The discussion in another thread got me to thinking about how well a rifle (and shooter) can produce tight groups at 100 yards in order to make an ethical kill shot on an animal at 1000 yards.

Right or wrong, here are my initial thoughts just to get the discussion going.

Let's say a given shooter and his rifle can shoot one-inch groups at 100 yards. Is it safe to say that would translate into a 10-inch group at 1000 yards? If so, that doesn't seem good enough to make an ethical kill shot unless you're shooting at elephants.

Comments?

No and no. 100% unrelated. 1" at 100 yards does NOT equal 10" at 1000 yards. You're thinking in linear dispersion, which bullets do not operate that way. You have bullet dispersion caused from flight time, muzzle velocity variation, wind, bullet BC, bullet inconsistencies, aiming error (NPA), scope issues, rifle issues, you name it.

This is the main difference when comparing good ammo (handloads or custom ammo) to your Rem CoreLoks that might shoot 1" at 100 yards.

I’m not sure a shot at 1000Y can be ethical with any rifle.

1" at 100 is easily obtainable. So easy, it can all be had with off-the-shelf components.

10" at 1000 requires much more work. Work loading, work shooting. Off the shelf components are less likely to do this, by a wide margin.

People capable of 1000 yard kill shots are a very, very small club. IF the equipment can do it, that doesn't immediately mean the shooter can or should do it, except on coyotes or hogs.

My personal standard for a rifle, and shooter using it, is to be able to reliably hit a 1" dot at 100 yards with the cold bore shot and 1 MOA size target with the cold bore shot beyond that, which is a very different standard than shooting groups.

By far the biggest factor in making a cold bore shot at 1,000 yards is the ability to accurately judge wind, and experience shooting the particular bullet to judge how to correct for that bullet in the specific wind condition for that cold bore shot.

One cold bore shot going to the intended point of aim is what matters, not group size.

A lot of variables in making a 1000yd shot on steel, tons more on a game animal.

And, as far as testing goes, 100 yard testing is something I do not waste time on. A "bad load" can look good at 100 yards. 200 yards is the minimum distance to test everything. There are times I test at 300 and 500 yards, depending on the project.

Ill jump in early on this an likely then get out. I rarely get on this firearms section cause yall are usually over my head.
Hypothetical expert shooter, shooting a rig and ammo specific for 1000 yards, what group size could you expect? Not just "I shot a 3 shot group ONE time." I mean enough multiple groups that you felt confident that the NEXT shot would hit in that size group. Hopefully some of yall are expert enough to have actually done it. What size group??

True dat. I've had a couple of loads in a couple of different rifles that were in the 0.5 to 0.75 inch range at 100 yards and would not hold together when I backed up. I still do my testing at 100, but if it looks good, I definitely back up and verify before I go inside and load a bunch of them.

I'm not claiming to be any kind of expert, but for my personal expectations, I want my EQUIPMENT to consistently shoot 5 to 6 inch groups at 1000 yards. And that happens often enough under reasonable conditions and when I'm having a good day. Some days I just shoot better than others. I'm sure I would have more good days if I shot more frequently.

Shooting a group at 1K is different that getting your round on target at your point of aim. The skill is getting your bullet to impact where you want it. Yes, the rifle needs to shoot tight groups, but that group can be off target and still look good. The skill is in getting that FIRST round on target at your aiming point. That's the difference.

Hence the 5 dot drill (1" dots) at 100 yards we used to shoot. Many shooters claim their rifle is sub moa, but can't seem to score any (or very few) points on a 5 dot drill in a match at 100 yards. Point in case.

Also, shooting with a rifle system enough to know the how the rifle will perform is key. System meaning, rifle, scope, ammo and shooter. It takes all 4 to make that happen. When you change something, especially the ammo, you are starting from near scratch again with how it will perform at distance. I've won many a bets getting one round shots on targets at distance. I've also had some misses that were epic. (I missed a pig at 1597 yards and went directly over his back, right at .4 to half a mil over. Ended up the pig was slightly closer than I estimated, and this difference was the half mil.) And anyone talking ethics on shooting a pig that far can stick it!

What Chad just posted is exactly right.

Is the group where it should be? The handloader and the shooter have to do several things to make that happen. If the answer is yes, then look at the group, which shows consistency in the whole system, including shooter. But to give you a number about 2.5" is 1/4 MOA, and better than that is more than do-able. But, one of the biggest factors in any distance shooting is the wind. Reading it, and properly correcting for it cannot be bought. It takes lots and lots of practice in lots and lots of wind directions and speeds, and lots of different type of lighting to get good at dealing with that. So in the scenario of your group, was it calm on shot #1, #2, and shot #3 a little 5 mph breeze kicked up? With some bullets and loads, that little 5 mph breeze can ruin that group.

