Shooting up hill/ Shooting down hill?

[WildRose]

I agree. My son is 16 and in wrestling, football, track, baseball,hunts. One of the assistant coaches that I went to HS with is a x SEAL and former instructor for same. He is 50, 6' plus and over 200 lbs. He jumped on pull up bar and cranked out 22 pull ups, beat all the kids. I could do 30 when I got out of HS. I WENT TO BAR I set up for son , did 14. Next day felt like someone was pulling my arms off

Well like I tell my wife, " I ain't as good as I once was, but I'm as good once as I'll ever be"... .

The sad part is my eyes. I can't read the dails on my scope without glasses but I can still spot a bob cat moving along the edge of a woodline at 750yds, or a coyote crossing a wheat field at 1000 or more.

 

[imasam]

Yes i agree, at normal hunting distances a general horiziontal distance is adequate. Simple and quick.. Which i think is what the question was for.

For long range shooting...it's best to pull out your range finder and calculator (lap top). Wind gages , a barometer, and chronograph are nice toys to have, Bullet coffecients and velocities and air densities are a must. But if you use these toys you won't be asking for holdover in generalities.

The bullet trajectory is changing so swiftly at the long ranges that additional equipment is needed.

 

[Buffalobob]

Yes i agree, at normal hunting distances a general horiziontal distance is adequate. Simple and quick.. Which i think is what the question was for.

Dispensing poor quality advice doesn't change and we have spent a week getting one person to educate himself about angle shooting and no sooner than we get done with him than a person who not only knows less but is ten times lazier shows up with the same poor advice.

Some days I am inclined to believe the gene pool is actually a cesspool. This is just really disheartening.

 

[imasam]

I apologize to you long range mongers.. who want to only shoot at 600 to 1000yds.. Yes you need to calculate the drop and dial it in. But there are also people who only shoot at game up to 500 yards. This is point blank range. Using a simple duplex reticle. No range adjustment knobs. I zero my 300 win mag in at 325 yards, dead nuts on at 25 yards or so, 3 to 4 inches high at 100 to 200 yards and 11 inches low at 400yds and another 17 drop at 500yds.. I have dropped lots of chucks estimating range and not having to dial in. quick snap shooting. Kentucky windage. I always keep the cross hairs on the animal. With the typical animal body this keeps me hitting. Using the horiziontal distance as an indicator for these ranges works well and keeps me on target. The 110 grain bullet does a job on chucks.

I'm and engineer and i use the sine waves and cosine and calculate all kinds of things... sinx of 30 degrees is .5... I can calculate all the numbers i want.

I don't believe the person asking the question was talking about 600 to 1000 yds..

remind me not to answer to the forum any more please..

 

[WildRose]

Yes i agree, at normal hunting distances a general horiziontal distance is adequate. Simple and quick.. Which i think is what the question was for.

For long range shooting...it's best to pull out your range finder and calculator (lap top). Wind gages , a barometer, and chronograph are nice toys to have, Bullet coffecients and velocities and air densities are a must. But if you use these toys you won't be asking for holdover in generalities.

The bullet trajectory is changing so swiftly at the long ranges that additional equipment is needed.

No that was not the original question.

http://www.longrangehunting.com/forums/f17/shooting-up-hill-shooting-down-hill-71246/#post497639

The title of this site is Long range Hunting.com

Unless stated otherwise the assumption is that all quesitons pertain to long range shooting.

That's why it helps to at least read the OP if not the whole thread before commenting.

 

[WildRose]

I apologize to you long range mongers.. who want to only shoot at 600 to 1000yds.. Yes you need to calculate the drop and dial it in. But there are also people who only shoot at game up to 500 yards. This is point blank range. Using a simple duplex reticle. No range adjustment knobs. I zero my 300 win mag in at 325 yards, dead nuts on at 25 yards or so, 3 to 4 inches high at 100 to 200 yards and 11 inches low at 400yds and another 17 drop at 500yds.. I have dropped lots of chucks estimating range and not having to dial in. quick snap shooting. Kentucky windage. I always keep the cross hairs on the animal. With the typical animal body this keeps me hitting. Using the horiziontal distance as an indicator for these ranges works well and keeps me on target. The 110 grain bullet does a job on chucks.

