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Bullet drop
fireunit29
Member Posts: 2 ✭✭
Was sighting in my new CVA Buckhorn using a 295 grain power belt bullet and 100 grains of trip 7 and at 50 yards it was hitting dead center of target and at 100 yrds it was about 15 inches low. Does this drop seem to be right. I thought that it would have alittle drop but not that much.
Comments
You are shooting a hot load, a 295 is not that big of a bullet, though it is big.
I would expect more like a 4 inch drop at 100.
What kind of groups do you get at 100?
295 Grains in front of only 100 grains is gonna be travelling kinda slooow, so expect a lotta drop. Sounds about right.
I agree. My 182 gn roundball .50 cal in front of 100 gns (volume equivalent) of pyrodex RS has a chrono'd mv of 1900 fps. It is 4" high at 50 yards and dead on at 100. Your 295 will have a lot less MV so will have more than the 4" drop I get.
CVA buckhorn rifle, Magnum?
24 inch barrel? 1:28 Twist?
Triple 7 100 grs - Loose powder or Pellets?
Iron sights or Scoped?
Shooting done from a bench?
Clear weather or wet, rainy, snowy?
Is this your first "black powder" experience?
Did you "clean" or swab out the barrel between shots?
I ask all of these questions because there are that many variables when shooting a "front loading" rifle. I have an early made Lyman Deerstalker carbine, caplock, 22 inch barrel, 1:24 twist (very fast), iron sights (fiber optic firesights), my deer hunting load is 90 grains of loose Triple 7 FFFg (lights off fast), 295 Gr Powerbelt ALL LEAD Hollow point bullet.
I haven't chronographed it - but it is a right good thump to my shoulder. If I am to believe the data from Hodgdon about Triple 7, I'm getting an average 1100 feet per second out of the muzzle. To hit bullseye center at 100 yards, this round will be 3.25 inches HIGH at 50 yards. (the deer woods around here, 100 yards would be a long shot for Blacktail.) This is what my ballistics program tells me.
Maybe with more information from you, we can determined what happened at 100 yards.
Yes?
Or this is an opportunity to go back to the range, shoot some more, make more "smoke and fire" and have fun.
With my inline, sighted dead on at 50, the bullet is still climbing at 50. Then it is 3/4 inch high at 100.
If you are using iron sights, it could be that, sighted dead on at 50 it would be dropping at 50 and you would get low at 100, still, shouldn't be that low.
Try some three shot groups and get back to us.
.50 cal 295 gr Copper Clad AeroTip BC=.186 100 grains
Distance (yards) Muzzle 25 50 75 100 125 150 175 200 225 250
Velocity (fps) 1670 1583 1501 1424 1350 1283 1223 1170 1126 1088 1054
Kinetic Engery (ft lb) 1827 1642 1476 1329 1194 1079 980 897 831 776 728
Trajectory -1.5 1.21 3.06 3.99 3.83 2.52 0 -4.09 -9.57 -16.65 -25.73
I took this info from the power belt site.
http://powerbeltbullets.com/docs/PBB28inchballistics.pdf
I've found this info to be very accurate for my PB loading.
Note:
Instead of zeroing at 50 yds and guessing the 100 yd drop try matching the chart by setting up for 1.2 inches high at 50 yards. But also take note of you group size at 50 yards. If your groups are not 3 inches or less then you have other things to worry about. Once you are shooting 50 yd groups where they are all touching then you will know if you are matching the desired trajectory.