500 yards
 

I put together a target holder to elevate a target over the corn behind my range before it gets too tall to do so. I'm going to see if I can stretch the Omega and 325gr .458 FTX to 500 yards this weekend if the weather cooperates. I think I still have enough clicks in my scope to get there...

RE: 500 yards
 

spaniel

That seems awful abitious, 500 yards with a 325 grain bullet - ought to be a good deal of drop in that one... What kind of energy might you have out that far?

RE: 500 yards
 

I need to confirm my data from February, but if it holds up I'm looking at around 38.1 MOA (or about 114 inches) of drop to dial in. I know my cheapo Barska Tactical has at least 30 MOA available but I have to check if it has 38.

Energy looks to be around 620 ft-lbs. Given that I cleanly took a doe at 338 yards with 500 fl-lbs of energy (pass-thru on both shoulders), that's pretty impressive energy that far out. This is just target shooting at this point though, not preparation to shoot a deer that far out. I'd want to shoot into some media to test expansion before I did that, I know a 200SW performs well at low velocity but I do not have the experience with the FTX to trust it yet.

Drop is the easy part, shoot at 100yds and 300yds, run the calculations and verify at 400, then move to 500 yards. Wind is the real issue with long range shooting, a 10mph crosswind would generate about SIX FEET of drift at 500 yards. I won't be attempting it with much crosswind, my target backer will not be huge.

RE: 500 yards
 

Tie a helium ballon centered over the bull at the right height to allow for drop. Be a good wind gauge as well. ;)

RE: 500 yards
 

Not a bad idea. I actually have some helium in the garage.

I'm going to check the scope travel tonight. I recently purchased a good Nikon spotter for my upcoming elk trip that should be able to spot holes from at least 300 yards, so that will save me from heat stroke checking targets....

RE: 500 yards
 

That sounds like a fun project Spaniel. But DANG, it's a long walk to the target. :D

RE: 500 yards
 

Good luck. It will be interesting to see your results.

RE: 500 yards
 

I have been told many times and proved it some, that if you want a 200 yd load shoot at 200 yds, if you want a 3,4,and 500 yd load shoot at those distances. Don't assume that a one inch group at 100 yds will be a 4" grp at 400yds. S o those of us that will try this lehigh at extream distantcys this should still still apply, dont ya think? An average size whitetail is 16" from its withers to the bottom of his chest. Thats alot of holdover.

RE: 500 yards
 

This is with FTX's, not Leighs.... Without a tip the Leigh is not a 500 yd design.

I always shoot targets far beyond where I shoot animals. I practice 300-400 yds more than 100-200.

RE: 500 yards
 

I got some borrowed time to make some smoke tonight, it was nice and calm. I confirmed my 100yd zero and then went right out to 300yds. It was in the mid-80s so I gave the gun 5 minutes between shots but the 100yd group was still a little bigger than it should have been (about 1.5-2"). The 300yd group was right where I thought it would be, group was just high of center with 15 MOA dialed into the scope. Given my lack of trigger time lately and the temps I was pretty happy with the 3.5" group I printed at 300 yds.

If the weather and my duties cooperate, and I can actually see the target over the corn, I'll go straight to 500 tomorrow. I ran the scope up and I have at least 45 MOA left in it so I have more than enough elevation to get there. I did not save the targets from today but I'll take a pic at 500 yards if I get to shoot it.

RE: 500 yards
 

spaniel

I am not sure I can even see 500 yards...

RE: 500 yards
 

Dang - I can't imagine shooting very accurately at 500 yds. Not that it can't be done. But at those distances, you would have to be very exacting on the yardage for the rainbow trajectory of that heavy hunk of lead.
It would be fun though.

RE: 500 yards
 

My .54 lyman drops 50 plus feet at 575 yds. We have a gong we play with at the range. Shooting open sights and 415gr tc maxi's. 13 shots i hit it twice. I stayed within ten feet of it at all times and I thought that was exceptional for the setup. With a scope i'm sure you could cut that down by half. But it's not a bench gun by all means.:D

RE: 500 yards
 

That is DARN good. I'm only getting a fifth as much drop so it's a "bit" easier (optics aside!). Laser rangefinders have made the long range game a lot easier.

RE: 500 yards
 

Good luck,you better hurry this hot weather is making that corn grow like crazy.

RE: 500 yards
 

RE: 500 yards - 6/26/2009 6:37:47 PM








showPicture("6/26/2009 6:37:47 PM",0,0,0,3446209,26)


spaniel
You may want to do some testing on the FTX for the way they open up, I cut some of them up and the lead in them is a quite a bit harder than the lead in a SW. They are designed for a cartridge gun that shoots 2500fps at the muzzle. They work well in that gun I seen some that were nicely mushroomed that came out of a 400pound boar. I am not sure just how fast they have to be pushed to get good results in a muzzleloader. Lee

RE: 500 yards
 

Lee,
That makes alot of sense to me. I wondered why i had so many problems with that bullet. I was shooting it at pretty slow velocities. Thanks for that information. I will crank her up next time.

RE: 500 yards
 

Yup, I'd always test them first. Of course this is just target shooting so it isn't a big deal.