I'm and engineer and i use the sine waves and cosine and calculate all kinds of things... sinx of 30 degrees is .5... I can calculate all the numbers i want.

I don't believe the person asking the question was talking about 600 to 1000 yds..

remind me not to answer to the forum any more please..

Again the title of this site is "long range hunting.com".

As an engineer do you generally jump into a project without reading the specs?

Patience wears thin when the same bad suggestion is made repeatedly in the same thread by multiple people who don't read the thread before commenting.

 

[imasam]

Long range shooting / hunting is determined differently by each individual. Each person has his own limits and capabilities. Everyone reading here isn't proficient to the same level. Some people may not want to shoot animals or targets past 600 yds. Yet we all learn from reading.


The question up hill or down hill was generalized. There were no specifics, angle, barometic pressure, humidity, wind, elevation...etc. Yes the links show you how to calculate the drop and holdover. And yes i can go there and read... but i could also determine it myself. I could also add in that you are two miles above the earth making the Horizontal shot??? How would you handle that..

I'm sorry that there are people with such bad mannors that they make comments about gene pools. I take it offensively when there are arrogants who critize people they don't know...

If you don't want new people into this sport just keep it up .. you are doing a good job. Just my two cents worth.

 

[rscott5028]

imasam,

You are correct. "Long Range Hunting" is subjective. There are people reading this for whom long range is 100-300 and others for whom 2000+ yds is common.

As such, it's often helpful to qualify your position especially when posting a discenting opinion.

There are also varying circumstances. There is no rifle for which 25-500yds is point blank range, ...unless you're ok with walking your shot in to the target. That may be fine for ground hogs. But as a general rule, most guys here are trying to make a first round cold bore kill.

The whole point of this website is to educate people to the fact that LRH has evolved to the point where Kentucky windage, guessswork, and blind luck are no longer required for precision shooting at increasing distances.

I still think there's room for rule's of thumb, short cuts, and manual systems for when technology fails. But, it's a mistake to lead folks to beleive that those should take the place of utilizing proper methods for making a calculated first round hit.

When armed with the proper knowledge, those who choose to "wing it" do so as a conscious decision. When doing so unprepared or having been lead to beleive that slop is acceptable, it's just out of ignorance. The latter being what this website seeks to overcome.

There are some amazing experts here. Read and learn. I have and do. And, sometimes I push them to explain or justify their position. But, let's not frustrate them into silence lest we miss out on a huge opportunity to learn for free what we may never have the time or dollars to figure out on our own.

Thanks for sharing and for reminding me that I need to be careful how things so that it's taken in the correct context as few people here really know my qualifications.

Thanks,
Richard

 

[rscott5028]

If you don't want new people into this sport just keep it up .. you are doing a good job. Just my two cents worth.

There's room for everyone.
Let's not get derailed.
Welcome aboard!

 

[imasam]

Thank you, I agree with you about being able to calculate for precision shooting. Proficient shooters need to make room for all styles and capabilities.

I have been shooting a 300 win mag for 40 years. The gun has never failed me while hunting. I used the velocity / flat trajectory to acheive my requirements. I have recently sold my last 300 win mag, and am changing over to shoot a 308 winchister and a 22-250. I no longer must have the flat trajectory to reach my needs. Range finders, varmit graticles, and dial in turrets have changed that. And, yes inexpensive chronographs as well.

The new guns have less kick and use less powder. I know the .264 bullet has the better BC but i like a little bigger diameter bullet when hunting.

I will be making custom ammo for my guns from now on, fire formed and necked sized. I haven't gone to the custom barrels but that will depend on how far i wish to shoot. I live in the city and long range shooting is a logistics problem .. not a proficiency problem.