The 6.5 Creedmoor comes up very often, we all know that. My recommendation to everyone that comes out with me for a day is simple. Shoot that rifle, and that load until you shoot the barrel out (which is 2500 rounds). After that, you're going to be fairly good at this.

In my opinion, the dot drill proves you have a good 100y zero a lot more than a sub moa gun. If all 5 shots are at 11 o'clock 1/4" off your dot, using your analogy that's not a sub moa gun....and I'd argue that.

Having a gun capable of shooting sub moa is different than having that sub moa group go where you want it.

Thats some good equipment right there. I can never find a day calm enough to even approach that kind of accuracy.

Distance is much less important than the shooters and/or his equipments capability as well as the specific situation. Ask me to shoot a deer at 75 yards, standing, freehand and you’re asking for an unethical shot.

Someone who can't get closer than 1000 yards to an animal, needs to work on their hunting skills more than their shooting skills.

Sometimes the whole point is hunting from a distance! Why? Because some people can.




300-850 yard coverage in this field from a cliff's edge hunting pigs in the off season.

Nobody dopes wind correctly on the first cold bore shot every time, nobody, none, zero, nada. I've watched Hodnett's guys many times as well as a guy named David Tubb. They don't either, but they do more often than most anybody else. Not a great idea to give them a 2nd shot though.

My question was probably a little off topic but I was real curious. I was not talking about what was ethical for hunting at all. I was just asking about shooting, not hunting. Chad thanks for the explanation but I understand the difference between hitting where you intend and merely shooting a group. My question was a group size with no importance to where they were on the target. Fireman I think answered my question if hes saying there is equipment out there and shooters out there that shoot 1/4 MOA. I guess hes saying that translates to 2.5" at 1000. That would be assuming exact conditions(wind) for each shot. I also did a quick google and it looks like(depending on crazy equipment) that would be about as good as it gets but "several" inches is doable. Im totally clueless about ultra long range shooting so I would of guessed even an expert couldn't hit a basketball at that distance and im certain I could not hit a sheet of plywood. I have no plans to shoot over 200 to 300 at a deer but that wasn't the question. Sorry, OP, for sliding off topic a little.

So i guess I'm not really a newb anymore at long distance shooting but far from an expert. I've never shot at a 1000 yard target before, 600 max for actual hit. I've never even patterned shots past 300 yards on paper. But here is what i can add after all the above:

- I've had a load do a little less than 1" at 100 yards and do almost 1.5" at 300 yards. I don't know why, maybe it's the wood benches vs concrete at my local range between the different distances. Maybe it was i just shot better in the after eating that delicious burrito and horchada. So to the OP, I would say your base claim at best is one that is only uni-directional in usefulness. If you aint shooting at least 1" groups at 100 yards then you'll need to go back to the drawing board before stepping out to attempt 10" groups at 1000. But just because it does do it at 100, do not assume the same rifles system with ammo can do it at 1000. As mentioned, that is linear interpolation that isn't applicable here.

- while a bit arbitrary 1000 yards is, it is funny how the vast majority of ammunition commonly purchased can not "make it to 1000 yards," by the criteria of maintaining supersonic flight at 1000 yards. This is not some subjective rhetoric about "is it 1000 yards good," but velocities of a launched bullet vs distance/time is a data driven value. Sure the formulas are empirical and are largely based on ballistic coefficients, but these formulas have been matched against real world Doppler testing enough to know they're pretty good. So if you run most factory ammo in a ballistics calculator with the specific bullet's BC and even assume generous muzzle velocities, I'd bet less than 25% of commercially available non-magnum ammo maintain supersonic speed. Furthermore as a skeptic, the calcualted velocities at 1000 yards always seem like that's the best result.

You might not be able to hit a sheet of plywood with any of your rifles at 1000 yards, but if you can hold reasonably steady I guarantee you can hit a 24 inch gong with one of mine shooting my handloads. Especially after it's already dialed in. The landowner where we have our mile range showed up one afternoon and I put him behind my .260 that was dialed at 1200 yards and he never missed.

http://www.pa1000yard.com/results/t...s=Light+Gun&grsc=Group&topct=100

1,000 yard benchrest match results. These are bench rigs...you can assume from these results a hunting rig to be in that 5-7" @ 1k...assuming good tune and accuracy.

I'm surprised to see a 300 Weatherby on that list. Not a round I normally associate with BR.

Lots of 6mm bullets and quite a few Krieger barrels.

Judd, awesome. That appears to be some good info for what I was curious about. Ill study that and I may come back with some questions. Thanks.