The Great Score Target and Bullet Size Controversy

oliver88

oliver88

New member
Over the last few weeks I have seen many posts on this forum about this or that score target and this size bullet versus that size bullet.

Not one time have I seen someone graph it all out and do the math on it...... so I sat down and done it for myself.

This was not done to promote one target over another or one sanctioning body over another....
I simply wanted to run the numbers and see what was true and how much was BS.

I wanted to answer two questions:

1. Is the UBR target really Caliber Neutral?
2. How much advantage do I have shooting a 30 caliber vs .243 and .224 on a non caliber neutral target.

I know that posting this will be like throwing fresh meat at a pack of starving wolves but there is no need to attack each other (or me) over this.
This is simple math. I encourage you to get your calculator out and follow along.

Again--- I support all benchrest shooting and this is not to promote one sanctioning body over another so let's keep it civil.
 

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oliver88 said:
Over the last few weeks I have seen many posts on this forum about this or that score target and this size bullet versus that size bullet.

Not one time have I seen someone graph it all out and do the math on it...... so I sat down and done it for myself.

This was not done to promote one target over another or one sanctioning body over another....
I simply wanted to run the numbers and see what was true and how much was BS.

I wanted to answer two questions:

1. Is the UBR target really Caliber Neutral?
2. How much advantage do I have shooting a 30 caliber vs .243 and .224 on a non caliber neutral target.

I know that posting this will be like throwing fresh meat at a pack of starving wolves but there is no need to attack each other (or me) over this.
This is simple math. I encourage you to get your calculator out and follow along.

Again--- I support all benchrest shooting and this is not to promote one sanctioning body over another so let's keep it civil.
Click to expand...

Thank you for taking the time to do this. It may not suit what everyone wants but it's math and has no preference.
 
Following a week or more, of licking my selfinflicted wounds . . .

I'll throw the following of for perusal.

Bench-rest score shooting roots are solidly entrenched in Hunter Class origin, and married to the concept of precision rifles.
It appears, that, as early as the mid-1960's, especially in Pennsylvania - somewhere, in my files, I have a match report, dated 1966/67, which was passed to me by [the late] George Myer. George sated that, even then, at 100 Yd., they were shooting at a 1/2" ten-ring - a carry-over from the "moth-ball", or, group shooting center-ring. I'll attempt to locate and post that report - it features a number of names, including George, recognizable yet today - stalwarts of bench-rest oh, and there were about 60+ competitors!

Apparently, it was decided that a 1/2" "bull" afforded an ample, while difficult level of accuracy, which required rather precision rifles.
To this day, this holds true: Aggregate winning scoring requires accurate shot placement via a precision rifle. Withstanding the eventual schism, which resulted in the NBRSA & IBS, the score format remained largely uniform. The IBS was first to officially offer a National Championship event. I believe the report (mentioned above) states, at the top of the page, that is was "sanctioned" by the NBRSA, but NOT registered.

Eventually, the IBS recognized Varmint for Score, in addition to Hunter Class, and, even Varmint Hunter, while, until about 2011/12, the NBRSA recognized only the Hunter Class. All classes retained the 0.500" ten-ring - any move to reduce the size was met with, well, led in the baloon . . . (see my post in another thread)

Then, a fellow, from Maine, one Jim Goody, decided to campaign a thirty caliber VfS rig - back around 1997, or so. Until then, the 6mm dominated VfS and, the thinly contested VH.

When, Mr. Goody laid claim to three consecutive IBS SOY titles (I believe 1998,99, &Y2K), and a National Championship (Y2K), blazing X-es with his 30 Jaguar (essentially, a 30x47HBR): "things were about to change." Most surprising, was the sudden decline is 250-20++X 6mm scores . . . I never have figured that out (see other threads). Also, in 1998/9, Ronnie Long, Joe Entrekin, 'Humble Henry" Rivers, and company began campaigning 30 BRs . . . and boy, did they work, and not for just a select few, who could figure them out. ;-)

So, in the context of precision, and to snip off my rambling, if anything, we needed a more difficult ten-ring, not an easier one - not for any caliber!! And, more incremental ring spacing! To this day, 6mm totters often take one look at the NBRSA/IBS 100 Yd. score target, and pronounce it, "too easy" . . . until they drop a point! ;-) And, that is the point - it, "ain't az eazy az it lookz"!

