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Accuracy driving me nuts. Not sure if it's rifle or scope(s)


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I have the .223.

Ammo was Federal

I put (2 different) 3-9x40 scopes on it hoping to be able to shot out to 100 or so yards easier.

 

At 50 yards I can dial in the scope and put 7 shots in a 1x1" or less square. Move out to 100 and can't hardly hit a paper plate more less any type of consistent placement. Sometimes it goes off the plate right next shot off the plate high, all over the place

 

I've changed scopes and same thing happens with both scopes.

 

I decided to slowly work my way out to 100 yards from 50.

50 yards was as stated above

65 yards it was hitting 2" low so I dialed it in to bull and 3 shots on top of one another

Moved it to 80 yards and completely off the plate and no consistent shot placement.

There was about 5 minutes time from the 65 yard shots to the 80. Same ammo.

 

I can't for the life of me figure out how or why it does this

 

Anyone have any suggestions. Is it the scope or the rifle

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I'm no expert, but my first thought is that your scope mount is probably not holding zero.

There's no way that a rifle shooting 1" groups at 50 yards can't hit paper at 100.    I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's probably not the rifle.

Edited by SGL
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I'm no expert, but my first thought is that your scope mount is probably not holding zero.

There's no way that a rifle shooting 1" groups at 50 yards can't hit paper at 100.    I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's probably not the rifle.

yeah, reading this more thoroughly this is a good theory.

 

what results do you get with iron sights?

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I'm no expert, but my first thought is that your scope mount is probably not holding zero.

There's no way that a rifle shooting 1" groups at 50 yards can't hit paper at 100.    I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's probably not the rifle.

 

yeah, reading this more thoroughly this is a good theory.

 

what results do you get with iron sights?

Lol yea I thought about that AFTER I left the range. I was just so disgusted with trying to figure out what in the world was going on I forgot.

Only thing though is that if it was the scope "mount" why would it do the same thing after putting the new scope on. When I took the first one off the mount seemed solid.

 

Both scopes did basically the exact same thing. Grouped great at 50 yards and went haywire out at 80 and 100. That's what's driving me nuts. It makes no since to me.

 

Little more info. There was NO wind when I was out so that would rule that out. Didn't matter about barrel heat. When it started getting a little to hot I left it sit to cool down.

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Scope rings are new

More info. I was having this same issue about a week ago but I was hoping it was the ammo. I was using steel cased ammo and was getting the same results as today. I did a complete cleaning of the gun and put new scope rings on.

 

I actually shot a few rounds of steel cased today to see what it would do. It was in the grouping of 7 shots I mentioned in my first post. 4 brass and 3 steel cased, all grouped together at 50 yards

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Are you locking the gun down on a sled (gun bench)?If you do not have a constant support for the rifle it could be anything.

Eliminate as much human movement as you can, check the crown of the rifle. Is it a mildot scope? I do not think it is ammo,I think it may be flinching.

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Sounds like scope is migrating with recoil and isn't shimmed parallel to receiver resulting in large movement of the POI. Also movement of POI with elevation knob at short ranges is very small. What looks like zero at 50 can be way off at 100. A picture of your rig would help.

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A few people have had posp rails that weren't securely riveted in place. Is it possible that the rail on the side of the gun has some wiggle?

This. Also the three bolt UTG mounts solid but if your not using a torque wrench to consistently tighten the bolt that could have an effect I would think. The are only aluminum and if front or back screw is tighter or looser between changes this could pull one end of the mount down. Just hypothesis. Change not just between steel or brass caused ammo. Rey different weight ammo. I would think it wouldnt matter much between 55 and 62 grain but eliminate everything. Make sure that if you have a bullet guide its not chewing off hunks of the bullet when cycling in new ammo. Also check crown for any damage. I mostly target shoot 22lr, and the dumb shit can make a huge difference in accuracy.
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Is the scope you are using 1" or 30mm? If you are using rings that are universal, that is, they have the shims in them to mount a 1" scope, I would recommend getting rid of them. As others have said, it could be the mount and you need to make sure that it is secure, but more times than not if using the shims to mount a 1" scope in 30 mm rings accuracy will suffer. I had the same issue with several sets of rings before I figured out buy rings specifically for the scope you have and avoid universal set ups. If you want to eliminate the gun as a possibility do what others have said and use iron sights and a good shooting platform such as a lead sled, etc.

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Its not the rifle if its shooting 1" @50 then it should shoot no more than 2" or so at 100.

 

If the scopes are junk that could be it. You say new but what kind of scope was it.

 

Also you ask if it's the mount why would it stay the same with the new scope? That's precisely why. If the mount is the problem and you didn't change that it wont matter how many scopes you try.

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Here's the crown and the mount. The mount is solid. It will not budge in any way.

 

Hopefully get out in a few days to try iron sites

 

I was using a bi-pod when shooting. No flinching (no question about it).

 

Barska scope (new). But also did exact same thing with the old scope.

Was also told it could be the barrell, but how in the world would it group at 50 and 65 yards. I would think that if it was the barrell it would be all over the place at that range also

post-24187-0-87611900-1381608645_thumb.jpg

post-24187-0-01671800-1381608667_thumb.jpg

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all good suggestions. like everyone else said - having an inconsistently zeroed optic will have more significant impacts when the range increases. the difficulty is in identifying why there is an inconsistency.

 

if you're putting the scope up against your face in any way, stop. it doesn't take much to flex the cheaper side-mounted rails and knock the scope out of zero temporarily.

 

I would also remove the bipod and handguard from the equation, to make sure that your setup isn't seriously affecting barrel harmonics. the rifle can be safely shot with the handguard removed without risk of burning anything, so long as you're giving some good time between shots.

 

that still doesn't explain why a rifle that shoots 1" groups at 50yds goes wild out past that.

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Sorry guys haven't had a chance to get out to the range. I got t-boned while I was working last week. I've been taking all of my free time trying to find another car and getting all the insurance taken care of.

 

I'll give an update hopefully soon on a range report.

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  • 2 weeks later...

UPDATE

 

Top pic This is a group using iron sites at 60~ yards

Middle pic. This is the best I could do with iron sites at 100 yards. Very hard to shoot out that far I could hardly see the target, which was the big black dot

 

Bottom pic. For giggles I slapped the scope mount and scope back on to see what I could do

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post-24187-0-55174900-1383089164_thumb.jpg

post-24187-0-58797400-1383089322_thumb.jpg

Edited by brgr
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I didn't do anything to the scope just put it on. No adjustments.

 

Seems to be that once the barrel gets warm/hot that's when my shots really start going nuts.

 

I only shot 20 or so rounds. And the shots seemed to stay at least "acceptable"

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I had the same sort of issue with my 7.62x39. Turned out it was the shyte side mount. I had the UTG lever mount, and it looks like you have the UTG bolt on. 

 

My groups were all over the place one day, and i was going crazy trying to figure out why... Turns out the mount was loose and was flapping against the receiver after every shot, spoiling my zero. I tightened up the lever as much as i could, and torqued it towards the receiver before closing the lever. After i did that, I got my best group EVER. I am going to be getting a decent side mount for it that hopefully takes care of the slack UTG.

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