to the Mini-14.
So is the M4 more accurate than the Mini-14?