Before I get skewered, in the last three seasons, in registered VfS tournaments, I have used .20; .24; .25; .30 Cal cartridges and never felt handicapped. Keep 'em ON the X! RG
 
R.G. Robinett said:
I'll throw the following of for perusal.

Bench-rest score shooting roots are solidly entrenched in Hunter Class origin, and married to the concept of precision rifles.
It appears, that, as early as the mid-1960's, especially in Pennsylvania - somewhere, in my files, I have a match report, dated 1966/67, which was passed to me by [the late] George Myer. George sated that, even then, at 100 Yd., they were shooting at a 1/2" ten-ring - a carry-over from the "moth-ball", or, group shooting center-ring. I'll attempt to locate and post that report - it features a number of names, including George, recognizable yet today - stalwarts of bench-rest oh, and there were about 60+ competitors!

Apparently, it was decided that a 1/2" "bull" afforded an ample, while difficult level of accuracy, which required rather precision rifles.
To this day, this holds true: Aggregate winning scoring requires accurate shot placement via a precision rifle. Withstanding the eventual schism, which resulted in the NBRSA & IBS, the score format remained largely uniform. The IBS was first to officially offer a National Championship event. I believe the report (mentioned above) states, at the top of the page, that is was "sanctioned" by the NBRSA, but NOT registered.

Eventually, the IBS recognized Varmint for Score, in addition to Hunter Class, and, even Varmint Hunter, while, until about 2011/12, the NBRSA recognized only the Hunter Class. All classes retained the 0.500" ten-ring - any move to reduce the size was met with, well, led in the baloon . . . (see my post in another thread)

Then, a fellow, from Maine, one Jim Goody, decided to campaign a thirty caliber VfS rig - back around 1997, or so. Until then, the 6mm dominated VfS and, the thinly contested VH.

When, Mr. Goody laid claim to three consecutive IBS SOY titles (I believe 1998,99, &Y2K), and a National Championship (Y2K), blazing X-es with his 30 Jaguar (essentially, a 30x47HBR): "things were about to change." Most surprising, was the sudden decline is 250-20++X 6mm scores . . . I never have figured that out (see other threads). Also, in 1998/9, Ronnie Long, Joe Entrekin, 'Humble Henry" Rivers, and company began campaigning 30 BRs . . . and boy, did they work, and not for just a select few, who could figure them out. ;-)

So, in the context of precision, and to snip off my rambling, if anything, we needed a more difficult ten-ring, not an easier one - not for any caliber!! And, more incremental ring spacing! To this day, 6mm totters often take one look at the NBRSA/IBS 100 Yd. score target, and pronounce it, "too easy" . . . until they drop a point! ;-) And, that is the point - it, "ain't az eazy az it lookz"!

Before I get skewered, in the last three seasons, in registered VfS tournaments, I have used .20; .24; .25; .30 Cal cartridges and never felt handicapped. Keep 'em ON the X! RG
Click to expand...

Very good history lesson, Randy.

Where to begin? You hit on a lot of points in a relatively short post.
I guess for starters, I think you are again alluding to certain organizations going to a smaller target. The UBR target is already much smaller. Just look at it like this...
It has no x's.
Instead of 11, what if we call the dot a 10,
The 10 ring a 9, and so forth.

That's a much smaller target and all we changed is we dropped the X and, in this scenario...changed to point values.

It's bedtime. I'll leave it at that for now.

Good night guys!
 
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Post #10, on this thread: < http://benchrest.com/showthread.php?98396-The-Equalizing-Scoring-Reticle >

The following by Andy Taber:
Not trying to take anything away from UBR. They have done a really good job of putting their program together, in the face of what I remember from the time, as getting a lot of ridicule for proposing a caliber neutral target. The reticle would allow a smaller club access to this game for a minimal cost. I purchase the targets for our clubs 100 yard score matches and they are not cheap. Especially shipping.

I would like to throw another thought into this process of the 30 caliber " advantage". I purchased one of these multi caliber reticles about three years ago and have used it to evaluate my own targets after a match. I shoot a 6mm bullet in score matches and was curious what would have happened had I been shooting a 30. In the years that I have done this about the best I would have improved my score was to pick up a few more x's along the way. I've never dropped a point that this scoring advantage would have helped. My biggest handicap is still reading and interpreting conditions.

