Shots per groups

[oldscot3]

trip down Ignorance Lane and into the land of the Texas Sharpshooter.

Care to elaborate on who these "Texas Sharpshooters" are and what they do?

[RC20]

As noted it depends on what you are after.

3 Shots works fine for hunting and sight in.

Target shooting the minimum is 5 (if its going to have any credibility ) and the full picture emerges at 10.

I have shot a number of 1.4 inch 5 shot groups, can't repeat that.

[Scorch]

The more shots you fire in a group just demonstrates the barrel's consistency. If you want to know how well your hunting rifle will shoot, 3 rounds is probably just fine. If you are concerned with how well your rifle will perform as a varmint rifle or target rifle, shoot more shots per group. I once built a 22-250 for a friend. It shot about 1/2" at 100 yds, but the group had about 30 shots in it, all of them well inside of a one-inch square on a Leupold sight-in target. He told me he was expecting better. I told him if he didn't want the rifle, I would take the target and the rifle and sell it for $1000 easy. Consistency counts, but most shooters will never be in a situation where they will fire that many rounds in a row.

I've NEVER seen a good 5 shot group that didn't start out as a good 3 shot group.

An old benchrest shooter once told me that "after the first shot, the groups always get bigger".

[FrankenMauser]

Care to elaborate on who these "Texas Sharpshooters" are and what they do?

Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy
Basic premise: Ignoring data that doesn't support the desired conclusion, or intentionally limiting data points in order to not skew the result away from the desired conclusion.

This could be, for example, only firing 3-shot groups, instead of 5-shot groups, because the groups only get bigger.

[agtman]

trip down Ignorance Lane and into the land of the Texas Sharpshooter.

Care to elaborate on who these "Texas Sharpshooters" are and what they do?

They're similar to the range phenomenon know as the "Sunday afternoon sniper."

The Sunday afternoon sniper appears about twice a month with his "deer gun" at the local range. He sets up on the bench with sandbags and a bipod. He shoots a few 3-shots groups at 100-yds using typical Wally Mart 30-06 'range' ammo and gets a false-positive best of 1.5" MOA. Now he's zeroed.

Then, when deer season rolls around, he's out loaded for bear in a tree stand with some super-duper venison-slaying premium '06 ammo - without the sandbags or bipod. It's all good, right, 'cause it's an '06?

An 8-pt buck appears and he misses it by a country mile, ... and has no frickin' clue why.

Moral of the story: be neither a 'Texas Sharpshooter' nor a 'Sunday afternoon sniper.'

You can thank me later.

[eastbank]

the rifle was not at fault, if he had used the so called cheap Walmart ammo and rested on the tree stands safety rail he would have most likely killed the deer. a 1.5" three shoot group at 100 yards is not to shabby for a hunting rifle, hell I know of a Kimber .270 with a good scope with hand loads that works to get a 1.5" three shot group at 100 yards, I would have sold that high priced piece of junk pretty quick. we are talking about hunters here are we not ?

[oldscot3]

Basic premise: Ignoring data that doesn't support the desired conclusion, or intentionally limiting data points in order to not skew the result away from the desired conclusion.

This could be, for example, only firing 3-shot groups, instead of 5-shot groups, because the groups only get bigger.

I watched the intro and explanation by way of your link but came away with a bit different take. The presenter gave the definition as "using the the same data to present both the premise and the conclusion". Nevertheless it looks interesting so I'll watch the rest later this evening.

I sometimes shoot three shot groups, but when I do they are usually one part of a set of three, or four, or even five, three shot groups using the same ammo and firearm. The issue for me is barrel cooling off time, either between shots or between groups shot. We all know barrels heat up when fired, and heated metal expands and moves around. Aside from numerous factors related to probability, ten shots heats the barrel (unless you allow sufficient cooling time between shots) and won't produce as tight a grouping as three or five shots.

Pretty basic.

[briandg]

I personally don't care a lot about this sort of thing. I am good and I know it. I am not even close to great. I try every time to do my best, and if it's ten or even twenty rounds on a target, I have a group that I will either like or hate.

A five shot group or even a fifty shot group will give a better pattern of what you expect when you take the rifle out again and take one shot. If you can get three shots into a squirrel sized target, but you miss the rest of the fifty, don't take it squirrel hunting.

Shoot as many as you want. Don't kid yourself about what can do. If a three shot one inch group is your very best and your five shot groups average about 2.5, those are the only facts you need. maybe that 300 yard shot will hit in three inches, maybe it will hit outside of a seven inch ring.

If you don't have the best of skills, a great opening and a good position, you aren't going to make that shot anyway. The best you can do is to get withing about eight inches based on your rifle, but if your skills aren't up to it, your 2.5 inch capable rifle may not even be able to come within a two foot circle at 300 yards.

Accuracy and group size are a noble and fully acceptable thing to strive for.

RELIABILITY is important. That three round inch is less than useful unless it can happen when you need it.

[ndking1126]

For anyone so inclined, here is a little math to help answer the question:

http://bisonballistics.com/articles/...ize-for-rifles

The math is only half the picture in my opinion. The more times I fire, the more likely my mistake will mess up the group size, and not the natural variance of the rifle. I received an e-mail from the author not long ago and he said this:

"Coincidentally, I was just made aware of a more modern version of the Grubbs study that I mentioned in that article. It turns out that due to the relatively small sample size he used (he didn't have our computers to do the work), there is a slight error in the results. While the general theory is still sound, it appears that the optimal group size is closer to 5 shots than 8, which is good news to me, since 5 is more manageable and allows for a higher resolution in any testing we want to do."

So apparently 5 really is the answer.

