floyd kittrell
Well-Known Member
Mr. Allen,That's what I do with bad mirage for sure!
10 mph head wind not easy
- Thread starter A A Ron
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Lots of good recommendations. Validates some of the techniques I have been trying. I have a target set up permemantly in an eyebrow above a wheat field. This gets me to 1135 shooting over two hills and three valleys. The terrain creates a lot of mechanical turbulence, which is hard. If I change angles I can remove two hills and have one valley to make it easier at around 900. I chose hard that day for practice.
On that day the wind wrecked me. It would go from nothing at the target to 10 mph in my face and then switch to wind at the target to nothing in my face. Who knows in the middle. I would rather have a crosswind. I have had better success figuring out crosswinds. It was over cast so I struggled to see any mirage. Spent a lot of time trying to see mirage. The only place I could see a little was on the horizon at about 1300 yards. It came and went. I have decent glass with a Leoupold VX 5 scope and Leoupold SX 4 15 to 40 HD spotting scope. Maybe $3000 glass would have made a difference that day?
That brings up a question for self spotting. Anyone have good recommendation for a spotting scope camera mount or phone mount that would allow fast playback?
On that day the wind wrecked me. It would go from nothing at the target to 10 mph in my face and then switch to wind at the target to nothing in my face. Who knows in the middle. I would rather have a crosswind. I have had better success figuring out crosswinds. It was over cast so I struggled to see any mirage. Spent a lot of time trying to see mirage. The only place I could see a little was on the horizon at about 1300 yards. It came and went. I have decent glass with a Leoupold VX 5 scope and Leoupold SX 4 15 to 40 HD spotting scope. Maybe $3000 glass would have made a difference that day?
That brings up a question for self spotting. Anyone have good recommendation for a spotting scope camera mount or phone mount that would allow fast playback?
LRNut
Well-Known Member
Allen Lone wolf
Well-Known Member
I hear you brother!Mr. Allen,That's what I do with bad mirage for sure!
LRNut
Well-Known Member
I just conducted an interesting experiment. I videoed holding my Kestrel up for 39 seconds. I then replayed it frame by frame and recorded the wind speed change every second. The wind was not that fast; it averaged 6.16 mph over that period with a standard deviation of 2.19. I did not track any direction changes; just speed. I then calculated the changes per frame (the Kestrel doesn't update much more than once per second) and found that 18.4% of the time, the wind change within 1 second was 1 mph or greater. One mph is enough to move my group 5" at 910 yards (.338 Edge 300 Berger at 2875 fps). My TOF is 1.1 seconds (you can clearly see the long TOF in my 1047 rock shot; it is 1.5 seconds). So what that is saying is even if I have a PERFECT wind call, over 18.4% of the time it will change during the TOF enough for me to have a 50% chance of missing. Or stated differently, a perfect wind call will result in a miss (outside of 5" from center) 9.2% of the time (takes into account that half my bullets are still going to hit the 10" vital area even if the drift is 5"). But students of calculus would recognize what I really need to do is integrate all the error collectively to come up with a solution. For example, 28.9% of the time, the difference in wind speed was .8 mph or greater. A .8 mph wind will blow my group 5" at 970 yards. So applying the same math, even an absolute PERFECT (yes, I am yelling) wind call is going to result in a 14.45% chance of a miss. And remember, this doesn't consider any directional changes, just speed.
Want to look beyond 1000 yards? It gets really ugly.
I know it is popular on this site to think there is no limit, but at some point, you can't argue with math, unless of course, you are okay with wounding an animal as a trade for bragging rights.
I don't have time to upload the video to YouTube right now but might later.
Will also create a new post on the subject.
Note: I made an error when calculating the average change per second; I should have taken the absolute values, not the differences. That makes a big difference: the average change per second is .54 mph. It would be very interesting to be able to video a head on 10 mph - record the speed (I can do that) as well as the directional changes per second (haven't figured that out yet).
Want to look beyond 1000 yards? It gets really ugly.
I know it is popular on this site to think there is no limit, but at some point, you can't argue with math, unless of course, you are okay with wounding an animal as a trade for bragging rights.
I don't have time to upload the video to YouTube right now but might later.
Will also create a new post on the subject.