Most people shooting a 6mm in short range Benchrest are shooting a bullet in the 65gr range while the people shooting a 30 are using a bullet around 125gr. I think the extra weight is a far bigger advantage than what is gained by the radius difference.



Andy has observed the same thing I've watched for 35+ years now: a good shooter, who over time, wavers back and forth between, say, 6mm, and thirty Cal., will, at 100 Yd., average, at best, adding a couple of Xes to his score - the advantage is highly over-rated. Of course, in a GRAND AGGREGATE format, the Xes carry on. However, at two hundred, the missed tend to be much BIGGER than the caliber differential.

I have "scored" (well, re-scored, following targets being hung) many registered IBS/NBRSA events, using worst-edge, to to see how that would affect the Grand Agg. results. Counter-intuitively , the winner has never changed, and often, the margin has grown. The last time I kept a, " running worst edge" sheet, my pal, Mike Bigelow's wining edge increased from 1 point, to three points . . there were three 6mm rigs shooting decent scores - Mike just doped the pants off of 'em.

This is easy enough to do/observe: carry a scoring device and place it over your misses. I do this at nearly every event - especially when shooting one of my smaller diameter bullets - when I stink it up, it wouldn't matter what caliber I shot. It's very unusual when I could say, "if I'd been shootin' my thirty" . . . ;-)

The "trick" is to observe this over time - at least a full season, and the longer the [more Aggs.] better . . . guess I presumed everyone did this type of self analysis. As the the BR proverb goes, "The wind is my friend." RG
 
R.G. Robinett said:
I'll throw the following of for perusal.

Bench-rest score shooting roots are solidly entrenched in Hunter Class origin, and married to the concept of precision rifles.
It appears, that, as early as the mid-1960's, especially in Pennsylvania - somewhere, in my files, I have a match report, dated 1966/67, which was passed to me by [the late] George Myer. George sated that, even then, at 100 Yd., they were shooting at a 1/2" ten-ring - a carry-over from the "moth-ball", or, group shooting center-ring. I'll attempt to locate and post that report - it features a number of names, including George, recognizable yet today - stalwarts of bench-rest oh, and there were about 60+ competitors!

Apparently, it was decided that a 1/2" "bull" afforded an ample, while difficult level of accuracy, which required rather precision rifles.
To this day, this holds true: Aggregate winning scoring requires accurate shot placement via a precision rifle. Withstanding the eventual schism, which resulted in the NBRSA & IBS, the score format remained largely uniform. The IBS was first to officially offer a National Championship event. I believe the report (mentioned above) states, at the top of the page, that is was "sanctioned" by the NBRSA, but NOT registered.

Eventually, the IBS recognized Varmint for Score, in addition to Hunter Class, and, even Varmint Hunter, while, until about 2011/12, the NBRSA recognized only the Hunter Class. All classes retained the 0.500" ten-ring - any move to reduce the size was met with, well, led in the baloon . . . (see my post in another thread)

Then, a fellow, from Maine, one Jim Goody, decided to campaign a thirty caliber VfS rig - back around 1997, or so. Until then, the 6mm dominated VfS and, the thinly contested VH.

When, Mr. Goody laid claim to three consecutive IBS SOY titles (I believe 1998,99, &Y2K), and a National Championship (Y2K), blazing X-es with his 30 Jaguar (essentially, a 30x47HBR): "things were about to change." Most surprising, was the sudden decline is 250-20++X 6mm scores . . . I never have figured that out (see other threads). Also, in 1998/9, Ronnie Long, Joe Entrekin, 'Humble Henry" Rivers, and company began campaigning 30 BRs . . . and boy, did they work, and not for just a select few, who could figure them out. ;-)

So, in the context of precision, and to snip off my rambling, if anything, we needed a more difficult ten-ring, not an easier one - not for any caliber!! And, more incremental ring spacing! To this day, 6mm totters often take one look at the NBRSA/IBS 100 Yd. score target, and pronounce it, "too easy" . . . until they drop a point! ;-) And, that is the point - it, "ain't az eazy az it lookz"!

Before I get skewered, in the last three seasons, in registered VfS tournaments, I have used .20; .24; .25; .30 Cal cartridges and never felt handicapped. Keep 'em ON the X! RG
Click to expand...

