M1 Garand evaluation in 2022

[divil]

Well I've had it out to the range now but the jury is still out as to how it shoots. I have shot a few groups at 50 yards that had 5 or 6 fairly tight shots, and 1 or 2 fliers. Today I had one that had 5 shots into 0.75 inches, but 2 fliers that opened it up to over 2 inches.

But many of the groups are worse. Most of them have a peculiar diagonal stringing to them, so I get all shots roughly in a straight line going up/right.

I'm not a great shooter, but I have never had a situation where I'm getting clusters of 0.75 - 1.00 inches at times, with fliers, and then other times, 3 inches or more evenly spread in all directions, and then sometimes this weird stringing. Maybe the bore is just shot out, but I think I need to dig around a little and see if I can improve things.

I can wiggle the rear sight a little, which doesn't seem right. The gas plug came loose which also might be an issue. Also the new stock this rifle has has been relieved a little in the foreend, so maybe that needs more work. The action is a nice snug fit in the stock, but I keep having to take it apart to clean it because I don't trust the ammo I'm using (might be corrosive).

Anyway I have a feeling it has potential. Any suggestions or recommendations for improving how it shoots are welcome!

[veprdude]

You could always try re-crowning the barrel. Brownells might sell a tool to do it at home. Most of the accuracy of a rifle is obtained at the crown. And a crown that's uneven will surely cause accuracy to be lost. The way I understand it is that the gases escaping from the rifling grooves need to be even. If you have one groove that allows more gas to escape than the others it can impart an uneven spin similar to a tire being out of balance.

M1 Garands often have oval shaped crowns from a cleaning rod resting in the same area of the crown during the 100's or 1000's of cleanings it's gone through. Most fielding these rifles either don't know better or don't care about this. When the barrel becomes unserviceable it goes back to the armory for a new barrel.

The question becomes do you leave it as-is, re-crown yourself, have a pro re-crown for you, get a new barrel?

My personal opinion is to leave it as-is and live with the accuracy you have. Maybe attempt to re-crown yourself. If you're looking for a 1 MOA rifle there are cheaper options to be had. Enjoy the rifle, how it operates and its history.

In the future, I think M1 Garands with military barrels will be worth more than ones commercial replacements, regardless how they shoot.

[Nodak1858]

What is the headstamp on the ammo you are shooting?
Or is it reloaded ammo?

[divil]

My personal opinion is to leave it as-is and live with the accuracy you have. Maybe attempt to re-crown yourself. If you're looking for a 1 MOA rifle there are cheaper options to be had. Enjoy the rifle, how it operates and its history.

Well that's not happening I'll do everything I can to improve it. It should be better than this. If I could get those tight clusters I'm seeing sometimes, but without the fliers being so far off, I'd be happy. But the big groups, no way.

If I can't fix it, I might get a new barrel. In that case there would be no reason not to try a re-crown first if there's a chance it saves me having to get a new barrel. But it's early for that yet I think.

So far I've discovered:

* the front sight is a tiny bit loose (it seems to be the whole assembly)
* the rear sight is even more loose
* the rifle fails the tilt test in the stock, and in fact I can feel the resistance in the rod with the spring removed. It passes perfectly out of the stock

At the very least I'll fix all these things and see where that gets me.

What is the headstamp on the ammo you are shooting?
Or is it reloaded ammo?

I don't know about the headstamp but it's Yugoslavian M2 ball ammo. I got 6 boxes of that with the rifle along with a couple of Korean boxes and one box of Remington hunting ammo (which makes me a tiny bit worried that the previous owner thought he could use that)

[Nodak1858]

The Yugo will be corrosive, the Korea could or could not be depending the headstamp.
Help on fitting stocks can be read about here.
http://forums.thecmp.org/showthread.php?t=147599

[divil]

Well I fixed the sights but I'm still struggling to get consistency. Before, I was usually getting 4 out of 5 rounds into a nice sub 1" at 50 yards, but always one flier that would open it up to around 2" in total.

Yesterday I discovered that the rear sight wasn't just loose, it was actually changing elevation (i.e the knob was turning every time I fired). So I tightened that up, peened the gas tube splines to tighten up the front sight, made the gas plug nice and snug, and tried again. Now my groups are more evenly spread over 2 inches. I just can't make sense of that.

