New in Colorado

[OldDutch]

Hello everyone. I haven't done a lot of shooting past 300 yards, but have access to a range to do so. I'm here to read up on how to make it happen.

 

[Jefe's Dope]

Welcome. Where are you located? I'm in Thornton.

 

[surgeon260]

Welcome. I am in Colorado Springs.

 

[OldDutch]

Welcome, in CO as well. Give us info on what you have to start with. Ballistic app, range finder, scope, rifle caliber, hand load, bipod, rear bag.........

I’ll be starting with essentially no long range gear. My scopes are all entry level 3-9 and 4-12 hunting scopes of various manufacture. I shoot a variety of cartridges, and load for most of them. Most of my rifles fall into the same category.

98% of my rifle shooting is at 100 yards. I occasionally go out to 300 yards, but haven't made the time to do so in a while. A number of years ago we used to do 500 yards, and I miss that. One of the clubs out here has a 1000 yard range, and I was thinking it was time to take a look at using it.
I know a guy (just one) who does 1000 yard shooting, and it's amazing to see the results.

For the last few years I have been focused on chasing accuracy.
The picture is 5 shots from a Remington M77 Mark II in .243, shot at 100 yards with sandbags at an indoor range.

 

[OldDutch]

Welcome. I am in Colorado Springs.

Me to. Thanks for the welcome.

 

[surgeon260]

Cool! I shoot mostly at the Fort Carson range.

 

[OldDutch]

Cool! I shoot mostly at the Fort Carson range.

I haven't been to the Carson range, actually. I took a job down the street from Whistling Pines West a few years back and started doing most of my shooting there, purely out of convenience. I can stop in for an hour on my way home from work.
I also belong to Frontier Sportsman's, which has the thousand yard range.

 

[OldDutch]

A lot of ranges and matches in your area to get you started. I would establish muzzle velocity on your chosen rifle and load you will use. Pick up an inexpensive or FREE program to calculate your trajectory. Strelok, Hornady, JBM to name a few.

http://www.jbmballistics.com/cgi-bin/jbmtraj-5.1.cgi

Rear bag is a must. You can make one if you search for the different types.
Also check to make sure your scope tracks elevation or know the correction factor. (Hunting scopes might not be able to dial with markings, only zero and hold over).

I've been faking the rear bag by stacking sandbags under the butt for added stability, which has been adequate for the point-blank 100 yard indoor range. I'll take a more serious look at them.
I will pull a free program down and start looking at my cartridge options, that's probably a good place to start deciding which cartridge to try.
As for scopes, I will have to look into it. It's not been a priority in the past. I have an old Unertl I could probably take a look at again. It's currently mounted on a Remington 40x in .222, which was interesting for about a minute then went into the back of the safe.

Thanks for the advice.