 

[Buffalobob]

The methods involved in shooting uphill and downhill can be placed in five categories


1. Do nothing and compensate for nothing. The least accurate of all methods but acceptable for ranges under 300 yards or so for deer and larger animals where you have an accurate rifle and a clear shot.

2. The Riflemans' method which involves measuring the distance and the angle and multiplying they cosine of the angle times the distance and then looking up the drop and for the modified distance. A significant improvement over doing nothing for the intermediate ranges.

3. Improved Riflemans' method which involves measuring the distance and the angle just as before but this time look up the drop and for the measured distance and then multiply the cosine times the drop and use the modified drop. A significant improvement over the rifleman's method and requires no more math and nor more steps and no more time to perform. Increase in accuracy of the method over the older Rifleman's method is about 50% depending on range, cartridge and angle.

4. The Sierra Bullets method which is reasonably as accurate as most of us can shoot and see the results. "Load" ran the numbers out for us so you can go back and look at his numbers.

5. Good ballistics programs such as JBM, Exbal, Whatever Bryan Litz did, Gustavo's program which I believe is called Loadbase, and some others which I am not familiar with. But not all ballistics programs are worth having and you should be sure you are getting a rigorously correct calculation with your particular program. These programs may or may not use the Sierra method.

In summary, the Riflemans method is less accurate and no faster and no simpler than the Improved Riflemans method. You get increased accuracy for the same amount of work by working with the drop instead of distance.

A couple of years ago my son was home for Thanksgiving and we went deer hunting with the 40X in 308 that he has used many time in shooting 1000 yard F-class competition. The rifle will shoot groups ranging from 0.19 to 0.4 MOA all day long and average of about 0.35 (I'm not a great shot myself). A six point buck showed up at a range of 265 yards and a angle of perhaps 20+ degrees. The lower half of the bucks chest was obscured by a limb so he had only a 2.0 MOA target. I gave him no correction for angle as it was simply not needed with his skill, the accuracy of the rifle and load and the range and the size of the target. The morale of the story is I have hunted a long time and there is a time to compensate and different ways to compensate and we have to understand our rifles behave accordingly.

Two other points for the first time readers.

Shooting uphill and downhill is different for two reasons.

1. For long range shots, the air density will change with altitude and affect the resistance the bullet incurs.
2. Gravity is real and only works in one direction.

Both of these effects are small but I often will use them to ridicule the internet experts.

In conclusion I will say that while I still love my fellow man, my tolerance of stupidity has decreased in direct relationship with the amount of hair I still have left on my head.

 

[imasam]

Thank you Buffalo Bob,,, i needed to smile.. I bought new Lapua brass, and i will most likely be shooting the Berger VLDs. I have been using the Berger ballistic calculator.. I do go to the range and shoot 400 & 500 yds at metal targets. I haven't had any problems hitting them, consistently. I just bought a new .308 waiting my 10 days.
I did shoot the metal with my 22-250. The calculator seemed to be on target.. I have a Leupold 4.5 x14 - 40mm Long Range Varmit graticle scope on a savage rifle, bull barre, Bell and Carlson Medalist stock. The specifics on the scope gave the drop for each graduation at two known magnification settings. One for light bullets and one for heavier bullets. I slowed the bullets up or down to match the graduation marks. Zeroed at 200 yds.

The scope is quick and dirty for shooting up to 500 yds. It has 10 and 20 mph wind corrections .I haven't proved them out yet.. But i 'm sure they will be good. I have the Leupold range finder to go along with the scope.

I am trying to decide which scope i will buy for the .308. It is also a Savage WW.. I wanted to buy American..No competition barrels yet. I'm using a combination of Redding and Hornady dies.

The varmit reticle is quick for typical hunting distances.. I am finding it hard to go to the dial settable reticle. What is your opinion if you have both.. I may need to buy a target scope just to try the style out.

Thanks.

 

[imasam]

Oh i forgot my range finder is the TBR model to 1000yds.. So i don't need to calculate any hold over corrections thru 500 yds.

I'll have to go out into the desert and shoot up and down hill some long shots to verify all this gear.