• Watch Out for Scammers!

    We've now added a color code for all accounts. Orange accounts are new members, Blue are full members, and Green are Supporters. If you get a message about a sale from an orange account, make sure you pay attention before sending any money!

Range Report Aerodynamic jump question

checkmate101

Sergeant of the Hide
Full Member
Minuteman
Dec 2, 2019
120
47
Not sure if this is the correct sub-forum to place this in, but here we go.

I am just getting into long(er) range shooting. Have been shooting rifles for decades, but mainly just hunting rifles with duplex reticles and Kentucky windage/elevation guesses. That said - I am loving the science of the longer range shooting. I read recently about aerodynamic jump/drag (AJ/D) and was wondering if it applied to a situation I had recently.

Hunting prairie dogs we mainly use a .17 hmr. 2 of the 3 days we hunted this year were extremely windy, 20-30 one day, 35-40 another. First day was pretty calm, maybe a 5-10 crosswind.

First day, the .17 was shooting POA/POI with the calm crosswind (generally a 90 degree wind, sometimes 3/4 value). In the high wind days we were seeing high left POI with a R->L wind and low right POI with a L->R wind.

I read this thread: https://www.snipershide.com/shootin...d-on-elevation-aerodynamic-jump-drag.6795073/
Generally seemed like AJ/D seemed like a minor factor, mainly to be ignored.

Finally to my question, with the terrible BC of the .17 hmr (we shoot 17g hornady vmax) and the extreme winds - would that be enough to account for AJ/D being what we were dealing with? Does a worse BC have any effect on increasing the effects of AJ/D? Also, as wind gets much higher I assume there would be a noticable increase in AJ/D? I am guessing it would be a linear increase? Guessing the above referenced thread is generally speaking about bullets with high BC so that it maybe diminishes the role to which AJ/D affects them.

My thoughts are that it might be, but I haven't paid that much attention before - just always assumed missed like that were me somehow. This year I noticed a very consistent pattern and the dope (once we found the problem) was very repeatable. This year I paid a lot more attention to what was happening and possible reasons for why, rather than just sending rounds without thinking about them. In general I am wanting to believe the bullet like I have read to do and what I was seeing certainly seemed to line up with what aerodynamic jump/drag would cause, but I am not sure if the science of it works out.
 
Last edited:
Forgot to add, shot distances were anywhere from 15-200 yards with the 17. Nothing really long distance about them, which also adds to my skepticism that AJ/D was what I was seeing. But again, wondering if really low BC and really high winds would account for it even at relatively short distances
 
thanks for that, makes sense and perhaps that really can account for what we were seeing. After reading about it and thinking back to the shooting we were doing, it sure seemed like that was near 100% of the error we saw in POI.