RE: 500 yards
 

Given the thread got to 2 pages before I even shot I felt under some pressure to get this done this weekend...

Well, it went good and bad. The bad part was that I spent somewhere over an hour and a half just getting to the point where I could think about shooting. Turns out I needed to get the target 15 feet in the air to shoot over the corn and terrain changes, so I had to make multiple trips out to assemble a "tower" and plant the bottom in the ground just to get the target up. In case you didn't know, on a 90 degree day the humidity in a field of 7 foot tall corn makes it feel pretty brutal.

By the time I got everything done I had less than ten minutes to shoot -- ie, no time to let the gun cool or check the first shot to make sure I was even on the target. So I crossed my fingers that the sabots would hold up and the ballistic calculator had been close, and fired off four shots just as fast as I could load.

Here's the good part:


I got an 8.5 inch group (four shots, not just three!) on a 90 degree day with no barrel cooling. I couldn't hold it with a bare hand when I was done. I'm certain I could tighten that up a bit under better conditions so I'm pretty happy with that.

I had 39 MOA dialed into the scope and it dropped closer to 40, or about 16 feet.

To be honest, I didn't feel it was any harder to shoot 500 yards than 300 from an aiming perspective. I could see my 300 yard target in the scope while I was shooting 500, couldn't remotely tell it was almost twice as far away. There was not much wind to judge today, that would have made it harder.

I know from experience last year that the gun starts to pull when it gets hot and the POI changes, so I'm guessing the two below the center of the bull were my first two and the ones to the left #3-4 but I don't know for sure.

RE: 500 yards
 

Thats some impressive shooting

RE: 500 yards
 

While I would not shoot at game that far I wish I had some place I could try it for fun. I normally won't shoot a high powdered rifle that far at game I am afraid they will move before the bullet gets there. Did you check your flight time? I am curious about it. Lee

RE: 500 yards
 

Calculator says 1.25 seconds. I take your point on the whole movement thing, of course I've had a couple shots go bad when deer spook at close range as the trigger is pulled. At longer range at least the deer has no idea anyone is around. Still, over a second is a decent stretch of time for something to hold completely still. Like I said, just target shootin'.

RE: 500 yards
 

Really nice shooting there.

RE: 500 yards
 

WOW!! that is some impressive shooting there. It just shows you what a person with skills can do. Now I honestly doubt that I could pull off a shot like that but it is impressive to know that someone can.

RE: 500 yards
 

I'm impressed andbow to your skill. My personal ability makes 150 yards a long shot, and 200 a VERY long shot. :D

RE: 500 yards
 

I hope it works out better than your clay shooting prowess....:D (j/k)

We need to burn some powder soon. [8D]

RE: 500 yards
 

Very cool! We shoot man sized targets at 500 yards with our M16A2's. But we use iron sights.

RE: 500 yards
 

RE: 500 yards
 

Ha! Hey, I think I shot 24-for-25 that day didn't I? Choked on the last set....

Yep, I'd like to have another shooting day when we're not freezing our tails off, I'm thinking August may work. This pregnancy has been a little tough for my wife and I've been really busy (I killed and replanted that whole field this year) so it's been a no-go so far. May have the ML guys come in early and make some smoke before we bust our shoulders on the shotguns this time.


Thanks everyone, just goes to show what a very modestly modified off-the-shelf ML is capable of these days if you put the work into knowing it well.

RE: 500 yards
 

Hope mama's doing okay.;)
Give me a shout when ya wanna do some shootin' again.[8D] Had a blast at the last outing!

RE: 500 yards
 

I've always wanted a long range iron sighted ML with Vernier-style sights to do just that....

havent shot my ml past 100 yet. looking forward to your pick.

Thats a long long way for a ML

Spaniel, that is some great shootin'. My longest shot with a BP cartridge gun was out to 330 meters. I would love to try my hand out to 500 or more with it. I have a Pedersoli Sharps 1874 in .45-70 and love shooting it.

All I can say is you da man!!!

Thanks...I recall seeing someone with Vernier sights shoot a 45-70 to something like 1500 yards and hit a steel buffalo 3 times consecutively. The BP cartridge guns have made some loooong shots.

If ya think that was cool, how about a guy that shot an Indian and killed him at over 1500 yds. ? That would be Billy Dixon. He was hunting buffalo for a bunch of surveyors that were working for the railroad and the Indians were bothering them. Well the Indians thought they were safe and kept bothering the crew and Dixon took the shot.

They know the exact distance because of the surveyors measuing it.

Now that is definitely way cool!

:hail::hail::hail::hail::hail::hail:

that will save me from heat stroke checking targets....[/quote]


That is why 4 wheelers were invented

Charlie

I qualified at Parris Island in March 65 with an M-14.I shot better at 500 than at 200 offhand. I still don't shoot offhand(I suck)

Charlie

No matter what you say... that is a long way to shoot. Whether with a scope or iron sights. I have shot that far with a center fire, but never with a muzzleloader. I thought I was doing good shooting a white paper plate at 150 yards off shooting sticks one day with my Black Diamond.

That will kill any Big game animal i ever hunt.