First long range report on Weatherby Modular chassis 223 Rem

[charliebrown1999]

Yesterday I made the 100 mile+ trip to Pala shooting range. I was on their long distance rifle range for over 3 hours shooting my new Weatherby Modular Chassis rifle. It is not a real Weatherby as it is made in Japan by Howa not in Germany. I would like to own a real Weatherby but at my age (77.75) and income level it is not possible without mortgaging the house. I am not going to do that because it took 30 years to pay off the mortgage and I am not employable (too old) and cannot afford another mortgage.
For glass I installed an Athlon Argos BTR 6x24x50 in Talley light weigh rings/mount.
Again it is not a real scope as those cost at least 8 to 15 times the price of this Chinese glass. A Nightforce, Zeiss, Swarovski, Leupold, would be much better but I don't have that kind of juice.
So, the equipment is not low end but, a step up from the Mossberg MVP that I just sold. The Howa/Weatherby was affordable and the action functioned perfectly for all 57 rounds of ammo. I was using New, brass cased Wolf Gold and PMC 223 Remington ammo at 30 cents a round. Hornady, Black Hills, or Federal match grade ammo would have been much better but that stuff is about 3 times the cost .
I have never had a spotter and you all know that a good one is as valuable as a good hunting dog. So all my targets were steel and had to be surrounded by dirt so that I could try to determine if I missed or hit them. I had previously sighted the rifle at the indoor range to hit at 200 yds. My first shots were at a 10" steel plate at 200yds. The rifle was on target at that distance so I clicked up 0.7 MILS to 300yds . I took several shots at 300yds and it was easy hitting 16" plates with the scope at 12x. I dialed up another 1 MIL for a total of 1.7 MILS to hit targets at 400yds. I was unsuccessful but could see that my bullets were about 1MIL right of target. That told me I had to make a correction for a 5 mph full left to right wind. I had to dial in 0.8 MILS of windage but after that had repeated success at 400yds. Then I progressed to the targets at 550yds while dialing the scope to 24x. My ballistic chart, obtained from Hornady indicated that I had to dial up an additional 2.0 MILS for a total of 3.7 MILS from my 200 yd zero point. It made those clicks and also clicked another 0.7 MILS of windage to account for the wind. I pressed the trigger and saw my bullet splash about 0.5 MILS above the target. I turned the turret down 0.5 MILS and had repeated success on steel 22" high by 11" wide steel coyote target. I cannot understand why it only took 3.2 MILS of elevation vs 3.7 MILS as prescribed by the ballistic chart in order to move bullet impact from 200yds to 550 yds. The rifle is excellent and runs like a Swiss watch. The scope is much better than my swfa ss 12x fixed scope and cost only $30 more. I like MIL/MIL FFP scopes and this reticle works for me.

 

[Novak77]

I love me some Weatherbys. My grandma used a .300 Weatherby into her mid-late 70s to hunt with lol.

 

[steve123]

Glad you had fun shooting your rifle on steel!

Some things you need to find out are

Your actual velocity
Actual BC of projectile
Scope height

At least the altitude, but even better the station pressure, or like many of us use, density altitude.

Another thing you can try is backing your dope in. That means aligning the actual dope with the dope a ballistic app gives. I had a crappy chronograph that lied like my crazy ex wife did. I had to learn to back dope in.

Next time you can try holdovers vs dialing, both those should coincide if the scope is tracking well.

Wind at the shooter isn't always the same as the wind downrange.

Half the fun is getting it all figured out.

 

[charliebrown1999]

Glad you had fun shooting your rifle on steel!

Some things you need to find out are

Your actual velocity
Actual BC of projectile
Scope height

At least the altitude, but even better the station pressure, or like many of us use, density altitude.

Another thing you can try is backing your dope in. That means aligning the actual dope with the dope a ballistic app gives. I had a crappy chronograph that lied like my crazy ex wife did. I had to learn to back dope in.

Next time you can try holdovers vs dialing, both those should coincide if the scope is tracking well.

Wind at the shooter isn't always the same as the wind downrange.

Half the fun is getting it all figured out.

Thanks for the info

 

[MarinePMI]

The altitude at Pala is something like 434ft IIRC.

 

[wade2big]

Dont question your numbers OP. You dont need a chronograph or anything else. Write down your numbers that got you the hits just and shoot what you know.

I have never shot over a chronograph. I use a ballistic app and guess muzzle velocity. That gets me close enough. I shoot at different distances and measure my corrections. I then right them down. This gets me trued in practice and not just theory.

You can dial back down to your zero and hold over using your reticle to validate your scope.

 

[charliebrown1999]

Dont question your numbers OP. You dont need a chronograph or anything else. Write down your numbers that got you the hits just and shoot what you know.

I have never shot over a chronograph. I use a ballistic app and guess muzzle velocity. That gets me close enough. I shoot at different distances and measure my corrections. I then right them down. This gets me trued in practice and not just theory.

You can dial back down to your zero and hold over using your reticle to validate your scope.

Thank you for the sage advice. It makes sense to me.

 

[308pirate]

It is not a real Weatherby as it is made in Japan by Howa not in Germany.

The Weatherby Mark V (what you think is a real Weatherby) was made by JP Sauer & Sohn in Germany from 1957 to 1970, by HOWA from 1970 to 1994, and in 1994 production started in Saco Defense (now General Dynamics Armaments Systems) in Maine.

Production then moved (can't find when) to ATEK Technologies in Brainerd, MN, and recently for the first time in history the Mark V is manufactured completely in house by Weatherby. Weatherby, BTW moved in early 2018 from Paso Robles, CA to Wyoming.

So while the Howa 1500 (what a Weatherby Vanguard really is) may not be a "real" Weatherby in your opinion, it is a very high quality rifle in its own right and made by the company contracted by Weatherby to make the Mark V for a quarter of a century.