# Annual Sighting In



## Fishindude (May 19, 2015)

My hunting partner is a city guy and has no place to shoot, so he's coming to the farm tomorrow for our annual sight in session of weapons for deer hunting. Will be shooting centerfire rifles, rifled slug shotguns, crossbows and possibly muzzle loader.

I'll bow hunt with my compound, then possibly my crossbow in real cold weather. Will use my .257 Weatherby and .308 Browning in IN and KS firearms seasons, then Savage 220, 20ga slug gun in IL firearms season. I shoot all of the time, and my stuff should be good, just needs checked out and confirmed. He shoots very little, so I try to work with him best I can.


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## GREENCOUNTYPETE (Jul 25, 2006)

you might want to have him bring a 22 also , a lot can be done to brush up on marksman ship skills with a 22lr in a shorter time with less cost, recoil and fatigue , there are reduced aqt targets you can download and print to be shot at 25 meters , everything converts very directly if he can make the score at 25 meters , and the rifle and ammo and data for vertical correction/hold over are correct then he should have no problem scoring hits at range.

I also find that if you know your zero repeat so say you zero at 200 yards , you likely also have a repeat around 50 yards with say a 223 and possibly closer with a 308 if you know your velocity and bullet you can punch your load into a ballistic calculator find your close / on the way up zero and it is usually close 25-60 yards close enough you should be cutting one ragged hole with your load zeroed then you move to your full distance and verify zero , you spend less time walking back and forth , and Less wind effect and less than ideal shooting or seeing of the target issue 

the other thing I do when working this "near or on the way up" zero is to just shoot at a blank sheet of paper fire one round , hold exactly on that bullet hole and only when I am positive I have a perfectly steady hold on that bullet hole sqeeeeeze off the next round and the next round it confirms I didn't have an oops if I have 2 in the same spot then measure distance up down and left right from hole 0 to hole 1 , 2

lets say your repeat was supposed to be at 50 yards and you are 1/2 inch left because with a 1/4 minute click you would need 2 clicks at 100 yards to move 1/2 inch you need to double that because you are half the distance at 50 you need to move 4 clicks it is still a half moa but because an MOA is an angular measurement and you are at half the distance you double it , if you were at 200 yards twice the distance of 100 you would half the adjustment. at 300 yards 1/3 the adjustment and at 400 yards 1/4 the adjustment.

say you are not a convenient 50 yards for your repeat say it is 37 yards 37/100=0.37 so you are dividing your inch measurement by 0.37 to find out how many moa you need to adjust so if you need to adjust 1 inch at 37 yards 1/0.37=2.7 moa or between 10 and 11 clicks on a 1/4 moa scope

you do want to get out the tape measure and measure the distance to your near zero target as the distance changes the angle faster at the shorter distance , but it is also easier to get a tight group on your mark then confirm and make small adjustments at distance 

you probably already know this but it may help your friend to read it and understand it so that your not just doing it for him and hopefully it will help others


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## hunter63 (Jan 4, 2005)

Shouldn't a Annual sight in session be one or two shot to verify it still zeroed in?

If you are starting from scratch.... ...never fired before, new scope or new rifle....all of the advice given by Greencountrypete.....spot on.


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## GREENCOUNTYPETE (Jul 25, 2006)

yes , with my slug gun it is a few rounds to verify nothing moved hasn't changed in over a decade , same for my 30-06 no change in 23 years still working on the ammo I bought the store out of back then but almost out , but the 300 that I am going out to start working with in tonight is a new gun shortly after deer season , working up loads and a new scope just this last week borrowed it's scope to replace a scope that failed on another gun 

my 223 is going back to the 50/225 yard hunting zero it was at a 25 yard zero this summer that repeated at about 390 yards great if your shooting AQT targets for score back to 400 yards but calculating 9.75 inches high at 200 and 6 inches high at 100 and 300 yards isn't so fast for 25-225 yard shooting 

the nice thing is the turrets on my new scopes are numbered so I just write down the settings once I find them and then I am able to just turn them back an verify the zero, a few shots to confirm where I should be high at 100 and 200 and all is ready to go.


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## GREENCOUNTYPETE (Jul 25, 2006)

I got a chance to test the load for 300 black out , I had speer hot-core and hornady v-max bot 110 gr over 22.5gr CFE-BLK both held right about a minute group so I don't think I will change anything , the hits on steel were from 200 yards with a sling and are actually not all one groups but shoot , hold on the bullet impact then shoot , then adjust then hold on the original bullet impact and shoot till I had the drop worked out to where I thought it should be at 200 matching my 1.5 minute hash in the scope at 150 it was all basically overlapping impact 

the 2 bullets do have different poi but I think I have settled on the v-max it has a little better BC and the local store carries them they are about 2 cents more each but don't have to pay shipping on them either.

but they shoot very close to each other for group size with this load I would need a bigger test group and a very solid rest to tell the difference 

I will load up more of these and go try them some more back at 38yards , 50 , 75 , 100 , 150 and 200 just to be sure I am set right the way I want.


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## hunter63 (Jan 4, 2005)

I was shooting my Ruger 7 mm mag....
My 3 main loads....130 gr (out west) 160gr (WI white tail) and 180 gr...brush/big animal load

Used the same target..has 3 touching 3 shot groups......
160 gr in. high [email protected],...130 gr, 1-1/2 high center. 180 gr....1-1/2 " high but 2/4 out to right.(?)

Checking target...lady next to me.... looks at it and says..."Thats a crappy group"....
Told her I would try to keep my eyes open next time......LOL
Still shooting antique ammo I reloaded in 1988......


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## Texaspredatorhu (Sep 15, 2015)

GREENCOUNTYPETE said:


> I got a chance to test the load for 300 black out , I had speer hot-core and hornady v-max bot 110 gr over 22.5gr CFE-BLK both held right about a minute group so I don't think I will change anything , the hits on steel were from 200 yards with a sling and are actually not all one groups but shoot , hold on the bullet impact then shoot , then adjust then hold on the original bullet impact and shoot till I had the drop worked out to where I thought it should be at 200 matching my 1.5 minute hash in the scope at 150 it was all basically overlapping impact
> 
> the 2 bullets do have different poi but I think I have settled on the v-max it has a little better BC and the local store carries them they are about 2 cents more each but don't have to pay shipping on them either.
> 
> ...


You need a suppressor on that 300BLK!


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## GREENCOUNTYPETE (Jul 25, 2006)

Texaspredatorhu said:


> You need a suppressor on that 300BLK!


maybe some day , it would happen a lot sooner if I didn't have to pay a 200 dollar tax to own one.


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## Texaspredatorhu (Sep 15, 2015)

GREENCOUNTYPETE said:


> maybe some day , it would happen a lot sooner if I didn't have to pay a 200 dollar tax to own one.


I hear ya, but I have paid for several even though I think it's BS!


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