MilGunsmith
Member
Those of us who shoot service rifle and palma do not get anything but the one range flag. We shoot with the mirage. A good shooter can shott 1/2 moa at 600yrds with iron sights and a sling.
Boyd Allen
Active member
To review, mirage does a couple of things. It tells you something about the direction of the wind near the target, and it displaces the image of the target so that it appears to be in a place that it is not. It is this latter effect that no flag system can deal with. Of course if the wind is of sufficient force, the warm air "bubbles" coming off of the ground are mixed with the colder air above before they can rise far enough to cause this to happen...I think. When you use the mirage in light conditions, holding a little in the opposite direction of its flow, you are probably compensating to some degree for the displacement of the target image in the direction of flow.
I have shot my Rail gun,in mirage,when the target was just a distorted blob. By Aiming the crosshairs on the record target and watching the flags. I have shot some impressive groups without ever looking through the scope. Go Figure.
When shooting a bag gun,in mirage, I watch my flags and go to the sighter to confirm wind direction. The sighter doesn't lie. At 200yds,sometimes its impossible to see bullet holes on the sighter. In this situation, wind reading becomes a guessing game for me. Mirage makes it more confusing.
Glenn
When shooting a bag gun,in mirage, I watch my flags and go to the sighter to confirm wind direction. The sighter doesn't lie. At 200yds,sometimes its impossible to see bullet holes on the sighter. In this situation, wind reading becomes a guessing game for me. Mirage makes it more confusing.
Glenn
Boyd Allen
Active member
It seems to me that the whole purpose of a rail gun is to reliably return to the same point of aim for every shot, without having to be aimed. As long as your group falls on the record target, you should not have to re-aim and so shot to shot variations of the apparent position of the target would be irrelevant.
As far as bag guns go, I am told that some excellent shooters ignore mirage, and others use it.
As far as bag guns go, I am told that some excellent shooters ignore mirage, and others use it.
I have a pretty good idea about how Rail Guns work. I've got one and I've shot it in actual competition.
My hats off to Mirage readers. I prefer good wind flags, Sighter targets and a well tuned rifle. Its worked OK for me and my simple approach to Benchrest shooting.
Bring on the E-Flag development. Their introduction could make Mirage affects irrelevant in short range Benchrest.
Glenn
My hats off to Mirage readers. I prefer good wind flags, Sighter targets and a well tuned rifle. Its worked OK for me and my simple approach to Benchrest shooting.
Bring on the E-Flag development. Their introduction could make Mirage affects irrelevant in short range Benchrest.
Glenn
Andy Cross
New member
Can't see it
I can't see how any type of wind flag can make the necessity to re-aim a bag gun irrelevant whether mirage was present or not.
Andy.
I can't see how any type of wind flag can make the necessity to re-aim a bag gun irrelevant whether mirage was present or not.
Andy.
During the early years of short range Benchrest competition,nobody used wind flags. I’ve talked to some old timers who say that they used whatever they could locate to indicate wind direction and speed. Grass,Trees, debris,etc. Wind reading was mostly a guessing game. None of the Old timers I talked to had much to say about Mirage . Perhaps because Rifle scopes used in those days were of less power(20X-30X.) I don't know if the Hunter Class venue using 6X scopes was around back then.
When wind flags were introduced to the Sport, It gave shooters a tool that instantly impacted Accuracy. Aggregates shrunk to levels not regularly seen previously. That says a lot about wind flags.
I don’t know who first introduced Wind flags,but my hats off to that innovator.
The designers who came up with the idea of E-Flags, a new and different wind flag ,Should be commended for their efforts. I have watched these devices in action. I believe they work as good or better than the traditional designs. It appears that the Sport is just not ready for their widespread use.
We were discussing Mirage. I have heard people talk about the effects of mirage but I’ve never heard anybody explain the specifics of how to shoot when you can’t distinguish a consistent aim point on the target, when shooting a bag gun.
The E-flag system I saw,You relied on the sensors to indicate wind forces downrange. No need to watch a monitor and at the same time, try to also interpret Mirage. Just my observations. The true test,of course, is in actual competition.
