shooting questions

[firstcoueswas80]

k so my questions are: when i sight my rifle in, i usually shoot in flagstaff arizona,(about 7,000 elevation) and hunt south of tucson arizona( approx. 4,000 maybe) my questions are will my rifle shoot the same zero in tucson that it will in flagstaff? will the velocity be close enough to the same so that it doesnt effect my varmint reticle scope? i usually shoot one or two shots from my rifles at say a little rock around 100 yards when i get to the hunting area. is there a problem with sighting in this high and then hunting down that low?? will my loads work the same way?

thanks.

[DesertBull]

Have you ever used "Point Blank" software? It's free and you can put in all kinds of different data, including elevation, and get "theoretical" perfomance data.

 

Point Blank

[firstcoueswas80]

i actually have and it is a great program, but last time i down loaded it, i noticed my computer running slower. it might have had nothing to do with that program but i try to download as little as possible!

[Benbrown]

A 3,000 ft reduction in altitude will effectively reduce the ballistic coefficent of the bullet that you are using, but the difference won't really affect the trajectory of your load that much.

 

Last year, I hunted elk at 8,600 ft in Colorado with a .300 Weatherby Magnum that I sighted in at my house here in southwestern New Mexico at 5,100 ft. Using the ballistic calculator that came with my PACT chronograph, I calculated and printed out a trajectory table out to 500 yds. I taped the table to the butt stock of my rifle so that I could consult it in the field if need be. I also shot the rifle at 100, 200 and 300 yds from a bench to confirm that the calculated trajectory matched the actual one.

 

As it turned out, I killed a bull on the second day of a five-day hunt. The owner of the ranch that I was hunting on had a 300 yd range set up and I spent part of one afternoon shooting at 200 and 300 yds to see (among other things) if the change in elevation affected the trajectory of the load that I was shooting. If it did, I couldn't tell the difference.

 

The main thing is to find a place to shoot from a solid rest at ranges out to the maximum that you might encounter in hunting and determine for yourself where your rifle is shooting at those distances.

 

Good hunting!