They have always been spread out more vertically, and they still are now. So maybe there's something I can do about that. It could be my aim/trigger control. For control purposes, I brought along my AR with some ordinary cheap ammo. With that, I had no trouble getting sub 1" at 50 yards consistently. But the sight picture on the AR does seem a little clearer, and the trigger is obviously way better.

How does a shot out bore typically behave on an M1? Do you tend to still get good groups, but with fliers - or do your groups stay the same kind of shape but just get bigger?

[mikejonestkd]

IIRC the military expectation was a 5 inch 8 shot group at 100 yards.
In my limited experience - a good condition mil surplus non modified/ not rebuilt/ not rebarreled garand fed good ammo will shoot about 2-3" groups at 100 yards.

[divil]

IIRC the military expectation was a 5 inch 8 shot group at 100 yards.

I've heard 3, 3.5, 4 and 5" from different internet sources. But what I would really like to know is: was that the expectation, or just the absolute bottom line, the limit beyond which you would send it back with a sternly worded letter? I mean, there surely has to have been some difference between those right?

In my limited experience - a good condition mil surplus non modified/ not rebuilt/ not rebarreled garand fed good ammo will shoot about 2-3" groups at 100 yards.

If I could get it down to that range I'd definitely stop complaining. But I'm a long way from there now.

[mikejonestkd]

You are not really that far from 3" groups at 100, since you are now getting 2" groups at 50 yards.

Treat the rifle as a functional piece of history, and enjoy it for what it is. Its not a sub MOA gun as originally manufactured. Yes, there are accurized garands that are exceptional shooting rifles, but that it not the norm.

I have a brand newly remanufactured CMP expert garand that shoots 2" at 100 yards with my old eyes and quality ammo. Its all I could hope for as I have realistic expectations for the rifle.

Quick addition- IIRC the national match standard was 3 MOA.

[JustJake]

Test it with HXP at 100yds first, get your M1 zeroed.

Then shoot at 200yds and click up as needed until your round are grouping in the black.

That’s how the M1 Pros-in-the-Know do it. And they do it with HXP which is the gold standard for M2 ball “issue” ammo (i.e., non-Match ‘06 ammo).

[divil]

Test it with HXP at 100yds first, get your M1 zeroed.

Then shoot at 200yds and click up as needed until your round are grouping in the black.

That’s how the M1 Pros-in-the-Know do it. And they do it with HXP which is the gold standard for M2 ball “issue” ammo (i.e., non-Match ‘06 ammo).

I don't have access to a 200 yard range. But what's wrong with 50 yards? My groups are big enough at that range that I can see I'm not shooting as well as with other rifles.

I don't know where to get HXP. I managed to get some nice PPU ammo after running out of the Yugoslavian M2 I had. Initial results at the standing range seem to be better, but it's too early to say for sure.

[JustJake]

50-yds only establishes that you’re on paper. It’s not a reliable indicator. … Yawn.

For M1 Pros, 200-yds is the minimum distance for vetting the practical accuracy of the rifle.

And they don’t do it off the bench either. They do it proned-out, sometimes in the snow.

[divil]

You are not really that far from 3" groups at 100, since you are now getting 2" groups at 50 yards.

Well I thought it was a long way off. But today I managed to gradually whittle my group size down to 1.5" at 50 yards. It was really hard though!

I still think it has a little more to give. I have seen 4 out of 5 rounds go into less than 1" a few times.

Why is it so much harder than with other rifles? The trigger is pretty decent and my dry firing indicates I'm not doing terribly with my trigger control.

I think it's a combination of the sights and the recoil. I don't handle recoil brilliantly so I have to fix my shoulder/cheek weld after every shot. When I work hard on this, I get better groups. But I still always get some movement in my shoulder and cheek weld not matter how hard I try.

I don't seem to have this with other milsurp rifles, but most of them have notch sights in the rear and I think that's why - they're not as dependent on consistent eye position as aperture sights are. On the other hand, I can beat this accuracy effortlessly with an AR-15 which has the same size aperture as the Garand. But that has almost no recoil, so I have no trouble keeping a consistent position.

The most common group shape I'm getting is diagonal stringing, up and to the left.

In any case I'm happy that the bore is not totally shot out despite its appearance. I'll keep working on my technique.