Glenn
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Boyd Allen
Active member
On a day when the wind varies from none, to enough to blow away any mirage, it can be instructive to set up a rifle on a good set of bags (or your rail if you are lucky enough to have one), and bench that does not move, and observe what happens.
Years back, on the guess that the lowest that the mothball cycles to when hopping around from mirage was a better reference than trying to aim in the middle of the circle as it moved, and given that local conditions mostly favor pickers, I changed from a center to a 6:00 hold, with the top of my horizontal cross hair, just touching the outside of the line that defines the mothball. The vertical cross hair bisects it.
Back then, one of the shooters that would come down to the Visalia matches from the Sacramento area, who had once owned a NBRSA record, was a picker. He told me that after starting hot, and dropping off, that that was the way that he had come back. Back then I believe that I saw him shoot a 100 yard agg, on a warm afternoon, that included three 0s (a friend thinks that it was four). In any case, the way that he would shoot was to spend a very long time knob twiddling to get his aim just right. Then he would sit up and wait for the condition that he was looking for, taking his time, and then pull the trigger when he saw it, without looking back through the scope. Then he would repeat the process. I have to say that given what the flags were usually doing, that he must have a terrific visual memory. My point is that seeing how he shot, had some influence on how I tried to shoot. I aim as I have described, so that the mothball touches at the lowest position that it cycles to, from the mirage, and split the circle with it in that position. Once when I had just decided on that change, I got excited during a 200 yard match, and aimed one shot at the center, which combined with my other issues to enlarge my group significantly. I had to laugh at myself, and that seemed to be enough to keep me from making the same mistake again. I made the change primarily for 200 but I use the same technique for both distances. This may be exactly wrong, but I offer it up for your consideration. If I remember correctly, Boyer does not shoot mirage. I hate to think about how much that has been holding him back all of these years ;-)
Years back, on the guess that the lowest that the mothball cycles to when hopping around from mirage was a better reference than trying to aim in the middle of the circle as it moved, and given that local conditions mostly favor pickers, I changed from a center to a 6:00 hold, with the top of my horizontal cross hair, just touching the outside of the line that defines the mothball. The vertical cross hair bisects it.
Back then, one of the shooters that would come down to the Visalia matches from the Sacramento area, who had once owned a NBRSA record, was a picker. He told me that after starting hot, and dropping off, that that was the way that he had come back. Back then I believe that I saw him shoot a 100 yard agg, on a warm afternoon, that included three 0s (a friend thinks that it was four). In any case, the way that he would shoot was to spend a very long time knob twiddling to get his aim just right. Then he would sit up and wait for the condition that he was looking for, taking his time, and then pull the trigger when he saw it, without looking back through the scope. Then he would repeat the process. I have to say that given what the flags were usually doing, that he must have a terrific visual memory. My point is that seeing how he shot, had some influence on how I tried to shoot. I aim as I have described, so that the mothball touches at the lowest position that it cycles to, from the mirage, and split the circle with it in that position. Once when I had just decided on that change, I got excited during a 200 yard match, and aimed one shot at the center, which combined with my other issues to enlarge my group significantly. I had to laugh at myself, and that seemed to be enough to keep me from making the same mistake again. I made the change primarily for 200 but I use the same technique for both distances. This may be exactly wrong, but I offer it up for your consideration. If I remember correctly, Boyer does not shoot mirage. I hate to think about how much that has been holding him back all of these years ;-)
Andy Cross
New member
Just ignore it ?
I can't see how any shooter can just ignore mirage. It interferes with your sight picture and at the very least you have to take measures to compensate for it. So every shooter shoots mirage even if they ignore the signatures that may help them shoot a smaller group.
Andy
Well,now that makes two of us.If,in fact, Tony Boyer doesn't shoot Mirage. That's a real good reason to trust what your wind flags,E-flags, are telling ya.
Glenn
I can't see how any shooter can just ignore mirage. It interferes with your sight picture and at the very least you have to take measures to compensate for it. So every shooter shoots mirage even if they ignore the signatures that may help them shoot a smaller group.
Andy
No need to just ignore mirage. A variable power scope does a good job of reducing its optical illusions. Watching wind flags and using your sighter target helps shoot smaller groups.