On the other hand - shoot, have fun, repeat. If you can shoot a 1 MOA 3 shot group every single time then you probably have a 1 MOA gun and 5 shot groups arent necessary unless you want to convince someone who is tied to the 5 shot group. If you have 2 1MOA groups and 2 1.5MOA groups, you probably have a 1.5MOA gun. The real problem is when someone shoots 1 .75" 3 shot group and then declares he has a 3/4MOA rifle.. it just doesn't work that way.

[ninosdemente]

Does one try to get better groupings at every trip to the range or how often do you strive for better groups? Other than to enjoy simply shooting your firearm of course.

[cw308]

Once I find a accureat load I shoot for the enjoyment an try my best for good groupings . Bad groups are on me , you know when you throw a round . At the start of the season I'll check all screws , so far all haven't changed . Look forward to shoot every Sunday as long as it doesn't rain .

[old roper]

I used to shot BR and we shot 5 shot groups in relay 5 targets for total 25 rds plus sighters. 100yds/200yds sometimes 300yds.

Today I mostly shoot 200/300yd for groups. One club I belong too has few benches that I can shoot 200/300yd from same bench.

When I get get tired shooting groups,I shot IBS HBR match and target has sighter and 5 target and you only shoot one bullet each target.

http://www.speedwelltargets.com/Prod...iABEgLXTfD_BwE

They make red color target for 300yds.

[agtman]

* * * Bad groups are on me, you know when you throw a round.

That happens when guys leave the bench and start shooting from real-world 'field positions' just like they'll do when they hunt - without benefit of bipods, sandbags, or other shooting crutches.

At the start of the season I'll check all screws, so far all haven't changed.

All screws, rings, and mounts should have been lock-tited from the git-go, and then, with a Sharpy pen, had 'witness marks' applied to their final position of torque, so that with just a quick look you can determine whether anything has loosened over time.

That's how the real snipers do it; the Fuddley McGoos, ah, not so much.

[RC20]

Keeping in mind that real snipers shooting at 1000 yards plus usualy miss the first time or two.

Its called walking in.

I saw the reenactment of the longest shot, he missed 2 or 3 times. His side kick walked him in.

The bad guys just kind of stood there scratching their heads, huh, noise, funny noise.

[jackstrawIII]

When I'm testing handloads for my hunting rifles, I shoot 4 shot groups at each powder charge. I figure that gives me a good 3 shot group, plus a flier. If all 4 are touching... well then that's just a nice bonus.

[Sure Shot Mc Gee]

As a rookie home reloader. 10 shots was my typical. As I grew older & wiser 5 shots gave me a good grouping read. These days being a geezer I seldom shoot more than three shot groupings and try get by with two. I kinda think three shot groupings increase barrel temperature to which increases the chance of my witnessing a flyer. ( A gen_uine down'er y'll.)

[ninosdemente]

Would having a heavier barrel although it heats up, isn't it suppose to help more vs a thinner barrel? Would it decrease the chance of having a flyer?

[Don Fischer]

Originally Posted by agtman

3-shots only establishes a point of aim on paper. Tyros, lazy shooters, and the overly cheap think 3-shots is 'good 'nough' to be called a 'group.' It's not.

5-shots is a baseline group - more commonly a string or sequence of three or four of them (with time between for barrel cooling) - and is necessary to reliably vet the accuracy of a particular load (factory or handload) in a particular rifle. Change the load, or switch to another the rifle even using the same load, and you'll have to start all-over.

This pertains to 'hunting'-grade rifles, not precision or bench-rest rifles. For those rifles, a 10-shot string is often used to establish accuracy, because from the git-go they've been set up with tuned and blue-printed actions, Match-grade barrels, and high-end triggers set especially light.



Don't expect much. Most of that stuff is 'junk' ammo. Good as 'range only' blasting ammo but not much else.

The high-grade .223 Match stuff is what you need if you really want to vet your rifle's accuracy potential - especially if shooting a 10-shot 'precision' group.

There ya go. An answer based solely on opinion. Five shot group's re fun to shoot but in a hunting, as in big game, they serve no useful purpose. You'll seldom get a third shot on big game much less a fifth! Actually if you fire one shot per day for several days at the same target, you gonna have a better understanding of what your rifle will do. I don't know that there is a standard of number of shot's to check a rifle; well other than someone want's you to believe. If 5 shot's is better than 3 then 10 shot's is better than 5!Of course that means 15 is better than 10 and 20 better than 15! Boy can this get crazy!

Let's say you take the one shot a day road. If every day the shot goes into the same group, what is the need for more shot's other than to brag about group size. If you really want to brag, go to the ten shot group. If your just a hunter, you don't need even a 1" group no matter how many shot's you take.

Testing new loads, i never shoot more than 3 shot group's, my rifle's are hunting rifle's. Never had a need for 5 shot's on a big game animal. But if you want to shoot five shots, well by all means go for it.

[Art Eatman]

Seems to me that if your rifle has been giving you the results you want, and you're satisfied with those results, then whatever size groups you've been using in testing have been adequate for YOUR purposes. (Generic "you".)

Different strokes for different folks.

[TXAZ]

A single hit on a target @ 1 mile is a group!

[Scorch]

A single hit on a target @ 1 mile is a group!

No, it is not. That is a single hit, as you stated. A group is multiple hits (just like a group of people is 3, 4, 5, whatever), and the distance between the center of the holes (spread or dispersion) is the size of the group.

[TXAZ]

TXAZ snickered:
A single hit on a target @ 1 mile is a group!

Scorch Opined:
[QUOTE]
No, it is not. That is a single hit, as you stated. A group is multiple hits (just like a group of people is 3, 4, 5, whatever), and the distance between the center of the holes (spread or dispersion) is the size of the group.[QUOTE/]


Don’t knock it till you’ve done it.
Read Art’s prior post. (Its humor)