Jeff In TX
Well-Known Member
In my real life job, I'm an engineer. I don't like to accept almost or close enough when it comes to results. I'm anal about results and I strive to achieve exact results and once I dig into something it's hard to let go. Sometimes my quest to achieve exact results takes unconventional methods.
I've owned many ballistic programs over the years, most of them ya'll swear by. Most in my opinion are border line adequate at best for long range calculation and estimation. I learned a lot of the ballistic formulas and even tried my hand at reworking Dave Kings excel program he sent me many years ago. But in the end I couldn't get them to match my actual shooting data. Four years ago I set out on a quest to map my .308 actual data to my ballistic program or at least get as close as possible.
You can agree or disagree with me on this, but in the end I accomplished what I set out to do and in the process learned a bunch.
First if you're using the published G1 BC from the bullet manufacture and program running the G1 drag model, you're gonna waste a lot of time and effort trying to do this.
The G1 drag model is based on a 100+ year-old calculation using a 1 inch 1 pound round nose projectile as its basis. So what the bullet manufactures are really saying is…. any type of bullet regardless of shape can be calculated using the same mathematical model. This is total BS. Last time I looked a VLD bullet is more aerodynamic than a flat based bullet.
Those are the real issues I see when it comes to BC. Boat tail bullets us a G5 drag model and VLD bullets use a G7 drag model. Both drag models have a lower BC both totally different calculations for determining the bullets exterior ballistic tables.
Okay let's get started. When I say I reversed engineered my ballistic program, what I'm really saying is I found the proper input data and messaged it a bit to get my exact results.
I started this in January 03. While at the TACPRO range I established a tremendous amount of shooting data. With two CED Millennium chronographs back to back at 7' from the muzzle I shot 10 rounds to get my actual muzzle velocity. Both CED's were within 3 fps of each velocity measurement. That's consistency! I recorded air temps, barometric pressure, and humidity with my Krestel 4000 weather meter. I don't deal with or use altitude. I then set one chronograph at exactly 100 yards plus or minus an inch or so and shot 5 shots and recorded my velocity. I did this again at exactly 200 and 300 yards. And yes, it's easy to shoot through a chronograph at 300 yards and not shoot the screens.
Also during this 200 and 300 yard process I never adjusted my scope elevation. I did however record my exact bullet drop at each of the yardages from my POA to POI.
I then went to 400 and 500 yards and shot for group and recorded how much my bullet dropped from my POA to POI. At 600 and 700 yards it required mounting a 12 foot 2X4 for aiming purposes to measure my POA to POI. I now had exact bullet drops to 700 yards with all the environmental conditions to go with it. 800, 900 and 1000 yards I had to rely on using mildots for hold overs and then calculating my POA and POI.
Using my RSI ballistic lab program I easily figured out which CD model to use for my bullet and what the exact CD model BC was for that bullet.
My ballistic program results were wacky. I could get my 100 and 1000 yards to match, but the intermediate ranges were skewed, or I could get some of my intermediate ranges but my short and long ranges were skewed. I tweaked velocity and BC's numbers and could get a tad closer but my results were like a balance beam. Adjust this side and the other end goes array.
I had measured my scope height very accurately, but I was using 20 moa bases. Could this change my results… big time! I started to message my scope height, BC and muzzle velocity, though muzzle velocity only slightly, within 25 fps. My ballistic data from my program began to match my actual shooting data all yardages. It took a lot or tweaking, but I got the right combinations of numbers. I was within .25 moa off all 100 yard increments.
My next trip to TACPRO was in July and it was 90 degrees already at 8:30 in the morning. I started to record all new data, but a funny thing was happening. I adjusted for air temps, barometric pressure and humidity on my RSI program and my actual results were matching exactly. I backed up from 400 yards to 1000 yards and adjusted my scope per my programs data. 5-shots within a 10" circle from POA. Holy crap it was working. When I used the ballistic data at the other ranges they were dead on.
Later that fall I went to Colorado and was about 8000 feet in elevation and temps were in the teens. The longest we could shoot was about 750 yards. I ran the program with the new temps and barometric pressure, figured out the wind and was dead on at all ranges according to my program.
I had cracked the code at least for my .308. BTW I tried it with the G1 drag curve and could never get close.
That's it in a nut shell, there is a bit more to this, but it all comes to down getting exact data at all ranges and messaging the numbers.