Glenn
Mirage
I was shooting my second ever match at the Crawfish..had a four shot .2 something at 200 and the wind changed. Sat there until the wind returned but the mirage was really moving fast. I shot thinking that if the flags were the same it wouldn't be too bad...but the shot fell 2 inches out. I learned that I needed to take a sighter now and then rather than EVER trust a returning wind.
Always shoot sighters when the wind or mirage is not pretty close and for sure when your wind returns. If time is running low, take a sighter and finish your group. Things can get really bad, really quick. An inch is better than two inches....not much but a little better.
I was shooting my second ever match at the Crawfish..had a four shot .2 something at 200 and the wind changed. Sat there until the wind returned but the mirage was really moving fast. I shot thinking that if the flags were the same it wouldn't be too bad...but the shot fell 2 inches out. I learned that I needed to take a sighter now and then rather than EVER trust a returning wind.
Always shoot sighters when the wind or mirage is not pretty close and for sure when your wind returns. If time is running low, take a sighter and finish your group. Things can get really bad, really quick. An inch is better than two inches....not much but a little better.
Mirage
Wilbur…I think We are essentially saying the same thing. Mirage is a ghost image. Yes, we all can see it clearly looking through a high power scope, but we don’t all accurately process what we’re looking at. Its an illusion. The only hard evidence we have to indicate what is happening between the bench and target is some type of wind indicator. The more sensitive, the better. The sighter target corroborates what we think we see. Sometimes,conditions change so quickly, when going from sighter to record,its easy to get burned. This often happens on days when there is no mirage. You hear the expressions from Shooters on the line. “Where the F### did that come from” I’ve said it a bunch of times myself. I’ll probably say it again this weekend at Tomball.
The bottom line is, Benchrest shooting is a tough Sport. The fun is trying to figure out all the nuances. At least it is for me.
Glenn
Wilbur…I think We are essentially saying the same thing. Mirage is a ghost image. Yes, we all can see it clearly looking through a high power scope, but we don’t all accurately process what we’re looking at. Its an illusion. The only hard evidence we have to indicate what is happening between the bench and target is some type of wind indicator. The more sensitive, the better. The sighter target corroborates what we think we see. Sometimes,conditions change so quickly, when going from sighter to record,its easy to get burned. This often happens on days when there is no mirage. You hear the expressions from Shooters on the line. “Where the F### did that come from” I’ve said it a bunch of times myself. I’ll probably say it again this weekend at Tomball.
The bottom line is, Benchrest shooting is a tough Sport. The fun is trying to figure out all the nuances. At least it is for me.
Glenn
Boyd Allen
Active member
On the suggestion to reduce magnification to get rid of mirage....you still have the displacement of target image, whether you can see it or not. I first ran across this in an old B&L booklet from the days when those scopes were made in America, and they had that big external adjustment 6x24 power variable scope. My main thing for mirage is the decision as to where to aim, a decision that has to be made for every shot from a bag gun. When the image is bouncing between two extremes, just where do you aim? That is an issue whether you use the flow to supplement your flags or not. Even though I may not use the flow, I do note when it is boiling and avoid aiming and shooting while this is happening, and pay attention to big differences in flow as well, just not as much as I probably should.
Jerry H
Different Drummer
Only my opinion, but based on my electric flag experiments, when you get burned bad by your flags you either were not looking at your neighbors for the incoming change or the close flags were not the same as before. Mirage is only readable at the target end of the range while its effect varies throughout the distance to the target.
Jerry just explained why me and Tony Boyer and others don't shoot Mirage.
Pay particular attention to what he said. "Mirage is only readable at the target end of the Range,while its effect varies throughout the distance to the target." I cant count the times I've made the mistake of missing what's happening up close. As far as aiming goes, your sighter target will tell you where to aim,provided you can distinguish where your bullet holes are. Sometimes,that's not easy to do when mirage really gets nasty. The only solution to the "Where to Aim" problem,when you cant see bullet holes, is a Rail Gun.
Glenn
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Thanks Jerry,that's kinda what I figured.
Just for the "Johnny Come Lately's" to the Sport,.....Jerry Hensler was shooting Benchrest a long time before I started back in 1999.
I interrogate him everytime I see him. I confess that i don't always understand what he tells me.
Glenn
Glenn