Today’s Group Therapy Session

I think I finally had a day of .17 HMR shooting with no malfunctions.

A while back, I bought an Athlon Argos 6-24x scope, which I have often misidentified as an Athlon Ares. It’s a $400 scope, so a person has to have realistic expectations, but it seems very, very nice. I made the mistake of mounting it on my Savage 93R rifle with a 20-MOA base, which was totally pointless for .17 HMR. I tried to zero it at 100 yards, and I ended up several inches above my point of aim. I had to order a 0-MOA base for it. That base arrived last week, and I installed it. Today I had to zero the rifle all over again.

I shot factory ammunition, because there is no other kind. I started out with Hornady 17-grain V-Max, and after zeroing, this is what I got:

I started on the 7 o’clock bullseye and worked my way around to the 5 o’clock bullseye, shooting 5 rounds per bullseye.

I didn’t do too bad. The second group looks very good apart from a flyer, and the same can be said of the third. The first one was not great, but it was okay. The fourth one opened up so much, I checked the gun to see if any screws had come loose.

I don’t know what happened. My guess is that it just shows a need for practice in order to develop consistency.

Here is the second target. I shot Hornady 20-grain XTP hollowpoints.

I like these groups a whole lot better. I particularly like the third group. Five rounds and only two holes. I was afraid a screw had backed out and I had missed the target entirely, but that’s not the case.

Other people have gotten better results with XTP’s than with V-Max, and maybe I’m in the same boat. Maybe my gun likes XTP’s. Or maybe I just shoot badly until I get going.

My understanding is that V-Max rounds are good for disintegrating annoying animals you don’t intend to eat. They do a great deal of damage right after they enter. XTP rounds are for bigger animals, and they penetrate deeper.

I bought a lot of both types of rounds. I thought XTP’s might be best for practice, and even if the V-Maxes never shoot as well, they certainly shoot well enough to kill varmints. No problems there.

It’s very nice to have this gun working the way it should. Now that I have a .17 HMR rifle I can trust, I can assume most of the error in my groups is caused by my mistakes, and that means I should be able to figure out what I’m doing wrong, fix it, and shoot better.

Now that the rifle is zeroed and has completed its shakedown period, I can think about shooting, not gunsmithing. I can shoot it a couple of times a week. I don’t like to shoot a lot of rounds in a given session, because my concentration drops off. Maybe I’ll plan on shooting 50 rounds per outing.

If I didn’t have .17 HMR, I suppose I’d have to rely on .204 Ruger. It’s the second-cheapest accurate caliber I own. I have .22 rifles, but if there is a 1-MOA .22 on the planet, shooting ammo that doesn’t cost 20 cents per round, I have not heard of it.

It looks like 20-grain rounds shoot an inch higher than 17-grain rounds. So which do I use to zero the scope? I guess I should use whatever is most accurate. I want to use the most accurate ammo for practice, and my guess is that zeroing for my practice ammo makes the most sense. I don’t really care if my zero is off when I’m trying to shoot a raccoon 30 yards away, but it would be annoying at the range.

I have mil-dots all over my reticle, so I suppose none of this matters. Regardless of which ammo I use to zero the scope, I can use the reticle to compensate when I use the other ammo. This is what real shooters do, and I would like to be a real shooter.

Now that I’m shooting well, I have a dilemma. Do I or do I not clean the rifle? Different calibers behave differently. The guy who taught my long-range class said he never cleaned his 6.5 Creedmoor barrels until groups started opening up. I’ve read that .17 HMR does not like clean barrels. I suppose the best thing is to keep shooting and see what happens.

If it’s true that I have two accurate guns, then it must be about time for me to visit a long range facility and move out to longer distances. I should be able to function at 300 yards with .17 HMR and 400 yards with .204 Ruger. It seems to me that it would be best to practice with cheap calibers before spraying half the county with expensive 6.5 Creedmoor.

I can start thinking about using my Kestrel, and I’ll have to get a spotting scope. I can see bullet holes through my rifle scopes at 100 yards, but that will not work farther out.

It’s nice to not be inept. I hope things continue to improve.