To add a little to the above:
Around 1999-2001 Mark Sainer (sp?) and his son were shooting a Sid Goodling smithed 30BR at Thurmont.
In 2002 at the 200-300 Nationals at Mainville Jim Goody's "deer gun" fell to the likes of a puny 6 PPC piloted by yours truly.
I distinctly remember although I cannot remember what year Joe Entrekin and Henry Rivers came to Maine with their 30's and handed out delicious peaches and a serious ass whooping. I still have the scars.
Of course then there was the "30BR Graveyard" sign at Thurmont.....and then the walls came tumbling down.
The 6 PPC is a brutal tool and I would not bet against it when driven by a qualified pilot.
Randy, pardon my feeble attempt at 'filling in some blanks'.
DA
 
R.G. Robinett said:
... This is easy enough to do/observe: carry a scoring device and place it over your misses. I do this at nearly every event - especially when shooting one of my smaller diameter bullets - when I stink it up, it wouldn't matter what caliber I shot. It's very unusual when I could say, "if I'd been shootin' my thirty" . . . ;-) The "trick" is to observe this over time - at least a full season, and the longer the [more Aggs.] better . . . guess I presumed everyone did this type of self analysis. As the the BR proverb goes, "The wind is my friend." RG
Click to expand...
Randy, I don't want to misinterpret what you are saying. So you believe, in the rare instances when you misread the wind, the penalty with a 68 gr bullet is so severe relative to, let's say, an 118 gr bullet, that the enhanced scoring reticle is meaningless? A 9 is a 9 is a 9?
 
R.G. Robinett;804961 I would like to throw another thought into this process of the 30 caliber " advantage". I purchased one of these multi caliber reticles about three years ago and have used it to evaluate my own targets after a match. I shoot a 6mm bullet in score matches and was curious what would have happened had I been shooting a 30. In the years that I have done this about the best I would have improved my score was to pick up a few more x's along the way. I've never dropped a point that this scoring advantage would have helped. My biggest handicap is still reading and interpreting conditions. [/QUOTE said:
UBR has no X's. That little dot is a POINT.

Of course a well piloted 6 may win in IBS, on occasion. Stranger things have certainly happened than that. But I don't see a rush of IBS/NBRSA 30 cal shooters rushing out to build a 6mm , any time soon.

Maybe we should look at a Super Shoot match report or two, to see just how far down the list the winner would be if you add the difference between a 6 and a 30 to their groups/agg. That would be .065", Randy. ;)
Click to expand...
 
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I'll dip my toe in here a bit and offer this:

Much of the .30's being 'better' on a Score target is due to the fact that their tune window is wider/more forgiving than a 6PPC-ish cartridge. This has been demonstrated for decades, starting with the Hunter class 30X47's, etc.

Good shootin'. :) -Al
 
Al Nyhus said:
I'll dip my toe in here a bit and offer this:

Much of the .30's being 'better' on a Score target is due to the fact that their tune window is wider/more forgiving than a 6PPC-ish cartridge. This has been demonstrated for decades, starting with the Hunter class 30X47's, etc.

Good shootin'. :) -Al
Click to expand...

I don't think many people will disagree with that, Al. They both have their own pro's and con's.
 
Al Nyhus said:
I'll dip my toe in here a bit and offer this:

Much of the .30's being 'better' on a Score target is due to the fact that their tune window is wider/more forgiving than a 6PPC-ish cartridge. This has been demonstrated for decades, starting with the Hunter class 30X47's, etc.

Good shootin'. :) -Al
Click to expand...

Actually, it's because it makes a bigger hole. I thought we were through with this but I guess not. I will need to double check this and Danny doesn't have all the past year's scores in anything but the paper records and they are difficult to go through. But I believe I have won more UBR matches with .224s than all but maybe one or two have with .30's. Also, I talked to him today about this because the Records page doesn't list the caliber that was shot for record. However, we are both pretty sure that with the exception of a couple of meter matches that had little or no competition, only two or three UBR records are held by .30's. All the rest are held by a 6mm or a 224. If a .30 holds a wider tune than a 6PPC why don't they win the Super Shoot, and why aren't they shot in more group matches? The only thing a 30 has going for it over a 6mm is a bigger hole. In IBS/NBRSA VFS shooting it's like Randy says "Bigger is Better". That's all. Perception is NOT fact.

Rick
 
Greyfox said:
I do, what are you smoking tonight?

Rick
Click to expand...

I disagree with you on this but it's not relevant to the subject. Tuners make how well a gun stays in tune or not, much less of an issue. You've been using them for a good while now.
 
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