You can agree or disagree, call me nuts, but I managed to achieve what I set out to.
Let the flood gates open.
I've owned many ballistic programs over the years, most of them ya'll swear by. Most in my opinion are border line adequate at best for long range calculation and estimation. I learned a lot of the ballistic formulas and even tried my hand at reworking Dave Kings excel program he sent me many years ago. But in the end I couldn't get them to match my actual shooting data. Four years ago I set out on a quest to map my .308 actual data to my ballistic program or at least get as close as possible.
You can agree or disagree with me on this, but in the end I accomplished what I set out to do and in the process learned a bunch.
First if you're using the published G1 BC from the bullet manufacture and program running the G1 drag model, you're gonna waste a lot of time and effort trying to do this.
The G1 drag model is based on a 100+ year-old calculation using a 1 inch 1 pound round nose projectile as its basis. So what the bullet manufactures are really saying is…. any type of bullet regardless of shape can be calculated using the same mathematical model. This is total BS. Last time I looked a VLD bullet is more aerodynamic than a flat based bullet.
Those are the real issues I see when it comes to BC. Boat tail bullets us a G5 drag model and VLD bullets use a G7 drag model. Both drag models have a lower BC both totally different calculations for determining the bullets exterior ballistic tables.
Okay let's get started. When I say I reversed engineered my ballistic program, what I'm really saying is I found the proper input data and messaged it a bit to get my exact results.
I started this in January 03. While at the TACPRO range I established a tremendous amount of shooting data. With two CED Millennium chronographs back to back at 7' from the muzzle I shot 10 rounds to get my actual muzzle velocity. Both CED's were within 3 fps of each velocity measurement. That's consistency! I recorded air temps, barometric pressure, and humidity with my Krestel 4000 weather meter. I don't deal with or use altitude. I then set one chronograph at exactly 100 yards plus or minus an inch or so and shot 5 shots and recorded my velocity. I did this again at exactly 200 and 300 yards. And yes, it's easy to shoot through a chronograph at 300 yards and not shoot the screens.
Also during this 200 and 300 yard process I never adjusted my scope elevation. I did however record my exact bullet drop at each of the yardages from my POA to POI.
I then went to 400 and 500 yards and shot for group and recorded how much my bullet dropped from my POA to POI. At 600 and 700 yards it required mounting a 12 foot 2X4 for aiming purposes to measure my POA to POI. I now had exact bullet drops to 700 yards with all the environmental conditions to go with it. 800, 900 and 1000 yards I had to rely on using mildots for hold overs and then calculating my POA and POI.
Using my RSI ballistic lab program I easily figured out which CD model to use for my bullet and what the exact CD model BC was for that bullet.
My ballistic program results were wacky. I could get my 100 and 1000 yards to match, but the intermediate ranges were skewed, or I could get some of my intermediate ranges but my short and long ranges were skewed. I tweaked velocity and BC's numbers and could get a tad closer but my results were like a balance beam. Adjust this side and the other end goes array.
I had measured my scope height very accurately, but I was using 20 moa bases. Could this change my results… big time! I started to message my scope height, BC and muzzle velocity, though muzzle velocity only slightly, within 25 fps. My ballistic data from my program began to match my actual shooting data all yardages. It took a lot or tweaking, but I got the right combinations of numbers. I was within .25 moa off all 100 yard increments.
My next trip to TACPRO was in July and it was 90 degrees already at 8:30 in the morning. I started to record all new data, but a funny thing was happening. I adjusted for air temps, barometric pressure and humidity on my RSI program and my actual results were matching exactly. I backed up from 400 yards to 1000 yards and adjusted my scope per my programs data. 5-shots within a 10" circle from POA. Holy crap it was working. When I used the ballistic data at the other ranges they were dead on.
Later that fall I went to Colorado and was about 8000 feet in elevation and temps were in the teens. The longest we could shoot was about 750 yards. I ran the program with the new temps and barometric pressure, figured out the wind and was dead on at all ranges according to my program.
I had cracked the code at least for my .308. BTW I tried it with the G1 drag curve and could never get close.
That's it in a nut shell, there is a bit more to this, but it all comes to down getting exact data at all ranges and messaging the numbers.
You can agree or disagree, call me nuts, but I managed to achieve what I set out to.
Let the flood gates open.