Note: I made an error when calculating the average change per second; I should have taken the absolute values, not the differences. That makes a big difference: the average change per second is .54 mph. It would be very interesting to be able to video a head on 10 mph - record the speed (I can do that) as well as the directional changes per second (haven't figured that out yet).
| Seconds | MPH | MPH | Diff | ABS Diff | % > 1 change | 18.4% |
1 | 4.3 | % >.8 change | 28.9% | |||
2 | 4 | 4.3 | 0.3 | 0.3 | ||
3 | 4.3 | 5.5 | -0.3 | 0.3 | Average | 6.158974 |
4 | 5.8 | -1.5 | 1.5 | Std Dev | 2.192144 | |
5 | 5.8 | 0 | 0 | |||
6 | 5.8 | 4.7 | 0 | 0 | Average change per second | 0.536842 |
7 | 4.7 | 4 | 1.1 | 1.1 | ||
8 | 4 | 3.2 | 0.7 | 0.7 | ||
9 | 2.9 | 1.1 | 1.1 | |||
10 | 2.8 | 0.1 | 0.1 | |||
11 | 2.8 | 2.9 | 0 | 0 | ||
12 | 2.9 | 3.1 | -0.1 | 0.1 | ||
13 | 3.1 | 3.4 | -0.2 | 0.2 | ||
14 | 3.4 | 4.8 | -0.3 | 0.3 | ||
15 | 4.8 | 6 | -1.4 | 1.4 | ||
16 | 6.2 | -1.4 | 1.4 | |||
17 | 5.5 | 0.7 | 0.7 | |||
18 | 5.5 | 4.9 | 0 | 0 | ||
19 | 4.9 | 4.6 | 0.6 | 0.6 | ||
20 | 4.6 | 4.4 | 0.3 | 0.3 | ||
21 | 4.4 | 5.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 | ||
22 | 5.2 | 6.4 | -0.8 | 0.8 | ||
23 | 6.4 | 7.6 | -1.2 | 1.2 | ||
24 | 7.6 | 8.5 | -1.2 | 1.2 | ||
25 | 8.5 | 9.3 | -0.9 | 0.9 | ||
26 | 9.3 | 9.8 | -0.8 | 0.8 | ||
27 | 9.8 | 9.6 | -0.5 | 0.5 | ||
28 | 9.6 | 9.7 | 0.2 | 0.2 | ||
29 | 9.7 | 8.9 | -0.1 | 0.1 | ||
30 | 8.9 | 8.5 | 0.8 | 0.8 | ||
31 | 8.5 | 8.2 | 0.4 | 0.4 | ||
32 | 8.2 | 8.7 | 0.3 | 0.3 | ||
33 | 8.7 | 8.8 | -0.5 | 0.5 | ||
34 | 7.9 | 8.5 | 0.8 | 0.8 | ||
35 | 8.5 | 7.9 | -0.6 | 0.6 | ||
36 | 7.9 | 7.8 | 0.6 | 0.6 | ||
37 | 7.8 | 7.7 | 0.1 | 0.1 | ||
38 | 7.7 | 7.5 | 0.1 | 0.1 | ||
39 | 7.5 | 7.1 | 0.2 | 0.2 |
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I would ask what you were up to today but I think we know
but seriously that's interesting!LRNut
Well-Known Member
I am obsessed with wind and coming to the conclusion that there are "wind limits" for each distance to the target (a 90% hit rate is what I deem reasonable). I also founded a software company that deals with data analytics and am a statistics freak.I would ask what you were up to today but I think we know
In High power you win at 200 and lose at 600 so goes the saying, at 200 yds you are offhand and that is 100 times more difficult than long range so if you can shoot a good score standing you probably will win the match, every other position is much less difficult. You loose at 600 because things are out of your control, wind switches where you have windage on your rifle, say you put 2 min to the right and between the time you look in your spotting scope and decide what to do and the time you shoot and the wind switches direction so now you need 2 min left instead you have 2 min right and you shoot a 7 or 6. I have shot with the best wind readers in the world , the palma team members, and very few times have I seen them shoot an X , which is 12" at 1000 on their first sighter shot in windy conditions. no matter how good of a wind reader one is shots past 600 yds in windy conditions should be avoided the beautifull animals deserve better. This weekend coming up has a 600,800,900,1000 yd match in Vale ,Oregon Snake River Sportsman any body interested in increasing their wind skills should show up because in one of these matches the target will be pulled after each shot and a marker is put in the bullet hole then put back up to be shot again so the shooter will have 80 individual shot to see the wind effect of each one, make your best guess and then see how close your guess was. the best way to learn the fickle wind
oldfortyfiveauto
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2011
- Messages
- 406
Spend some time in a South Dakota prairie dog town. Every shot can be a unique adventure in learning.
Trm82
Well-Known Member
Hope you had a 6.5 creed. Wouldn't even notice the wind with one of those beasts
That must have been my problem; I opted for my .300 WSM loaded with 215 Berger that day.
They probably only hit them once or twice in 20 shots...
IIRC the Barbour Creek Golf Ball Challenge gives you 10 rounds to hit the ball. Definitely harder in gusty winds and the guns gotta be dialed.They probably only hit them once or twice in 20 shots...
A shifty head wind is absolutely the hardest wind to shoot in. I went to KRG Extreme Steel and we had a 10-20 mph gusting head wind shifting from about 10 to 2 o'clock, that was tough
